russ_watters said:
When was the last time our empire grew, under the definition of the term that fits what the Romans did?
I hate to necropost, but I'd like to offer a sort of compromise to these conflicting ideas.
I think, at least in the social sector, the global masses have reached a less violent sort of society, we are becoming more civilized in that aspect. News also travels faster nowdays, and large amounts of countries are united in treaties. You can't be like Rome today, you'd get your ass handed to you by the EU or UN and their allying with anyone you're wrecklessly conquering.
Instead, we set up economic institutions and figure out ways to slowly drain their economy into ours, but also making their economy appear to be stronger (i can't say whether it really does or not, because it's so complicated of an interaction. I know in some cases it does, and in some it doesn't.) .
We do go to war, and conquest, but we have to come up with very convincing reasons, and obviously we're willing to push the bounds on cases where the UN or EU (or whoever would try to handle the US if it went Rogue) can't really take harsh action against us, but isn't obligated to support us either.
When people say 'we are the new Rome' they're referring to an evolution of the idea of conquest that is less (note, less, not non) violent, and more economically based.
Further more, the idea of empire is more evolved too. We're a representative democracy, we don't chose to go to war as the people, hell we don't always get to chose our president. The whole idea of war is run in our immediate physical interests but absent of our moral interest or long-term well-being. I have no say in cabinet members (edit:) which have a lot of say in our foreign affairs... which eventually comes back to the US individuals and domestic businesses in some form or another.
Economically, it's been shown (starting with the Hobbes/Locke era) that being an empire sucks, because that limits your profits. If the markets to free, you won't be able to make money off of it as the government, but if you find a spot in between, you can effectively make more profits and still manage the consequences of a free market.
Superpower is the new form of Empire, that's all. Same underlying concept, different means, and we're the leading Superpower.
disclaimer: damn it jim! I'm a scientist, not a political economist (but I'm taking a political economy class, so forgive me if I'm drawing premature conclusions about the current state of affairs)
