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Another fairly random one: the Habsburgs ruled England for a while in the late 16th and early 17th century, British colonization of North America was largely averted, and butterflies went here and there.

Currently, things are looking fairly good for the forces of democracy and niceness. The *fascistic regime in Russia has been replaced by a reasonably democratic one, and while the ruling Archons of the Fraternal Republic of the Andes (formerly the Peruvian Empire) haven't quite given up the ship on their form of totalitarian egalitarianism, it has largely lost its appeal to the Wretched of the Earth, and their only important ally left, Indonesia, is disintegrating in bloody civil war.

The Franco-British alliance considers itself to have been the mainstay of democracy during the Feverish Years from the 60s to the 90s, which annoys their allies in Italy and Gran Florida a bit. (After all, it _was_ the republic of Florida which made the biggest contribution to keeping the Levelers out of the North American Hispanidad)

France and Britain are both Catholic in this world, which is one reason they get along better than OTL: they are also both republics. Italy is exceedingly secular and anti-clerical (they feel that the Papacy aided the Habsburgs in delaying the Union of Italy...if the Battle of Bologna had gone the other way in 1672, well...), and much of its population belongs to various "new agey" cults (and let's not mention all those Muslims). Church-government conflicts eventually got so bad that the Papacy moved to Spain in the 19th century: nowadays, there is a strong privately-funded effort by some Floridans to attract the papacy to north America: the government steers well clear of it.

Poland has gone Protestant, although it's like British Anglicanism, an essentially conservative "national catholicism" derived from old quarrels with the Habsburgs.

The British, without the US/Canada outlet of OTL, did move in larger numbers to Latin American states and tropical colonies than in our world: British Puntland is running about 1/3 white nowadays, while British entrepeneurs in North America have played, like the Chinese in much of Asia, a fertile role in developing the economy. Still, the British isles are more crowded than in our world: the republican Federal Union of the British Isles has a population of almost 100 million, 20 million in Ireland. (They import quite a bit of food from Florida). Australia is also more populous, and suffering from water shortages.

The Russian Federation is the worlds single strongest nation, capitalist and fairly modern, but suffering from seperatist problems in Poland and Central Asia now that the repression has been softened. It is not on good terms at all with the authoritarian, modernizing regime in China, which remembers a great many insults and losses at Russian hands.

Japan is a modern nation, but never had much of an Empire, having had a slower, more troubled path to industrialization than in our world, and being blocked by a relatively stronger Russia and the Anglo-French alliance by the time it might have tried something. (Korea up until recently was a Russian protectorate). Southeast Asia is a federation put together by France and the British Union to block further Russian expansionism in Asia, and now that the Russians are no longer so menacing, shows some strong signs of breaking up: the Burmese, in particular, want to leave. This would not be so much of a problem if it were not for the fact that they want to take with them a number of people who do not.

India used to be French, and they did the divide-and-rule thing with much vigor: the French departure from India was messy, although a lot of old French India and several regional states have managed to put together a mutually profitable customs union. The Middle East is troubled, as the egyptian Empire and the Union of Arab Republics jostle for position as the Destined Unifier of the Arab Peoples. Both have nuclear arsenals, if teeny ones so far. There is no Israel, but the British Union, concerned over persecution of Jews in the Russian sphere, set up a refuge zone for Jews in what in our world would be Tasmania after the locals just happened to conveniently die off.

Africa is somewhat better off than in our world, and a less intensive colonization allowed for the survival of somewhat more rooted political systems. South Africa was settled by the Portuguese and is a vast, sprawling federal state with a weak central government, massive corruption, and a social system in which although lighter-skinned people tend to be on top, skin is whitened by Catholicism, a good grasp of Portuguese, and, above all, money.

The reunification of Germany (less Croatia and Bohemia) has made some people a bit nervous, but the nuclear equalizer remains in play. Rather more worrisome is the possibility of nuclear civil war in South America. Technology is somewhat more backward than OTL, perhaps a generation in engineering, but is closer to OTL in medecine and biology. Space travel has not passed beyond the unmanned satellite.

Cultural relativism has not really caught on, and Asians and Africans find European and North American assumptions of a more "sophisticated" culture rather annoying. On the other hand, hard-line biological racism never became as institutional as it was in our world, and North America and Europe are probably a bit less sexist than they were OTL in the 1980s. Religion is more influencial in eastern Europe than in our world, although in solidly Catholic Greater Florida people are less devout than in our world.

