ABSTRACT
American Empire is the current rage, whether hailed or denounced, accepted as inevitable or greeted as an historic opportunity, where the empire is a political control exercised by one organized political unit over another unit separate from and alien to it. Many factors enter into empire-economics, technology, ideology, religion, above all military strategy and weaponry, but the essential core is political: the possession of final authority by one entity over the vital political decisions of another. But real empire requires that effective final authority, and states can enjoy various forms of superiority or even domination over others without being empires. An imperial power rules the system, imposes its decision when it wishes. Recent developments reshaping the international system reinforce this longstanding trend, making empire increasingly unworkable and more needed, and more potentially stable and beneficial. A hegemonic power is the one without whom no final decision can be reached within a given system; its responsibility is essentially managerial.
