## 1. Conceptual issues


### 1.1 What is patriotism?



The standard dictionary definition reads "love of one's
country." This captures the core meaning of the term in ordinary
use; but it might well be thought too thin and in need of fleshing
out. In the first philosophical book-length study of the subject,
Stephen Nathanson (1993, 34-35) defines patriotism as
involving:


1. Special affection for one's own country
2. A sense of personal identification with the country
3. Special concern for the well-being of the country
4. Willingness to sacrifice to promote the country's good



There is little to cavil about here. There is no great difference
between special affection and love, and Nathanson himself uses the
terms interchangeably. Although love (or special affection) is usually
given expression in special concern for its object, that is not
necessary. But a person whose love for her country was not expressed
in any special concern for it would scarcely be considered a patriot.
Therefore the definition needs to include such concern. Once that is
included, however, a willingness to make sacrifices for one's
country is implied, and need not be added as a separate component.
Identification with the country, too, might be thought implied in the
phrase "one's country." But the phrase is extremely
vague, and allows for a country to be called "one's
own" in an extremely thin, formal sense too. It seems that if
one is to be a patriot of a country, the country must be his in some
*significant* sense; and that may be best captured by speaking
of one's identification with it. Such identification is
expressed in vicarious feelings: in pride of one's
country's merits and achievements, and in shame for its lapses
or crimes (when these are acknowledged, rather than denied).



Accordingly, patriotism can be defined as love of one's country,
identification with it, and special concern for its well-being and
that of compatriots.



This is only a definition. A fuller account of patriotism is beyond
the scope of this article. Such an account would say something about
the patriot's beliefs about the merits of his country, his need
to belong to a group and be a part of a more encompassing narrative,
to be related to a past and a future that transcend the narrow
confines of an individual's life and its mundane concerns, as
well as social and political conditions that affect the ebb and flow
of patriotism, its political and cultural influence, and more.


### 1.2 Patriotism and nationalism



Discussions of both patriotism and
 nationalism
 are often marred by lack of clarity due to the failure to distinguish
the two. Many authors use the two terms interchangeably. Among those
who do not, quite a few have made the distinction in ways that are not
very helpful. In the 19th century, Lord Acton contrasted
"nationality" and patriotism as affection and instinct vs.
a moral relation. Nationality is "our connection with the
race" that is "merely natural or physical," while
patriotism is the awareness of our moral duties to the political
community (Acton 1972, 163). In the 20th century, Elie
Kedourie did the opposite, presenting nationalism as a full-fledged
philosophical and political doctrine about nations as basic units of
humanity within which the individual can find freedom and fulfilment,
and patriotism as mere sentiment of affection for one's country
(Kedourie 1985, 73-74).



George Orwell contrasted the two in terms of aggressive vs. defensive
attitudes. Nationalism is about power: its adherent wants to acquire
as much power and prestige as possible for his nation, in which he
submerges his individuality. While nationalism is accordingly
aggressive, patriotism is defensive: it is a devotion to a particular
place and a way of life one thinks best, but has no wish to impose on
others (Orwell 1968, 362). This way of distinguishing the two
attitudes comes close to an approach popular among politicians and
widespread in everyday discourse that indicates a double standard of
the form "us vs. them." Country and nation are first run
together, and then patriotism and nationalism are distinguished in
terms of the strength of the love and special concern one feels for
it, the degree of one's identification with it. When these are
exhibited in a reasonable degree and without ill thoughts about others
and hostile actions towards them, that is patriotism; when they become
unbridled and cause one to think ill of others and act badly towards
them, that is nationalism. Conveniently enough, it usually turns out
that *we* are patriots, while *they* are nationalists
(see Billig 1995, 55-59).



There is yet another way of distinguishing patriotism and nationalism
- one that is quite simple and begs no moral questions. We can
put aside the political sense of "nation" that makes it
identical with "country," "state," or
"polity," and the political or civic type of nationalism
related to it. We need concern ourselves only with the other, ethnic
or cultural sense of "nation," and focus on ethnic or
cultural nationalism. In order to do so, we do not have to spell out
the relevant understanding of "nation"; it is enough to
characterize it in terms of common ancestry, history, and a set of
cultural traits. Both patriotism and nationalism involve love of,
identification with, and special concern for a certain entity. In the
case of patriotism, that entity is one's *patria*,
one's country; in the case of nationalism, that entity is
one's *natio*, one's nation (in the ethnic/cultural
sense of the term). Thus patriotism and nationalism are understood as
the same type of set of beliefs and attitudes, and distinguished in
terms of their objects, rather than the strength of those beliefs and
attitudes, or as sentiment vs. theory.



To be sure, there is much overlap between country and nation, and
therefore between patriotism and nationalism; thus much that applies
to one will also apply to the other. But when a country is not
ethnically homogeneous, or when a nation lacks a country of its own,
the two may part ways.


