The accounts, symbols and feelings that we have about national
identity were largely imagined, created and popularized in the
nineteenth century. The word ‘nationalism’ itself dates from the
early nineteenth century and marked the increasing use of
national identity in order to make political claims. So to argue
that national identity is pre-political is itself a political
statement. It is becoming chic among some of Europe’s young
elites to call for a return to nationalism. This is the case not
only with the current crop of xenophobic populists muddying our
political waters from west to east, but also of a growing cadre
of flashy academics and pundits. In some European countries, of
course, nationalism never truly went out of fashion. But here in
the Netherlands explicit nationalism has since the war been
something considered embarrassingly distasteful in polite
company, rather like an ideological fart: an indiscrete
confession of hidden fascist longings. It is all the more
striking then – rather like a cana