Do you consider the US to be an empire and if so why?

Answer 1

No.

The US controls no countries outside it's borders. It has no direct say in any other country's foreign affairs.

Is the US an influence? Yes. However, that doesn't make it an empire.

To understand the modern empire, look to England and the Ottoman Turks.

Answer 2

At most we could be called "the reluctant empire." Our traditional push for expansive trade has often put us in position to look a lot like an empire, but if you look at China in the time around 1900, for instance, you'll see that other countries were carving China into "their parts," where the US was trying to do a Rodney King "why can't we all just get along?" thing. And from the end of WW II to about 1990, the US found itself the last of the western powers with huge strength, the others having spent/warred themselves out of empire. We simply filled a power vacuum to balance communism ( and that reluctantly--our military had downsized so much in 1950 that we really got kicked at the onset of the Korean conflict). In a world of proliferation of WMD's, nobody can afford for us to be caught short as we were before, so we have worldwide obligations that we carry simply because only we can.

Answer 3

An empire generally refers to either a group of nations ruled by an emperor, or, at times, a single nation under the rule of a emperor. An emperor is most often understood as the sovereign ruler of a group of people. Hence, we cannot say that the president is an emperor, and so we can therefore draw that the United States is not, in fact, an empire.

Answer 4

In the strict sense of having legal colonies probably not. However the United States does have sovereignty over a variety of areas the inhabitants of which (those which are inhabited) do not have the full rights of citizens of the 50 states and DC. Notably these include American Samoa,Guam, Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands along with a variety of uninhabited islands. Some or all of these could be considered de facto colonies thus making of the US an imperial power.

Answer 5

Yes, but not in the same way as previous empires. In previous empires, to gain power you needed to conquer enemy territories. To conquer peoples and then take their resources. But nowadays it isn't as necessary. We've become too advanced technologically and economically, and the power now is in politics and military. The one who can destroy an enemy is the most powerful, so the one with the biggest and most advanced military is the strongest; not the one with the most land.

And the one with the most control over the information available, because that is how you control thoughts, is the most powerful. That is one of the major reasons terrorists have seemed so powerful when they have nothing really compared to what they are fighting. They are better with the propaganda on their own people, while our information is too readily available to us. We find out almost immediately when ours die and we hate the government for sending them to their death. They don't find out sometimes ever their child has died, and even when they do it is an honor.

That is why the Bush adminstration attacks so hard the media. He is attempted to gain control over it so he can run better propaganda for his side. It has its advantages (we are more likely to support the war if we don't know what is going on in it), but it is the path to dictatorship.

I consider motive the main reason when you classify anyone. The fact that the Bush adminstration hasn't yet fully gained control of the media (they are close, but not yet), doesn't change the fact that they aren't trying. I classify them as emperors and dictators not because they actually do it but because they are trying to become it. They are an empire if only because that is their final goal.

Answer 6

It's a continental empire like the Soviet Union. When it got independence it was only thirteen states and proceeded to expand by war and land purchase, inflicting genocide on the natives.
To people who disgree just remember that NewYork calls itself the Empire State and has the Empire State building. there's a reason for that.

Answer 7

The word "empire" bears no relation to an internal system of government. Nor does it have sanything to do with the strict military control or soveignty of other nations. The Athenian Empire, though it did flex its military muscle, controlled other peoples and meddled in their politics (often installing friendly "democratic" governments) often without ever placing a military garrison or otherwise infringing on a city's soverenty.

An empire seeks to control the actions of other nations for its own benefit. America does not engage in imperialism in the 19th century sense. Firstly because it is a dirty and loaded word and the people do not care to hoist such a term on ourselves. Second, as touched on above, it does not fit the realities of today's geopolitics. Its alot cheaper to alter the economic politics of a soveign government to our own benefit then it is to physically occupy a nation.

So do we do this? Do we fund "friendly" governments, alter elections, have military bases around the world, bring modern economic weapons to bear on nations who do not toe our line? The answer is yes. Do we send our military around to billyclub the little fellas? Panama, Grenada, Iraq, Vietnam, Dominican Republic? Yes we do.

The concept of an empire and how it applied itself has evolved throughout the milenia. America is simply an empire in its most modern form.

Answer 8

No!

An empire refers to a monarchy!

I know, the word is used loosely in modern times when someone has great wealth and clout - one is said to have built an empire, but the true meaning of the word precludes this.

Answer 9

Empires conquer other countries for economic exploitation. Does the US have any?

Answer 10

No, The US insn't a monarchy, but Dubya might think he's the King of the World