S. Auer, Liberal nationalism in central Europe

Leonidas Donskis

pp. 247-249

in: Studies in East European Thought 59 (3), 2007.

Abstract

We have good reason to argue, with Stefan Auer, that liberal nationalism, which is by no means irreconcilable with skeptical liberalism, is likely to have originated from political realities and moral sensibilities specific to Eastern and Central Europe. Noteworthy is the fact that it is this region’s liberal nationalists who tend to be the harshest critics of the sinister mystique, barbaric vocabulary, and ferocious politics of blood-and-soil, mass-oriented, doctrinal nationalism. Recall such great Central and East European critics of illiberal nationalism as Czeslaw Milosz, Adam Michnik, Milan Kundera, Vaclav Havel, or Tomas Venclova.

Cited authors

Kundera Milan

Havel Vaclav