- Location
- Teignmouth, Devon
- Pronouns
- She/Her
Based on a dream what I had
United Kingdom
1945-1956: Clement Atlee (Labour)
World War III broke out when the Berlin Airlift was shot down in 1949, leading to the Soviet invasion of West Germany, another national government and the nuclear bombing of Colchester. America grew less and less discriminating in their reprisal nuclear attacks as Europe fell to communism. By 1954, continental Europe was under Soviet domination and while the Allies dominated the seas all hope was lost of victory.
During the uneasy peace, street fighting broke out in Britain over the starvation rations. However, with Soviet allies mostly interned the leadership tended towards forms of English Trotskyism. As riots spread across the country, much of the government escaped, temporarily, to Canada. However riot and revolution was beginning to spread to the Americas.
Republic of Great Britain
1956-1960: Ted Grant (Leftist Bloc)
For four years, Britain was a bulwark of revolution in the formerly capitalist world, as Revolutionary forces took the main cities in America and the tenor of the revolution there began to change as white, anglo-saxon figures took leading roles and tapped into patriotism. The new alliance of South Africa, Australia, and America found itself fighting a war of reconquest as Maoist and Soviet forces snapped at Africa and Asia. The political situation of the time was chaotic and changeable as pro-capitalist forces attempted to triangulate between the enemies within, without, and beyond all at once.
Oceania
1960-1962: Triumvirate (IngSoc)
Oceania was founded on a promise of being a cohesive, unitary republic of the sort that had emerged in the Eurasian Soviet Union and the Eastasian People's Republic. But this was a difficult feat. There was no Mao, no Beria, but instead a chaotic handful of leaders in charge of a chaotic handful of parties.
One saving grace was the development of IngSoc as a party and ideology. It was a philosophy that had developed out of World War III and the British revolution - pragmatic, patriotic, entryist, and brutally conformist. IngSoc cells formed within other parties and would aim to convert to an outer party level of understanding, then indoctrinate people into the higher levels of the ideology. IngSoc was always the priority and their agents were willing to go as far as murder of political allies to achieve their goals.
Another useful development was NewSpeak - while English was by far the most common language in Oceania, it was spoken in various different ways and not at all in some areas in South America that Oceania was keen to incorporate. NewSpeak was initially intended as a simpler form of English for use in multilingual settings but soon became an important cultural project in its own right.
1962-1963: 2nd Triumvirate (IngSoc)
IngSoc finally took control of Oceania in 1962, and by the end of the year all other political parties had been banned.All functions of government were focused into three over arching super-ministries under one of the members of the triumvirate. All former laws were abolished and surprisingly few were put back in place, although the political police force of the Ministry of Love took an increasingly active role in keeping the peace.
1963-1965: 3rd Triumvirate (IngSoc)
The purges of 1963 saw the establishment of "Immediate Socialism" and Oceania declared an end to all class distinctions and capitalism. How meaningful this was is dubious - the proles were developing into a distinct underclass and society was collapsing. While Emmanuel Goldstein survived the initial purges by seeking shelter in Eurasia, he was assasinated in very short order. A fact that never quite made it into the national news in Oceania, where he developed into a convenient boogeyman figure. In 1965 the national legislature was shut down, leaving full power in the hands of the three ministries.
1965-1967: Collective Leadership (IngSoc)
The purges of '65 and '66 were the largest yet and it became clear that just as no one figure could run such a large and diverse country, nobody could publically be seen to control a part of it without risking themselves in a purge. The figure of Big Brother became more prominent, first as a mascot but increasingly it became common to speak about him as though he was real. By 1966 denying the existence of Big Brother became thought crime.
