IMPERIALISM. — The term imperialism designates a specific mode of action inspired by a precise theory: to speak of imperialism with reference to centuries prior to the 19th is inaccurate, both because it is only in the 19th century that a “philosophy” of imperialism arises, and because it is with the shift in the quantitative balance of markets and with the era of industrialism and colonialism that this philosophy finds its inspiration and, in turn, itself spurs action.
Imperialism is theorized by F. W. Nietzsche’s will to power, by the racism of G. R. Gobineau and H. S. Chamberlain, and by the exaggerated nationalism of the late 19th century; it is enacted through the overwhelming and convulsive economic pressure of capitalist countries, the ruthless seizure of markets, navalism, and the colonialism of England, France, Russia, Japan, and Germany (Italian imperialism, proclaimed by A. Oriani and G. D’Annunzio, remained in practice subdued, except for certain later aspects of the Fascist attempt in Ethiopia). Communism has been among the most vigorous opponents of democratic-liberal imperialism (for Lenin, the most consistent theorist of the myth of imperialist collapse, imperialism is the final stage of capitalism, precisely because the anti-feudal struggle of rising national capitalism has given way to a defensive financial capitalism, surviving beyond itself); yet communism has ended up creating its own distinct proletarian form of Soviet imperialism.
The Catholic theory is a clear ideological and moral opponent of imperialism: suffice it to recall the work of Leo XIII, the encyclicals *Quadragesimo Anno* (May 15, 1931) and *Caritate Christi Compulsi* (May 3, 1932) of Pius XI, which clearly oppose banking imperialism and nationalist imperialism (men who gather to pray to the true God cannot promote nationalist imperialism, since it makes of each people a deity), and finally the Christmas messages of Pius XII against the false notion that force creates right.