Charles S. Maier

Two new books attempt to explain U.S. power and policy in imperial terms. Unfortunately for their authors, the United States neither has nor is an empire.

The malaise that currently sours public opinion in Europe, Japan and North America is a manifestation of a crisis, not economic or political, but moral. The Gilded Age that accompanied the rise of new nation-states in the late nineteenth century ushered in a similar era of civic discontent. Today, exhausted by the end of the Cold War, people are disillusioned with great projects, skeptical of reform and distrustful of politicians. Populists fuel old resentments and xenophobia as they promise national renewal. This crisis of the democracies could lead to either an era of reform or disintegration. America can help prevent the latter.