Modern empires and nation-states

Empires and nation-states are not opposed or distinct forms of polity but closely linked forms. Pre-modern empire existed without any contrasting form of polity we might call a nation-state. Rather, they contrasted with non-national state forms such as city-states, small kingdoms and mobile, nomadic polities. These in turn were in constant interaction with any neighbouring empire or empires, perhaps becoming the core of an empire themselves, perhaps taking over all or part of an existing empire, perhaps maintaining some autonomy by virtue of remoteness or lack of attractiveness, perhaps by balancing opposed empires against each other. Empires did not have a national core, and non-empires were not national. By contrast, modern empires have always had a clearly designated nation-state core and a physically separate set of non-national peripheries. This has been crucial to ensuring that when formal empire is ended, both the imperial core and the former colonies are defined as nation-states. But ex-imperial nation-states and ex-colonial nation-states are really two kinds of states. Much contemporary confusion about the prospect for a world order of nation-states revolves round the failure to make that basic distinction

N&N themed section: reflections on nationalism and the Russian invasion of Ukraine: Introduction

This introduction to themed section consists of two parts: a sketch of national(ist) historiography and a brief description of the following contributions

Benedict Anderson’s imagined communities: a symposium

This article considers how Eric Hobsbawm (1917–2012) connected the concepts of revolution and nationalism, analysing this in relation to his biography, his politics and his work as a professional historian. It traces major changes in Hobsbawm's understanding of revolution and nationalism as he, the political world and the ways of writing history all changed over the course of his long life

Definition of motionless phases for monitoring gated reconstruction of SPECT images in alive mice

To be filled INInternational audienceThe present method aims at defining motionless phases for monitoring gated reconstruction of SPECT images in the movable area containing lungs and liver among others. It is based on the filtering of gating signals that are generated from an abdominal pressure variation signal. This method is considering gating signals only for cycles for which the period is included in a defined range around periods mean. This correction is essential to improve the quality of SPECT reconstruction

From extraction of physiological features with dynamic µ-SPECT imaging to modelling of iodide biodistribution in stomach

This study investigates the potential retention of iodide in the stomach, for a better understanding of the iodide biodistribution in the body and more precisely of its potential antiseptic role. To that end, we will study the uptake of the 99m Tc-pertechnetate (an iodide ana-log) within the murine stomach observed thanks to a SPECT camera. The temporal evolution of the uptake is analysed thanks to a dedicated multi-compartment model. The addressed challenges consist in 1) estimating the time-activity curves for the different compartments, and 2) identifying the model parameters. Real experiments on different subjects demonstrate a quite good coherence of the computed parameters, and the computed parameter values suggested that there is some iodide retention in the stomach wall

Understanding the limits to ethnic change: lessons from Uganda's “lost counties”

The historically constructed nature of ethnicity has become a widely accepted paradigm in the social sciences. Scholars have especially have focused on the ways modern states have been able to create and change ethnic identities, with perhaps the strongest case studies coming from colonial Africa, where the gap between strong states and weak societies has been most apparent. I suggest, however, that in order to better understand how and when ethnic change occurs it is important to examine case studies where state-directed ethnic change has failed. To rectify this oversight I examine the case of the “lost counties” of Uganda, which were transferred from the Bunyoro kingdom to the Buganda kingdom at the onset of colonial rule. I show that British attempts to assimilate the Banyoro residents in two of the lost counties were an unmitigated failure, while attempts in the other five counties were successful. I claim that the reason for these differing outcomes lies in the status of the two lost counties as part of the historic Bunyoro homeland, whereas the other five counties were both geographically and symbolically peripheral to Bunyoro. The evidence here thus suggests that varying ethnic attachments to territory can lead to differing outcomes in situations of state-directed assimilation and ethnic change