Opinion Why not have empire? By Douglas Lummis	フレームで見る  英文をプリントする  脚注をプリントする
帝国には報復の時が訪れる 他国市民の権利や威厳を軽視することは、自国の市民のそれらを軽視することにつながる。 帝国の犠牲となるのは、結局自国の市民なのだ。

For half a century after World War II, empire was taboo. As the United Nations Charter stated, the post-war world was to be based on "respect for the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples" (Art. 1). The United Nations would usher in a new age, and empire would become a thing of the past.

There were still people who accused the Western powers, especially the United States,of, neo-imperialism or neo-colonialism. They (rather, we; I was one of them) argued that while these countries were not ruling the poor countries as colonies the way the 19th-century imperialists did, they were still dominating and exploiting them through economic means.

The argument would go like this. The critic of a government would say, "That's imperialism," and the defender would respond, "No, it isn't." Both would agree that imperialism was wrong, but disagree on whether the government's policies were, in fact, imperialistic.

In the past three years, this has changed. Now if you accuse the U.S. government of building an empire, the answer is, "That's right. So what?"

When empire was taboo, you didn't have to explain what was wrong with it. "Empire" was another word for "wrong." Not any more. Arundhati Roy, the Indian writer, talked about this in her Jan. 16 speech to the World Social Forum in Mumbai, India. "In the great cities of Europe and America," she said, "where a few years ago these things would only have been whispered, now people are openly talking about the good side of imperialism. Occasionally some of us are invited to 'debate' the issue on 'neutral' platforms. Debating imperialism is a bit like debating the pros and cons of rape. What can we say? That we really miss it?"

Indeed, what can we say? But it seems we have to say something. As I have pointed out in this column before, U.S. foreign policy has become openly imperialist. Its defenders no longer deny it. To cry out, "But that's empire!" no longer has any effect. You have to explain what's wrong with that.

One person who has offered an answer is Chalmers Johnson, in his books "Blowback" (2000) and "The Sorrows of Empire" (2004). What is wrong with empire is summarized in the title to the earlier work: blowback. If you try to rule foreign peoples through violence, which is what empire is, the violence will return to destroy you.

Blowback can take the form of direct violence (Johnson has described the 9/11 attacks as quintessential blowback). Or it can take indirect forms. A government's contempt for people's rights and dignity abroad eventually becomes contempt for rights and dignity at home. Law becomes corrupted, freedoms are infringed upon, lying becomes normal political discourse. Eventually the people in the imperial homeland, who perhaps imagined they would gain something from their empire, find themselves its victims.

This is not the only argument against empire, not necessarily even the best one, but it's pretty good. Its greatest flaw is that it is aimed only at the people in the imperial homeland. But of course the victims of empire don't need such an argument. For them blowback, far from being a drawback, may be the only part of empire that they like.

Shukan ST: April 9, 2004

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