Would a world without the USA a worse world?

Would a world without the USA a worse world?

  • Yes

    Votes: 126 53.6%
  • No

    Votes: 109 46.4%

  • Total voters
    235

Thomas1195

Banned
No, the bottom line of democracy is for all people, not just white men, as much as some people like to shrug off the experiences of women and non-whites. While racism has been common across societies, the complete absence of state protection from domestic terrorism certainly isn't. If you truly want a bottom line, I would note today the EIU, the leading independent think tank on assessing democracy, currently classes the UK and Canada as full democracies and the USA as a flawed democracy.
I mean pre-1900. It's really absurd to say that Britain was more democratic than the US before 1928 (when woman suffrage was enacted in the UK)
 

Thomas1195

Banned
That is ancient history. The China of today is much different from the China back then.
That is the natural action of a big power, especially when a really powerful China would have no regional rivals. And Asian powers (e.g. Mongols, Imperial Japan...) were even more prone to violence and war, if not genocide.
 
Apparently a lot do things about "No Irish Need Apply" were references to how they were treated in England, with those mentioning no Irish in American newspapers often being English immigrants.

Interesting if indeed true. Any links you can show me?

The US was a very helpful relief outlet for the impoverished populations of Europe in the 19th century. Without that outlet existing, the population pressures could have pushed Europe in some really bad directions a lot earlier.

Politically speaking, for better or worse the Bretton Woods institutions and the Marshall Plan undergirded the modern west developing as it did. That is another big positive in my view.

On the downside, we did open the nuclear genie box, which in many ways might have saved lives in the long term but acts as a massive risk to global stability nontheless.

That first bit could make for an interesting timeline, if you ask me.....

No, the bottom line of democracy is for all people, not just white men, as much as some people like to shrug off the experiences of women and non-whites. While racism has been common across societies, the complete absence of state protection from domestic terrorism certainly isn't. If you truly want a bottom line, I would note today the EIU, the leading independent think tank on assessing democracy, currently classes the UK and Canada as full democracies and the USA as a flawed democracy.

I understand, and we don't necessarily disagree.


Several founding fathers are on record as criticising democracy and set up the US system with several explicit checks against democracy, including the electoral college and the senate.

Not entirely true, to be honest. What Madison and certain of the other founders were concerned with was unchecked democracy(hence, the comments about "mob rule" and such), not democracy itself(there is a key difference)

The USSR had all sorts of civil rights coded in law. If they are not enforced, they do not exist.

Fair enough, but I should note this was not uniformly true in *all* of America; some places were better than others.

I disagree. The extremism that has taken over the Republican Party can be directly traced to the rise of the conservative movement in the South, which was a direct reaction to black people getting political and civil rights.

There is some truth to this. However, though, Southern conservatism's more general link to the fear and/or loathing of black people, and racism in general, honestly, well predates the World War II era, and can be traced all the way back to the 1830s, if not earlier.

I do accept that the extremism could exist in alternate polities,

That's fair.

but the south would not be as dominant in a British empire that included the British Isles and Canada.

I wouldn't be quite too sure about this, though, necessarily. I mean, it's certainly possible, yes, but it depends on the scenario....and perhaps there are at least a few scenarios out there in which the *South become more dominant, and/or for longer, not less.

I'm not sure that would be true, since slavery would remain a significant part of the income of the empire if the southern colonies are held, and economic forces are political forces.

Yes, this is likely, at least for some time.

But even assuming that the British still abolish slavery sometime in the mid 19th century, it doesn't prevent oppressive, slavery like conditions or de facto slavery in British India or British Africa.

And this happened IOTL.

Also, what is to say that a British Empire with a white imperial population of 300-500 million, held together with military force, wouldn't survive to the present, retaining racial and social views somewhere between Cecil Rhodes at worst and Winston Churchill at best until 2017? Especially if there is no WW1 or WW2.

While I honestly wouldn't go quite that far, it is true that IOTL, the Allies' victory in World War II did a fair bit to advance the cause of liberalism worldwide.

With perhaps the exception of the establishment of the Dutch Republic, the American Revolution was the first victory of liberalism. If the revolution fails, liberalism will be set back decades. The French Revolution even more so.

