Social Identity and World War I

As nationalism grew in Europe in the 19^th century, spreading through mainly the middle class but also into the lower economic class, it brought with it some major problems.

Social identity and Nationalism were major causes of WWI. Social identity is when people “classify themselves and others into various social categories” (Ashworth and Mael 20). Typically people within these categories tend to think more positively of their categories over others. Citizens of the nations of Western Europe and of Russia certainly fell under this definition as they classified themselves, along with each other, by which nation they lived in; hence the term nationalism.

With nationalism came the extremists. The extremists were the ones who took everything one step farther. They saw their nation as being better than all others. The extremists made sure to rally the people. They went above and beyond what the average citizen would do to prove that their nation was the best and that everyone knew it. “Governments were willing to go to the brink of war or beyond” (Lyons 1) to protect their ideologies. The citizens were ready to fight for their nation. The citizens were encouraged by the extremists to encourage the government to stand up for what were the nation’s ideals. With this nationalistic view, of needing to prove one’s nation is indeed better, comes competition, because what better way to prove one’s superiority than in a display of strength?

With the governments’ will to protect and the citizens’ will to fight, there was little thinking to be done. It only seemed reasonable at the time to each nation to build up defenses in case of an invasion by another nation trying to prove its superiority. The nations were in a competition arms race to see who could build and maintain the bigger navy and who had the better army. With this competition came fear that some nations had too much strength and should be brought down to an equal playing field (Lyons 1). This mentality brought about the idea that a nation had to strike first or be quickly overtaken. Unfortunately for Europe, this was the mentality of a majority of the nations. They formed alliances to better protect themselves; Germany, Italy, and Austria-Hungary in the Triple Alliance and Britain, France, and Russia forming the Triple Entente. These alliances caused major tension as both sides feared attack and didn’t want to be the first to fall.

And so World War I began; the result of something as harmless as citizens and governments feeling connected by their nationality growing into something monstrous. If only the nationalism could’ve been directed towards a more positive purpose.

Even now in world conflicts, social identity is still a major cause. People are still more than willing to fight for what their social identification group feels is right. The only difference is what the conflicts are about and how they are fought. We could still stand to learn from our mistakes. We all need to look for better alternatives to war. There has to be a better way to prove that one nation has better ideas than everyone else and forcing other nations to take on these ideas. That is, if one nation truly is better than everyone else.

Potential possibilities for expenditure of nationalist energies without resorting to war are numerous. A few ideas include the Olympics, helping less developed nations to prosper, or finding cures for diseases. It not only sounds more pleasant but it is more pleasant to say my nation won the Olympic gold medal for such and such event versus my country took over and destroyed this country.

Citations

Ashworth, Blake, and Fred Mael. Social Identity Theory and the Organization.
1989. Print. http://www.jstor.org/pss/258189

Lyons, Michael. World war II: A Short history. 5. Prentice Hall, 2009. Print.