The Empire and the Five Kings: America’s Abdication and the Fate of the World

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One of the West's leading intellectuals offers a provocative look at America's withdrawal from world leadership and the rising powers who seek to fill the vacuum left behind. The United States was once the hope of the world, a beacon of freedom and the defender of liberal democracy. Nations and peoples on all continents looked to America to stand up for the values that created the Western world, and to oppose autocracy and repression. Even when America did not live up to its ideals, it still recognized their importance, at home and abroad. But as Bernard-Henri Lévy lays bare in this powerful and disturbing analysis of the world today, America is retreating from its traditional leadership role, and in its place have come five ambitious nations, former empires eager to assert power and influence. Lévy shows how these five nations — Russia, China, Turkey, Iran, and the Sunni Arab world — are taking steps to undermine the liberal values that have been a hallmark of Western civilization. The Empire and the Five Kings is a cri de coeur that draws upon lessons from history and the eternal touchstones of human culture to reveal the stakes facing the West as America retreats from its leadership role, a process that did not begin with Donald Trump's presidency and is not likely to end with him. The crisis is one whose roots can be found as far back as antiquity and whose resolution will require the West to find a new way forward if it — and its values — are to survive. Title Page......Page 2 Copyright Notice......Page 5 Prologue: On Dove’s Feet, the Kurds......Page 6 Part One: The Latest News from the Empire......Page 17 Chapter 1: Hegel’s Ghost......Page 18 Chapter 2: How the Word Came to America......Page 25 Chapter 3: Lest I Forget You, Jerusalem, Aeneas, Virgil......Page 33 Chapter 4: Jeremy Bentham and the Web......Page 46 Chapter 5: Thus Spake the Empire of the Eye and of Nothingness......Page 61 Part Two: Five Kingdoms on the Offensive......Page 73 Chapter 6: The Earth Shook in Kurdistan......Page 74 Chapter 7: Herodotus’s Trap......Page 85 Chapter 8: Dante, Abraham, and the War of the Five Kings......Page 99 Chapter 9: The Brown Wave......Page 114 Chapter 10: The Specters’ Ball......Page 129 Epilogue: Where Does the Sea Go at Ebb Tide?......Page 143 Index......Page 154 Also By Bernard-Henri Lévy......Page 169 About the Author......Page 170 Newsletter Sign-up......Page 171 Copyright......Page 173