Monarchy World

Writer's note: This story is Copyright © 2005 by Tony Jones, and was posted here under the Fair Use Act of 1976.

Monarchy world is an alternate history inspired by the character background of Winston Gordon (Void), a character from my London Champions game, played by Matt Johns. It is a world with three superpowers, the British, Russian and Chinese Empires, engaged in a three-way nuclear balance of power, where the American Revolution never happened and France ceased to exist as a nation in the late 18th century.

In some ways, particularly in the fields of science and engineering, Monarchy World is more advanced than in the real world. In other fields, particularly social ones, Monarchy world is less advanced.

The point of departure from the real world is the birth of a Chinese Emperor, Shang-Kun, who replaces the real-world Emperor Qianlong. Shang-Kun was an intelligent, strong-willed individual who opened China up to the world rather than keeping it isolated as it was in the real world.

This increased openness lead to increased trade with Europe. Because of this increased trade there was a different outcome in the Seven Years War, with France keeping Canada rather than losing it as in the real world. This and a successful Albany Congress in 1754 stopped the American Revolution from occurring.

With France over-stretched, and no American revolution as an example, when the French Revolution finally occurred, it caused France to dissolve into a collection of small states rather than having a revolution as it did in the real world.

Because of its openness, China did not stagnate in the late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, but instead industrialised, and began to send merchants and colonists around the world. This drove Russia to industrialise in response to the growing power on its borders.

Trade and colonisation around the world drove all of the powers on, and the Empires spread further and further. By 1995, North America is divided between British, Russian and Chinese colonies. Africa and Australiasia remain colonised. South America is divided between a number of weak former Spanish and Portuguese colonies. Mainland Europe is largely divided into a large number of small states with weak Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman Empires, and the 'Fourth Power', the NEU, which grew out of the Netherlands, Sweden and various German principalities.

Over time, and after three world wars, the world has settled into a mild three-way cold war, with the world divided between the equally balanced Great Powers of the British, Chinese and Russian Empires, and the various smaller, less powerful nations. All of the Great Powers have grown into a similar form of state, with a constitutional monarchy and an elected parliament, but with a fair amount of power still held in the hands of the monarch.

And with the advent of space flight, the colonial race has begun to move off the Earth and into the Solar System...

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