Brazilpunk World

In this TL, a rather different series of events in the 16th century lead to Portugal rolling a few sixes, going on to kick ass in the New World and their former colony of Brazil proceeding to dominate the world.

Today in 2015, the Empire-Republic of Brazil directly incorporates OTL Venezuela, eastern Colombia, the Guianas, Uruguay, Nicaragua, Florida and much of the Caribbean. It leads the world in science, technology and culture, and much of the rest of the world has, to some degree, been influenced by Brazil in one way or another.

The government of Brazil is a bit of an odd one, at least by OTL standards (as if the name “Empire-Republic” didn't tip you off). The head of state is simultaneously the President and the Emperor, despite being an elected official, with the “Emperor” title generally taking precedence, and while he or she only has the same basic powers of the OTL US President, the position is a lifetime appointment [1]. This is apparently to provide stability and provide a balance of the historic Brazilian Empire when the Portuguese monarchy fled overseas after the French invasion (different circumstances than OTL, however) that arguably constituted Brazil's historic Golden Age, and the more modern trappings of democratic rule.

Brazil itself seems to follow the same sort of mix of old and new, with polar opposites coexisting all over the nation. Some of the world's most vibrant, advanced and liveable cities reside almost right next to sprawling metropolises of favelas (Brazilian slums), where poverty and crime run rampant. Despite being considered a model of democracy and a considerable economic power, the system still runs rampant with corruption, and large-scale income inequality is a permanent fixture of the nation. It has one of the highest usages of green energy on the planet, but has little-to-no protection in place for the natural biodiversity within the nation, leading to widespread exploitation by both public and private parties.

Of course, people still favour Brazil of many other places in the world despite said issues, if only because, for the most part, said issues are arguably worse much of the world over, Brazil simply enjoying the top spot by default. Nonetheless, there remains a coalition dedicated to opposing Brazilian hegemony, not that it really amounts to much.

Leading the pack is Peru, which incorporates OTL west Colombia and Panama. It is a highly nationalistic country that attempts to resist Brazilian influence at every turn, and has assembled a rather motley alliance of minor, highly nationalistic countries that attempt to resist Brazilian influence at every turn. It is a single party nation that follows an ideology that can roughly be described by OTL standards as “Capitalist Juche”, encouraging total self-sufficiency and heavy militarisation coupled with a near-religious devotion to monetary trade. The primary language spoken is Spanish with quite a few Quechua influences emphasised to set itself apart from the Portuguese-English hybrid language slowly gaining traction as the world's second language.

Peru faces an uphill battle to try and counter Brazilian power, however, as, thanks to Portugal's expanded colonial base compared to OTL, projection of power is a lot easier thanks to historical ties and lack of linguistic barriers. Central Africa and Southeast Asia, all heavily colonised by Portugal, are all steadily rising along with Brazil thanks to heavy investment (many less-well-off Brazilians question sending so much money overseas when there are so many at home who live in squalor; alas, Brazil's higher-ups consider maintaining their global influence more important that placating the local have-nots [2]). Plus, with the world's economy largely revolving around Brazil, being shut out of it is a bit of a problem, and it is well within Brazil's power to do so.

Across the Atlantic stands Europe, which suffered the worst during the Two Decades of Ash and Blood, a period from the mid 1940s to the mid 1960s when a series of dominoes were set off all across the world sending most nations devolving into catastrophic warfare both with their neighbours and with themselves. It was from this nightmarish time that the current world order arose, and one particular woman helped pave the way for Europe's destiny: a Frenchwoman named Alice Rosier, who founded the ideology known as Rosierism, better known by its OTL counterpart: Communism [3].

One by one, the governments of the various European nations were toppled by the bitter and fed-up populaces, who set up new regimes with various degrees of dedication to the tenants of Rosierism. France, Spain, Sicily, the various German nations (nationalist sentiments took a good while longer to get going ITTL, and in some cases never really took off at all), Denmark-Norway, Sweden, Poland and the perpetually quarrelling British Isles all suffered much the same fate, but, incredibly, a large number of native monarchies managed to flee to colonial establishments overseas, much as the Brazilian monarchs had a few centuries earlier. However, something that the former European monarchs do that Brazil's Emperor-President explicitly does not do is maintain their claim to their original nations, confident that someday, after the revolution has run its course and the false regimes have collapsed, they will be welcomed back into their nations with open arms and a few ticker-tape parades for good measure.

The likelihood of this belief coming to pass generally depends on the European nation from which they originated. France, Ireland, Bavaria and Bohemia are, at present, fairly respectable, if relatively poor, *socialist nations that are unlikely to crumble any time soon, Britain, Sweden and Poland are borderline Stalinist in their oppression and Croatia, ever since their outright genocidal invasion of Serbia, is considered a pariah even by the hard-line standards of those nations. Almost none of them are democratic, and their propaganda is both very overblown and extremely far-reaching (which is all the more unusual considering how little presence outside Europe Rosierism has nowadays).

However, all the European nations (sans a collection of Balkan nations including Hungary, Bulgaria and Greece that escaped the Rosierist wave, who are united in an alliance to defend themselves) are united in an organisation called the European Rosierist Council, dedicated purely to the maintenance of Rosierist government throughout, which includes propping up the less palatable ones, as they all agree on the same basic tenants of ideology, and that maintaining said ideology and promulgating it to the world to be more important than worrying about economic issues or human rights violations (such problems are merely hiccups for the future World Rosierist Commune to sort out). This, naturally, is a bit of a problem for the monarchs who are waiting impatiently for the oppressive governments to come crashing down so they can go back to living in the palaces that no longer exist (pretty much all of them were torn down in the various populaces' fury to rid themselves of any and all trappings of monarchist government).

Russia is a bit of an unusual case, divided in two with the west being a moderately hard-line Rosierist nation (and a fickle one, too; Poland has had to intervene twice over the last few decades to prevent rebels from seizing Moscow), while East Russia, mostly comprising everything beyond the Urals, is a democratic federation that has industrialised and surpassed its western former partner in what has been termed “the East Russian economic miracle”, becoming a semi-important power on the global stage, commanding a reasonable presence in Central Asia as well as becoming a resource and cultural exporter to the rest of the world (mainly the Brazilian sphere) [4]. Indeed, it has even gotten to the point where quite a few people have expressed that, even if the opportunity arose, they should decline the offer of rejoining with West Russia, and some anti-reunificationists have taken to referring to themselves as “Siberians”.

The Ottoman Empire is no more, having broken up in the 1960's after a *fascist theocratic coup that overthrew the Sultan, declaring his policies of tolerance to be the root of Ottoman stagnation, taking over and launching a fresh wave of persecution against Shi'a adherents, Kurds and other such minorities, declaring them “subversive influences conspiring to bring down the Caliphate”, which all led up to a full-scale war with Iran. This turned out to have been a terrible idea, as Brazil then came in on the side of Iran, with the war turning into a bloodbath (this war is generally considered by historians to be the final one of the Two Decades). Consequently, the public, with their resources being squandered for a war that the higher-ups refused to back down from, rebelled. Civil order broke down across the region and anarchy reigned for several years before the situation sorted itself out again, but not before the resultant three-digit petrol prices had driven green energy into the spotlight and weaned a good deal of the planet off fossil fuels.

Brazil's biggest ally is the former British Empire, with the monarchy now residing in Myanmar (still referred to as Burma ITTL) of all places, including the southernmost bits of South America, Somalia, a few bits of West Africa and Indonesia, northern Australia and a semi-large contingent of Pacific Islands. It is about as influential as the OTL Commonwealth, and serves mainly to supplement Brazil's naval power throughout the world. British culture has absorbed quite a bit from India, becoming a bit more ostentatious in the process, and the local caste system has loosened up quite a bit, but the British dedication to the class system remains, with the aristocracy still being incredibly powerful and inequality a powerful force (the food is a lot better, though).

North America is a heavily disunited continent, and is sometimes referred to as the “Land of Western Exile” in reference to the number of European monarchs that have fled there. Much of the east is divided between the multiple former colonies of European nations that set up shop there (Britain being noticeably absent; through a hideous stroke of bad fortune, England (before union with Scotland) lost badly in a war with France, with France gaining the upper hand on both continents). In the interior and the north, there are quite a few Native-dominated nations who survived by playing the multiple colonisers against each other, while the west is heavily Hispanicised thanks to Spain investing more heavily in the California region, stretching as far up as OTL Yukon. Mexico, alas, is balkanised after the historically secessionist region of Tejas broke away in a war that ended up cracking the whole thing apart (Tejas nowadays is a military dictatorship trying, and failing, to diversify its economy after oil sales began to dry up).

Asia is fairly unremarkable. China remains Imperial; a different opening by Portugal led to the Qing Dynasty falling earlier and being replaced by the new Liang Dynasty that kinda-sorta modernised the nation, but doesn't really want to get involved in world affairs (though it is on cordial terms with Brazil). Corea (spelt with a C, you foreigner scum) is a Buddhist theocracy that dominates the backwards nation of Japan, and to a lesser extent, Manchuria, which is independent and is a bit of a cultural blend of Corean, Russian and Chinese influence. They have made quite a few steps away from Corean domination in the last decade as they grow closer to East Russia, and Corea is not taking this well.

