Political economy

Imperialism, as defined by The Dictionary of Human Geography, is "the creation and maintenance of an unequal economic, cultural, and territorial relationship, usually between states and often in the form of an empire, based on domination and subordination." The imperialism of the last 500 years, as described by the above work, is primarily a western undertaking that employs "expansionist – mercantilism and latterly communist – systems."[1] Geographical domains have included the Mongolian Empire, Roman Empire, the Ottoman Empire, the Holy Roman Empire, the Portuguese Empire, the Spanish Empire, the Dutch Empire, the Persian Empire, the French Empire,[2] the Russian Empire,[3] the Chinese Empire, and the British Empire,[4] but the term can equally be applied to domains of knowledge, beliefs,