Andrew Heywood In His Book

Andrew Heywood in his book, Political Ideologies: An Introduction, explains how nationalism has changed its shape and form consistently throughout history. It came into being as a social doctrine or movement in the 18th and 19th centuries as part of revolutions to rid empires of tyrannical rulers and to impose the right of self-determination. These nationalist movements, usually undertaken by and for people, led to the formation of nation states and gave way to the doctrine of popular self-government.
However, with time, nationalism has become more of an ideology than a mere movement, and the term has developed more political overtures. Two main categories of Nationalism exist today: Political Nationalism consisting of liberal, conservative, expansionist and anti-colonial nationalism, and Cultural Nationalism which also comprises of ethnic nationalism. Liberal nationalism entails that nations have the right to self-govern, and that the people are not mere subjects of the ruler. Anti-colonial nationalism was in full force when most of the world rid itself of its colonial masters during the 19th and 20th centuries. Heywood gives these two special attention because of the roles these forms of nationalism have played in the recent past.
The character of nationalism at the time of its conception has indeed proved to be much different than the way the term is used now and what its annotations currently entail. In the beginning, nationalism was thought to be a selfless means of achieving equal political and social status for the people; nowadays however, the term nationalism is used frivolously to mobilize popular support for leaders who have selfish reasons to come to power, and not to liberate the people from an oppressive regime. This term has become, more or less, a clever political tool that populist leaders use to dupe the proletarian class into supporting them. Hence, truly selfless movements or uprisings of nationalistic fervor, such as the one in Venezuela in