National and Post-National Identity

Abstract

Abstract In addition to sustaining and strengthening the public sphere, government often claims a responsibility, to its citizens, to help sustain and enrich the national identity. As was true with respect to the public sphere, this government interest forces a relationship between the state and the media. In the first chapter, I defined national identity as the collection of myths, ideas, and narratives used by a dominant group or coalition to maintain power in a society. That is a fairly instrumental (and unusual) definition, but it is useful to set against the more appealing, popular, and less cynical uses of the term. The common invocation of national identity forwards the conviction that something is being described at a level of abstraction that all share in common above party or sectarian concern. Behind this second, more romantic view is that American-ness, German-ness, Russian-ness are all proper deeply rooted national identities and each has a unique historic essence. Institutions must be established to protect, nourish, articulate, and perpetuate such identities. Symbolic forms like flags, architecture, works of art, and treasured histories give form to these identities. The public schools, the university, the Church, and the broadcasting organizations are repositories of them as well. If the government supports these symbols and reinforces the ideas behind them, it is often assumed that it is doing so independently of sectarian political expedience.