Sign up to save your podcasts
Or
Share Miles M. Evers and Eric Grynaviski, "The Price of Empire: American Entrepreneurs and the Origins of America's First Pacific Empire" (Cambridge UP, 2024)
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Or
Miles M. Evers and Eric Grynaviski, "The Price of Empire: American Entrepreneurs and the Origins of America's First Pacific Empire" (Cambridge UP, 2024)
The United States was an upside-down British Empire. It had an agrarian economy, few large investors, and no territorial holdings outside of North America. However, decades before the Spanish-American War, the United States quietly began to establish an empire across thousands of miles of Pacific Ocean.
While conventional wisdom suggests that large interests – the military and major business interests – drove American imperialism, The Price of Empire: American Entrepreneurs and the Origins of America's First Pacific Empire (Cambridge University Press, 2024) argues that early American imperialism was driven by small entrepreneurs. When commodity prices boomed, these small entrepreneurs took risks, racing ahead of the American state. Yet when profits were threatened, they clamored for the US government to follow them into the Pacific.
Through novel, intriguing stories of American small businessmen, this book shows how American entrepreneurs manipulated the United States into pursuing imperial projects in the Pacific. It explores their travels abroad and highlights the consequences of contemporary struggles for justice in the Pacific.
Our guests today are: Miles M. Evers, who is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Connecticut; and Eric Grynaviski, who is an Associate Professor of Political Science and International Affairs at George Washington University.
Our host is Eleonora Mattiacci, an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Amherst College. She is the author of "Volatile States in International Politics" (Oxford University Press, 2023).
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/east-asian-studies
View all episodes
By Marshall Poe
4.5
5757 ratings
The United States was an upside-down British Empire. It had an agrarian economy, few large investors, and no territorial holdings outside of North America. However, decades before the Spanish-American War, the United States quietly began to establish an empire across thousands of miles of Pacific Ocean.
While conventional wisdom suggests that large interests – the military and major business interests – drove American imperialism, The Price of Empire: American Entrepreneurs and the Origins of America's First Pacific Empire (Cambridge University Press, 2024) argues that early American imperialism was driven by small entrepreneurs. When commodity prices boomed, these small entrepreneurs took risks, racing ahead of the American state. Yet when profits were threatened, they clamored for the US government to follow them into the Pacific.
Through novel, intriguing stories of American small businessmen, this book shows how American entrepreneurs manipulated the United States into pursuing imperial projects in the Pacific. It explores their travels abroad and highlights the consequences of contemporary struggles for justice in the Pacific.
Our guests today are: Miles M. Evers, who is an Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Connecticut; and Eric Grynaviski, who is an Associate Professor of Political Science and International Affairs at George Washington University.
Our host is Eleonora Mattiacci, an Assistant Professor of Political Science at Amherst College. She is the author of "Volatile States in International Politics" (Oxford University Press, 2023).
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/east-asian-studies
More shows like New Books in East Asian Studies
View all
The New Yorker Radio Hour
6,680 Listeners
Economist Podcasts
4,169 Listeners
The Political Scene | The New Yorker
4,012 Listeners
Fareed Zakaria GPS
3,390 Listeners
New Books in Philosophy
111 Listeners
New Books in History
212 Listeners
New Books in Military History
161 Listeners
New Books in Critical Theory
150 Listeners
New Books in Religion
29 Listeners
New Books in Psychoanalysis
189 Listeners
Foreign Policy Live
602 Listeners
New Books in African American Studies
165 Listeners
New Books in Literary Studies
23 Listeners
New Books in Native American Studies
104 Listeners
New Books in American Studies
30 Listeners
New Books in Intellectual History
61 Listeners
Sinica Podcast
611 Listeners
ChinaPower
205 Listeners
The DSR Network
1,760 Listeners
ChinaTalk
288 Listeners
Interesting Times with Ross Douthat
7,033 Listeners
Pekingology
139 Listeners
New Books in Chinese Studies
10 Listeners
The Ezra Klein Show
16,144 Listeners
Ones and Tooze
350 Listeners