ABSTRACT
Inter-American relations have always been part of global Realpolitik , whether in the first epoch of globalization at the beginning of the colonial period, during the post-Enlightenment era of revolutions and wars of independence, or in the ideological bisection of the planet during the Cold War of the 20th century. In terms of a disciplinary discourse, then, Inter-American Studies is more properly International American Studies, as demonstrated by the 21st century’s intense forms of globalized American entanglements, with the earlier Pan-American asymmetries now emerging as precursor, integral components of a Pangaean and truly planetary complex. Thomas Jefferson’s nomination of the new republic in 1780 as the “empire of liberty” takes on new meaning in the current era, whose imperialism Karl Marx had proleptically defined as “the highest stage of capitalism.” Inter-American relations are now more inextricably enmeshed than ever in the geopolitics of monopoly capital and the techno-politically innovative forms of extractive imperialism through the latest avatars of globalization and resurgent, morphing colonialism. This chapter traces some of the key dynamics of this development.
