Pax Romana/Pax Americana: Views of the "new Rome" from "old Europe," 2000-2010

Abstract

The English-language press and current affairs literature often drew parallels between the modern United States and ancient Rome during a period of robust American military intervention, particularly in the Middle East, between 2000 and 2010. How was the Rome-America parallel deployed in similar literature in western European countries? Did commentators in the major Eurozone nations - in particular, France, Germany, and Italy - use the parallel with different purposes in mind? Was this commentary mostly positive or negative? This paper aims to answer these questions. © 2013 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht.