Path of Empire

Reviews / Votes

Path of Empire makes an important contribution to the historiography of the California gold rush, Panama, and U.S. expansion and intervention in Latin America. It promises not only to expand scholars' knowledge of their fields but also to challenge them to engage previously overlooked transnational connections.

(Western Historical Quarterly) Drawing upon research in Panama, Colombia, and the United States, McGuinness's fine study Path of Empire not only provides new perspectives on U.S. expansion but explores events whose broader importance within Latin American history is often overlooked. Path of Empire is an innovative study of a largely unexamined topic. By drawing upon Panamanian sources and narratives, McGuinness places Panama at the center of a crucial episode in global history, providing a fresh perspective on Latin America's encounter with U.S. empire. This is an original and provocative book, and McGuinness's recounting of his travails in Panama's National Archive is alone worth the price. Path of Empire will appeal to scholars of U.S. as well as Latin American history and would serve as an excellent early reading in courses on U.S.-Latin American relations.

(Hispanic America Historical Review) In Path of Empire, Aims McGuinness has crafted a well-conceived and painstakingly executed account of Panama in the face of U.S. imperialism. As far as Americans were concerned, Panama was simply a transit zone, and the efforts of interested parties-Panamanians, travelers, American capitalists-to take advantage of that fact form the meat of this book. By placing this story in his chosen context, McGuinness illustrates the true breadth of his topic.

(Journal of American History) McGuinness is a superb storyteller.

(Foreign Affairs) This fine book tells a multilayered story about intersections among people, capital, and nations in Panama during the gold-rush era.... It has many virtues: a self-reflexive style; a rich source base in autobiographies, travel accounts, and records from both the United States and Panama; a focus that both acknowledges states and also presents them as comprised of disaggregated actors; a sense of historical change as contested.... In this small and carefully researched book, McGuinness rises above the specificity of time and place to address broad questions about race, gender, class, nation, and empire. He also stresses the often lopsided nature of historical remembrances. Scholars from many different fields will appreciate the book's expansive thematic and interpretive reach.

(American Historical Review)