Originally published on September 2, 2027 (Episode 473).
Introduction
At the beginning of the twentieth century many thinkers, activists, and politicians would have been astonished if you told them that at the end of that century the nation-state would be the prevalent form of government throughout the world. After all, the previous fifty years had seen a revival of empires, and by 1900 everyone was living in a world of empires. The nation-state was not an obvious next step.
But following 1945, argues my guest Jon Wilson in his new book Out of Chaos: How the Nation-State Emerged from the Ruins of World War II, the nation-state was the only kind of political organization that could gain universal support and become a vehicle for national liberation. The nation-state transcended postwar ideology: communists, capitalists, and nationalists of every stripe could agree to a world of sovereign states. “One can’t understand the political crises and tendencies from the late 1960s to the early 1980s,” writes Wilson, “without understanding the history of the nation-state and the very particular way it emerged.”
About the Guest
Jon Wilson is Dean of the College of Humanities, Arts, and Social Sciences at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. A historian of empire, decolonization, and South Asia, he is the author of The Chaos of Empire: The British Raj and the Conquest of India. His latest book, Out of Chaos: How the Nation-State Emerged from the Ruins of World War II, offers a sweeping reinterpretation of the emergence of the modern nation-state after the Second World War.
For Further Investigation
Jon Wilson, Out of Chaos: How the Nation-State Emerged from the Ruins of World War II (Basic Books, 2026)
—, The Chaos of Empire: The British Raj and the Conquest of India (PublicAffairs, 2016)
Mark Mazower, Governing the World: The History of an Idea, 1815 to the Present (Penguin, 2013)
Susan Pedersen, The Guardians: The League of Nations and the Crisis of Empire (Oxford University Press, 2017)
Erez Manela, The Wilsonian Moment: Self-Determination and the International Origins of Anticolonial Nationalism (Oxford University Press, 2009)
Sunil Khilnani, The Idea of India (Farrar, Strauss, and Giroux, 1999)
Related Episodes
Louisiana Purchase: Alexander Mikaberidze on the acquisition that (eventually) transformed the United States into a continental empire.
Inventing a New World Order: Glenda Sluga on the Congress of Vienna and the birth of international politics
War and Power: Phillips Payson O’Brien on Who Wins Wars and Why
1942—When World War II Engulfed the Globe: Peter Fritzsche on the decisive year of a global conflict
Tags
Nation-State • Empire • Decolonization • World War II • Cold War • India • Partition • International History • Political History • Jon Wilson
