This sharp and authoritative account of American foreign relations analyzes the last fifteen years of foreign policy in relation to the last forty years, since the end of the Cold War. Provides an overview and understanding of the recent history of U.S. foreign relations from the viewpoint of one of the most respected authorities in the field Includes suggestions for further reading.

"The Fall of the American Empire" not only asks thought-provoking questions about the state of the nation, but also proposes solutions to make the country prosper in the 21st century.

The United States rose from a modest colonial power to a formidable world superpower, but then it went into decline. M. Y. Demeri traces the major events that allowed a loosely held league of thirteen British colonies to become a union of fifty states spanning the North American continent as well as Alaska and Hawaii. The nation would revolutionize world arts, science, technology, space exploration, and lead the digital revolution--all while promoting the ideals of democracy, freedom, and liberty. But it also contributed to global conflicts, a nuclear arms race, political upheavals, and the financial collapse of world markets. To this day, it has failed to live up to its promise of turning economic success and prosperity into social progress. With more than two hundred charts and tables, this book examines where America has been, what led to its decline, and how a rising deficit, soaring health care and Social Security costs, national security concerns, and miscarriages of social justice pushed it into decline. More importantly, however, it offers solutions to reverse course before we witness the end of The Rise and Decline of the American Empire.

"Compelling, provocative, and learned. This book is a stunning and sophisticated reevaluation of the American empire. Hopkins tells an old story in a truly new way--American history will never be the same again."--Jeremi Suri, author of The Impossible Presidency: The Rise and Fall of America's Highest Office.Office.

It's been almost a century and a half since a critical mass of Americans believed that secession was an American birthright. But breakaway movements large and small are rising up across the nation. From Vermont to Alaska, activists driven by all manner of motives want to form new states-and even new nations. So, just what's happening out there? The American Empire is dying, says Bill Kauffman in this incisive, eye-opening investigation into modern-day secession-the next radical idea poised to enter mainstream discourse. And those rising up to topple that empire are a surprising mix of conservatives, liberals, regionalists, and independents who-from movement to movement-may share few political beliefs but who have one thing in common: a sense that our nation has grown too large, and too powerfully centralized, to stay true to its founding principles. Bye Bye, Miss American Empire traces the historical roots of the secessionist spirit, and introduces us to the often radical, sometimes quixotic, and highly charged movements that want to decentralize and re-localize power. During the George W. Bush administration, frustrated liberals talked secession back to within hailing distance of the margins of national debate, a place it had not occupied since 1861. Now, secessionist voices on the left and right and everywhere in between are amplifying. Writes Kauffman, "The noise is the sweet hum of revolution, of subjects learning how to be citizens, of people shaking off . . . their Wall Street and Pentagon overlords and taking charge of their lives once more." Engaging, illuminating, even sometimes troubling, Bye Bye, Miss American Empire is a must-read for those taking the pulse of the nation.

With the cold war over and the Soviet empire dead, a new examination of American national policies and priorities is beginning. Most of the economic, political and military costs of the American empire, which exceed $1 trillion each year, are being questioned for the first time since World War II. Touted by George Washington as the infant empire, the United States expanded across the North American continent and at the turn of the twentiety century into the Pacific and Caribbean. At the end of World War II, it became the leader of the free world, a world empire of unprecedented power. However, by the 1980s, the strain of world leadership became apparent and signs of economic decline appeared, which is the inevitable fate of all empires. Jim Hanson undertakes this examination of imperial overstretch and decline and calls for a rechanneling of national energies into solving world-wide problems of war, environmental deterioration, and over-population. This historic-based and analytic critique of imperial America will interest scholars and students of American and world history, political and social science, economics, and foreign affairs.