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Features

Introduction

Throughout the West, populist political parties are challenging the status quo. In response, political parties on both the Left and the Right claim that the populist challenges, many of which look to national histories and cultures for inspiration, are a “threat to democracy.” The established parties warn against “ethnocentrism,” which they claim fosters racism, stereotyping, discrimination, or xenophobia. Most likely, unless a credible alternative is offered, these political debates will continue for years.

One credible alternative is “personalist nationalism.” In his classic 1871 book, Democratic Vistas, America’s Walt Whitman espoused a personalist nationalism. He focused on the quality of Being, according to a person’s “own central idea and purpose.” He proposed a “healthy average personalism . . . the object of which should be to raise and supply through the States a copious race of superb American men and women, cheerful, religious, ahead of any yet known.”[1] For Whitman, it is only in the national context that a person can realize his or her true self: “The literature, songs, and esthetics of a country are of importance principally because they furnish the materials and suggestions of personality for the women and men of that country, and enforce them in a thousand effective ways.”[2]

Similarly, in a 1980 speech to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, known as UNESCO, Pope John Paul II explained how culture is the specific way of man’s existing and being. “Man always lives according to a culture which is specifically his, and which, in its turn, creates among men a tie which is also specifically theirs, determining the inter-human and social character of human existence.”[3]

Pope John Paul II urged UNESCO delegates:

"[W]ith all the means at your disposal, watch over the fundamental sovereignty that every Nation possesses by virtue of its own culture. Cherish it like the apple of your eye for the future of the great human family. Protect it! Do not allow this fundamental sovereignty to become the prey of some political or economic interest. Do not allow it to become a victim of totalitarian and imperialistic systems or hegemonies."[4]

This pillar of Global Governance Watch, provides resources in four areas critical to the success of personalist nationalism: Law and Liberty, Law and Religion, Law and Sovereignty, and Law and Economics.

[1] Walt Whitman, Democratic Vistas (1871), in Specimen Days, Democratic Vistas, and Other Prose, R. Shafer, ed. (Doubleday-Doran, New York) (1935), 294-295

[2] Id., 292.

[3] John Paul II, “Address to UNESCO,” June 2, 1980, https://inters.org/John-Paul-II-UNESCO-Culture

[4] Id.

Documents

Resources

Commentary

Personalist Nationalism

"Originalism" Class Pioneered in Texas Law Schools

May 29, 2025

United States District Judges Brantley Starr and Mark Pittman have begun teaching a course at Texas law schools focusing on the Constitution and "what the document's drafters intended when it was written."
Celebrating 100 Years of School Choice

May 29, 2025

In honor of the 100th anniversary of the landmark United States Supreme Court decision Pierce v. Society of Sisters, Paul E. Peterson summarizes the history of the school choice movement in America.
Building the Global Welfare State, Part 2: The Open Government Partnership as Community Organizer

By Jim Kelly

May 28, 2025
Young Americans Are Increasingly in Support of Socialism

May 19, 2025

In a recent survey, the Cato Institute and YouGov found that well over half of young Americans aged 18-29 hold a worryingly "favorable view" of socialism.
Chicago Public Schools Settle Religious Liberty Dispute

May 12, 2025

Last week, the Chicago Public School systems settled a class action lawsuit for allegedly forcing high school students to participate in "Hindu-based Transcendental Meditation (TM)" and specifically telling students not to inform their parents.

Total Records: 72

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