Is Modern U.S. Foreign Policy a Form of Imperialism?

[russ_watters]

Just because you can buy chinese food in America doesn't mean imperialism. That's not what I said at all. The rest of the world is slowly becoming Americanized though with American-based companies moving overseas. I don't see a large number of overseas companies moving to America.

How come the opposite isn't happening Russ? Maybe I'm missing something here.

Maybe I'm missing something: how is it imperialism when American companies go overseas but not imperialism when foreign companies come to America?

 

[LightbulbSun]

Maybe I'm missing something: how is it imperialism when American companies go overseas but not imperialism when foreign companies come to America?

I wasn't implying that at all.

 

[russ_watters]

I wasn't implying that at all.

Now I'm really confused. Earlier, you said this:

I think globalization as a whole could be added as support to the notion that the U.S. is becoming imperialistic.

Could you please explain exactly what you mean, because it seemed pretty clear to me that you were saying that a MacDonalds' in Red Square is economic imperialism.

 

[LightbulbSun]

Now I'm really confused. Earlier, you said this: Could you please explain exactly what you mean, because it seemed pretty clear to me that you were saying that a MacDonalds' in Red Square is economic imperialism.

I already did.

 

[russ_watters]

That post just said it isn't happening the other way, and that is clearly false. You can't create this false dichotomy. If it is imperialism for American companies to go overseas then it must also be imperialism for foreign companies to come here.

 

[LightbulbSun]

That post just said it isn't happening the other way, and that is clearly false. You can't create this false dichotomy. If it is imperialism for American companies to go overseas then it must also be imperialism for foreign companies to come here.

And I would agree with that line of thought. I am under the philosophy that companies should stay within their own country and not expand overseas. I am very much an advocate of maintaining a country's natural culture. I don't want to go overseas to see a bunch of McDonalds.

 

[Moonbear]

And I would agree with that line of thought. I am under the philosophy that companies should stay within their own country and not expand overseas. I am very much an advocate of maintaining a country's natural culture. I don't want to go overseas to see a bunch of McDonalds.

Really? You don't believe in international trade? So, if we don't have a resource here in the US, we shouldn't be allowed to import it or have an overseas company come here? And, if another country is unable to produce something, we shouldn't export it to them? Do you have any understanding of global commerce? If people overseas don't want or like McDonald's, they'd make no money there and shut down. I think if they want the industry there, then it's their choice.

 

[LightbulbSun]

Really? You don't believe in international trade? So, if we don't have a resource here in the US, we shouldn't be allowed to import it or have an overseas company come here? And, if another country is unable to produce something, we shouldn't export it to them? Do you have any understanding of global commerce? If people overseas don't want or like McDonald's, they'd make no money there and shut down. I think if they want the industry there, then it's their choice.

No, countries can import and export goods. I am an advocate though of maintaining a country's natural culture. I travel overseas to experience someone else's culture, and not to be saturated with American chains.

 

[russ_watters]

No, countries can import and export goods. I am an advocate though of maintaining a country's natural culture.

How can you not see that those two statements are mutually exclusive?

Heck, and how does that jive with the "melting pot" concept of the US??!

 

[LightbulbSun]

How can you not see that those two statements are mutually exclusive?

Heck, and how does that jive with the "melting pot" concept of the US??!

I do see them as mutually exclusive. Now I'm confused.

Every other country doesn't have a "melting pot" concept like we do Russ.

 

[CaptainQuasar]

Whoa, whoa, whoa. The definitions of imperialism being advanced here are not accurate.

To put a finer point on it: toppling a government is not imperialism unless the government is replaced by a puppet.

A foreign power being able to select the government of a country, or exercise veto power to remove an undesired government from power, is an extension of political hegemony over that country by the foreign power. In the cases where the United States removed a government (sometimes a democratically elected one) and the subsequent government was a dictatorship or monarchy (as in the Iranian coup) we had more political control of the country than its own citizens as a body did.

Let me put a finer point on it by expanding on that definition, since the definition doesn't really explain much. It requires historical context.

Up through about WWII, much of the world, including the US, operated under a very simple/straightforward form of imperialism: Country A decides they want country B, so country A invades/annexes country B and makes it a part of country A (or installs a puppet regime). Simple. I call this "classical imperialism" because it is the way imperialism worked for most of human history before WWII.

What you are describing there is European Colonialism, which is only a specific subset of imperialism, and a recent one at that. Most of the empires in history the entire world over: the Inca, the Mongols, the Hellenic empires, Carthage, the Hittites and Assyrians and Sumerians of the ancient world, the Persian empires, the empires of India and China, et cetera, worked the way the Roman Empire did. The only major exception were the Islamic empires that were interested in spreading a religion too.

The Romans would send an envoy to a small kingdom and say, "We rule the world, you owe us tribute." The king would say, "Like h▒ll I do." An army of goose-stepping soldiers in lorica segmata wielding cesti would march into the kingdom and beat them like a redheaded stepchild until they said "give". The army would pull out and move on to the next kingdom, perhaps leaving a few Roman officials to keep an eye on things. The kingdom started sending chests full of shiny stuff to Rome regularly and perhaps ships full of grain if they were good for that. If the tribute stopped, heads would roll.

(If you were the Mongols, you just beheaded every adult male immediately, put their heads on stakes outside the city gates, enslaved all the women and children, and kept doing that at every place you came to until your reputation preceded you and no one even thought of resisting. I don't remember the exact numbers but the did it so much that the overall population of the entire planet was significantly reduced during the formation of the Mongol Empire.)

Sure, the overt demands we have of whoever we permit to control the country (because when we're in the business of deposing disagreeable governments, whoever rules does it at our pleasure whether we picked him or he was just the last man standing) is usually just compliance with "American interests". The tribute is more indirect, through access of American companies to the country's private and public sectors and natural resources.

But the vast wealth we have extracted from places all over the world is imperial tribute as surely as the Egyptian grain that fed Rome or the Cornish tin from the British Isles that allowed Rome to produce bronze to make all the public statues that decorated Rome. And the obedience and power to select client kings that Rome had throughout its empire is the same form of hegemony we've exerted in countries all over Latin and South America, in the Caribbean, and in much of the rest of the world.

⚛​