Culture is very different, mostly through Brazilian influence, but there are quite a few other differences too. Planned cities and utilitarian architecture are far more widespread throughout the world as a continuation of the “reject any and all things monarchy-related” that the world went through post-Two Decades (the whole thing started in Europe, so most people blamed Kings and Queens for their problems). Roads have been heavily invested in at the expense of trains except in Britain, cars having been lauded as the “vehicles of the future”, and indeed they were, but not everything is peachy as a result: urban networks are now so vast, sprawling and intricate that it has become impossible to maintain them.

Income inequality is tolerated far more than OTL, with corruption and such seen as something natural that nations just have to learn to deal with. Indeed, while the OTL Third World is arguably better off then OTL, the corresponding First World is worse off, so it all pretty much balances out. Architecture is currently in its “ultramodern, austere, solid concrete structures” phase, giving the cities of the worse a very stolid, impersonal look to them. Soccer, while butterflies have affected its formation to the point where it is recognisably different yet still understandable from an OTL visitor’s point of view, is even more widespread than OTL soccer, with competition the world over being even more intense as they compete for the coveted World Championship title, an event watched by billions every three years.

Religion is also a bit different: the *Reformation went a bit off-rails from OTL with Britain remaining Catholic and Ireland going *Protestant, along with Denmark-Norway, southern France (which retains a sizable minority to this day) and several German and Balkan nations. In general, *Protestantism is not even close to being as influential as OTL, with Catholicism reigning supreme over much of the world, which has unfortunately led people to become a bit more dickish about expressing their faith. The February Carnival Season is a worldwide celebration practically equivalent to OTL's lead up to Christmas, Portuguese West India still doesn't get why Hindus are offended when they are referred to as “pagans”, and many nations have entered into an unofficial contest as to who can build the biggest statue of Jesus (the current record holder, BTW, is Sicily at 57.6 metres tall without the pedestal included [5]).

The world is simultaneously better and worse when it comes to environmental issues. Carbon-neutral biofuel based on waste plant remains, avoiding the use of natural petroleum, has been widespread for some time now, and other sources of green power are highly present as well. However, with humanity being more widespread across the planet than OTL, resources such as water and greenery are being consumed at much higher rates, with corresponding problems (water riots in Sudan and southern Arabia have reached critical mass). Conservation of the natural environment is not particularly well-enforced the world over, with many unique species such as elephants, rhinos and tigers have been driven to extinction, and the Amazon rainforest at around 5% of its original area.

Technology is more advanced in some areas and less advanced in others. Certain fields like biological and chemical science are much further along than OTL, with genetically engineered food and plants commonplace, while physics is alternately average and backwards, with the first nuclear bomb not going off until 1989. Air conditioning was invented earlier than OTL, as was powered flight, and blimps, after a brief spell of popularity in the 1910's are making a comeback thanks to environmental concerns. Medicine is more advanced than OTL, with malaria and certain other tropical diseases having been eliminated wholesale. Woolly mammoths have been brought back from the grave of history, and there are attempts to bring back some of the more recent extinct animals. However, as with everything, regulation is an issue; dodgy home-made bioweapons are a bit of a concern, and there are several underground human cloning attempts going on throughout Central Africa and Papua.

After the chaos of the Two Decades of Ash and Blood, the world rather lost its appetite for warfare as the new world order asserted itself. However, as the new generation grows up, lessons of the past fade into memory, stagnation sets in and trigger fingers of the world's nations begin getting twitchy. Peru, at the very least, believes that the current world order cannot stand forever at the expense of those who disagree with it, and, with the help of its allies (the northern Spanish states, Hungary, Zanzibar aka Oman-in-Exile, Siam, Tejas and Spanish Morocco), has decided that the time to seize the day and topple the existing order is approaching soon, and if the world refuses to take the plunge, it might just need a bit of a push...


[1] However, they can be forced to step down by a vote in Congress, followed by a general election to decide if he or she should be kicked out or not.

[2] As for whether or not the starving masses will rise up, the higher-ups aren't worried. As long as the military answers to them, they don't see any cause for concern.

[3] However, owing to the name, the symbol for Rosierism isn't the hammer and sickle, it's a red rose.

[4] East Russia currently holds a monopoly over world fantasy literature. If you're wondering what that looks like, imagine if, instead of Tolkien being the standard model for fantasy the world over, H.P. Lovecraft took that coveted title.

[5] This display of religious sentiment does not in any way conflict with Rosierist doctrine, in one of its more radical departures from OTL Communism; in fact, Alice Rosier herself was a fervent Catholic.