This volume charts the rise and fall of a distinct empire-system in the period between the end of the Crimean War in 1856 and the Bandung Conference in 1955.

The Heyday of the Empire-System argues that the late 19th and early 20th centuries were defined by the co-existence, competition and hybridization of imperial and state logics. Rather than a simple story of empire's decline and the nation-state's rise, it reveals a multi phase transition in which empires not only persisted but intensified.

Bringing together leading scholars of International Relations, the volume maps how these two systemic logics interacted to produce a hybrid global order whose legacies continue to shape world politics today. By reframing this crucial century as the era of a distinct empire-system, it offers a fresh and compelling account of how modern international society came to be.

Thomas Müller is Senior Lecturer in the Faculty of Sociology at Bielefeld University, Germany.

Daniel M. Green is Associate Professor of International Relations at the University of Delaware, USA.