Nations, countries, and states, are all terms used interchangeably to describe government. I contend that there are differences, and the differences are important as descriptors for different forms of governance. We ought to be specific with our words, and try to use definitions that are not too broad. A nation is a geographic area in which a broad assortment of people identify with each other, a country is a specific entity with defined borders and standards for citizenship, and finally a state is the actual structure of government within a country or even a nation.
When looking up definitions for nation, country, and state, you will find that many definitions, such as the American Heritage Dictionary, will define Nation as:
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A relatively large group of people organized under a single, usually independent government; a country.
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The territory occupied by such a group of people. “All across the nation, people are voting their representatives out.”
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The government of a sovereign state.
Whereas the same dictionary will define a Country as:
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A nation or state.
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The territory of a nation or state; land.
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The people of a nation or state; populace. “The whole country will profit from the new economic reforms.”
This is a problematic way of defining words, especially considering that in both definitions, country and nation are used in the other’s definition. While this is just a singular issue with one rather obscure dictionary (the Merriam-Webster dictionary does not have this issue, for example), I’m using this dictionary to illustrate a common issue I run into during discussions about, nations, countries, and specifically, the state. In general, people use those three words to refer to one single entity: the state. When discussing about how the Soviet Union collapsed, people will say something along the lines of “That country collapsed”, or “that nation collapsed”. The reality is that only the state of the Soviet Union ceased to exist in 1991. The people who were living in the Soviet Union before its collapsed, continued to live where they lived after the collapse. The only real difference before and after was the form of the government, which is what a state is.
Whenever I discuss these issues, I have three distinct words in my head, that have clear definitions, and concrete examples that I can use to illustrate my definitions in practice. These definitions start from a broad perspective, and develop into a fine point. What I mean by this is the idea of a nation is a fairly broad idea, whereas a country is something more specific, and a state is the most specific of all.
Nations are geographic areas where a collection of peoples and cultures share some sort of identity or kinship with each other. Whether it’s a linguistic connection, cultural connection, historical or genealogical, the people themselves identify with others in some form or another. Some examples of this are the Haudenosaunee (also known as the Five Nations, or popularly as the Iroquois Confederacy), Polynesian Culture, Anglophone Nations, Arabic Nationalism, Greco-Roman culture, and finally Slavic culture. All of these are broadly nations in which the people within them share some form of shared worldview or beliefs. Some of these examples, such as Polynesian culture, or Slavic culture, are spread out over a large area, and speak specifically different languages. However, the people within this nation recognize that despite specific differences, there is a common history and language between them. The Anglophone nations are all individual countries, yet they are tightly allied with each other, and trade and travel between them is almost like traveling within their own countries.
Countries are geographic area with defined borders, and a standard for citizenship. Countries differ from the nations because a nation is a more nebulous idea. While the Slavic nation shares the Slavic linguistic group, the country of Poland has a number of differences than Latvia, a nation right next to it, but speaks a fairly different Slavic language, and has a variety of similar yet distinct cultural customs. Defining countries by languages is a fairly easy endeavor, however it is not always necessary. A country can come into being based on any group of people coming together and seeking self determination. This is how countries such as the United States came into being. People within a country easily identify those from within and those from outside of the country. In the modern era, citizenship is the easiest way of determining who is or is not a part of the country. While citizenship is a relatively modern invention, similar customs existed in the past, such as swearing fealty to a lord or king, or membership within a religion, such as Islam or Judaism.
The state is the actual entity of government. A country may need a state in order to function on a macro scale, however it may not matter specifically what kind of state, or the form of the state, is. To go back to the example of the Soviet Union, the majority of people continued living on as they did after December 26th, 1991, when the Russian Soviet Socialist Republic dissolved, and the USSR was finally no more. What replaced the Soviet Union was a variety of states within countries that sought independence from the USSR. These countries set about creating their own forms of government, their own states in which the duties of government (justice), could be executed. Some borders were redrawn during this period, but broadly, the borders as they existed within the Soviet Union only changed in that they became outside, external borders buffering countries from each other. The states that were created, were created by the people who wished to seek self determination, and thus created their own states to achieve those ends.