Empires – or political units made up of several territories and peoples, typically created by conquest and divided between a dominant center and subordinate peripheries – have existed across recorded time, both ancient and modern. The political economy of empire as a scholarly enterprise can take several forms, including studying the costs required to maintain and defend the empire; the profits generated by peripheries (or “colonies”); the laws regulating trade within the empire and development within the colonies; and the conflicts within and across empires for current and future wealth. Scholars of comparative economic and political development have long studied empire, and modern formal and quantitative tools in social science – along with greater focus on and appreciation of the “deep roots” of history and their impact on contemporary political-economic decision making – have created new and exciting avenues for inquiry.

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