Pulling democracy up by its national bootstraps? Contemporary societal order in Italy, Europe and the West

Abstract

Tackling the structures of contemporary political life, constituted by nation, state and political regime, is no easy task. Many scholars have dedicated research to decipher the interlinks, even interdependencies, between state-building, nation-building and the formation of political regimes. By crossing centuries and deconstructing the sedimentation of political phenomena that have characterised domestic political life as well as international relations, the essay reviews some of the major features of what it suggests to be a triadic nation-state-regime edifice. With a specific attention paid to Italian and European societies, issues concerning democratic rule, sovereignism, nationalism, populism and so forth are scrutinised, whilst using processual analysis that indicates lacks and excesses in the Western model of a nation-state-based collectivity. The essay briefly introduces the interdependent threefold infrastructure of modern national statehood and juxtaposes some of the main theses which shaped contemporary political thought. It thus draws from recent scientific literature from which it takes inspiration in bridging different scholarly sensibilities. While placing the Italian case, the European context and the vaster Western morphology of nation-state-democracy combination, the essay adds two other variables that have shaped European and Western citizenry: ideology and nostalgia. The latter are then discussed through both theoretical and empirical exemplification of the dynamic dialectics between individuals, collectivity and societal order. The state of contemporary Western democracy is thus put in relation to its long-term institutional and mental stratification, as forged by national statehood and its seemingly ever-lasting hold.
Key-words: democracy, national statehood, Italy, European society, ideology, nostalgia