Ideology is what drives the success and failure of empires. It’s what made the United States the most powerful nation on earth, and what might end up bringing it down. The greatest blunders of US foreign policy over the past century were driven by ideology: a belief in America as the defender of freedom and democracy around the world. The last three presidents, in their own very different ways, sought a return to pragmatism, national interest and problem-solving. But America’s ideological mindset might prove too powerful to overcome, writes Alex Roberto Hybel.

Ideology helps build and destroy empires. Its latest victim is the United States.

It is assumed that an aspiring empire will seek to change the international system through territorial, political expansion until the marginal costs of further change are equal or greater than the marginal benefits. The assumption is incorrect. Throughout history, any actor seeking to become an empire has been guided by an ideology of its own making, one that through time became so engrained in the mindset of its leaders that it prevented them from grasping the moment the marginal costs of further change were greater than the marginal benefits. Such failure has engendered their downfall. For more than five decades the United States was aggrieved by the same ill – a blind commitment to ideology that helped it become an empire but ultimately undermined its capacity to avert its own downward spiral.