## 2. Normative issues



Patriotism has had a fair number of critics. The harshest among them
have judged it deeply flawed in every important respect. In the
19th century, Russian novelist and thinker Leo Tolstoy
found patriotism both stupid and immoral. It is stupid because every
patriot holds his own country to be the best of all whereas,
obviously, only one country can qualify. It is immoral because it
enjoins us to promote our country's interests at the expense of
all other countries and by any means, including war, and is thus at
odds with the most basic rule of morality, which tells us not to do to
others what we would not want them to do to us (Tolstoy 1987, 97).
Recently, Tolstoy's critique has been seconded by American
political theorist George Kateb, who argues that patriotism is
"a mistake twice over: it is typically a grave moral error and
its source is typically a state of mental confusion" (Kateb
2000, 901). Patriotism is most importantly expressed in a readiness to
die and to kill for one's country. But a country "is not a
discernible collection of discernible individuals"; it is rather
"an abstraction ... a compound of a few actual and many
imaginary ingredients." Specifically, in addition to being a
delimited territory, "it is also constructed out of transmitted
memories true and false; a history usually mostly falsely sanitized or
falsely heroized; a sense of kinship of a largely invented purity; and
social ties that are largely invisible or impersonal, indeed abstract
..." Therefore patriotism is "a readiness to die and
to kill for an abstraction ... for what is largely a figment of
the imagination" (907).



Some of these objections can easily be countered. Even if full-fledged
patriotism does involve a belief in one's country's
merits, it need not involve the belief that one's country is
better than all others. And the fact that a country is not a
collection of "discernible individuals" and that the
social ties among compatriots are "largely invisible or
impersonal," rather than palpable and face-to-face, does not
show that it is unreal or imaginary. As Benedict Anderson, who coined
the term "imagined community," points out, "all
communities larger than primordial villages of face-to-face contact
... are imagined." "Imagined community" is not
the opposite of "real community," but rather of community
whose members have face-to-face relations (Anderson 1991, 6).



However, there is another, more plausible line of criticism of
patriotism focusing on its intellectual, rather than moral
credentials. Moreover, Tolstoy's and Kateb's arguments
questioning the moral legitimacy of patriotic partiality and those
highlighting the connection of patriotism with international tensions
and war cannot be so easily refuted.


### 2.1 Patriotism and the ethics of belief



When asked "why do you love your country?" or "why
are you loyal to it?", a patriot is likely to take the question
to mean "what is so good about your country that you should love
it, or be loyal to it?" and then adduce what she believes to be
its virtues and achievements. This suggests that patriotism can be
judged from the standpoint of ethics of belief - a set of norms
for evaluating our beliefs and other doxastic states. Simon Keller has
examined patriotism from this point of view, and found it wanting.



Keller argues that whereas one's love of and loyalty to a family
member or a friend may coexist with a low estimate of the
person's qualities, patriotism involves endorsement of
one's country. If the patriot is to endorse her country, she
must consider her beliefs about the country's virtues and
achievements to be based on some objectively valid standards of value
and an unbiased examination of the country's past and present
record that leads to the conclusion that it lives up to those
standards. However, the patriot's loyalty is not focused on her
country simply because it instantiates a set of virtues a country can
have. If that were the case, and if a neighboring country turned out
to have such virtues to an even higher degree, the patriot's
loyalty would be redirected accordingly. She is loyal to her country
because that country, and only that country, is *her* country;
hers is a loyalty "in the first instance." Thus the
patriot is motivated to think of the *patria* as blessed by all
manner of virtues and achievements whether the evidence, interpreted
objectively, warrants that or not. Accordingly, she forms beliefs
about her country in ways different from the ways in which she forms
beliefs about other countries. Moreover, she cannot admit this
motivation while at the same time remaining a patriot. This leads her
to hide from herself the true source of some of the beliefs involved.
This is bad faith. Bad faith is bad; so is patriotism, as well as
every identity, individual or collective, constituted, in part, by
patriotic loyalty. This, in Keller's view, amounts to "a
clear presumptive case against patriotism's being a virtue and
for its being a vice" (Keller 2005, 587-88).



This portrayal does seem accurate as far as much patriotism as we know
it is concerned. Yet Keller may be overstating his case as one against
patriotism as such. When queried about one's loyalty to
one's country, couldn't one say: "This is
*my* country, my home; I need no *further* reason to be
loyal to it and show special concern for its well-being"? This
might not be a very satisfactory answer; we might agree with J.B.
Zimmermann that "the love for one's country ... is in
many cases no more than the love of an ass for its stall"
(quoted in Nathanson 1993, 3). But however egocentric, irrational,
asinine, surely it qualifies as patriotism. (In a later statement of
his argument (2007a, 80-81), Keller seems to be of two minds on
this point.)


### 2.2 The moral standing of patriotism



Many think of patriotism as a natural and appropriate expression of
attachment to the country in which we were born and raised and of
gratitude for the benefits of life on its soil, among its people, and
under its laws. They also consider patriotism an important component
of our identity. Some go further, and argue that patriotism is morally
mandatory, or even that it is the core of morality. There is, however,
a major tradition in moral philosophy which understands morality as
essentially universal and impartial, and seems to rule out local,
partial attachment and loyalty. Adherents of this tradition tend to
think of patriotism as a type of group
 egoism,
 a morally arbitrary partiality to "one's own" at
odds with demands of universal justice and common human solidarity. A
related objection is that patriotism is exclusive in invidious and
dangerous ways. Love of one's own country characteristically
goes together with dislike of and hostility towards other countries.
It tends to encourage militarism, and makes for international tension
and conflict. Tolstoy's and Kateb's moral objections to
patriotism, mentioned above, are in line with this position.



