Kruno Krstić is well known for his contributions to the research areas of Croatian philosophy and philosophy of language; yet his contribution to political philosophy has so far drummed up little interest. In this article, we consider some of the views from his discussion “Narod, država, nacionalizam” (“People, state, nationalism”) published in the journal Hrvatska smotra in 1944 and as an offprint in 1945. In the first part, we attempt to place Krstić’s treatise into the context of discussions on peoples and nations from his time within the framework of Croatian political thought, and to establish the possible intellectual trends that influenced his views and the way he approached the topic. In the second part, we present his take on “the criteria for the particularities of peoples”. In the third part, we give special attention and ethically reflect on Krstić’s concept of “cohabitation”, which in Krstić’s thought serves as the normative foundation for both the nation state and close relations within a nation. After we bring the normative view in the background of Krstić’s sociological approach to light in the fourth part, the final part compares Krstić’s position to some distinguished historical and contemporary views about the nation and nationalism in political philosophy.