After the Empire: The Breakdown of the American Order (French: Après L'Empire: essai sur la décomposition du système américain) is a 2001 book by French demographer and sociologist Emmanuel Todd. In it, Todd examines the fundamental weaknesses of the modern United States to conclude that, contrary to American conventional wisdom, America is fast losing its grip on the world stage in economic, military and ideological terms. Todd predicts the fall of the United States as the sole global superpower.