Beginning in the nineteenth century, the world witnessed the emergence of national movements that advocated the construction of states founded upon the historical and cultural identity of peoples, as well as upon their independence and strategic autonomy. This wave, which manifested itself most prominently in the European revolutions of 1848, the so-called “Springtime of the Peoples,” produced a long-term historical impact — according to the principle of the longue durée — that influenced world political history in the decades that followed. This phenomenon was of enormous importance in the Western political sphere, having its precursors in the American Revolution and in the political epic of South American Bolivarianism, and gaining momentum from 1848 onward with the emergence of a whole series of European national movements. With the First World War, and with the promotion by Woodrow Wilson and the United States of the principle of “self-determination of peoples,” the same idea experienced a revival which, through Turkish Kemalism and the formation of the Chinese nationalist movement, extended into the non-Western world. Non-Western forms of this type of movement, in turn, had important precursors in anti-colonial movements, which, like European national movements, sought to secure independence and autonomy for broad sectors of the world subjected to foreign domination of an economic and extractive nature. During the twentieth century, the idea of national independence assumed various ideological and political forms, eventually giving rise to different theories of national autonomy and sovereignty, such as Mao Zedong’s “Three Worlds Theory.” At the same time, the rise of communist revolutions and of the world socialist camp revitalized this political idea, generating new formulations of theories of national revolution.

With this call for papers, we intend to collect contributions on the theme of national revolutions in the West and the East, considered both from a theoretical perspective — by examining the political thought of the authors who promoted these movements, as well as the movements themselves — and from the perspective of the relations among these movements and the elaboration of a political theory of coexistence among these political projects. We also intend to focus on the theories and practices of these movements from the perspective of international relations, both by analyzing national revolutions within the international context, in diplomatic and strategic terms, and by addressing the theoretical elaboration of an international order founded upon national independence.


A non-exhaustive list of topics that may be addressed includes:

•Jacobinism and the emergence of the idea of national revolution in Europe
•The American Revolution and the national-revolutionary paradigm
•Bolivarianism and national revolution in Spanish America
•1848 and the transformation of the national idea in Europe
•Mazzini and the theory of nationalities
•The Italian Risorgimento and its relationship with the great powers
•Bonapartism and national revolutions
•Self-determination of peoples and the international order after the First World War
•Kemalism and the Turkish national revolutionù
•The Soviet Revolution and the issue of nationalities
•Chinese nationalism and national revolution in the thought of Sun Yat-sen
•Nationalism and anti-imperialism in anti-colonial liberation movements
•Mao Zedong and the theory of national revolution
•National revolution and internationalism in Marxist and communist thought
•National sovereignty, the balance of power, and the international order
•National identity and international relations theory
•National movements and the opposition to a bipolar and unipolar world
•National movements and anti-colonial struggles in Africa
•Arab nationalism and movements for emancipation in the Middle East
•Indian nationalism and the struggle for independence
•National and revolutionary movements in twentieth-century Latin America
•Nationalisms in Southeast Asia and the dissolution of the colonial empire


Proposals should contain a title, a brief summary or abstract of between 300 and 400 words, the author's email address, and a brief five-line CV.
Proposals must be sent to the email address nationalrevolutionsintheworld@gmail.com
The deadline for submitting proposals is December 31, 2026.
Accepted proposals will be announced starting January 31, 2027, and editorial instructions for preparing the book chapter will be provided.
The deadline for submitting the final version of the chapters will be a date to be determined in the first quarter of 2027.
The monograph containing the selected and submitted book chapters will subsequently be published, following corrections and comments by the coordinators. The monograph is expected to be published by an international academic publishing house.



Coordinators:
Orazio Maria Gnerre (Institute for the History of the Italian Risorgimento)
Ruikai Xue (Beijing International Studies University)