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Imperialism is meant to serve the needs of a ruling class much more than a nation. It has nothing to do with democracy. Perhaps for that reason it has often been characterized as a parasitic phenomenon-even by critics as astute as John Hobson in his 1902 classic, Imperialism: A Study. And from there it is unfortunately all too easy to slide into the crude notion that imperialist expansion is simply a product of powerful groups of individuals who have hijacked a nation's foreign policy to serve their own narrow ends.
Numerous critics of the current expansion of the American empire-both on the U.S. left and in Europe-now argue that the United States under the administration of George W. Bush has been taken over by a neoconservative cabal, led by such figures as Paul Wolfowitz (deputy secretary of defense), Lewis Libby (the vice president's chief of staff), and Richard Perle (of the Defense Policy Board). This cabal is said to have the strong backing of Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld and Vice President Cheney, and, through them, President Bush. The rise to prominence of the neoconservative hegemonists within the administration is thought to have been brought on by the undemocratic 2000 election, in which the Supreme Court appointed Bush as president, and by the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, which suddenly enlarged the national security state. All of this has contributed, we are told, to a unilateralist and belligerent foreign policy at odds with the historic U.S. role in the world. As the Economist magazine raised this question in its April 26, 2003 issue: "So has a cabal taken over the foreign policy of the most powerful country in the world? Is a tiny group of ideologues using undue power to intervene in the internal affairs of other countries, create an empire, trash international law-and damn the consequences?"
The Economist's own answer was "Not really." Rightly rejecting the cabal theory, it argued instead that "the neo-cons are part of a broader movement" and that a "near-consensus [among U.S. policy elites] is found around the notion that America should use its power vigorously to reshape the world." But what is missing from the Economist and from all such mainstream discussions is the recognition that imperialism in this...