What, then, is the moral status of patriotism? The question does not
admit of a single answer. We can distinguish five types of patriotism,
and each needs to be judged on its merits.


#### 2.2.1 Extreme patriotism



Machiavelli is famous (or infamous) for teaching princes that, human
nature being what it is, if they propose to do their job well, they
must be willing to break their promises, to deceive, dissemble, and
use violence, sometimes in cruel ways and on a large scale, when
political circumstances require such actions. This may or may not be
relevant to the question of patriotism, depending on just what we take
the point of princely rule to be. A less well known part of
Machiavelli's teaching, however, is relevant; for he sought to
impart the same lesson to politicians and common citizens of a
republic. "When the safety of one's country wholly depends
on the decision to be taken, no attention should be paid either to
justice or injustice, to kindness or cruelty, or to its being
praiseworthy or ignominious" (Machiavelli 1998 [1518], 515). The
paramount interests of one's country override any moral
consideration with which they might come into conflict.



This type of patriotism is extreme, but by no means extremely rare. It
is adopted much too often by politicians and common citizens alike
when their country's major interests are thought to be at stake.
It is encapsulated in the saying "our country, right or
wrong," at least on the simplest and most obvious construal of
this saying. Not much needs to be said about the moral standing of
this type of patriotism, as it amounts to rejection of morality.
"Our country, right *or wrong*" cannot be
right.


#### 2.2.2 Robust patriotism



In his seminal lecture "Is Patriotism a Virtue?" Alasdair
MacIntyre contrasts patriotism with the liberal commitment to certain
universal values and principles. On the liberal view, where and from
whom I learn the principles of morality is just as irrelevant to their
contents and to my commitment to them, as where and from whom I learn
the principles of mathematics is irrelevant to their contents and my
adherence to them. For MacIntyre, where and from whom I learn my
morality is of decisive importance both for my commitment to it and
for its very contents.



There is no morality as such; morality is always the morality of a
particular community. One can understand and internalize moral rules
only "in and through the way of life of [one's]
community" (MacIntyre 1984, 8). Moral rules are justified in
terms of certain goods they express and promote; but these goods, too,
are always given as part and parcel of the way of life of a community.
The individual becomes a moral agent only when informed as such by his
community. He also lives and flourishes as one because he is sustained
in his moral life by his community. "... *I* can
only be a moral agent because *we* are moral agents ...
Detached from my community, I will be apt to lose my hold upon all
genuine standards of judgment" (10-11).



If I can live and flourish as a moral agent only as a member of my
community, while playing the role this membership involves, then my
very identity is bound up with that of my community, its history,
traditions, institutions, and aspirations. Therefore,



> 
> if I do not understand the enacted narrative of my own individual life
> as embedded in the history of my country ... I will not
> understand what I owe to others or what others owe to me, for what
> crimes of my nation I am bound to make reparation, for what benefits
> to my nation I am bound to feel gratitude. Understanding what is owed
> to and by me and understanding the history of the communities of which
> I am a part is ... one and the same thing. (16)
> 



This leads MacIntyre to conclude that patriotism is not to be
contrasted with morality; it is rather a central moral virtue, indeed
the bedrock of morality.



The object of patriotic loyalty is one's country and polity; but
this does not mean that a patriot will support any government in power
in her country. Here MacIntyre's position is different from a
popular version of patriotism that tends to conflate the two. The
patriot's allegiance, he says, is not to the *status quo*
of power, but rather to "the nation conceived *as a
project*" (13). One can oppose one's country's
government in the name of the country's true character, history,
and aspirations. To that extent, this type of patriotism is critical
and rational. But at least some practices and projects of the
*patria*, some of its "large interests," must be
beyond questioning and critical scrutiny. To that extent, MacIntyre
grants that what he considers true patriotism is "a
fundamentally irrational attitude" (13). But a more rational and
therefore more constrained loyalty would be "emasculated,"
rather than real patriotism.



This account of patriotism is exposed to several objections. One might
question the communitarian foundations of MacIntyre's case for
patriotism: his view of the moral primacy of the community over the
individual. One might find fault with the step from communitarianism
to patriotism:



> 
> Even if his communitarian conception of morality were correct and even
> if the process of moral development ensured that group loyalty would
> emerge as a central virtue, no conclusion would follow about the
> importance of patriotism. The group to which our primary loyalty would
> be owed would be the group from which we had obtained our moral
> understanding. This need not be the community as a whole or any
> political unit, however. It could be one's family, one's
> town, one's religion. The nation need not be the source of
> morality or the primary beneficiary of our loyalty. (Nathanson 1989,
> 549)
> 



Yet another objection would focus on the fundamentally irrational
character of robust patriotism: its insistence that "large
interests" of the *patria* must be beyond
questioning.



MacIntyre concedes that "on occasion patriotism might require me
to support and work for the success of some enterprise of my nation as
crucial to its overall project ... when the success of that
enterprise would not be in the best interests of mankind" (14).
If so, this type of patriotism would seem to involve the rejection of
such basic moral notions as universal justice and common human
solidarity.



