From my reading of Benedict Anderson's 'Imagines Communities' I came across these quotes which I didn't quite understand. Please enlighten me! Also it would be very helpful if anyone who had read the book could define some of the arguments it puts forwards and justify or criticise it. I'm trying to be more open minded and critical about history so I would like to see a range of opinion. Thank you!
If I understand correctly, the person Anderson is quoting (Tom Nairn) is arguing that Marx was wrong in his ideas about nationalism. Specifically, Nairn is saying Marx was wrong about how class struggle is the motor of change and nationalism is merely an unintended secondary effect of class struggle. Marx believed that the social divisions and disruptions caused by capitalism would reorganize society along class lines. Nairn argued that nationalism - not class consciousness - is what filled in the gaps in societies torn apart by predatory capital.
Comments/critiques - In my opinion, Marx is easily the most misunderstood and deliberately maligned of all modern intellectuals. It can be difficult to find sources that explain Marx's writings without editors/commentators spinning it in a "wow look at how stupid that guy was" kinda way.
Having said that, I more or less agree with this analysis. I disagree in that "nationalism" was the greatest failure of Marxist thinking. There are certainly flaws and errors but I'm not sure if this counts as the superlative among them. Personally I would say ideology, not strictly nationalism, is what Nairn is really describing. The ideology of a nation with common people and a common cause certainly did take hold much better than class consciousness - that's the part I agree with. But reducing class consciousness is also an ideological goal of most national power structures. After all, it's easier to control you're work base when they believe they belong to a community that has their best interest at heart. When working people become acutely aware of their exploitation, then the power structure of the nation can have a bad mess to deal with.
There's also the tricky question of nationalism in Marxist states. There are plenty of old film reels from the USSR with all the hallmarks of nationalism - people coming together to show off just how great their society, their culture is. Communist nations leveraged the ideology of nationalism just as much as any other nation. Anti-Soviet sentiment over the last 60 years has given us a big stockpile of Soviet nationalist propaganda to analyze for signs of mass control.