WI: South Africa reintroduces slavery and becomes a pariah state like North Korea

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If this happened it would probably be in the 1960s or '70s, so unlikely that people like Mbeki or Zuma would be leading this bizarro-ANC.

Heh. I'm trying to imagine the 1960s ANC having the infrastructure to enslave the entire white population.

ANC: Okay, whites, either you all report for the slave-auction tomorrow, or we BLOW UP ANOTHER POWER LINE!!

WHITES: Oh God, no! Anything but that!! Okay, okay, where do we sign up for the shackles?
 
Something else that would happen is cubic zirconia and colored precious stones become far more common, even in engagement rings. Iit's not out of the question to see a U.K.-led war against SA that would have a 1991-Gulf War level and number of supporting nations.
 
Replace the word "slavery" with "apartheid" in the title, and you have a scenario similar to that in Larry Bond's excellent book, Vortex.
 

missouribob

Banned
Some of you all need to calm down with your indignation at this thread. We've got stuff like Decades of Darkness on here, but discussions of modern slavery is the straw that breaks the camels back?

Anyway I don't know about South African history but here's my uneducated musing.

Different WW2, maybe a different Axis? (Soviet-Nazi Alliance). Now South Africa has a much different post war political environment to do whatever it wants with its black population.

World of Laughter situation with the United States never giving up Jim Crow and then adding Jim Crow on steroids.

No end to the cold war. The South Africans threaten to move to the Soviet camp if embargoed to hard? (I really don't know how feasible this is.)

South Africa doesn't transition away from apartheid. It then massively increases it's nuclear arsenal and missile range. Now it can give Britain or France instant sunshine in case the Allies want to go all Gulf War. I think this is the most realistic. At the end of the day the global community isn't going to risk tens of millions of deaths and a economic depression to free South African blacks. Think of all the misery on earth today that happens and yet I don't see many humanitarian interventions. By the time we get to 2010's the South Africans have a large enough arsenal to be free from any external invasion and should have crushed any black dissent with other WMDs or near genocide. Now by the time the nuclear arsenal is complete in the 2010s you can drop the apartheid name and just call it slavery. Or you can have slavery and just keep calling it apartheid.

This scenario is far from ASB. We should all remember that slavery still exist today in OTL.
 
No end to the cold war. The South Africans threaten to move to the Soviet camp if embargoed to hard? (I really don't know how feasible this is.)

They wouldn't be the Soviets in any recognizable sense if they were accepting apartheid South Africa into their camp. That would utterly destroy their credibility with anti-colonialist movements in the Third World. (China did manage to ally with the same groups that SA was supporting in the OTL Angolan Civil War, but that wasn't a direct alliance, and anyway China was quickly wrapping up its career as a global left-wing beacon by that point.)

You'd need Russia to be ruled by some sort of hypernationalist party, that allies with the far-right globally. Putinism on steroids, basically. Maybe that's what you were getting at with your proposed Nazi-"Soviet" alliance?
 
Somebody's gonna get banned real quick.

Worst thread ever.

This is ASB.

Nobody, not even the most hardened unreconstructed apartheid racist, would have thought introducing slavery was a good idea. Also expect an uprising among black people and, probably, a UN-backed invasion.

This is honestly one of the worst threads I've seen on this site. My IQ dropped at least three points by even reading the OP and applying my mind to the question.

I like how mature and adult-like people's responses are in this thread. It just shows how mature alternatehistory folks can be when asked a question in alternate history. :)

Anyways, After 1900 ? It's very, very unlikely. One would require a POD before 1900 for slavery to at least stay in South Africa.
 

missouribob

Banned
I like how mature and adult-like people's responses are in this thread. It just shows how mature alternatehistory folks can be when asked a question in alternate history. :)

Anyways, After 1900 ? It's very, very unlikely. One would require a POD before 1900 for slavery to at least stay in South Africa.
Is it really that unlikely? I mean come on we live in a world were North Korea has nukes, has slavery and I don't see anyone doing anything about it. Also it should be noted that if South Africa institutes slavery it doesn't have to be the WHOLE black population. I could easily see them just enslaving a portion.

