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The focus of the book is the cost of empire, particularly the cost in the American case - the internal burden of American global leadership. The book builds an argument about the propensity of external responsibilities to undermine the internal strength, raising the question of the link between weakening and the global spread of American power.

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Contents Introduction PART I: THE PROBLEM 1. The Nature of Our Contemporary Condition 2. The Question of Empire PART II: THE PARALLELS 3. The Glory that was Rome 4. Spain: The Rise and Fall of a Dynastic Empire 5. The Rise and Fall of the British Empire 6. Russian Empires Old and New 7. Lessons of Empire PART III: THE RECKONING 8. A New Rome on the Potomac? 9. Towards a Better America Notes

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David Coates holds the Worrell Chair in Anglo-American Studies at Wake Forest University, USA. He previously held personal chairs at the universities of Leeds and Manchester in the UK. He has written extensively on US and UK public policy, comparative political economy, and the history of labor movements.

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