Introduction to the Special Issue on National Cultural Autonomy in Diverse Political Communities: Practices, Challenges, and Perspectives

Abstract

Numerous contemporary examples attest to the continued political salience of ethnic identification. This is the case even in multi-ethnic societies bound together by a strong overarching sense of patriotism, but it is most especially so in contexts where ethnicity has historically functioned as the building block of modern nations (Rudolph 2006). Since today’s world contains many more ethnoculturally defined nations than it does states, a tension persists between the principle of self-determination of peoples and the principle of territorial integrity of existing polities (Dembinska, Máracz, and Tonk 2014). The almost invariable overlapping of different ethno-national populations within the same territorial space renders the nation-state concept inherently problematic as a modality for ethnically based self-determination, for while all nation-state projects dictate cultural uniformity, all must contend with differing degrees of pluralism. Within the nation-state frame, those who do not profess belonging to the dominant ethnocultural community are consigned to the category of “national minority” and thereby deemed an anomaly and a barrier to the creation of a “good political order.”1 In this context, claims by minority national and ethnic communities for recognition of collective rights can be easily construed as a threat to the security of the state and its dominant ethno-national group, leading to situations of tension and—in the worst case—open conflict.

Who and what is Jewish?

“…Analyzing political and legal measures that serve to operationalize race, ethnicity or nationality brings together legal, historical, and political scholars (see e.g., Smith, 2020;or Stergar & Scheer, 2018). Brubaker (2015;2016) argues that just like gender, the color line may be sharp and rigidly policed in theory but is often blurred and porous in practice.…”

Accommodating National Diversity Within States: Territorial and Non-Territorial Approaches Since the Late 19th Century

“… 8 David Smith has recently highlighted the importance of this region for the development of various approaches to accommodate national diversity (Smith 2020, 224). …”

Jewish by Law: Legislative Operationalizing of Race and Ethnicity in Holocaust-Era Hungary

“…Fuzzy Conceptualization, Rigid Operationalization: Race and the Law Political and legal measures that serve to operationalize race, ethnicity, or nationality intrigue legal, historical, and political scholars (Stergar and Scheer 2018;Dobos 2019;Sansum and Dobos 2020;Smith 2020, Pap 2021. As argued earlier (Brubaker 2015;Pap 2021), the past decades brought transformative changes in how the meaning of the terms of (first of all gender, but also) ethnoracial identity are assigned and conceptualized in social sciences and humanities and to a certain degree in politics and law.…”