An American Empire

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In this essay I examine so called ’American empire’ in order to find out if it exists and if it makes sense to call the USA an empire. In the first part of this essay I examine the hard power of the United States. Even though it is clear that the USA has a huge material preponderance, I come to the conclusion that it is unable to use it to fullfill its political goals in a way that an empire would be able to do. In the second part I proceed to take a look at the soft power of the USA, namely ideological, cultural and structural power. In the end I conclude that it does not make sense to speak of an American empire, because there has never been one and it is unlikely that there will be one in the near future.

It is undeniable that the USA has the greatest military power in the world. Mann (2004) demonstrates it persuasively: ’Its military budget for 2003 was 40 percent of the world’s total military spending, exceeding the spending of the next 24 states combined.’ Furthermore, Zakaria (2008) compares the USA and China: ’China has about 20 nuclear missiles that can reach the United States. We have 830 missiles, most with multiple warheads, that can reach China.’ These figures tell their own convincing story. Even during the Cold War the USA had such a superior military strenght that it did not take any other state (including USSR) as a serious security risk. (Cox 2001) After the Soviet Union collapsed it has even less powerful and threatning enemies, especially when its military budget is expanding while the military budgets of the most states are declining. (Mann 2004) However, the material preponderance of the USA’s military power does not make it an empire. For it to be an empire, it would have to be able to use its military pow...

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...mpire. It is true that the USA has exceptionally strong military resourses, especially when it comes to fire-power. However, it is able to invade countries, but it is unable to control or stabilize them. It also has world-leading economy, but the rest of the world is rising fast and the USA is losing its momentum. It also doesn’t have effective ways to control the world through its economic power. When it comes to ideological power, it is once again true that most American values are attractive to the majority of the world. However, it is contestable whether they are purely American values. Furthermore, even culturally Americanized people feel strong national pride and even hatred towards the USA. Therefore the USA is unable to make use of its ideological and cultural powers. All in all, the USA is a true superpower, in most cases even a hegemon, but not an empire.

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