ABSTRACT

Early historians from Herodotus to Gibbon examined the rise and fall of empires as perhaps their underlying theme and produced what we would now refer to as ‘imperial histories’.2 Historians of the modern era continued this tradition of studying empires and the attendant processes of ‘imperialism’. Indeed, as Stephen Howe writes, ‘it could be said that all history is imperial – or colonial – history, if one takes a broad enough definition and goes far enough back’.3 Although the dominant imperial systems have collapsed, their legacies persist throughout the world today as well as within the historiographical landscape wherein there is a thriving debate among scholars as to what has replaced the empires of old. For example, does the USA and its allies, transnational companies, financial and media institutions, or the forces of ‘globalization’ constitute a new imperial world order?4 In the recent literature on empire, scholars have explored how European imperialism was a precursor to globalization.5 One key work within this tradition is Niall Ferguson’s Empire: The Rise and Demise of the British World Order and the Lessons of Global Power wherein he postulates that, for good or ill, the British Empire paved the way to an interconnected world and as such, remains the empire’s most enduring and revolutionary legacy.6