Nationalism and Ethnicity in Nepal – David N Geller;Joanna Pfaff-Czarnecka;John Whelpton

Nationalism and Ethnicity in Nepal – David N Geller;Joanna Pfaff-Czarnecka;John Whelpton|For nearly 240 years (1768-2006) either the Shah dynasty or their Rana Prime Ministers ruled Nepal in the name of Hinduism; in more recent times Shah kings claimed also to embody national unity in their own person. Since the nineteenth century Nepal has experienced the autocracy of the Ranas, a first experiment with parliamentarianism, guided partyless democracy led by the king, multi-party constitutional monarchy (including an elected minority communist government for nine months, 1994-5), royal reaction (2004-6) finally reversed by massive street protests, a ten-year ‘People’s War’ launched by the Maoists in 1996, followed by a peace process and elections to a Constituent Assembly in April 2008 in which the Maoists emerged as the largest single party with almost 30% of the vote. In all this, national and ethnic questions have been of crucial importance.