Pan-Canadian nationalism since 1867: precarious nation-building revisited in light of the writings of George Grant and Eric Hobsbawm

The author here proposes a broad study of pan-Canadian nationalism that demonstrates, first, that economic forces were the dominant structuring element in the nation-building narrative, thereby reinforcing the neo-Marxist theses of Eric Hobsbawm and Ernest Gellner. Secondly, the article revisits the thesis presented in George Grant’s seminal work Lament for a Nation, and concludes that his writing on pan-Canadian nationalism was remarkably premonitory.