They wouldn't be the Soviets in any recognizable sense if they were accepting apartheid South Africa into their camp. That would utterly destroy their credibility with anti-colonialist movements in the Third World. (China did manage to ally with the same groups that SA was supporting in the OTL Angolan Civil War, but that wasn't a direct alliance, and anyway China was quickly wrapping up its career as a global left-wing beacon by that point.)

You'd need Russia to be ruled by some sort of hypernationalist party, that allies with the far-right globally. Putinism on steroids, basically. Maybe that's what you were getting at with your proposed Nazi-"Soviet" alliance?
Yeah I had a feeling that the Soviets wouldn't want to jeopardize their alliances with the brown and black nations of the earth by being associated with South Africa. Although a Fascist or HyperNationalist Russia post Cold War would maybe fit the bill like you proposed.
 
I like how mature and adult-like people's responses are in this thread. It just shows how mature alternatehistory folks can be when asked a question in alternate history. :)

Anyways, After 1900 ? It's very, very unlikely. One would require a POD before 1900 for slavery to at least stay in South Africa.

It is a stupid POD and I'll call it out. It's like asking 'WI the Germans try implement the Final Solution again but against the Turks in the '60s?' Or 'The Old Confederate states try bring slavery back in the 20th century?'

PODs should be thought out, not the bastard offspring of a fever dream and a Draka novel.
 

missouribob

Banned
It is a stupid POD and I'll call it out. It's like asking 'WI the Germans try implement the Final Solution again but against the Turks in the '60s?' Or 'The Old Confederate states try bring slavery back in the 20th century?'

PODs should be thought out, not the bastard offspring of a fever dream and a Draka novel.
I'm sorry I have to disagree. Apartheid South Africa was a horrible place that could of EASILY gone to shit. It is not outside the realm of possibility that instead of Mandela South Africa just kept on and then things get worse, much much worse. This thread is no worse than asking what if the Nazis won WW2 or freaking Sealion or something.
 
I mean come on we live in a world were North Korea has nukes, has slavery and I don't see anyone doing anything about it.

Actually, various international entities, including the US, Japan, South Korea, and the UN, have imposed sanctions on the DPRK, and the country basically gets by because China wants a buffer state on its borders, and a few other international actors are interested in their weapons industry.

And, when I say "gets by", that is with a VERY decimated standard of living, something I'm sure the government of South Africa would have been unwilling to tolerate for its white population.

As has been stated, what you would need is a situation where the white South African standard of living is so abysmal that they figure they have nothing to lose anyway, so why not go ahead and cement their pariah status by enslaving the blacks?
 
I'm sorry I have to disagree. Apartheid South Africa was a horrible place that could of EASILY gone to shit. It is not outside the realm of possibility that instead of Mandela South Africa just kept on and then things get worse, much much worse. This thread is no worse than asking what if the Nazis won WW2 or freaking Sealion or something.

I'm well aware how shit apartheid SA was. I still don't think there's a viable POD that would see fucking SLAVERY be reintroduced in South Africa.

In your opinion what is the POD that would see slavery reintroduced into South Africa? Which individuals would drive it?
 

missouribob

Banned
Actually, various international entities, including the US, Japan, South Korea, and the UN, have imposed sanctions on the DPRK, and the country basically gets by because China wants a buffer state on its borders, and a few other international actors are interested in their weapons industry.

And, when I say "gets by", that is with a VERY decimated standard of living, something I'm sure the government of South Africa would have been unwilling to tolerate for its white population.

As has been stated, what you would need is a situation where the white South African standard of living is so abysmal that they figure they have nothing to lose anyway, so why not go ahead and cement their pariah status by enslaving the blacks?
O wow sanctions because those have been so effective at stopping the Kims from living like billionaires and now North Korea is an open democratic capitalist state with no slavery right? The sanctions don't matter to the regime because the standard of living for the people don't matter to the regime. Also a South Africa embargoed is a bit different than tiny North Korea undergoing the same with it's defunct command economy.

Have the transition to democracy in South Africa go off the rails, or a massive black insurgency/uprising/civil war that black South Africans lose and the South African state would bare economic isolation especially once a feedback loop got going. Once you are in that place of a raw fight for survival a "North Korean" style South Africa is very possible.
 
Just to point out, Mauritania was tbe last country to de jure ban slavery in 1981, and it is, for all intents and purposes, de facto "legal" in several countries. All of this w/o intervention or serious sanction from the UN or anyone else.
 
O wow sanctions because those have been so effective at stopping the Kims from living like billionaires and now North Korea is an open democratic capitalist state with no slavery right? The sanctions don't matter to the regime because the standard of living for the people don't matter to the regime.

Hm. I think you might actually be agreeing with me here.

You originally said that no one was doing anything about North Korea, and I pointed out that various countries have imposed sanctions. You replied that the sanctions don't matter to the regime, because they don't care about the people's welfare.

Which is kind of my point. The Kims only care about the ruling elite, so they're willing to tolerate the sanctions, as long as they and their cronies stay in power. But the National Party of South Africa actually DID care about the well-neing of the whites, because they relied on them for votes. So, if enslaving the blacks leads to an imposition of total sanctions, they're probably not gonna wanna do that if it means the white standard-of-living goes to hell as well.

I think what has to happen is the ruling elite of South Africa would have to say "F*ck the blacks, and ya know what, f*ck the whites as well. If sanctions mean most of the whites starve, so be it. We'll just hit up [whatever right-wing superpower is the equivalent of China in this scenario] to keep us and our families well-fed and swimming in cognac." But there was no such fascist superpower that had an interesting in propping up the elite of the National Party that way.
 
Just to point out, Mauritania was tbe last country to de jure ban slavery in 1981, and it is, for all intents and purposes, de facto "legal" in several countries. All of this w/o intervention or serious sanction from the UN or anyone else.


Well, okay, but a western(more or less) industrialized country forcibly enslaving MILLIONS of people, who previously had not been enslaved for generations, is probably gonna attract the world's attention in a way that a small, third-world country tolerating the continued existence of slavey won't.

If someone suggested a time-line where Sweden brought back literal witch-trials in the 1990s, I don't think it would enhance the credibility of the scenario to point out that witch-trials still take place in Saudi Arabia and other medivalist locales.
 
Before I go to bed, I'm just gonna say...

For this scenario to work, I think you REALLY need to play around with the Boer War, though I'm not quite sure how. But I think it has to go back at least that far for its POD.
 

missouribob

Banned
Hm. I think you might actually be agreeing with me here.

You originally said that no one was doing anything about North Korea, and I pointed out that various countries have imposed sanctions. You replied that the sanctions don't matter to the regime, because they don't care about the people's welfare.

Which is kind of my point. The Kims only care about the ruling elite, so they're willing to tolerate the sanctions, as long as they and their cronies stay in power. But the National Party of South Africa actually DID care about the well-neing of the whites, because they relied on them for votes. So, if enslaving the blacks leads to an imposition of total sanctions, they're probably not gonna wanna do that if it means the white standard-of-living goes to hell as well.

I think what has to happen is the ruling elite of South Africa would have to say "F*ck the blacks, and ya know what, f*ck the whites as well. If sanctions mean most of the whites starve, so be it. We'll just hit up [whatever right-wing superpower is the equivalent of China in this scenario] to keep us and our families well-fed and swimming in cognac." But there was no such fascist superpower that had an interesting in propping up the elite of the National Party that way.
No not really. The leadership that apartheid South Africa had by the end of that regime in OTL is going to be very different from the leadership they would have after say a massive uprising by blacks in which tens of thousands of whites are killed. What the (more than likely new and hardline) SA leadership would accept to keep control along with the white South African population would be very different in that timeline. Sanctions =\= Regime Change. Also I contend that South Africa would have an easier time riding out international sanctions than say North Korea. Also I would argue that it would be easy enough for South Africa to just call it something besides slavery or say don't enslave all of the black South Africans. To meet this thread challenge you just have to get some of the population enslaved. I can EASILY see that happening in a different timeline.
 
Well, okay, but a western(more or less) industrialized country forcibly enslaving MILLIONS of people, who previously had not been enslaved for generations, is probably gonna attract the world's attention in a way that a small, third-world country tolerating the continued existence of slavey won't.

If someone suggested a time-line where Sweden brought back literal witch-trials in the 1990s, I don't think it would enhance the credibility of the scenario to point out that witch-trials still take place in Saudi Arabia and other medivalist locales.

That could happen given a 1983 nuclear exchange-scenario in which a rump-Sweden has fell into a corrupt dictatorship to survive. A cult-like post-Swedish polity for that manner.

Actually, that can happen for South Africa, too.
 
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