Empire

In the span of just four hundred years, how did an island nation on the rain- and fog-shrouded northwestern edge of the European continent grow step by step into the British Empire that spanned the globe—and how did it reshape the face of the modern world through colonization, trade, capital, and war? This is the central question Niall Ferguson seeks to answer in this book. The author does not set out to write a general history of the British Empire; instead, he treats the expansion of empire and colonies as an early form of globalization, using chronology as the backbone and six major themes to thread the narrative together: the globalization of commodity markets, of labor markets, of culture, of political systems, of capital markets, and of war. From the sugar plantations and pirate trade of the Caribbean to the American War of Independence and the transportation of convicts to Australia, and on to the Victorian "civilizing mission," the military technology of long-range warfare, and the imperial tax system, the book lays out one by one the concrete mechanisms by which imperial power accumulated and projected itself outward. Within this framework, Ferguson does not shy away from the violence, plunder, and oppression of empire, but places greater emphasis on arguing for the empire's long-term impact on trade networks, financial institutions, legal systems, and linguistic landscapes. He examines the empire's decline against the backdrop of competition with other powerful empires, the shocks of two world wars, and the awakening of nationalist consciousness in the colonies, and asks what has become of Britain's standing today. The book combines the perspectives of economic and financial history with vignettes of people and events, reading more like a polemical work about "where globalization came from" than a straightforward historical narrative.