Tolstoy and other critics have argued that patriotism is incompatible
with these notions - that it is egoism writ large, an exclusive
and ultimately aggressive concern for one's country, and a major
cause of international tensions and war. This is not a fair objection
to patriotism as such. Patriotism is defined as a *special*
concern for one's country's well-being, and that is not
the same as an *exclusive* and *aggressive* concern for
it. But the objection is pertinent, and has considerable force, when
brought up against the type of patriotism advocated by MacIntyre.
MacIntyre's patriot may promote his country's interests in
a critical, and therefore non-exclusive way, over a range of issues.
But when it comes to those "large interests" of his
country that are beyond criticism and must be supported in an
irrational way, his concern will inevitably become exclusive, and most
likely aggressive too. If justice is understood in universal, rather
than parochial terms, if common human solidarity counts as a weighty
moral consideration, and if peace is of paramount importance and war
is morally permissible only when it is just, then this kind of
patriotism must be rejected.


#### 2.2.3 Moderate patriotism



Rejecting robust patriotism does not entail adopting sweeping
impartialism that acknowledges no special obligations, and allows no
partiality, to "our own." Nor does it entail adopting the
more restricted, cosmopolitan position, that allows no partiality to
our own country and compatriots. There is considerable middle ground
between these extremes. Exploring this middle ground has led some
philosophers to construct positions accommodating both the universal
and the particular point of view - both the mandates of
universal justice and claims of common humanity, and the concern for
the *patria* and compatriots.



One such position is "patriotism compatible with liberal
morality," or "liberal patriotism" for short,
advocated by Marcia Baron (1989). Baron argues that the conflict
between impartiality and partiality is not quite as deep as it may
seem. Morality allows for both types of considerations, as they
pertain to different levels of moral deliberation. At one level, we
are often justified in taking into account our particular commitments
and attachments, including those to our country. At another level, we
can and ought to reflect on such commitments and attachments from a
universal, impartial point of view, to delineate their proper scope
and determine their weight. We can conclude, for example, "that
with respect to certain matters and within limits, it is *good*
for an American to judge as an American, and to put American interests
first" (Baron 1989, 272). In such a case, partiality and
particular concerns are judged to be legitimate and indeed valuable
from an impartial, universal point of view. This means that with
respect to those matters and within the same limits, it is also good
for a Cuban to judge as a Cuban and to put Cuban interests first, etc.
Actually, this is how we think of our special obligations to, and
preferences for, our family, friends, or local community; this kind of
partiality is legitimate, and indeed valuable, not only for us but for
anyone.



In MacIntyre's view, the type of partiality in general, and
patriotism in particular, that is at work only at one level of moral
deliberation and against the background of impartiality at another,
higher level, lacks content and weight. For Baron, on the other hand,
MacIntyre's strongly particularistic type of patriotism is
irrational and morally hazardous. Baron also finds problematic the
popular understanding of patriotism which focuses on the
country's might and its interests as determined by whatever
government is in power. She emphasizes concern for the country's
cultural and moral excellence. By doing so, she argues, our patriotism
will leave room for serious, even radical criticism of our country,
and will not be a force for dissension and conflict in the
international arena.



Another middle-of-the-road view is "moderate patriotism"
propounded by Stephen Nathanson (1989, 1993). He, too, rejects the
choice between MacIntyre's robust patriotism and
cosmopolitanism, and argues that impartiality required by morality
allows for particular attachments and special obligations by
distinguishing different levels of moral thinking. A good example is
provided by the Ten Commandments, a major document of Western
morality. The wording of the commandments is for the most part
universal, impartial; but they also tell us "honor *your*
father and *your* mother."



The kind of patriotism defended by Nathanson and Baron is moderate in
several distinct, but related respects. It is not unbridled: it does
not enjoin the patriot to promote his country's interests under
any circumstances and by any means. It acknowledges the constraints
morality imposes on the pursuit of our individual and collective
goals. For instance, it may require the patriot to fight for his
country, but only in so far as the war is, and remains, just.
Adherents of both extreme and robust patriotism will consider
themselves bound to fight for their country whether its cause be just
or not. Extreme patriots will also fight for it in whatever way it
takes to win. Whether adherents of MacIntyre's robust
patriotism, too, will do so is a moot point. If they do not, that will
be because the morality of their own community places certain
constraints on warfare, whether of a particularistic type ("a
German officer does not execute POWs"), or by incorporating some
universalistic moral precepts ("an officer does not execute
POWs").



Moderate patriotism is not exclusive. Its adherent will show special
concern for his country and compatriots, but that will not prevent him
from showing concern for other countries and their inhabitants.
Moreover, this kind of patriotism allows for the possibility that
under certain circumstances the concern for human beings in general
will override the concern for one's country and compatriots.
Such patriotism is compatible with a decent degree of humanitarianism.
By contrast, both extreme and robust patriotism give greater weight to
the (substantial) interests of one's country and compatriots
than to those of other countries and their inhabitants whenever these
interests come into conflict.



Finally, moderate patriotism is not uncritical, unconditional, or
egocentric. For an adherent of this type of patriotism, it is not
enough that the country is *her* country. She will also expect
it to live up to certain standards and thereby deserve her support,
devotion, and special concern for its well-being. When it fails to do
so, she will withhold support. Adherents of both extreme and robust
patriotism, on the other hand, love their country unconditionally, and
stand by it whatever it does as long as its "safety" or
its "large interests" more generally are concerned.



Baron and Nathanson have found a middle ground between sweeping
cosmopolitanism that allows for no attachment and loyalty to
one's country and compatriots, and extreme or robust patriotism
that rejects universal moral considerations (except those that have
become part and parcel of one's country's morality). They
have shown that the main objections usually advanced against
patriotism as such apply only to its extreme or robust varieties, but
not to its "liberal" or "moderate" versions.
The latter type of patriotism need not conflict with impartial justice
or common human solidarity. It will therefore be judged morally
unobjectionable by all except some adherents of a strict type of
 cosmopolitanism.



However, both Baron and Nathanson fail to distinguish clearly between
showing that their preferred type of patriotism is morally
unobjectionable and showing that it is morally required or virtuous,
and sometimes seem to be assuming that by showing the former, they are
also showing the latter. Yet there is a gap between the two claims,
and the latter, stronger case for moderate patriotism still needs to
be made.


#### 2.2.4 Deflated patriotism



What is the case for the claim that moderate patriotism is morally
mandatory - that we have a duty of special concern for the
well-being of our country and compatriots, similar to special duties
to family or friends?



*Gratitude* is probably the most popular among the grounds
adduced for patriotic duty. Echoing Socrates in Plato's
*Crito* (51c-51d), Maurizio Viroli writes: "... We
have a moral obligation towards our country because we are indebted to
it. We owe our country our life, our education, our language, and, in
the most fortunate cases, our liberty. If we want to be moral persons,
we must return what we have received, at least in part, by serving the
common good" (Viroli 1995, 9).



Both Socrates and Viroli are exaggerating the benefits bestowed on us
by our country; surely any gratitude owed for being born or brought up
is owed to parents, rather than *patria*. But there are
important benefits we have received from our country; the argument is
that we are bound to show gratitude for them, and that the appropriate
way to do so is to show special concern for the well-being of the
country and compatriots.



One worry here is that considerations of gratitude normally arise in
interpersonal relations. We also speak of gratitude to large and
impersonal entities - our school, profession, or even our
country - but that seems to be an abbreviated way of referring
to gratitude to particular persons who have acted on behalf of these
entities. A debt of gratitude is not incurred by *any* benefit
received. If a benefit is conferred inadvertently, or advisedly but
for the wrong reason (e.g. for the sake of the benefactor's
public image), gratitude will be misplaced. We owe a moral debt of
gratitude (rather than the mere "thank you" of good
manners) only to those who confer benefits on us deliberately and for
the right reason, namely out of concern for our own good. And we
cannot talk with confidence about the reasons a large and complex
group or institution has for its actions.



Perhaps we can think of compatriots as an aggregate of individuals. Do
we owe them a debt of gratitude for the benefits of life among them?
Again, it depends on the reason for their law-abiding behavior and
social cooperation generally. But there is no single reason common to
all or even most of them. Some do their part without giving much
thought to the reasons for doing so; others believe that doing so is,
in the long run, the most prudent policy; still others act out of
altruistic motives. Only the last group - surely a tiny minority
- would be a proper object of our gratitude.



Moreover, gratitude is appropriate only for a benefit conferred
freely, as a gift, and not as a *quid pro quo*. But most of the
benefits we receive from our country are of the latter sort: benefits
we have paid for by our own law-abiding behavior in general, and
through taxation in particular.



The benefits one has received from her country might be considered
relevant to the duty of patriotism in a different way: as raising the
issue of *fairness*. One's country is not a land
inhabited by strangers to whom we owe nothing beyond what we owe to
any other human being. It is rather a common enterprise that produces
and distributes a wide range of benefits. These benefits are made
possible by cooperation of those who live in the country, participate
in the enterprise, owe and render allegiance to the polity. The rules
that regulate the cooperation and determine the distribution of
burdens and benefits enjoin, among other things, special concern for
the well-being of compatriots which is not due to outsiders. As
Richard Dagger puts it:



> 
> Compatriots take priority because we owe it to them as a matter of
> reciprocity. Everyone, compatriot or not, has a claim to our respect
> and concern ... but those who join with us in cooperative
> enterprises have a claim to special recognition. Their cooperation
> enables us to enjoy the benefits of the enterprise, and fairness
> demands that we reciprocate. ... We must accord our fellow
> citizens a special status, a priority over those who stand outside the
> special relationship constituted by the political enterprise.
> [...] [Our fellow citizens] have a claim on us ... that
> extends to include the notion that compatriots take priority. (Dagger
> 1985, 446, 443)
> 



This argument conflates the issue of patriotism with that of
 political obligation,
 and the notion of a patriot with that of a citizen. Unlike informal
cooperation among tenants in a building, for instance, cooperation on
the scale of a country is regulated by a set of laws. To do
one's part within such a cooperative enterprise is just to obey
the laws, to act as a citizen. Whether we have a moral duty to obey
the laws of our country is one of the central issues in modern
political philosophy, discussed under the heading of political
obligation. One major account of political obligation is that of
fairness. If successful, that account shows that we do have a moral
duty to abide by the laws of our country, to act as citizens, and that
this duty is one of fairness. To fail to abide by one's
country's laws is to fail to reciprocate, to take advantage of
compatriots, to act unfairly towards them. But whereas a patriot is
also a citizen, a citizen is not necessarily a patriot. Patriotism
involves *special* concern for the *patria* and
compatriots, a concern that goes *beyond* what the laws
obligate one to do, *beyond* what one does as a citizen; that
is, beyond what one ought, *in fairness*, to do. Failing to
show *that* concern, however, cannot be unfair - except
on the question-begging assumption that, in addition to state law,
cooperation on this scale is also based on, and regulated by, a moral
rule enjoining special concern for the well-being of the country and
compatriots. Dagger asserts that the claim our compatriots have on us
"extends to include" such concern, but provides no
argument in support of this extension.



Some philosophers seek to ground patriotic duty in its good
*consequences* (see the entry on
 consequentialism).
 The duty of special concern for the well-being of our country and
compatriots, just like other duties, universal and special, is
justified by the good consequences of its adoption. Special duties
mediate our fundamental, universal duties and make possible their most
effective discharge. They establish a division of moral labor,
necessary because our capacity of doing good is limited by our
resources and circumstances. Each of us can normally be of greater
assistance to those who are in some way close to us than to those who
are not. By attending first to "our own," we at the same
time promote the good of humanity in the best way possible.



Patriots will find this account of their love of and loyalty to their
country alien to what they feel patriotism is all about. It presents
the duty of special concern for the well-being of one's country
and compatriots as a device for assigning to individuals some
universal duties. Patriotic duty owes its moral force to the moral
force of those universal duties. But if so, then, as a proponent of
this understanding of patriotism concedes, "it turns out that
'our fellow countrymen' are not so very special after
all" (Goodin 1988, 679). They merely happen to be the
beneficiaries of the most effective way of putting into practice our
concern for human beings in general. The special relationship between
the patriot and the *patria* and compatriots - the
relationship of love and identification - has been
dissolved.



There is also a view of patriotic duty that, in contrast to the
consequentialist account, does not dissolve, but rather highlight this
relationship. That is the view of patriotism as an *associative
duty* (see the entry on
 special obligations,
 section 4). It is based on an understanding of special relationships
as intrinsically valuable and involving duties of special concern for
the well-being of those we are related to. Such duties are not means
of creating or maintaining those relationships, but rather their part
and parcel, and can only be understood, and justified, as such, just
as those relationships can only be understood as involving the special
duties pertaining to them (while involving much else besides). For
instance, one who denies that she has an obligation of special concern
for the well-being of her friend shows that she no longer perceives
and treats the person concerned as a friend, that (as far as she is
concerned) the friendship is gone. One who denies that people in
general have a duty of special concern for the well-being of their
friends shows that she does not understand what friendship is.



Andrew Mason has offered an argument for the duty of special concern
for the well-being of compatriots based on the value embodied in our
relationship to compatriots, that of common citizenship. By
"citizenship" he does not mean mere legal status, but
takes the term in a moral sense, which involves equal standing.
Citizenship in this sense is an intrinsically valuable relationship,
and grounds certain special duties fellow citizens have to one
another. Now citizenship obviously has considerable instrumental
value; but how is it valuable in itself?



> 
> Citizenship has intrinsic value because in virtue of being a citizen a
> person is a member of a collective body in which they enjoy equal
> status with its other members and are thereby provided with
> recognition. This collective body exercises significant control over
> its members' conditions of existence (a degree of control which
> none of its members individually possesses). It offers them the
> opportunity to contribute to the cultural environment in which its
> laws and policies are determined, and opportunities to participate
> directly and indirectly in the formation of these laws and policies.
> (Mason 1997, 442)
> 



Mason goes on to claim:



> 
> Part of what it is to be a citizen is to incur special obligations:
> these obligations give content to what it is to be committed or loyal
> fellow citizen and are justified by the good of the wider relationship
> to which they contribute. In particular, citizens have an obligation
> to each other to participate fully in public life and an obligation to
> give priority to the needs of fellow citizens. (442)
> 



The first of these two special duties can be put aside, as it is not
specific to patriotism, but rather pertains to citizenship. It is the
second that is at issue. If we indeed have a duty of special concern
towards compatriots, and if that is an associative duty, that is
because our association with them is intrinsically valuable and bound
up with this duty. The claim about the intrinsic value of our
association might be thought a moot point. But even if it were
conceded, one might still resist the claim concerning the alleged
duty. If someone were to deny that she has a duty of *special*
concern for the well-being of her country and compatriots, beyond what
the laws of her country mandate and beyond the concern she has for
humans and humanity, would she thereby cease to be a citizen (in the
sense involving equal standing)? If she were to deny that citizens
generally have such an obligation, would that betray lack of
understanding of what citizenship (in the relevant sense) is? If she
came across two strangers in a life-threatening situation and could
only save one, would she have a *prima facie* moral duty to
save the one who was a compatriot? Mason's position commits him
to answering "yes" in each case, but all three claims are
implausible (Primoratz 2009).



