Galactic Empire

Galactic empires are a fairly common theme in science fiction. The idea suffers from practical difficulties, not least that it requires faster-than-light travel to hold the empire together. Nonetheless, many authors have either used a galactic empire as background, or written about the growth or decline of such an empire. Some of these empires are clearly based on the Roman empire, that in Isaac Asimov's Foundation series being an obvious example. The most well known is the empire from Star Wars, which was formed from the ashes of the Galactic Republic.