Imperialism Old & New: A Thermodynamic Analysis Blair Fix I contend that imperialism has deep connections with the project of human civilization 1 . Imperialism, as I refer to it here, is defined as any “dominance relation between collectivities” (Galtung, 1971). Analyzed through the lens of historical materialism, the logic of imperialism is the extraction of surplus from one “collectivity” and its subsequent enjoyment by another. Surplus may come in concrete forms (such as crops or resources) but may also be disguised as symbolic claims to these forms, ie: money. The presence of imperialism implies the existence of a “core” region which extracts and centralizes surplus from a “periphery” region. Under this definition, then, an imperialist relation exists between any two economically connected regions if a superiority in built infrastructure, material affluence, and/or energy usage is maintained in one region at the expense of another. I propose that the mechanism for the creation and maintenance of imperialist core/periphery relations is the principle of unequal exchange (Emmanuel & Bettelheim, 1972). In its broadest sense, this implies a social relationship in which one party receives more than the other in a given transaction. But more of what? Traditionally, the theory has been used to show how transactions between core and periphery are unequal due to the disparity in wage levels between regions. High wages and high productivity mean that products from the core will have less labor time “embodied” in them than periphery products, thus core regions essentially gain access to unequal labor time when products of equal price are traded. Following Hornborg (1992, 1998, 2003, 2006), I propose broadening the scope of this analysis to include unequal exchange of land and productive potential. Using this framework, the goal of this paper is to compare and contrast the different historical instances of imperialism and analyze their corresponding modes of accumulation. After briefly summarizing the characteristics of different modes of imperialist accumulation, I analyze two distinct time periods: First, the pre- capitalist era characterized by “tributary” empires and, second, the era of the modern capitalist world system, broken down into three distinct stages. Modes of Accumulation (Methods of Realizing Unequal Exchange) Hornborg (1998) has created a useful taxonomy for categorizing modes of accumulation which I have reproduced here with minor alterations. The following methods have been used historically to extract surplus: 1. Plunder (Marx's primitive accumulation): accumulation by force, nothing is given in return 2. Merchant Capitalism: the exploitation of cultural differences in how goods are evaluated ("buying cheap and selling dear") 3. Financial Capitalism: demanding interest on credit. The lender gives money and receives a greater 1 Following Jenson (2006), I consider civilization to be the emergence of cities Fix 1