On the Terminology of Political Discourses, especially The Case of“Nation”or“Ethnicity”

Abstract

In any political discourse some diachronic terms are indispensable, but these terms themselves were originally made in some age in the contexts of real situations. Therefore we are obliged to use these terms with enough consciousness of their original contexts.Moreover the scholars in Non-Western world have another problem concerning translation of terminology. Both European and native term has many meanings, and one term scarcely corresponds to its counterpart.Japanese term minzoku covers ethnos, populus, natio and so on, which on the other hand cover far more meanings than minzoku, and also have special contexts in their usages.Although the term“nation”derives from Middle Ages, its modern usage presupposed the emergence of sovereign state as a governing mechanism and provided it of some sense of community. The emergence of modern languages and the communication through printed matters made it possible and through French Revolution the new model of political integration“one nation, one language, one state”was established, while against Napoleon's imperialism nationalism rose in Germany and so on. Around the 1st world war“nation self determination”came to be a principle after the collapse of empires, Austrian, Russian and Turkish. And after the 2nd, this principle lead to the independence of colonies in Asia and Africa. In 1960s new term of ethnicity, the status of ethnic groups within the framework of nation state, was made originally in the mufti-racial United States of America. And this term came to be applied to the ethnic movements in Western Europe, the very birth place of nation states, and also extended to the developing countries, which covered former colonial territories and naturally consisted of many ethnic groups. The end of Soviet domination of Eastern Europe brought the third wave of“national self determination”, which also disintegrated the Soviet Union itself as well as Yugoslavia. Now we are watching many tragedies in e.g. Gorgia and Bosnia. But “national self-determination”no more could be the solution of many problems in this age of multi-identity of the individual, and the relativization of state system would be indispensable for the prospect of mankind.