Is the empire the USA? (Rome and Mesopotamia egs) What of the British Empire as a more poignant example of what happens in financial situations.

If we are talking about modern day, the last 200years, economy then perhaps the empire takes on different connotations as states change function and we witness what was forecast in the 1970s with corporates taking greater control?

Same elites switching which horse to back - What we are really asking is how people have more vested interest in the World they live in.

Surely we start to talk more of changed dynamics as new economies open and drastically changed approaches to what is consdiered success emerge in the older economies. Green growth? Changes in what constitutes a job and hence what is tax for?

Have a read on the piece here under my name - regarding status quo, false equilibrium and working the control of the swing momentum - Nice provocation Tim and some great inputs here