Having a recent conversation with my co-workers the other day, the subject came up of success: he says no successful organization achieved its success without conquering and exploiting the conquered…no business, church, nation, etc.
Offhand, I couldn’t think of an exception…can you?
Not just a success in the neighborhood, I mean international/global.
It certainly is a matter of degrees. The Romans succeeded in expanding their empire both by military conquest and bribery/diplomacy. Car companies became more efficient, needing to employ fewer humans to construct their cars and undercut each others prices. The Church sent out both missionaries who integrated their beleifs into the prevailing cultures (Irish) as well as led Crusades (Scandinavians).
It appears that your coworker is using far too broad a definition of conquering and exploiting for there to be any meaningful debate.
On a large scale, your friend is probably right. On a smaller scale, Brunei and Luxembourg look like fairly peaceful success stories to me.
Who has NATO conquered and exploited? Yet I consider it a success. Apple Computer?
How about liberation movements in general? Who define success as home rule or independence. Was the United States a failure in 1781 because they had merely established independence but not yet begun the conquest of the continent?
It think that without specifying the types of organizations and the definition of successful the analogy doesn’t stand up without defining conquest and exploitation down to meaninglessness.
Tell him he is repeating some of the ideas that communists espouse about class wars and using workers… 
He should just be careful about not thinking in terms of Zero-Sum game. Your getting 10 profit doesn’t necessarily mean someone loses 10 profit elsewhere
Well, South Korea has the largest percentage of Christians (26%) of any east Asian nation, so you could consider that a success for Christian missionaries. et there has never been any history of forced conversion to Christianity in South Korea that I know of, nor can I think of how Koreans have been exploited by Christian churches.
Well, Rev. Moon doesn’t call it exploitation…They send their money willingly.