social science Social science (often rendered in the plural as the social sciences) is one of the branches of science, devoted to the study of societies and the relationships among members within those societies. The term was formerly used to refer to the ...

, methodological nationalism is an intellectual orientation and pattern in scholarly research that conceives of the nation-state as the sole unit of analysis or as a container for social processes. This concept has largely been developed by

Andreas Wimmer Andreas Wimmer is a Swiss sociologist who is the Lieber Professor of Sociology and Political Philosophy at Columbia University. He has a PhD in social anthropology from the University of Zurich. He is known for his research on nationalism, nation ...

and Nina Glick Schiller, who specifically define it as "the assumption that the nation/state/society is the natural social and political form of the modern world". Methodological nationalism has been identified in many social science subfields, such as

anthropology Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, society, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including archaic humans. Social anthropology studies patterns of behav ...

sociology Sociology is the scientific study of human society that focuses on society, human social behavior, patterns of Interpersonal ties, social relationships, social interaction, and aspects of culture associated with everyday life. The term sociol ...

, and the interdisciplinary field of

migration studies Migration studies is the academic study of human migration. Migration studies is an interdisciplinary field which draws on anthropology, prehistory, history, economics, law, sociology and postcolonial studies. Origin and development of migration ...

. Methodological Nationalism, as a practice within Social Science, has been further critiqued by scholars such as

Saskia Sassen Saskia Sassen (born January 5, 1947) is a Dutch-American sociologist noted for her analyses of globalization and international human migration. She is a professor of sociology at Columbia University in New York City, and the London School of Eco ...

, who contends that the nation-state and its borders are an insufficient unit of analysis and that the national is at times the "terrains of the global".

Three types of methodological nationalism

According to Andreas Wimmer and Nina Glick Schiller, there are three types of methodological nationalism in social science scholarship: ignoring or disregarding the importance of nationalism for modern societies, naturalization, and confining studies to geopolitical boundaries of a particular nation-state. These types may co-occur or occur separately. When they co-occur, they may reinforce each other. Speranta Dumitru distinguished between other three different versions of methodological nationalism: state-centrism (unjustified supremacy granted to the nation-state), territorialism (understanding space as divided in territories), and groupism (equating society with the nation-state’s society). She argued that methodological nationalism heavily biases the philosophy of migration.

Methodological nationalism and migration studies

Methodological nationalism and its conception of nation-states has been a component of both contemporary and historical methodologies in migration studies, insofar as certain studies have adhered to it or diverged from its theoretical foundations. This adherence has been acknowledged or otherwise criticized in numerous studies. Moreover, the historical prevalence of methodological nationalism within social science has been explored by scholarship which argues that many turn-of-the-century writings on globalization have "conflated the necessary conceptual critique of methodological nationalism with the empirical claim of the nation-state’s diminishing relevance". On the other hand, research on

transnationalism Transnationalism is a research field and social phenomenon grown out of the heightened interconnectivity between people and the receding economic and social significance of boundaries among nation states. Overview The term "trans-national" was ...

and transmigrants has contemporary examples of divergence and criticism of methodological nationalism as an enduring practice in scholarship. Recent studies in transnationalism have conceived of the nation-state as one agent in a complex relationship with many global actors. Migration Studies that conceive of society as extending beyond national boundaries, then, sever this link between nation-state and society. Research on transnational Latina motherhood has negotiated issues of the nation-state as well as transnationalism. The conceptual frameworks of power geometries, social location, and geographic scales is positioned to counteract the analytical tendency to fall back on methodological nationalism. Other scholarly research has combined transnational migration studies and conceptual frameworks such as

coloniality of power The coloniality of power is a concept interrelating the practices and legacies of European colonialism in social orders and forms of knowledge, advanced in postcolonial studies, decoloniality, and Latin American subaltern studies, most promine ...

to avoid methodological nationalism and better account for the intersecting transnational phenomena that constitutes the experiences of transmigrants and better explains the processes of transnational migration.

References

{{Reflist Nationalism Social sciences Migration studies