Posted 2/27/2004 09:24:00 PM by Douglas

Is America an Empire? Here are some pretty good questions.

In the global information age, strategic power is simply not so highly concentrated. Instead, it is distributed among countries in a pattern that resembles a complex three-dimensional chess game. On the top chessboard, military power is largely unipolar, but on the economic board, the US is not a hegemon or an empire, and it must bargain as an equal when, for example, Europe acts in a unified way. On the bottom chessboard of transnational relations, power is chaotically dispersed, and it makes no sense to use traditional terms such as unipolarity, hegemony, or American empire.

I guess that makes us an "Empire Lite." Man, what a great term, which seems to fit perfectly with this observation:

In fact, the problem of creating an American empire might better be termed imperial underreach. Neither the US public nor Congress has proven willing to invest seriously in the instruments of nation building and governance as opposed to military force.

You can't play chess by yourself.