Empire and Moral Identity‪.‬

For many critics, simply to call any political arrangement an "empire" is, at the present political conjuncture, to condemn it. (1) But on what grounds? Both defenders and critics of empire often focus on the effects of empire on the subject peoples, or on the stability of the international system. Will benevolent imperial tutelage bring tangible benefits such as liberty, democracy, and security to the subject peoples? Will it make the international system more stable and less liable to be held hostage by a few insolent powers or small groups? These questions regarding the external effects of empire are legitimate and constitute the terrain over which the recent debate over the so-called American Empire has been carried out. But there is an older tradition of thought that is sharply critical of empire that focuses less on its external effects than on the ways in which the building and maintenance of empire can transform the imperial power itself. This tradition focuses in particular on the ways in which empire shapes the moral identity of the imperial power. According to this tradition, empire will predictably transform the moral identity of the imperial nation, implicating it in acts of power that are antithetical to its constitutive values. Its political constitution, for example, is often transformed by changes in the internal balance of power between different branches of government and different sections of society. Executives can strengthen themselves at the expense of legislatures by appealing to "military necessity" to reallocate resources internally, and the effects of empire on the domestic economy can be far-reaching. Moreover, these critics insist, imperial nations can become captive to the project of building and maintaining empire itself. Empires, in whatever circumstances they may arise, and whatever justifications may be offered for them, increasingly come to define national ambitions, purposes, and priorities. An empire is a constitutional usurpation in every sense of the term. This essay examines the ways in which empire can transform the moral identity of the imperial nation. It argues that these transformations profoundly affect the imperial nation's standing in the world: they often diminish the prestige and authority of the nation and its ability to mobilize support based on the power of its own example.