A nation is said to exist when it could traced its origins through the state, in which it associate itself with, histories. Additionally, the cultural elites must be established and well-versed in writing and speaking the national language. There must also be a valid reason for its claim on a certain territory. It is only when these three requirements are fulfilled will the international community consider their claim for a nation (Hobsbawm, 1990: 37). Disagreements, however, tend to arise in the political community over the definition of a nation. This essay will try to list out the different approaches employed in defining a nation starting from a nation being a natural cultural entity to it being politically and psychologically formed. It will then continue to discuss briefly the role that a nation plays and also its future.The first approach in defining a nation looks from a sociological perspective. Sociologists began by studying the patterns of human behaviour over a period of time. They realised that humans are not conditioned to live in isolation. Without human contact, we would just revert to animal behaviour. Therefore, human beings often seek each other company. This pattern of behaviour is affirmed by Ronald Dawkins (1989) (Heywood, 1999: 104). He concluded that humans tend to establish social networks between themselves no matter where they are. The emergence of social network lays the foundation for the formation of a nation as it shows the solidarity shared by the society.Even though the above argument show the formation of social ties between groups, it did not mention how solidarity is being maintained. Gellner try to fill in this gap by introducing the concept of ‘will and consent’ (Gellner, 1983: 53). The importance of this concept could be illustrated with the following illustration. A man is made to feel as though he has a choice in deciding his affiliation to a community. The question on why and how h...
