Contemporary nationalism tends to be understood in ethnic terms and associated with bottom-up populism and nativism. But there is also a top-down nationalism that is inherent in states` boundary-policing membership policies, including immigration policy. This talk draws the contours of a state-level neoliberal nationalism, whose imprint can also be found in social policy and citizenship policy. Neoliberal nationalism combines diversity and meritocracy, and thus a modicum of cultural and economic liberalism. The prefix “neo” flags the refashioning of political community from solidarity- to contract-based, conditional on individual contribution and strict reciprocity.

Christian Joppke is a professor of sociology at the University of Bern. After receiving his Ph.D. from the University of California at Berkeley in 1989, he taught at the University of Southern California, European University Institute, University of British Columbia, International University Bremen, and the American University of Paris. He wrote extensively on social movements, immigration, citizenship, multiculturalism, religion, nationalism and populism. His most recent book is Neoliberal Nationalism: Immigration and the Rise of the Populist Right (Cambridge University Press 2021). His current book-in-progress is The Political Forms of Neoliberalism: Order and Disorder.

During the course 2022-23, IBEI has organised a series of research seminars, which normally take place once a week. Check the 2022-23 programme