Endless Empire: Spain's Retreat, Europe's Eclipse, America's Decline

Brief Description: Throughout four millennia of recorded history there has been no end to empire, but instead an endless succession of empires. After five centuries of sustained expansion, the half-dozen European powers that ruled half of humanity collapsed with stunning speed after World War II, creating a hundred emerging nations in Asia and Africa. Amid this imperial transition, the United States became the new global hegemon, dominating this world order with an array of power that closely resembled that of its European predecessors. As Brazil, Russia, India, China, and the European Union now rise in global influence, twenty leading historians from four continents take a timely look backward and forward to discover patterns of eclipse in past empires that are already shaping a decline in U. S. global power, including: - erosion of economic and fiscal strength needed for military power on a global scale- misuse of military power through micro-military misadventures- breakdown of alliances among major powers- weakened controls over the subordinate elites critical for any empire's exercise of global power- insufficient technological innovation to sustain global force projection. Biographical Note: Alfred W. McCoy is the J. R. W. Smail Professor of History at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and author of "Policing America's Empire." Josep M. Fradera is professor of history at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona, Spain, and author of many books on Spanish colonial history, including "Colonias para despuEs de un imperio." Stephen Jacobson is associate professor of history at Pompeu Fabra and author of "Catalonia's Advocates."Review Quotes: "A rich combination of historical expertise, comparative perspective, and engagement with contemporary trends at the outset of the twenty-first century. It should be a foundational text and point of reference for teaching and scholarship on imperial histories and on American power in today's world."--John Sidel, London School of EconomicsReview Quotes: "An exceptionally comprehensive look at empire in a genuinely global context. The scope and sophistication of these essays are unequaled anywhere."--Franklin W. Knight, Johns Hopkins UniversityTable of Contents: Acknowledgments -- Part 1. Introduction -- Fatal Florescence: Europe's Decolonization and America's Decline / Alfred W. McCoy -- Part 2. Spain's Long Imperial Retreat -- Eclipse and Collapse of the Spanish Empire, 1650-1898 / Josep M. Delgado Ribas -- Empires in Retreat: Spain and Portugal after the Napoleonic Wars / Josep M. Fradera -- Imperial Ambitions in an Era of Decline: Micromilitarism and the Eclipse of the Spanish Empire, 1858-1923 / Stephen Jacobson -- The Empire Is No Longer a Social Unit: Declining Imperial Expectations and Transatlantic Crises in Metropolitan Spain, 1859-1909 / Albert Garcia BalaNA -- Part 3. Imperial Transitions in Latin America and the Philippines -- Facing South: How Latin America Socialized United States Diplomacy / Greg Grandin -- Alliance Imperialism and Anglo-American Power after 1898: The Origins of Open-Door Internationalism / Courtney Johnson -- Pro-imperialist Nationalists at the End of Spain's Caribbean Empire / Francisco A. Scarano -- Imperial Transition in the Philippines: The Making of a Colonial Discourse about Spanish Rule / MarIa Dolores Elizalde -- The Broken Image: The Spanish Empire in the United States after 1898 Christopher / Schmidt-Nowara -- Part 4. British Global Dominion and Decline -- Information and Intelligence in the Mid-Nineteenth-Century Crisis in the British Empire / Tony Ballantyne -- The Fin de SiEcles of Great Britain and the United States: Comparing Two Declining Phases of Global Capitalist Hegemony / Kelvin Santiago-Valles -- The Geopolitics of Decolonization / John Darwin -- Part 5. Complexities and Contradictions of French Decolonization -- The Absent Empire: The Colonies in French Constitutions / Emmanuelle Saada -- When Did Decolonization End? France and the Ending of Empire / Robert Aldrich -- Decolonizing France: L. S. Senghor's Redemptive Program for African Socialism / Gary Wilder -- Part 6. Subordinate Elites and Imperial Decline in Southeast Asia -- Informal Empire: The Case of Siam and the Middle East / Gregory A. Barton -- Scientific Patriotism: Medical Science and National Self-Fashioning in Southeast Asia / Warwick Anderson, Hans Pols -- Decolonization and the Roots of Democracy / Remco Raben -- Part 7. Imperial Decline and National Identities -- Natives Who Were Citizens and Natives Who Were IndIgenas in the Portuguese Empire, 1900-1926 / Cristina Nogueira Da Silva -- From Subjecthood to Citizenship in South Asia: Migration, Nationality, and the Post-imperial Global Order / Joya Chatterji -- Part 8. U. S. Global Hegemony -- The Three R's and the Making of a New World Order: Reparation, Reconstruction, Relief, and U. S. Policy, 1945-1952 / Greg Bankoff -- Entangled Empires: The United States and European Imperial Formations in the Mid-Twentieth Century / Julian Go -- Cold War Transition: Europe's Decolonization and Eisenhower's System of Subordinate Elites / Brett Reilly -- Imperial Illusions: Information Infrastructure and the Future of U. S. Global Power / Alfred W. McCoy -- Notes -- Contributors -- Index. Marc Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index. Review Quotes: "Without doubt an important contribution to world diplomacy and a credit to the University of Wisconsin Press for publishing it."--"Red Wing Republican Eagle"Review Quotes: "A rich, globally vast portrait of imperial decline that should interest scholars engaged in any aspect of history touched by empire's receding, relentlessly grasping tendrils."--"H-Net Reviews" Review Citations:

Choice 05/01/2013 (EAN 9780299290245, Paperback)

Choice 05/01/2013 (EAN 9780299290238, Other)

Contributor Bio:  McCoy, Alfred W Alfred W. McCoy is J. R. W. Smail Professor of History at the University of Wisconsin--Madison. His books include The Politics of Heroin and A Question of Torture. Contributor Bio:  Fradera, Josep M Josep M. Fradera is Professor of History at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra and a researcher at the InstituciA Catalana de Recerca i Estudis AvanA ats (ICREA). He is the author of Colonias para despuA(c)s de un imperio (2005). Contributor Bio:  Jacobson, Stephen Stephen Jacobson is a Ramon y Cajal Research Scholar at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona.