Empires

Characteristics

Empires were seen as expanding power and administration, and guaranteeing stability, security and legal order for their subjects. They tried to minimize ethnic and religious antagonism inside the empire. Some empires tended to impose their ideas, beliefs and cultural habits on the subject states to strengthen the imperial structure; others opted for multicultural and cosmopolitan policies. Anthony Pagden estimates that most of the early empires were multicultural and attempted to incorporate various groups into some larger cosmopolitan whole. The aristocracies that ruled empires were often more cosmopolitan and broad-minded than their nationalistic successors. Cultures generated by empires could have notable effects that outlasted the empire itself.