The theory of “cultural imperialism” was first proposed by communications scholar Herbert Schiller to describe how a wealthier Western country might be said to dominate another even without actually colonizing it or taking it over. The term became fairly popularly known because it resituates the older politics of anti-imperialism into the postwar context of an American-led world order. Of course, it’s true that America’s economic and soft power is enormously influential on people in other countries, often in negative ways. But it’s also an abuse of language to call it “cultural imperialism.”

What is so objectionable about historical imperialism is specifically the physical occupation and violent domination that, for example, Belgian or British colonialism involved. It’s quite a different thing to observe that experiencing U.S. exports such as Coca-Cola and Hollywood films change minds. So, “cultural imperialism” is an attempt to tie together two things that ought to be kept mentally separate.