2026/07/29 by Pau Torres
paper · doi:10.1017/nps.2026.10165
Abstract Why did some stateless nationalist movements at the turn of the twentieth century manage to build broad support while others remained marginal? This article’s argument is that literacy conditioned the prospects for minority nationalisms not only through its spread but also through the content of the curriculum that accompanied it. Where schooling expanded literacy without a cohesive, state-driven nationalist curriculum, it created an “open” reading public that minority-nationalist entrepreneurs could mobilize through the printed public sphere. By contrast, where schooling embedded a strong state identity, rising literacy primarily socialized readers into the state nationalism, narrowing the informational space available to rival claims. Comparing substate regions in Spain and France around 1900, the analysis shows that neither literacy nor economic development alone can account for the opportunity structure of minority nationalisms. Accounting for the type of state-sponsored education is crucial to understanding the political terrain in this formative period for nationalist ideologies.