Unfortunately, this would be a real possibility. Maybe not inevitable, but more possible than some might think.

Did the United Kingdom evolve into a liberal country? Yes. It didn't start out as one though.

Right. I mean, Britain was by no means a dystopia even in the early days of colonialism but it took quite a bit to make Britain the functional, modern, and relatively liberal democracy that it is today.

If anything, a less industrialized North America and less agricultural productivity means that the settlers need more land to produce the amount of food they did, meaning the expansion west will be more violent and seize more land.

This may well be true, too.
 
Last edited:
I disagree with this substantially. The Revolution maybe accelerated the British abolitionist movement by ten years, but it was already in incubation so it was coming. Plus a British Empire that abolishes slavey in the early 1840s still saves 25 years of slavery in North America.

The British abolitionist movement was already in incubation by the 1760s, yes. So were the British reform acts. So was the impetus to abolish the House of Lords - how's that coming?

The Parliament that abolished slavery stood to lose a bit of their sugar profits - sugar profits that had been declining in importance for decades. They risked offending a smattering of whites in overwhelmingly black colonies with minuscule populations.

This ATL Parliament has to make the same decision with vastly increased costs, while in all likelihood being told in no uncertain terms that it will cost them a continent-spanning empire. And with your supposition of the 1840s, it has to do it at a point when Britain's economy had fewer alternatives to King Cotton.
 
nouvelle France is the correct term, or would have been 20 years earlier. Louisiana was part of NF. However, in 1763 it was ceded to Spain. Spain returned it to Napoleonic France in 1800 or 01. No French Revolution means it remains in Spanish hands.

Nouvelle France was not the correct term during the Spanish period, which we are expecting does not end until slash unless there is an Anglo-American takeover.
 

Deleted member 97083

TBF to TTL, that's assuming their demographics, including high birthrates and immigration, are as OTL, which is likely not the case.
The Thirteen Colonies and US actually had the highest fertility rate in the world both before and during the industrial revolution. Both white Americans and black Americans had a higher population growth rate than any country in Europe, including Britain the first industrialized nation. Even the enslaved population of the US grew faster than the population of England. Yet from 1780 to 1850, immigration was a rather small percentage of population growth.

The likely reason was the low prevalence of famine and disease due to low population density.
 
I'm just going to shamelessly advertise my new baby timeline right here if you don't mind. Part two should be up this week or so.

Anyways to answer the question, no, the world wouldn't be better or worse off because there's no meaningful point of reference which we can judge it to be. Maybe slavery will end earlier, maybe it'll last longer. Maybe the British Empire will rule the next century and continuously inflict the horrors of imperialism in Africa and Asia, or maybe keeping America on it's side will prove to be too much of a financial burden and it never reaches the height that it did in OTL.
 
Nouvelle France was not the correct term during the Spanish period, which we are expecting does not end until slash unless there is an Anglo-American takeover.
mea culpa. I didn't click on the link you provided to see that you were talking about Spanish Louisiana. I assumed you were referring to French Louisiana and distinguishing it as separate from New France.
 
Well, the US was not perfect, but it became the first time in history when people actually stood up against the oppressors and fought for the Rights of Man and hence it did inspire people around the world. Besides, the ARW in one way or another led to French Revolution, which spread radical ideas of equality and liberty, as well as nationalism. Also because of that, the US also became the land of opportunity for lower-class Europeans who were oppressed by European monarchies àn nobilities.

After all, the US and later France were the world's only democracies during the 19th century (Britain should not be considered as a democracy until 1928).


Well, the bottom line is that until 1914 only a third of British male adult population were eligible to vote. Meanwhile, all US white males could vote since 1860.

Racism was common during the 19th century. For Britain, we cannot conclude like that because there weren't a lot of people of other colors in the UK.

Without attempting or wanting to disregard your opinion I do think the history of mankind began before the American revolution - history is littered with examples of peoples standing up to oppressors and standing up for the rights of men.

Also I think it is pertinent to note that the USA is in many respects a modern colonial empire - yes citizens vote and pursue "democracy" but great swathes of land was gained through conquest and conflict. Maybe various Native American groups deserve their own nations IMHO.