Description
Another fairly random one: the Habsburgs ruled England for a while in the late 16th and early 17th century, British colonization of North America was largely averted, and butterflies went here and there.

Currently, things are looking fairly good for the forces of democracy and niceness. The *fascistic regime in Russia has been replaced by a reasonably democratic one, and while the ruling Archons of the Fraternal Republic of the Andes (formerly the Peruvian Empire) haven't quite given up the ship on their form of totalitarian egalitarianism, it has largely lost its appeal to the Wretched of the Earth, and their only important ally left, Indonesia, is disintegrating in bloody civil war.

The Franco-British alliance considers itself to have been the mainstay of democracy during the Feverish Years from the 60s to the 90s, which annoys their allies in Italy and Gran Florida a bit. (After all, it _was_ the republic of Florida which made the biggest contribution to keeping the Levelers out of the North American Hispanidad)

France and Britain are both Catholic in this world, which is one reason they get along better than OTL: they are also both republics. Italy is exceedingly secular and anti-clerical (they feel that the Papacy aided the Habsburgs in delaying the Union of Italy...if the Battle of Bologna had gone the other way in 1672, well...), and much of its population belongs to various "new agey" cults (and let's not mention all those Muslims). Church-government conflicts eventually got so bad that the Papacy moved to Spain in the 19th century: nowadays, there is a strong privately-funded effort by some Floridans to attract the papacy to north America: the government steers well clear of it.

Poland has gone Protestant, although it's like British Anglicanism, an essentially conservative "national catholicism" derived from old quarrels with the Habsburgs.

The British, without the US/Canada outlet of OTL, did move in larger numbers to Latin American states and tropical colonies than in our world: British Puntland is running about 1/3 white nowadays, while British entrepeneurs in North America have played, like the Chinese in much of Asia, a fertile role in developing the economy. Still, the British isles are more crowded than in our world: the republican Federal Union of the British Isles has a population of almost 100 million, 20 million in Ireland. (They import quite a bit of food from Florida). Australia is also more populous, and suffering from water shortages.

The Russian Federation is the worlds single strongest nation, capitalist and fairly modern, but suffering from seperatist problems in Poland and Central Asia now that the repression has been softened. It is not on good terms at all with the authoritarian, modernizing regime in China, which remembers a great many insults and losses at Russian hands.

Japan is a modern nation, but never had much of an Empire, having had a slower, more troubled path to industrialization than in our world, and being blocked by a relatively stronger Russia and the Anglo-French alliance by the time it might have tried something. (Korea up until recently was a Russian protectorate). Southeast Asia is a federation put together by France and the British Union to block further Russian expansionism in Asia, and now that the Russians are no longer so menacing, shows some strong signs of breaking up: the Burmese, in particular, want to leave. This would not be so much of a problem if it were not for the fact that they want to take with them a number of people who do not.

India used to be French, and they did the divide-and-rule thing with much vigor: the French departure from India was messy, although a lot of old French India and several regional states have managed to put together a mutually profitable customs union. The Middle East is troubled, as the egyptian Empire and the Union of Arab Republics jostle for position as the Destined Unifier of the Arab Peoples. Both have nuclear arsenals, if teeny ones so far. There is no Israel, but the British Union, concerned over persecution of Jews in the Russian sphere, set up a refuge zone for Jews in what in our world would be Tasmania after the locals just happened to conveniently die off.

Africa is somewhat better off than in our world, and a less intensive colonization allowed for the survival of somewhat more rooted political systems. South Africa was settled by the Portuguese and is a vast, sprawling federal state with a weak central government, massive corruption, and a social system in which although lighter-skinned people tend to be on top, skin is whitened by Catholicism, a good grasp of Portuguese, and, above all, money.

The reunification of Germany (less Croatia and Bohemia) has made some people a bit nervous, but the nuclear equalizer remains in play. Rather more worrisome is the possibility of nuclear civil war in South America. Technology is somewhat more backward than OTL, perhaps a generation in engineering, but is closer to OTL in medecine and biology. Space travel has not passed beyond the unmanned satellite.

Cultural relativism has not really caught on, and Asians and Africans find European and North American assumptions of a more "sophisticated" culture rather annoying. On the other hand, hard-line biological racism never became as institutional as it was in our world, and North America and Europe are probably a bit less sexist than they were OTL in the 1980s. Religion is more influencial in eastern Europe than in our world, although in solidly Catholic Greater Florida people are less devout than in our world.