1967-1992: Big Brother (IngSoc)
Big Brother was officially vested in power in around 1967, although officially it was decided by around 1970 to deny that he had ever not been in power. The 70s were the highpoint of IngSoc, which controlled all organs of power not via intermediaries and personalities, but through sheer force of impersonal dogma. By the 80s, however, the system was collapsing. Prole riots were never reported but were not uncommon, and the economy was in free fall and almost nothing was produced and nobody was able to plan, innovate, record data or analyse trends without attracting the attention of the thought police. By 1987, Oceania was fighting to maintain control of South America. By 1988 it was decided that it was bravely focusing on conquoring South America for the first time. 1990 saw a peace with the two other great powers as Australia was wrecked by rebellions. The one saving grace was that Western Europe was under similar strain and Eastasia, overstretching itself into Africa and Asia, would soon follow suit.
1991 saw the beginning of civil war in America, and Big Brither began to recede from view, more useful as a symbol now that the state was unable to paper over the cracks with doublethink and purges.
People's Republic of Britain
1992-1993: Alan Johnson (IngSoc)
Alan Johnson was never formally the leader of the People's Republic, but as the Republic was coming together he was the most prominent figure. When IngSoc needed someone to negotiate with rebel towns, when it was necessary to negotiate a peace deal with the nasceant French Republic, Alan Johnson was the person in the fore.
As IngSoc receded, this became less true. By 1993, when the first semi-free elections were held (IngSoc controlled regions and company towns were allowed to appoint rather than elect representatives) he was seen to have been replaced. Though he continued to be a senior figure in IngSoc controlled areas, where it was treated as thought crime to believe that Oceania had fallen or the Big Brother was not in charge of increasingly large parts of the world.
1993-2000: David Allan (People's Republican Party)
Former news announcer David Allan was a calming face that the British populance could get behind, but he was not a powerful figure. Across the country standards of living were dropping as formerly party controlled property was "privatised" by whoever took over it. People found themselves suddenly paying "rent" to mob bosses. The election on 1999 was almost entirely appointed rather than elected, but the state struggled on
2000-2004: Tam McGraw (People's Republican Party)
2004-2005: Robert Kilroy (People's Republican Party)
Taking over after what was widely considered to be the suicide of Tam MacGraw, Kilroy continued to expand the private sector and formalise laws, although his time as president was relatively short. In 2005 he did what no leader of Britain had done in sixty years - he lost an election and peacefully handed over power to a rival party.
2005-2011: John Prescott (IngSoc) Coalition with George Galloway (Communist Party PRB)
IngSoc still controlled some areas of London - by now only really the towers of the three ministries and some areas around them - but outside of those areas, the Party had adapted and become a broadly left of centre organisation that did some work in society and could contest elections. This was still a rarity, and the organisation was able to win a slight plurality in the Congress - which became a majority when they agreed to work alongside the Goldsteinist Communists.
Corporations lost their right to vote on people's behalf and IngSoc surprised voters by applying the same rules to their own territories. The few remaining areas that considered themselves to be controlled by Big Brother's world state of Oceania were now relegated to perhaps being allowed seats on London City Council.
During this time the state also introduced basic unemployment benefits, orphanages, and even some level of healthcare insurance.
2011-2017: Richard Littlejohn (People's Republican Party)
The 2011 election was contested mainly on the issue of vagrancy reform. IngSoc's policies of feeding and clothing the itinerant poor had created hotspots for poverty that created crime, disorder and disease. Littlejohn's government promised to clear the soup kitchens and abolish the worst of the orphanages. It was a difficult time for the state. While criminality decreased, starvation greatly increased, and public disorder did break out on a few occasions in protests and even riots.
Nonetheless it was an era of economic success and cultural development, as British businesses started to be seen overseas and the film and music industries were revived by new talents that pushed British culture across the world.
2017-2019: Steven Morrissey (Liberal Democratic Party)
The Liberal Democrats were meant to represent a third way between the handouts of IngSoc and the brutality of the PRP, but under Morrissey, the system never quite worked out. What was meant to happen was a freeze on immigration from deprived areas of Western Europe and a massive housebuilding programme that would employ the poor in building their own new homes. This never quite worked. Companies took the advances on their government contracts then did nothing with them, while even the minimal provisions that existed for social welfare went unmet.
