Death has a volatile "exchange rate" on the "world market", while politics systematically distorts values and proportions, and also exaggerates interests. Is it only the threatening with death, extermination and the prospect of mass destruction that could impede death, extermination and mass destruction?

Emanuel Todd: Après l'Empire: Essai sur la décomposition du système américain, Gallimard, Paris 2002

Miskolc, 4-5 April 2003

Michael Hardt-Antonio Negri: Empire, Harvard University Press, Cambridge, Mass and London, 2000

No matter how impressive the material consequences of globalization may be, it seems evident that its soft dimension, that is, the cultural expansion is at least as important in maintaining America's power. The ability to persuade others to want what we want by emphasizing the appeal of the American lifestyle is much more beneficial than military or political coercion.