American imperialism in the context of "Anti-imperialism"

Manifest destiny was the expansionist belief in the 19th-century United States that American settlers were destined to expand westward across North America, and that this belief was both obvious ("manifest") and certain ("destiny"). The belief is rooted in American exceptionalism and romantic nationalism, implying the inevitable spread of republicanism and the American way. It is one of the earliest expressions of American imperialism.

According to historian William Earl Weeks, there were three basic tenets behind the concept:

The 21st century is the current century in the Anno Domini or Common Era, in accordance with the Gregorian calendar. It began on 1 January 2001 (MMI), and will end on 31 December 2100 (MMC). It is the first century of the 3rd millennium.

The rise of a global economy and Third World consumerism marked the beginning of the century, along with increased private enterprise and deepening concern over terrorism after the September 11 attacks in 2001. The NATO intervention in Afghanistan and the United States-led coalition intervention in Iraq in the early 2000s, as well as the overthrow of several regimes during the Arab Spring in the early 2010s, led to mixed outcomes in the Arab world, resulting in several civil wars and political instability. The early 2020s saw an increase in wars across the world, including a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian war and the Gaza war. Meanwhile, the war on drugs continues, with the focus primarily on Mexico and the rest of Latin America. The United States has remained the sole global superpower, while China is now considered to be an emerging superpower.

Juan Evo Morales Ayma (Spanish: [xwan ˈeβo moˈɾales ˈajma]; born 26 October 1959) is a Bolivian politician, trade union organizer, and former cocalero coca farmer who served as the 65th president of Bolivia from 2006 to 2019. Widely regarded as the country's first president to come from its indigenous population, his administration worked towards the implementation of left-wing policies, focusing on safeguarding the legal rights and improving the socioeconomic conditions of Bolivia's previously marginalized indigenous majority and combating the political influence of the United States and resource-extracting multinational corporations. Ideologically a socialist, he led the Movement for Socialism (MAS) party from 1998 to 2024.

Born to an Aymara family of subsistence farmers in Isallawi, Orinoca Canton, Morales undertook a basic education and mandatory military service before moving to the Chapare in 1978. Growing coca and becoming a trade unionist, he rose to prominence in the campesino ("rural laborer") union. In that capacity, he campaigned against joint U.S.–Bolivian attempts to eradicate coca as part of the war on drugs, denouncing these as an imperialist violation of indigenous Andean culture. His involvement in anti-government direct action protests resulted in multiple arrests. Morales entered electoral politics in 1995, was elected to Congress in 1997 and became leader of MAS in 1998. Coupled with populist rhetoric, he campaigned on issues affecting indigenous and poor communities, advocating land reform and more equal redistribution of money from Bolivian gas extraction. He gained increased visibility through the Cochabamba Water War and the Gas War. In 2002, he was expelled from Congress for encouraging anti-government protests, although he came second in that year's presidential election.

The United States has been involved in hundreds of interventions in foreign countries throughout its history, engaging in nearly 400 military interventions between 1776 and 2023, with half of these operations occurring since 1950 and over 25% occurring in the post-Cold War period. Common objectives of U.S. foreign interventions have historically revolved around economic opportunity, protection of U.S. citizens and diplomats, territorial expansion, counterterrorism, fomenting regime change and nation-building, promoting democracy and enforcing international law.

There have been two dominant ideologies in the United States about foreign policy—interventionism, which encourages military and political intervention in the affairs of foreign countries—and isolationism, which discourages these.

Sir Niall Campbell Ferguson, HonFRSE (/niːl/ NEEL; born 18 April 1964) is a British-American historian who is the Milbank Family Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and a senior fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard University. Previously, he was a professor at Harvard University, the London School of Economics, New York University, a visiting professor at the New College of the Humanities, and a senior research fellow at Jesus College, Oxford. He was a visiting lecturer at the London School of Economics for the 2023/2024 academic year and at Tsinghua University in China from 2019 to 2020. He is a co-founder of the University of Austin.

Ferguson writes and lectures on international history, economic history, financial history, and the history of the British Empire and American imperialism. He holds positive views concerning the British Empire. In 2004, he was one of Time magazine's 100 most influential people in the world. Ferguson has written and presented numerous television documentary series, including The Ascent of Money, which won an International Emmy Award for Best Documentary in 2009. In 2024, he was knighted by King Charles III for services to literature.

This article covers the cultural history of the United States primarily since its founding in the late 18th century. The region has had patterns of original settlement by different peoples, and later settler colonial states and societal setups. Various immigrant groups have been at play in the formation of the nation's culture. While different ethnic groups may display their own insular cultural aspects, throughout time a broad American culture has developed that encompasses the entire country. Developments in the culture of the United States in modern history have often been followed by similar changes in the rest of the world (American cultural imperialism).

This includes knowledge, customs, and arts of Americans, as well as events in the social, cultural, and political spheres.