South Africa is definitely a multinational state. To understand why this is, we have to understand how the terms “nation” and “state” are used in social sciences disciplines like political science and human geography.
In everyday usage, people use the term “nation” to mean a country. In this usage, South Africa would be a nation. However, this is not how social scientists use the term. To social scientists, a “nation” is essentially an ethnic group. ...
South Africa is definitely a multinational state. To understand why this is, we have to understand how the terms “nation” and “state” are used in social sciences disciplines like political science and human geography.
In everyday usage, people use the term “nation” to mean a country. In this usage, South Africa would be a nation. However, this is not how social scientists use the term. To social scientists, a “nation” is essentially an ethnic group. It is a group of people who share a common identity that is based on something like religion or culture. It is not a political entity the way that a country is.
When social scientists want to talk about countries, they usually use the term “state.” A state, in this usage, is the same thing as a country. This means that South Africa is a state because it has defined boundaries and a government that is sovereign within those boundaries.
Once we know these definitions, we can see that South Africa cannot be a multi-state nation. This is because South Africa is a state and not a nation. Using these definitions, along with what we know about South Africa’s demographics, we can also say that South Africa is not a nation-state. A nation-state is a state like Japan where essentially the whole population of the state belongs to the same nation. We know that South Africa is home to many different ethnic groups/nations, which means that it cannot be a nation-state. Instead, it is a multinational state. It is a state in which people of many different nations live.
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