Review of Kathryn A. Manzo, Creating Boundaries: The Politics of Race and Nation

Abstract

Kathryn Manzo seeks to explain the power of nationalism in a global world. Questioning standard theories which differentiate Western nations from 'others' through secular versus religious, modern versus traditional, civic versus ethno-racial dichotomies, she claims that nationalism is a political religion that creates boundaries separating sacred kin and alien kind, and that the terms of this separation are articulated through variable concepts of race. I write 'claims' rather than 'argues', for although her analyses are at times suggestive, they are marred by a lack of rigorous reasoning.