All the main arguments for the claim that patriotism is a duty, then,
are exposed to serious objections. Unless a new, more convincing case
for patriotism can be made, we have no good reason to think that
patriotism is a moral duty.



If not a duty, is patriotism morally valuable? Someone showing concern
for the well-being of others well beyond the degree of concern for
others required of all of us is considered a morally better person
than the rest of us (other things equal), an example of supererogatory
virtue. Patriotism is a *special* concern for the well-being of
one's country and compatriots, a concern beyond what we owe
other people and communities. Isn't a patriot, then, a morally
better person than the rest of us (other things equal)? Isn't
patriotism a supererogatory virtue?



One standard example of such virtue is the type of concern for those
in an extreme plight shown by the late Mother Theresa, or by Doctors
Without Borders. But they are exemplars of moral virtue for the same
reason that makes a more modest degree of concern for others a moral
duty falling on all of us. The same moral value, sympathy for and
assistance to people in need, grounds a certain degree of concern for
others as a general moral duty and explains why a significantly higher
degree of such concern is a moral ideal. This explanation, however,
does not apply in the case of patriotism. Patriotism is not but
another extension of the duty of concern for others; it is a special
concern for *my* country because it is *my* country, for
*my* compatriots because they are *my* compatriots.
Unlike Mother Theresa and Doctors Without Borders, whose concern is
for all destitute, sick, dying persons they can reach, the concern of
the patriot is by definition selective; and the selection is performed
by the word "my." But the word "my" cannot, by
itself, play the critical role in an argument showing that a certain
stance is *morally* valuable. If it could, other types of
partialism, such as tribalism, racism, or sexism, would by the same
token prove *morally* valuable too.



If patriotism is neither a moral duty nor a supererogatory virtue,
then all its moral pretensions have been deflated. It has no positive
moral significance. There is nothing to be said *for* it,
morally speaking. We all have various preferences for places and
people, tend to identify with many groups, large and small, to think
of them as in some sense ours, and to show a degree of special concern
for their members. But however important in other respects these
preferences, identifications, and concerns might be, they lack
positive moral import. They are morally permissible as long as they
are kept within certain limits, but morally indifferent in themselves.
The same is true of patriotism (Primoratz 2002).


#### 2.2.5 Ethical patriotism



All four types of patriotism reviewed so far seek to defend and
promote what might be termed the worldly, i.e. non-moral, interests of
the *patria*: its political stability, military power, riches,
influence in the international arena, and cultural vibrancy. They
differ with regard to the lengths to which these interests will be
promoted: adherents of extreme and robust patriotism will ultimately
go to any length, whereas those whose patriotism is moderate or
deflated will respect the limits universal moral considerations set to
this pursuit. Marcia Baron also calls for expanding patriotic concern
for the flourishing of one's country to include its "moral
flourishing" (see 2.2.3 above).



Thus Baron's position is half-way between the usual, worldly
kind of patriotism, and what might be described as its distinctively
ethical type. The latter would put aside the country's
well-being in a mundane, non-moral sense, and would focus instead on
its distinctively moral well-being, its moral identity and integrity.
A patriot of this sort would not express his love for the
*patria* by seeking to husband the country's resources
and preserve its natural beauty and its historical heritage, or make
it rich, powerful, culturally preeminent, or influential on the world
scene. Instead, he would seek to make sure that the country lives up
to moral requirements and promotes moral values, both at home and
internationally. He would work for a just and humane society at home,
and seek to ensure that the country acts justly beyond its borders,
and shows common human solidarity towards those in need, however
distant and unfamiliar. He would also be concerned with the
country's past moral record and its implications for the
present. He would support projects exploring the dark chapters of the
country's history, acknowledging the wrongs perpetrated in the
past and responding to them in appropriate ways, whether by offering
apologies or making amends, and by making sure such wrongs are not
perpetrated again.



A patriot of this, distinctively ethical type, would want to see
justice done, rights respected, human solidarity at work at any time
and in any place. But her patriotism would be at work in a concern
that *her* country be guided by these moral principles and
values which is more sustained and more deeply felt than her concern
that these principles and values should be put into practice
generally. She would consider her own moral identity as bound up with
that of her country, and the moral record of the *patria* as
hers too. Unlike a patriot of the more worldly type, she might not
feel great pride in her country's worldly merits and
achievements. She would be proud of the country's moral record,
when it inspires pride. But her patriotism would be expressed, above
all, in a critical approach to her country and compatriots: she would
feel entitled, and indeed called, to submit them to critical moral
scrutiny, and to do so *qua* patriot.



While we have no moral reason to be patriots of the more usual,
mundane kind, we do have reason to show special concern for our own
country's moral well-being. As a rule, when someone is wronged,
someone else benefits from that. When a country maintains an unjust or
inhumane practice, or enacts and enforces an unjust or inhumane law or
policy, at least some, and sometimes many of its citizens reap
benefits from it. Sometimes such a practice, legislation or policy
affects people beyond the country's borders; in such cases, the
population as a whole may benefit. The responsibility for the
injustice or lack of basic human solidarity lies with those who make
the decisions and those who implement them. It also lies with those
who give support to such decisions and their implementation. But some
responsibility in this connection may also devolve on those who have
no part in the making of the decisions or in their implementation, nor
even provide support, but accept the benefits such a practice, law or
policy generates.



