Nationalism

Nationalism

Nationalism is a dominating political concept while being at the same time theoretically and practically problematic. In relation to science and technology, it is common to talk about national styles—French science and engineering are more rationalist, English science and engineering more empirical—and to see science and technology as having different national impacts. Certainly the scientific community in United States is able to marshal a greater percentage of gross domestic product (GDP) for research investment than similar communities in any other developed country, and U.S. culture is the most high-tech saturated in the world. Nationalism both energizes scientific and technological communities and has served as a justification for behavior that has been argued to violate scientific standards of conduct with regard, for instance, to research involving human subjects and to the sharing of knowledge. The scientific community has on occasion also seen itself as opposed to nationalism (and able to replace it with the "republic of science"), while nation-states have suspected scientists of disloyalties and seen them as a threat to national security. The following analysis of nationalism is thus designed to provide a basis for further exploration of such issues.

Nationalism as Theoretical Enigma

Nationalism is among the most problematic concepts in the social sciences.

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