This idea, she argues, was brought about by the historical accident of the Wars of the Roses which created a vacuum in the upper strata of English feudal society leading to an unprecedented amount of upward social mobility. Such upward mobility was a new, bewildering "(anomic)", yet positive experience for many of the English people. It required justification because it could not be made sense of within the framework of their previous—feudal—consciousness. At that time, the word “nation” meant an elite. The English defined the English people – the word “people” was, at that time, defined as the lower classes –as a nation, elevating the entire population to the dignity of the elite. With this definition, our distinctly modern world was brought into being. Nationalism, fundamentally, is the equation of the “people” with the “nation”. It destroyed the traditional social hierarchy and, with national identity, granted people dignity, which was previously enjoyed only by the elites. National identity, as such, is a dignifying identity: it makes dignity the experience of every member of a nation. Once one experiences dignity, it cannot be given up. The fundamental equality of national membership also implies an open and inclusive social stratification which encourages all people to mobilize and to play the active political and cultural role formerly played only by the elites. The people become the bearer(s) of the sovereignty, replacing God and king, and have the freedom and right to decide their own as well as the common destiny. Popular sovereignty, together with fundamental equality of membership, as well as secularization, are the three core principles of nationalism. Presupposing an open system of social stratification, at the core of nationalism lies a compelling, inclusive image of society and an image of a sovereign community of fundamentally equal members. Ruled by the people, national community is no longer an estate created by God and owned by the monarch. It requires an impersonal form of government, in distinction to earlier forms of government, called the "state". Greenfeld also argues that democracy is logically implied in nationalism because of the principles of popular sovereignty and equality of memberships. All modern states built under the influence of nationalism are, therefore, democracies. Depending on the initial definition of the nation (a composite entity or a collective individual) and the criteria of membership (civic/voluntary or ethnic), however, there exist three "ideal types" (in the Weberian sense) of nationalism – individualistic-civic nationalism, collectivistic-civic nationalism and collectivistic-ethnic nationalism.