Nationalism In Frantz Fanon's The Pitfall Of National Consciousness

Frantz Fanon writes on the problems of nationalism mostly after independence. He shuns the glories that come about more when independence is achieved and focuses on the drive of independence which is mostly nationalism. Nationalism can be understood as love of one’s country whereby the doctrine of the national culture and interests are of high importance than others and one is willing to sacrifice for it. With this idea of nationalism in mind the paper agrees with most of the consequences of nationalism as Fanon addresses it in “The Pitfall of National Consciousness”. The paper will discuss the weaknesses and strengths of the underlying motive for independence, the main weakness being the laziness of the national middle class and the biggest merit for nationalism in any situation being freedom from oppression. Weaknesses will be discussed first and then on the other hand strengths.

Nationalism is a drive that gets to an where it blinds the nationalists of the future and people are so concerned with the present that they have no plan for the future, that’s one of the main weaknesses. During the colonisation period nationalism stirs the masses in rebel to gain their freedom, the leading intellectuals or leading parties are so driven by the hatred of the colony’s influence that they want to remove it in power and replace colonialism with nationalism. To the political parties freedom is the end point of their campaign where the economy will go they are not certain, “When such