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By Root 961 0

it cannot simply seize local resources—Iraqi oil, for example—or annex their territory. The United States can (and does) offer ballot boxes, model constitutions, troop training, weapons, and billions of dollars in loans and aid. But it cannot (and does not want to) turn these foreign populations into Americans. Yet without some kind of “glue,” America has no means of overcoming the hostile, disintegrative forces that quickly tore apart Achaemenid Persia, the Great Mongol Empire, Tang China, and every other hyperpower in history that was unable to forge a common political identity that bound the central power with the peoples it dominated.

Moreover, democracy rests ultimately on legitimacy and consent. An “enlightened” or “liberal” empire may be an impossible feat, precisely because it requires an element of coercion inconsistent with democratic ideals. In June 2003, for example, L. Paul Bremer III, the head of the American military occupation in Iraq, unilaterally canceled local elections, even though the Iraqis were eager and ready to vote. Mr. Bremer based his decision on the grounds that conditions in Najaf were not yet appropriate for elections. A senior official in his office elaborated: “The most organized political groups in many areas are rejectionists, extremists, and remnants of the Ba'athists…They have an advantage over the other groups.” Not surprisingly, the barring of elections in Na-jaf, as well as later postponements of elections elsewhere in the country, produced tremendous anger at America throughout Iraq. This anti-Americanism—not to mention the continuing bombings and beheadings—in turn fueled a wave of hostility within the United States against the “ungrateful” Iraqis and “hopeless” Middle Easterners generally.

It is hard to imagine how an American empire could possibly flourish or even serve United States interests. In today's world, an aggressively militaristic hyperpower incurs massive costs—whether measured in terms of money spent, lives lost, legitimacy squandered, or hatred provoked—without any of the benefits that accrued to empires of the past. The face of an American empire is present-day Iraq: hundreds of thousands of U.S. troops caught far from home in the middle of a sectarian war, disliked and targeted on all sides, with no obvious upside or even concrete objective in sight.

To be clear, this is not an argument for America to embrace pacifism or isolationism. The battle against terrorism may require strong military measures, and the United States could, if it chooses, deploy its armed forces on limited humanitarian missions to prevent ethnic cleansing or other crimes against humanity. The argument rather is against empire building—the use of America's world-dominant military abroad to achieve regime change and remake other nations by imposing American-style institutions. At the same time, trumpeting the United States’ intention to maintain its global hegemony at any cost, including through military means, has only hurt our standing among other nations.

Instead, the United States would be better off following the formula that served it so well for more than two hundred years. America pulled away from all its rivals by turning itself into a magnet for the world's most energetic and enterprising; by creating a society in which individuals of all ethnicities and backgrounds have an opportunity to rise; by rewarding talent and ingenuity no matter what its source; and finally, with a few notorious exceptions, by shrewdly avoiding unnecessary, self-destructive military entanglements and expansionist adventures overseas. The United States would be far truer to its own history and principles striving to be an exemplar for the world—a “city on a hill”—rather than arrogating to itself the Sisyphean task of remaking societies around the world in its own image.

But America in the twenty-first century cannot think of itself only as a city on the hill. Having achieved world dominance, America—like every hyperpower that preceded it—is acutely dependent on the cooperation, the contributions, and the