The Next Decade By George Friedman

Michael Cox’s thesis as outlined in “Empire by Denial? Debating US Power”, is chiefly that: the United States of America is an empire, and that current beliefs to the contrary are the result of denialism due to negative connotations associated with the concept of empire, not due to a lack of suitability of that term to describe the current state of American foreign policy.

By the year 1901, the United States possessed one of the largest navy’s in the world, a growing empire, and the respect of the world as a growing power. It gained these achievements by being involved in the growing imperialism of this era along with Britain, France, Germany, and Japan. However America did not gain its power spontaneously. During the Gilded Age and prior America established policies and precedents that would lead America into the discussion as a world power. Although the United States expansionism in the late nineteenth- and early twentieth-centuries was a continuation of the social and cultural continuation of the past, it was also resulting from the departure from the methods of the past in the government’s pursuit of new economic and political endeavors.

From the dawn of man, the different civilizations of mankind have been out to dominate and conquest the globe. To spread his/her’s power, authority, and culture across as vast an area humanly possible. Only in the last century have these ideals been diminished, but for the U.S. during the turn of the 20th century it faced a choice on this path. Was the U.S. to remain to the domain of the contiguous United States? Or was it destined to take foot on the global stage and claim land far from it’s shores? William Graham Sumner, an American sociologist and Albert Beveridge, a U.S. senator from Indiana both disagreed as to whether imperialism was right for the country. Beveridge argues that imperialism is beneficial to the U.S. by giving access to raw materials, while Sumner fears that imposing rule on someone who does not want to be ruled makes us the exact people that we declared our independence from. This is just one example from their different views on American Imperialism.

In the last few decades of the19th century, it was a period of imperial spreading for the United States. The American story took a different route from that of its European rivals, however, because of the U.S. history of scuffle against European empires and its divine

During the 19th century the United-States, already a regional power, slowly emerged as an imperial one (Slater, 2010; Steinmetz, 2005). Up until the 20th century, the country was mainly focused on fulfilling its ‘manifest destiny’ and centred its foreign policy on Latin America (Kissinger, 1994). It was of great importance for the Americans not only to differentiate themselves from the colonialist Europe but also to assert their

It was an age of empire, and by the 1900s Europe’s powers had taken control of more than 10 million square miles and 150 million people. In the closing years of the nineteenth century, foreign policy assumed a new importance for Americans. Political and business leaders have been preoccupied by internal matters and began to look outward in order to advocate a more activist approach to world affairs. Not wanting to be left behind, the United States emerged as a great power exercising imperialism; two of the countries which experienced this exercise was, Hawaii and Cuba.

Many Americans seem to be anxious about how the world perceives them, and are disturbed by what seems to be its declining image and position in many countries. Some wonder if the end is near for U.S. dominance or influence. The following are some quotations from recently published materials that are worth considering.

In the late 19th to early 20th century, American imperialism was on the rise. The United States was expanding outside of the continent from Puerto Rico to the Philippines. While the conquering of nations was important, the ideologies behind imperialism played an even greater role. Intellectuals from sociologists to Navy admirals created arguments to justify America’s global expansion. Little did they know that remnants of their philosophies would still be in use over a century later.

As a nation born out of the desire to reject despotic rule and reinvent a new, non-Eurocentric model of the nation state, Americans during the nation’s nascent decades subscribed to a notion of anti-imperialism and relied upon a closed door approach to national foreign policy. Yet simultaneously, the United States engaged in acts of global expansion throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, and by the arrival of the 20th century, the nation had reached an ideological crossroad. Following a series of foreign conflicts which left America as an active participant in global expansion and a growing world power, by the conclusion of the 19th century, the nation was forced to determine whether or not it would permanently adopt a national doctrine

“America was conducting business as usual, but others were joining the game.” (Zakaria, 221). All this time we thought we were on top, we were actually slowly becoming less and less of leader and more a bystander as the rest of the world is slowly rising around us. Zakaria shows in that quote that as America has been continuing business like always, and because of this we have failed to realize our standing with the world around us. In the book The Post-American World, Zakaria shows us the challenges that America faces today. I believe the United States is most affected by our ignorance, competition, and worldly participation.

Many strategies have been devised by empires over centuries, these strategies and decisions have helped shape the world as it is in its present state. The author explains how strategic decisions made in the past were the wrong decisions in his opinion, as John Perkins had seen first hand the devastation that could be caused by the American government in its pursuit for a “global empire”.

After the Cold War, the United States emerged victorious and became the sole super power in the international system. Since then, the US has been a champion of liberal democratic values such as very strong institutional protections of individual civil rights, free-market economy, governmental leaders who are elected by the people in fair and balance elections who make the choices concerning peace and war and a secular political order. However, in recent years there are debates and talks of what role the United States as a country should play in the future, especially after the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The debate on what path the nation should follow has led to debates with those who argue that we should revert back to isolationism and to others who believe the United States should submit its power to the United Nations and an international system of laws. But I argue for a different approach, an approach that the nation has used in the past and that is primacy.

Another main idea in the book is the linkages of the financial system to the real economy during the recession. In the duration of the financial crisis, unemployment as well as job loss increased, wage eroded, and companies and businesses closing were in significant numbers (66; 83). In a more specific example, the Reserve Primary

A common characteristic of What Good is Grand Strategy: Power and Purpose in American Statecraft from Harry S. Truman to George W. Bush and The Myth of America’s Decline: Politics, Economics and a Half Century of False Prophecies is they both talk about the histories of what has happened to America since after World War II. I am arguing that both books give the best example of how and why the United States is still seen as an empire and still a very powerful nation. Thanks to the default power and grand strategic choices they made in the past 60 years.

The purpose of this note is to briefly examine the different approaches in interpreting the financial crisis by mainstream and heterodox economists. To emphasize the drawbacks in the neoclassical (mainstream) view, and criticize it from the post-Keynesian (major heterodox) viewpoint. The latest financial crisis of 2008 and 2009 will definitely become a cornerstone in the history of economic though and, correspondingly, the development of capitalistic system. It is a turning point as the neoclassical (mainstream) theory that has seemingly been a driver of the late 30 years of development lacks the ability to comprehensively explain the causes of frequent economic downturns, and provide policy implications for preventing crisis from occurring again and again.