America: an Empire in Denial

Thursday, March 27th, 2003

America: an Empire in Denial examines the good and bad elements of the British Empire:

When the British governed a country — even when they only influenced its government by flexing their military and financial muscles — there were certain distinctive features of their own society that they tended to disseminate. A list of the more important of these would run as follows:

1. The English language
2. English forms of land tenure
3. Scottish and English banking
4. The Common Law
5. Protestantism
6. Team sports
7. The limited or “night watchman” state
8. Representative assemblies
9. The idea of liberty

The last of these is perhaps the most important because it remains the most distinctive feature of the empire — the thing that sets it apart from its continental European rivals.

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