Thomas Bender makes the argument that every trend and event in American history happened always in the broader context of world history, and if one examines world history, one can find both connections and parallels between the United States and the rest of the world.  This would include the American Revolution, which Bender places in the context of warfare and subsequent imperial crises around the world.  How could one pay for massive war and continuous warfare?  This was the problem faced not only by the British empire in the mid 18th century, but by many empires in the same era, just as it is being faced by the American empire today.

Bender does not ask, however, if ordinary people in the past noticed those connections and parallels between the United States and the rest of the world.  Did people living in the British empire and Ameican colonies actually recognize what was happening in other parts of the world?

Meanwhile, do you, today, know what is happening in other parts of the world, and how it might be connected to or parallel with the United States?

1.  Let’s take a stab at it. What are the connections between the United States and the rest of the world?  In other words, does the United States affect other parts of the world, how and why; and do other parts of the world affect the United States, how and why?




2.  What are the parallels between the United States and the rest of the world?  In other words, are there similar conditions elsewhere in the world?