A degree of complicity may also accrue to those who have no part in
designing or putting into effect immoral practices, laws or policies,
do not support them or benefit from them, but do benefit in various
ways from being citizens of the country. One may derive significant
psychological benefit from membership in and identification with a
society or polity: from the sense of belonging, support and security
such membership and identification afford. If one accepts such
benefits, while knowing about the immoral practices, laws or policies
at issue, or having no excuse for not knowing about them, that, too,
may be seen as implicating him in those wrongs. To be sure, he makes
no causal contribution to those wrongdoings, has no control over their
course, and does not accept benefits from them. But in accepting
benefits from his association with the wrongdoers, he may be seen as
underwriting those wrongs and joining the class of those properly
blamed. His complicity is lesser and the blame to be laid at his door
is lesser too - but he still bears *some* moral
responsibility and deserves *some* moral blame on that account.
He cannot say in good faith: "Those wrongs have nothing to do
with me. I am in no way implicated in them."



If this is correct, we have reason to develop and exercise a special
concern for the moral identity and integrity of our country. By doing
so, we will be attending to an important aspect of our own moral
identity and integrity. While patriotism of the more usual, worldly
kind is neither morally required nor virtuous, but at best morally
permitted, ethical patriotism can, under certain fairly common
circumstances, be a moral duty (Primoratz 2006).


## 3. The political import of patriotism



While moral philosophers debate the standing of patriotism as an
instance of the problem of reconciling universal moral considerations
with particular attachments and loyalties, political theorists are
primarily interested in patriotism as an ethos of the well-ordered
polity and an antidote to nationalism. Since the rise of the
nation-state, it has been widely held that some form of nationalism is
indispensable as a pre-political basis of the unity of the state that
makes for solidarity among citizens and provides them with motivation
to participate in public life and make sacrifices for the common good.
As Roger Scruton put it, "for a liberal state to be secure, the
citizens must understand the *national* interest as something
other than the interest of the *state*. Only the first can
evoke in them the sacrificial spirit upon which the second
depends" (Scruton 1990, 319). But in the course of the
20th century nationalism was deeply compromised. That has
led political theorists to look for alternatives. Some have argued
that an emphatically political patriotism could perform the unifying
function of nationalism while avoiding its perils. This "new
patriotism" puts aside, or at least de-emphasizes, pre-political
ties such as common ancestry, language, or culture, and enjoins love
of, and loyalty to, one's political community, its laws and
institutions, and the rights and liberties they make possible.



In view of the disastrous record of national socialism, it is not
surprising that German thinkers in particular should be suspicious of
patriotism as long as it has not been dissociated from nationalism. As
early as 1959, political theorist Dolf Sternberger called for a new
understanding of the concept of fatherland. "The fatherland is
the 'republic,' which we create for ourselves. The
fatherland is the constitution, to which we give life. The fatherland
is the freedom which we truly enjoy only when we ourselves promote it,
make use of it, and stand guard over it" (Sternberger 1990, 12).
In 1979, on the 30th anniversary of the Federal Republic,
he coined the term "constitutional patriotism"
(*Verfassungspatriotismus*) to describe the loyalty to the
*patria* understood in these terms (13-16). The term was
later adopted by Jurgen Habermas in the context of a case for
overcoming pre-political, i.e. national and cultural, loyalties in
public life, and supplanting them with a new, postnational, purely
political identity embodied in the laws and institutions of a free and
democratic state. Habermas argues that this identity, expressed in and
reinforced by constitutional patriotism, can provide a solid
foundation for such a state, given the ethnic and cultural
heterogeneity characteristic of most countries in western Europe. It
can also facilitate further European integration, and provide an
antidote to the "chauvinism of affluence" tempting these
countries (Habermas 1990).



Constitutional patriotism is the most widely discussed, but not the
sole variety of "new patriotism." Another is
"covenanted patriotism" advocated by John H. Schaar as
appropriate for countries whose population is much too ethnically and
culturally heterogeneous to allow for "natural
patriotism." Schaar's paradigmatic example is the United
States, whose citizens "were bonded together not by blood or
religion, not by tradition or territory, not by the walls and
traditions of a city, but by a political idea ... by a covenant,
by dedication to a set of principles and by an exchange of promises to
uphold and advance certain commitments" (Schaar 1981, 291).
Still another variety is the "patriotism of liberty"
propounded by Maurizio Viroli, who calls for a return to what
patriotism used to be before it was harnessed in the service of the
nation-state and submerged in nationalism: love of the laws and
institutions of one's polity and the common liberty they make
possible (Viroli 1995).



This new, emphatically political version of patriotism has been met
with both sympathy and skepticism. Those sympathetic to it have been
discussing the prospects of a European constitutional patriotism (see
Muller 2007, 93-139). Skeptics have argued that patriotism
disconnected from all pre-political attachments and identities can
generate only much too thin a sense of identity and much too weak a
motivation for political participation - that, thus understood,
"patriotism is not enough" (Canovan 2000).