A big part of the problem was that the civil service was mostly PRP and IngSoc loyalists, and finding new allies was hard for Morrissey, after just a year, and hangued on all sides, he handed power over to his party.
2019-2020: Triumvirate (Liberal Democratic Party)
No new President could be decided on, but a number of figures rose to dominance. Moving the seat of government into the old Ministry of Love building, the Triumvirate was able to conveniently replace much of the old bureaucracy in the process. For a strange few months, the upper levels of the seat of government believed themselves to be in a different state to the rest of Britain. But eventually the last few stragglers from Oceania were starved out.
Housing and social welfare commitments were mostly forgotten, and the triumvirate focused instead on whipping up patriotism and finding excuses to attack its ideological enemies in congress. The Liberal Democrat's also started to use government funds to arm their militia. While of course every political party has a militia it was previously understood that these were to be funded privately. Increasingly, the Liberal Democrats took on the function of a politicised police force. This was particularly notable in their breaking of the London transport strike.
2020: Collective Leadership (Liberal Democratic Party)
One by one, the original Triumvirate have been replaced with a confusing array of distant figures. Nobody is quite sure who they are anymore, or if they can still be voted out of office. The democratic organs of government are still in place, technically. But they've never been trusted and increasingly commentators are speaking in terms of if, not when, there's another election. The figure of Big Brother has even been rehabilitated by the party, as a national symbol and a human face of the government.
Despite this, there's no guarantee that the Liberal Democrats would even lose the next election. People are mostly happy. There is freedom of a sort, enough food, and clothes, and supplies. And there's peace. Perhaps this is as good as it gets?
United Kingdom
1945-1956: Clement Atlee (Labour)
World War III broke out when the Berlin Airlift was shot down in 1949, leading to the Soviet invasion of West Germany, another national government and the nuclear bombing of Colchester. America grew less and less discriminating in their reprisal nuclear attacks as Europe fell to communism. By 1954, continental Europe was under Soviet domination and while the Allies dominated the seas all hope was lost of victory.
During the uneasy peace, street fighting broke out in Britain over the starvation rations. However, with Soviet allies mostly interned the leadership tended towards forms of English Trotskyism. As riots spread across the country, much of the government escaped, temporarily, to Canada. However riot and revolution was beginning to spread to the Americas.
Republic of Great Britain
1956-1960: Ted Grant (Leftist Bloc)
For four years, Britain was a bulwark of revolution in the formerly capitalist world, as Revolutionary forces took the main cities in America and the tenor of the revolution there began to change as white, anglo-saxon figures took leading roles and tapped into patriotism. The new alliance of South Africa, Australia, and America found itself fighting a war of reconquest as Maoist and Soviet forces snapped at Africa and Asia. The political situation of the time was chaotic and changeable as pro-capitalist forces attempted to triangulate between the enemies within, without, and beyond all at once.
Oceania
1960-1962: Triumvirate (IngSoc)
Ted Grant (English Socialist Party); James P. Cannon (Socialist Workers' Party); Jack Kavanagh (Workers' League of Australia)
Oceania was founded on a promise of being a cohesive, unitary republic of the sort that had emerged in the Eurasian Soviet Union and the Eastasian People's Republic. But this was a difficult feat. There was no Mao, no Beria, but instead a chaotic handful of leaders in charge of a chaotic handful of parties.
One saving grace was the development of IngSoc as a party and ideology. It was a philosophy that had developed out of World War III and the British revolution - pragmatic, patriotic, entryist, and brutally conformist. IngSoc cells formed within other parties and would aim to convert to an outer party level of understanding, then indoctrinate people into the higher levels of the ideology. IngSoc was always the priority and their agents were willing to go as far as murder of political allies to achieve their goals.
Another useful development was NewSpeak - while English was by far the most common language in Oceania, it was spoken in various different ways and not at all in some areas in South America that Oceania was keen to incorporate. NewSpeak was initially intended as a simpler form of English for use in multilingual settings but soon became an important cultural project in its own right.
