"A small volume for igniting big discussions" (Booklist), the renowned historian Eric Hobsbawm's On Empire is a major new intellectual resource for anyone seeking to understand America's fate in the new millennium. In four brief chapters encompassing a century of world history, Hobsbawm engages the key questions of our era with his characteristic wit, precision, and historical breadth of knowledge. A startling image of danger and instability emerges as On Empire sketches the tangled relationship between globalization, war, and the prospects for peace in a world that has witnessed uninterrupted military conflict since 1914. It is against this somber backdrop that Hobsbawm offers his views about why America will never achieve the dominance of past empires--despite the overwhelming preponderance of U.S. military power in the world. And in a powerful series of historical observations about the war in Iraq, Hobsbawm dismantles every major assumption underlying American military strategy, demonstrating the utter futility of U.S. hopes for "victory" in the Middle East. "Good grounds for heated discussion about America's role in the world" (Kirkus Reviews), On Empire is a brilliant new intellectual volley from "our greatest living historian" (The New York Review of Books).

Author Biography

Eric Hobsbawm was born in Alexandria in 1917 and educated in Austria, Germany and England. He taught at Birkbeck College, University of London, and then at the New School for Social Research in New York. In addition to The Age of Revolution, The Age of Capital, The Age of Empire and The Age of Extremes, his books include Bandits, Revolutionaries, Uncommon People, and his memoir Interesting Times. Eric Hobsbawm died in 2012.