American Nationalism: Rich Lowry vs. Alex Nowrasteh

Rich Lowry and Alex Nowrasteh debate the resolution, "Nationalism is an important value that Americans should support." The event was produced by The Soho Forum, a monthly debate series presented by Reason Foundation, the nonprofit that publishes Reason.

For the affirmative: Richard Lowry is the editor in chief of National Review. He was selected to lead the news outlet by its founder, William F. Buckley. Lowry writes a syndicated column for King Features and a weekly column for Politico. He is also a commentator for NBC News. His most recent book is The Case for Nationalism: How It Made Us Powerful, United, and Free.

For the negative: Alex Nowrasteh is the director of economic and social policy studies at the Cato Institute where most of his work has focused on immigration. He is widely published in newspapers, blogs, and peer-reviewed academic journals. He is the coauthor (with Benjamin Powell) of the book Wretched Refuse? The Political Economy of Immigration and Institutions (Cambridge University Press, 2020), which is the first book on how economic institutions in receiving countries adjust to immigration. He is a native of Southern California and received an MS in economic history from the London School of Economics.

[d.johnson]

1:04:21 "Hitler was not a nationalist" - Rich is DEEP into "real socialism has never been tried" territory with his definition of nationalism.

[tann_man]

I’ve been saying this for years. Whether the debaters realize it or not nearly all debates revolve around a battle of defining terms. This debate is an excellent example

[yengsabio]

Program starts at 5:00. Debate proper starts at 22:00.

[username]

It’s quite funny that the guy they got to defend nationalism did not even know the definition of a nation.

[JonathanRossRogers]

44:01 Nation, country and state are all distinct concepts.

[ludwigvonsowell]

Someone needs to fix the editing. Audio doesn’t match up with video.

[RhttDvs]

As someone who finds themselves as somewhere in between libertarianism and conservatism, this was very interesting to listen to.

Alex had me with "Nationalism is to stalking, as patriotism is to love."

[ForceCom]

I vote for the British empire and napoleon

[jazzgrackle]

I have no issue with shared cultural and political values. Having a coherent vision of your country is important.

What I don’t like is the idea that somehow your life is less important if you aren’t a member of my nation.

[DanielWoike]

As an ideological private law society market anarchist (libertarian), but with great fondness for traditional American conservatism, I disagreed with Rich Lowry way more than Alex, but I still feel like Alex didn't do as good of a job as he could. He should of talked more about how Rich Lowry's version of conservatism is not rooted in the American tradition, which has always been about strong decentralization, and federalism.

[lowbudgetmic]

This so Jerry Springer minus the beating up aspect... 😮

[JoeBizzle]

I've been undecided on many a debate. This might be the first time I went into a debate agreeing with the resolution and left it disagreeing.

[alexanderx]

This right here won it for me.
"It's an ideology of GROUP-RIGHTS, that denigrates individualism in favor of an ABSTRACTION known as a tribe or in this case the nation."
Arbitrarily grouping and drawing conclusions from statistics concerning those groups is the source of nearly all stupidity in social policy. The letter of law is at it's best when group membership is totally ignored.

[usnbostx]

I think this debate was a missed opportunity - debating a definition rather than the substance. What Rich defended isn’t necessarily what opponents of “nationalism” oppose. Alex became distracted by the definitions and didn’t hone in on the real concerns.

[JonathanRossRogers]

53:51 Rich Lowry really failed when he tried to claim that Hitler wasn't a nationalist. I'm sure he was aware of what the "N" in NAZI stands for.

[Xamufam]

patriotism and nationalism are the same thing

[ewangent]

Anyone who has lived under peculiar nationalisms, like oneself, living in Scotland a nation within Great Britain, can tell you is that it's a double-edged sword.

[frenchstudentA]

Seems like Rich is in favor of "nation-ism" (i.e. a territory having a single government as established by the Peace of Westphalia in 1648 is the default unit of international relations and internal governance) and "American-ism" rather than nationalism. His argument seems to be, basically, "I love America, America is a great nation, therefore I'm a nationalist and nationalism is good, because America is good."

The best moment in this debate was when he was asked at what point a nation becomes an empire---for which he did not have a good answer.

It lays bare that "nationalists" are just would-be imperialists who have enough strength to dominate and centralize power over one group of people, but aren't strong enough to start exerting that power over others. Hence, German nationalism was nationalism when Prussians were forcing French speakers in Alsace to pay German taxes and speak German, but somehow it is "imperialism" when they attempt to do the same thing to Belgians.

Shame no one asked Rich about the Uighurs in China. Aren't they being "reeducated" so they can become a part of the Chinese nation?

[tann_man]

I was 50/50 going into the debate. The final question at 1:30:45 sold me on No. Where do we draw the line for a legitimate nation’s scope? Surely not at global domination. The size of an empire? No. Russia including Ukraine? Just Russia? There are major differences between many Russians surely some are being held agains their will as part of the nation, it would be good if they could break apart. State? Province? differences between people groups that require violence to enforce participation exist even at province level. Ultimately we reach the individual.

Funny how the logical of conclusion of many ideologies end this way. Nationalism, Intersectionality, and Gender theory. To name a few.

[charleshawn]

If nationalists are naught zees, what are globalists?