1962-1963: 2nd Triumvirate (IngSoc)
Emmanuel Goldstein; Murray Rothbard; Ted Grant
IngSoc finally took control of Oceania in 1962, and by the end of the year all other political parties had been banned.All functions of government were focused into three over arching super-ministries under one of the members of the triumvirate. All former laws were abolished and surprisingly few were put back in place, although the political police force of the Ministry of Love took an increasingly active role in keeping the peace.
1963-1965: 3rd Triumvirate (IngSoc)
Murray Rothbard; William Aaronson; Eric Edgar Cooke
The purges of 1963 saw the establishment of "Immediate Socialism" and Oceania declared an end to all class distinctions and capitalism. How meaningful this was is dubious - the proles were developing into a distinct underclass and society was collapsing. While Emmanuel Goldstein survived the initial purges by seeking shelter in Eurasia, he was assasinated in very short order. A fact that never quite made it into the national news in Oceania, where he developed into a convenient boogeyman figure. In 1965 the national legislature was shut down, leaving full power in the hands of the three ministries.
1965-1967: Collective Leadership (IngSoc)
The purges of '65 and '66 were the largest yet and it became clear that just as no one figure could run such a large and diverse country, nobody could publically be seen to control a part of it without risking themselves in a purge. The figure of Big Brother became more prominent, first as a mascot but increasingly it became common to speak about him as though he was real. By 1966 denying the existence of Big Brother became thought crime.
1967-1992: Big Brother (IngSoc)
Big Brother was officially vested in power in around 1967, although officially it was decided by around 1970 to deny that he had ever not been in power. The 70s were the highpoint of IngSoc, which controlled all organs of power not via intermediaries and personalities, but through sheer force of impersonal dogma. By the 80s, however, the system was collapsing. Prole riots were never reported but were not uncommon, and the economy was in free fall and almost nothing was produced and nobody was able to plan, innovate, record data or analyse trends without attracting the attention of the thought police. By 1987, Oceania was fighting to maintain control of South America. By 1988 it was decided that it was bravely focusing on conquoring South America for the first time. 1990 saw a peace with the two other great powers as Australia was wrecked by rebellions. The one saving grace was that Western Europe was under similar strain and Eastasia, overstretching itself into Africa and Asia, would soon follow suit.
1991 saw the beginning of civil war in America, and Big Brither began to recede from view, more useful as a symbol now that the state was unable to paper over the cracks with doublethink and purges.
People's Republic of Britain
1992-1993: Alan Johnson (IngSoc)
Alan Johnson was never formally the leader of the People's Republic, but as the Republic was coming together he was the most prominent figure. When IngSoc needed someone to negotiate with rebel towns, when it was necessary to negotiate a peace deal with the nasceant French Republic, Alan Johnson was the person in the fore.
As IngSoc receded, this became less true. By 1993, when the first semi-free elections were held (IngSoc controlled regions and company towns were allowed to appoint rather than elect representatives) he was seen to have been replaced. Though he continued to be a senior figure in IngSoc controlled areas, where it was treated as thought crime to believe that Oceania had fallen or the Big Brother was not in charge of increasingly large parts of the world.
1993-2000: David Allan (People's Republican Party)
Former news announcer David Allan was a calming face that the British populance could get behind, but he was not a powerful figure. Across the country standards of living were dropping as formerly party controlled property was "privatised" by whoever took over it. People found themselves suddenly paying "rent" to mob bosses. The election on 1999 was almost entirely appointed rather than elected, but the state struggled on
2000-2004: Tam McGraw (People's Republican Party)
On New Years Eve 1999 David Allan announced, to many people's surprise, that he was standing down. Former prole ganster Tam MacGraw took his place. This was of great concern to some former Party members who felt it would mean more Kleptocracy, but it was in fact quite successful. Over four years much of the remaining IngSoc territory was cleared, leaving the Party in control of little more than small parts of Inner London. The newly privatised properties allowed big gangs to expand into actual businesses, which allowed them to operate in more official ways - not just collecting rent but also making repairs. Not just ignoring the rules, but writing laws to protect their property. By the end of four years, some semblance of the rule of law had been re-established.2004-2005: Robert Kilroy (People's Republican Party)
Taking over after what was widely considered to be the suicide of Tam MacGraw, Kilroy continued to expand the private sector and formalise laws, although his time as president was relatively short. In 2005 he did what no leader of Britain had done in sixty years - he lost an election and peacefully handed over power to a rival party.
