Our present historical moment is marked by a complex
interlocking between processes of globalization and the
proliferation of nationalisms. Contemporary processes of
globalization have attenuated the institutional capacities of
nation-states to regulate their national economies See Harvey (1989), Held (1990, 1995), Hirsch (1995),
Sassen (1991, 1996). and challenged the spatial
correspondence between nation, state, economy, culture, and
people that has long defined the nation-state. See Agnew (1994), Appadurai (1996, 1997), Gupta and
Ferguson (1992), Malkii (1992), Robertson (1992). The
inherited hyphenization of nation and state, forged during the
late-nineteenth century, now appears “less as an icon of
conjuncture than an index of disjuncture.” Appadurai (1996:39). The increasing visibility
of the strains in the union between nation and state has been matched
by a remarkable burst in analyses of nationalism and the nation-state.
In particular, the territorial bases of nationhood has emerged as a
major theme in studies of nationalism. This essay seeks to extend
and broaden this line of enquiry through an analysis of the historical
production of a national space and economy in late nineteenth century
colonial India. My discussion of the nationalization of conceptions of
economy and territory at once engages with and departs from received
approaches to national territory.