Just finished reading “Imagined Communities” by Benedict Anderson, and I am seriously not impressed. The book is difficult to read and has a strong left bias.
I believe that all human beings have a strong need to belong. Add to this a primeval power dynamics and a probabilistic system, and we get some interesting results over time. Any form of organization, even the communist brotherhood, can be defined as stupid imagination of the mind. The rise of the concept of nation is indeed another invention to organize, control and belong. Disproving and scorning it will never be a problem. Nevertheless, the human beings would have to settle on an alternative form of governance that is stable if they have to either understand or leave this abstraction behind. And I seriously hope that the alternative form is not Communism, Marxism, Leninism, Stalinism, Maoism, Pol-potism or the like. The book could have been written in simpler words with lesser footnotes and could have traced the development of the concept of nation with lesser normative/value based judgements.
I seriously doubt the book’s usefulness for a business student, except perhaps to learn a trick or two about propaganda and make believe. Students of nationalism or history will, however, find it useful. My recommendation to an MBA would be to avoid it.
I believe that all human beings have a strong need to belong. Add to this a primeval power dynamics and a probabilistic system, and we get some interesting results over time. Any form of organization, even the communist brotherhood, can be defined as stupid imagination of the mind. The rise of the concept of nation is indeed another invention to organize, control and belong. Disproving and scorning it will never be a problem. Nevertheless, the human beings would have to settle on an alternative form of governance that is stable if they have to either understand or leave this abstraction behind. And I seriously hope that the alternative form is not Communism, Marxism, Leninism, Stalinism, Maoism, Pol-potism or the like. The book could have been written in simpler words with lesser footnotes and could have traced the development of the concept of nation with lesser normative/value based judgements.
I seriously doubt the book’s usefulness for a business student, except perhaps to learn a trick or two about propaganda and make believe. Students of nationalism or history will, however, find it useful. My recommendation to an MBA would be to avoid it.
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