2005-2011: John Prescott (IngSoc) Coalition with George Galloway (Communist Party PRB)
IngSoc still controlled some areas of London - by now only really the towers of the three ministries and some areas around them - but outside of those areas, the Party had adapted and become a broadly left of centre organisation that did some work in society and could contest elections. This was still a rarity, and the organisation was able to win a slight plurality in the Congress - which became a majority when they agreed to work alongside the Goldsteinist Communists.
Corporations lost their right to vote on people's behalf and IngSoc surprised voters by applying the same rules to their own territories. The few remaining areas that considered themselves to be controlled by Big Brother's world state of Oceania were now relegated to perhaps being allowed seats on London City Council.
During this time the state also introduced basic unemployment benefits, orphanages, and even some level of healthcare insurance.
2011-2017: Richard Littlejohn (People's Republican Party)
The 2011 election was contested mainly on the issue of vagrancy reform. IngSoc's policies of feeding and clothing the itinerant poor had created hotspots for poverty that created crime, disorder and disease. Littlejohn's government promised to clear the soup kitchens and abolish the worst of the orphanages. It was a difficult time for the state. While criminality decreased, starvation greatly increased, and public disorder did break out on a few occasions in protests and even riots.
Nonetheless it was an era of economic success and cultural development, as British businesses started to be seen overseas and the film and music industries were revived by new talents that pushed British culture across the world.
2017-2019: Steven Morrissey (Liberal Democratic Party)
The Liberal Democrats were meant to represent a third way between the handouts of IngSoc and the brutality of the PRP, but under Morrissey, the system never quite worked out. What was meant to happen was a freeze on immigration from deprived areas of Western Europe and a massive housebuilding programme that would employ the poor in building their own new homes. This never quite worked. Companies took the advances on their government contracts then did nothing with them, while even the minimal provisions that existed for social welfare went unmet.
A big part of the problem was that the civil service was mostly PRP and IngSoc loyalists, and finding new allies was hard for Morrissey, after just a year, and hangued on all sides, he handed power over to his party.
2019-2020: Triumvirate (Liberal Democratic Party)
Steven Yaxley; Vincent Cable; Kellie-Jay Minshull
No new President could be decided on, but a number of figures rose to dominance. Moving the seat of government into the old Ministry of Love building, the Triumvirate was able to conveniently replace much of the old bureaucracy in the process. For a strange few months, the upper levels of the seat of government believed themselves to be in a different state to the rest of Britain. But eventually the last few stragglers from Oceania were starved out.
Housing and social welfare commitments were mostly forgotten, and the triumvirate focused instead on whipping up patriotism and finding excuses to attack its ideological enemies in congress. The Liberal Democrat's also started to use government funds to arm their militia. While of course every political party has a militia it was previously understood that these were to be funded privately. Increasingly, the Liberal Democrats took on the function of a politicised police force. This was particularly notable in their breaking of the London transport strike.
2020: Collective Leadership (Liberal Democratic Party)
One by one, the original Triumvirate have been replaced with a confusing array of distant figures. Nobody is quite sure who they are anymore, or if they can still be voted out of office. The democratic organs of government are still in place, technically. But they've never been trusted and increasingly commentators are speaking in terms of if, not when, there's another election. The figure of Big Brother has even been rehabilitated by the party, as a national symbol and a human face of the government.
Despite this, there's no guarantee that the Liberal Democrats would even lose the next election. People are mostly happy. There is freedom of a sort, enough food, and clothes, and supplies. And there's peace. Perhaps this is as good as it gets?