Also let's be honest slavery in the British Enpire was abolished at least from a legal perspective before the out break of the ACW. America kinda dragged it's heals regarding slavery and Shameful institutional treatment of minorities continued throughout the twentieth century.

Now that's not to say America has not been a force for "good". I simply believe that the issue of goodness is rarely their reason d'être but neither is any other nation's intentions so conscientious. Empires rise and fall and Americas contribution to the world will be judged by it's contemporary context.
 
Also the Americans might finally realise how fucked parliament was and how fucking retarded declaring George iii a tyrant was
 
Also the Americans might finally realise how fucked parliament was and how fucking retarded declaring George iii a tyrant was
I know that spazz is somewhat innocent in American English but negative in British English due to connotatoins with those suffering epilepsy and such. I am unsure if retarded is negative in British English, but it is veeeeery unwise to use it around Americans. I see I misread your post for a moment and thought you were calling George III (who suffered mental or neurological problems) r*{%]%]%ed, but either way best to avoid the term. Now, the George's all got on reasonably well with parliament, partially because each father son duo got along badly with each other, meaning that those opposed to the ruling ministry could call themselves the Loyal Opposition and congregate around the Prince of Wales. Parliament did have issues back then of course. Part of it being the rotten and pocket boroughs and how treasures funds could by used by the king to buy elections. Could you clarify in what issues you believe Parliament was f'ed on though, so we can address them individually?
 
How would the world look like? Would it become worse than OTL, especially ITTL, the French Revolution could be butterflied away?
The US winning the ARW prevented the broadcast of a British propaganda program in 1972 which would have been picked up by a passing Xirhzzian ship, which took it wrong and incinerated humanity. This the US winning was a massive positive...

Or to put it simply: we don’t know. The butterflies of no US are so huge the events of the 225 years following can’t even be guessed at with even a tiny degree of confidence and the question is difficult to answer.
 

Thomas1195

Banned
Without attempting or wanting to disregard your opinion I do think the history of mankind began before the American revolution - history is littered with examples of peoples standing up to oppressors and standing up for the rights of men.
Well, before ARW, most if not all rebellions, either peasant rebellions (especially in Asia) or noble rebellions, resulted in a new king with a new dynasty (replacing an old monarchy with a new one), most of which eventually became a new tyranny after several generations. ARW was the first time when the result was entirely different: a new regime in which normal citizens (not all, but far more than just the landed nobility only) actually had a say.

That's not a bad thing
The demand for public education at first grew out of this revolution, which was the first victory of liberalism. Before that, education was only limited for the elites. Mass illiteracy and ignorance would be common characteristics of a world without liberalism. And for many countries, industrial revolution could be butterflied away.

Let's see... no, it would probably be better.
Britain could have done the same, if not worse. Look at the way they oppressed and exploited their Asian and African colonies to the bones.
 

IFwanderer

Banned
Britain could have done the same, if not worse. Look at the way they oppressed and exploited their Asian and African colonies to the bones.

1. Are you saying that South American countries are US colonies?

2. This comment is pure whataboutism. I'm talking about an atrocity the US did commit, and you say that one possible Britain in one of many US-less worlds might have done the same. Another possible Britain might not have done anything, a possible France might have decided to put pressure on those would-be military juntas to step away from power and let democracy return, etc.
 
I know that spazz is somewhat innocent in American English but negative in British English due to connotatoins with those suffering epilepsy and such. I am unsure if retarded is negative in British English, but it is veeeeery unwise to use it around Americans. I see I misread your post for a moment and thought you were calling George III (who suffered mental or neurological problems) r*{%]%]%ed, but either way best to avoid the term. Now, the George's all got on reasonably well with parliament, partially because each father son duo got along badly with each other, meaning that those opposed to the ruling ministry could call themselves the Loyal Opposition and congregate around the Prince of Wales. Parliament did have issues back then of course. Part of it being the rotten and pocket boroughs and how treasures funds could by used by the king to buy elections. Could you clarify in what issues you believe Parliament was f'ed on though, so we can address them individually?
Oh I was more referring to the fact that many Americans rebelled due to seeing George III as a tyrant and many still do today. Yet few accept or even know that by this point parliament and elected government decided policy and taxation not the king.
 
Top