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Thousand Years of Imperial History

(us) Krishan Kumar

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Krishan Kumar, a well-known American scholar, painted a panoramic view of empires spanning a thousand years in "A History of Empires". He started with the Roman Empire and analyzed the five empires of the Ottoman Empire, the Habsburg Dynasty, the Russian Empire, the British Empire and the French Empire. These empires all believed that they shouldered the mission of universal civilization, and struggled and struggled for it. Kumar attempts to interpret the rulers and people of the empire from a new perspective, how they sought legitimacy for imperial rule, how they understood themselves, and how in the process of establishing a universal world order, the imperial rulers left a diverse political legacy that is closely related to today's world. Unlike most works that describe the development of empires, this book focuses on the relationship between rulers and people. The empire is not only a common cause pursued by the two, but also a community formed by the entangled interests of all parties. Kumar also specifically discussed the difference between empires and nation-states, mentioning that rulers will deliberately suppress their own national identity in order to protect the country's long-term destiny. However, this also brings confusion to the identity of major ethnic groups and a series of problems that this confusion ultimately causes. The difficulties that these empires once encountered, including how to deal with differences between different countries, multicultural coordination within countries, harmonious coexistence of multiple ethnic groups, and international talent flows, still exist today. It can be said that empire holds a mirror to reflect on today's pressing political issues, even the pain before the birth of a new world order. Especially for multi-ethnic China, we can use this to examine the relationship between nations and countries, international exchanges, and the mission of a great power.