Like it or not, the American Empire is here 

By Julia Keller and Marja Mills

The Austin American-Statesman

On June 8, 1982, Ronald Reagan memorably referred to the Soviet 
Union as "the evil empire." His choice of "empire" --
as opposed to 
"nation" or "state" -- revealed more than just a yen
for alliteration.  

Reagan and his speechwriters knew that the word "empire" carried all 
sorts of negative associations and would cause little shivers of 
apprehension in some listeners. Empire meant imperialism, domination, 
oppression. Empire meant big and bad.  

Similarly, when George Lucas needed a name for the nefarious cabal 
that opposed those noble Jedi warriors, he, too, went with "empire." 
And why not? "The word `empire,' " noted Neal Conan on National Public 
Radio's "Talk of the Nation" recently, "is redolent of
slavery, war and 
arrogance."  

Lately, though, the word and what it represents -- a stupendously 
powerful nation marching across borders -- seems to be undergoing 
a makeover. The phrase "American Empire," which once would have 
caused hives to break out on the skin of freedom-loving people, now 
evokes a shrug of resignation: We're the most powerful nation in the 
history of the world, this line of thinking goes, so why not revel 
in it. Empire? You bet.  

Some observers, however, still bristle at the word's dark historical 
connotations.  

"There's been a huge shift" in attitudes toward empire, says Bruce 
Robbins, a Columbia University professor of English and comparative 
literature, who is critical of the shift. "Until very recently, there 
was no way you could use the word `empire' in any but a critical sense. 
It's been a very, very long American tradition to set ourselves apart 
from the European notion of empire. The American public wouldn't support 
imperialism.  

"But Americans have lost their shame about it," adds Robbins, whose 
books include "Feeling Global: Internationalism in Distress" (1999).  

The anxiety attending the idea of empire, American or otherwise, is 
demonstrated by an increasing number of books, articles and conferences 
that explore its ramifications. Robbins recently participated in a 
forum at the University of Florida called "American Empire." Among 
the new books that evaluate empires past and present are "Empire: The 
Rise and Demise of the British World Order and the Lessons for Global 
Power," by Niall Ferguson, and "American Empire: The Realities and 
Consequences of U.S. Diplomacy," by Andrew Bacevich. The word
"empire" 
also adorns numerous articles in specialized foreign policy journals 
and bulletins from think tanks.  

And no wonder: Fresh from a swift and decisive victory in Iraq, American 
leaders reportedly were considering going after other states such as Iran 
and Syria, which Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld had branded a 
"rogue nation."  

What some regard as America's cultural imperialism -- which catapulted 
American fashions, TV shows, movies and fast-food chains around the 
globe -- has now been joined by real imperialism, says Walter La Feber, 
a professor of American foreign relations at Cornell University and 
author of "Michael Jordan and the New Global Capitalism" (1999).  

"The United States has had an economic empire for a long time," 
he says. "What's different now is the military."  

Another reason that empire doesn't sound quite so heinous to American 
ears, says Michael Adas, is the nation's response to the Sept. 11 
terrorist attacks. "It changed everything. The civilian population of 
America suddenly saw itself at risk," says Adas, history professor at 
Rutgers University, whose books include "High Imperialism and the New 
History" (1993). The idea of using American might to restore order to 
the world -- to be an empire -- seemed like a pretty good idea. "It was, 
`Yes, we're willing to give up domestic rights; yes, we must use force 
overseas. Yes, we must build an empire -- an empire of preemptive 
military strikes.' "  

Yet some people still wince at the word "empire," La Feber says. 
"Americans don't like the word `empire.' We like the word `democracy.'" 
 

The British-born Ferguson concurs: "Americans have it drummed into 
them from kindergarten that their political lexicon doesn't include 
the `E' word," he wrote in a recent article. "The U.S. was forged 
in a revolt against British colonialism."  

The term, however, is gradually becoming acceptable again, La Feber 
says. "We're working our way through that transition now."  

Economic monolith

Home to five percent of the world's population, the nation is responsible 
for 43 percent of its economic production. The American economy equals 
the combined total of the next three largest economies, those of Japan, 
Germany and Britain. The United States spends more on defense than all 
other nations of the world combined.  

That kind of towering strength can make a nation bold in foreign affairs 
-- and can make other nations apprehensive. Past empires have been known 
for their bombastic excesses: The capricious cruelty of the Roman emperors; 
the swaggering racism that British bureaucrats brought to their jobs in 
India and Africa; the deadly purges in the Soviet Union. The popular 
image of an empire is a state run by an arrogant leader out of touch 
with his people, striking out to conquer weaker people simply because 
she or he can, leaving a huge boot print on the world.  

Some TV viewers cringed when a U.S. Marine scaled a large statue of 
Saddam Hussein in the newly fallen Baghdad and draped an American 
flag over the deposed leader's stone face, though the Marine quickly 
took down the American Stars and Stripes. Almost immediately, an 
Iraqi flag went up, was removed, and then the statue was pulled down.  

Other empire-worthy moments likely to come include images of Americans 
running Iraqi oil fields and an American running Iraq. Retired U.S. 
general Jay Garner, the first American named to run postwar Iraq, 
often was referred to as the country's "viceroy" in the British press. 
Viceroys governed colonies of the British Empire, so you're unlikely 
to hear American leaders calling him that. Officially, Garner is the 
director of the Defense Department's Office of Reconstruction and 
Humanitarian Assistance.  

Empires and imperialism haven't always gotten such bad press, 
says Jesse Sheidlower, North American editor of the Oxford English 
Dictionary.  

"The disparaging connotations of `imperialism' is directly from 
communist writing. Imperialism was used originally in positive 
senses," he says.  

Even in America, the word "empire" wasn't always shunned, says La 
Feber. Early American leaders such as George Washington and Thomas 
Jefferson employed it frequently and positively. "In the 1770s to 
the 1840s, the phrase `American Empire' was very popular. It started 
to change in the 1840s and was used less and less. The phrase became 
`American nation.' " By the early 20th century, La Feber says, the word 
empire "had a bad connotation. We didn't like the empires at the time: 
Russian, German, even the British."  

A no-colony empire

Yet some caution that "empire" is too much a catch-all term. " 
`American empire' means nothing to my mind," says etymologist 
Anatoly Liberman, a professor of German at the University of 
Minnesota. "I think when people speak about an American empire 
they mean something like this: a country that wants to broaden 
its influence and dominate others, though the U.S. never has 
had colonies as England and Rome and even Russia did.  

"If a certain country exercises an enormous influence, economic and 
cultural, it is not an empire. An empire is a political entity."  

Nor would everyone concur that past empires are uniformly wicked.  

In his new book, Ferguson argues that the British Empire was a positive 
experience for the world, spreading ideas about the values of liberty 
and education around the globe. That is why Ferguson expresses 
puzzlement that Americans are gun-shy about using the word, creating 
what he calls "the strange, self-denying character of the new empire."  

As Ferguson wrote recently in the London Sunday Times, "Welcome to 
the weird and wonderful world of the Pax Americana -- the empire that 
dare not speak its name . . . Even hard-nosed conservatives share this 
allergy to empire."  

Though the Bush administration avoids "the E word," certain influential 
players such as deputy defense secretary Paul Wolfowitz and key 
adviser Richard Perle have made clear their advocacy of intervention 
abroad.  

One needs only to read the statement of principles of the Project for a 
New American Century, an influential "neoconservative" group, to see 
the modern face of imperialist philosophy.  

"We need to accept responsibility for America's unique role in 
preserving and extending an international order friendly to our 
security, our prosperity, and our principles," the group asserted 
in a 1997 document signed by Wolfowitz, Dick Cheney and Rumsfeld.  

Empires, however, needn't always involve armies and arms, says James 
Kurth, a political science professor at Swarthmore University.  

"If there is now an American empire, it is best defined by the `soft 
power' of information networks and popular culture rather than by the 
hard power of economic exploitation and military force," James Kurth 
writes in the current issue of "The National Interest."  

The country might not fit the image of the empires of old, Kurth 
believes, but that may not matter.  

"It is an empire representative of the information age rather than the 
industrial age. Whatever they may think about their empire, however, 
Americans should not be surprised if Europeans and almost all other 
peoples around the world persist in perceiving the new American empire 
to be similar enough for their purposes to the earlier empires of their 
own historical experience," he writes. "We can tell them they're wrong, 
but it won't do us any good."  

Rise and fall of empires

Empires have come and gone, but all shared one characteristic: hubris. 
Some of the things that made empires dominant -- sprawling size, brutal 
subjugation, a sense of superiority -- eventually made them vulnerable. 
Many were brought down by invasions and independence movements, 
power struggles and out-of-touch home governments. A sampling:  

* Roman

(27 B.C.-476 A.D.): In the 1st century, the Roman empire covered half of 
Europe and much of the Middle East.  

* Byzantine

(330-1453): Created from the eastern half of the Roman Empire. Its 
capital, Constantinople (now Istanbul), was the center of its wealth 
and culture.  

* Ottoman

(1517-1917): Once sprawled from the edge of Austria to Yemen and 
from Morocco to Persia.  

* British

(1610-1970): The sun never set on the British empire, as the phrase 
goes. It once included one-quarter of the world's population and 
territories as diverse as the American colonies and Australia, India 
and much of Africa.  

* Soviet 

(1936-1991): Stretched across the northern half of Asia and part 
of Eastern Europe; had 15 republics from Ukraine to Uzbekistan.  

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                          -==-

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