L’impero-nazione di Napoleone Bonaparte

The author maps the history of the napoleonic Empire 'backwards', starting from the moments of genetic weakness which led to its "decline and fall". Among these moments: the weakness of a regime torn between the old monarchic legitimacy and the new republican rule of law; the establishment of an exclusive nationality principle, in accordance to which other territories of the Empire were exploited as mere strategic strongholds, instrumental to the assurance of France's natural borders; the processes of violent, cohercive "civilization", of economic and military exploitation to which subaltern states were submitted.