Macro: no communism and the world

[Straha]

I came across this nice little chart:

Comparing the GDP per Capita Levels of Economies Behind the Iron Curtain with Those of Similarly Situated Economies that Escaped Communist Rule East-Block Country GDP per Capita Matched West-Block Country GDP per Capita Relative Gap
North Korea 700 South Korea 7660 0.91
China
490
Taiwan
9550
0.95
Vietnam
170
Philippines
850
0.8
Cambodia
150
Thailand
2110
0.93
FSR Georgia 580 Turkey 2970 0.8
Russia
2340
Finland
19300
0.88
Bulgaria
1140
Greece
7390
0.85
Yugoslavia
3240
Italy
19840
0.84
Hungary
3350
Austria
23510
0.86
Czech Republic 2710 Germany 23560 0.88
Poland
2260
Sweden
24740
0.91
Cuba
460
Mexico
3610
0.88

Geometric Mean 930 Geometric Mean 8030 0.88

And it got me thinking. If communism had never developed, and the above
communist countries had instead done as well as their non-communist countries, what would things be like?

Doing a rough calculation in my head, it would, more or less, double the
wealth of the planet (the biggies are China and Russia). But there would be a lot more as well. More interactions and travel through the various places in the world. Globalization would be further along, and we'd probably have more of a world culture. Russia and China would both probably have movie industries and pop-culture that would be the equal (in terms of popularity around the world) to the US. And so much more.

Any interesting thoughts or ideas you can think of, macro-speaking, for the non-communist world?

 

[wkwillis]

No world war I either?

If there is no WWI there will be no Communism. There might not be Socialism, either. We get a Libertarian America and a Colonial Europe. Europeans would not have died in WWI and II, and the Africans and Asians would have continued to die as the Europeans continued their forced labor, ethnic cleansing, and other genocidal policies.
Would America and Europe have put as much wealth into R and D as they did in OTL? Most wealth in the world is condensed research and development. If we didn't have that, the world's population is not the only thing that would have shrunk, so would the world's Gross World Product.
Can you imagine trying to drill for oil without computers? Can you imagine AIDs getting lose without PCR to find it? Maybe Africa and Asia would not be the only places where the population was shrinking.

 

[Grey Wolf]

If there is no WWI there will be no Communism. There might not be Socialism, either. We get a Libertarian America and a Colonial Europe. Europeans would not have died in WWI and II, and the Africans and Asians would have continued to die as the Europeans continued their forced labor, ethnic cleansing, and other genocidal policies.
Would America and Europe have put as much wealth into R and D as they did in OTL? Most wealth in the world is condensed research and development. If we didn't have that, the world's population is not the only thing that would have shrunk, so would the world's Gross World Product.
Can you imagine trying to drill for oil without computers? Can you imagine AIDs getting lose without PCR to find it? Maybe Africa and Asia would not be the only places where the population was shrinking.

Well, I don't really see why socialism has disappeared from your world ? In fact without Communism, and without the world war it would be MORE likely in the USA as Debs would not have been seen as a traitor and a danger. The word would not be tainted with the idea of massacres, totalitarianism etc, and though everyone would know there are extremists, the ruling class would not be able to portray all socialists in that light.

Within Europe, it is a fair bet that without a world war the SPD would have had to be involved in government within Germany by the early 1920s as the system of government could not survive indefinitely going the way it was - it would simply run out of coalitions in the face of an increased socialist vote. In fact, with there being no war, and with the Kaiser getting older, its likely that something analogous to OTL Prince Max's reforms would have been instituted in a peacetime Germany, and made the Kaiser more accountable to the Reichstag.

Within Britain, although the war did a lot for the Labour movement, I fail to see how the absence of war is going to do anything except retard it somewhat. Its possible that it wouldn't emerge as a giant political force in the near-term if the Liberals held things together, but a significant amount of the Liberals' platform would end up being borrowed from the ILP just to hold onto working class votes.

Grey Wolf

 

[Grey Wolf]

Looking at research and development, I don't think the absence of war would make a major difference except in the paths taken to get to the same general goal

Take both aeroplanes and wireless for examples :-

With aeroplanes the pre-world war one period saw a huge leap forward during peace-time, with international races being the main impetus towards ever-greater improvement - one I recall being a race to fly into the Sudan for some reason! Endurance, reliability and suchlike were the key features here. This would not produce aircraft analogous to OTL 1920s without major war experience, but aircraft development has not halted. Its still more or less a small company concern, but even before WW1 several major companies were getting interested and investing more. There would be more experimental designs, longer 'shelf-life' for designs which at first do not appear to be going very far, probably a much longer period of eminence for the pusher models etc. But reliability, endurance and increasingly usefulness would all be improving. Thus, by the mid 1920s I can see no reason why aircraft would not be used for passenger transport, freight etc just as in OTL. The route there may have been different, but arrive there they would.

With wireless, in some ways the war actually retarded development, partly by cutting across international projects/rivalries.

http://www.answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=197018
and
http://www.answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=285777

are very interesting articles on this, and similar, subjects

Best Regards
Grey Wolf

 

[David Howery]

I'm not seeing the link on no communism leading to no WW1... didn't the war have to do with German and French rivalries, rather than world fear over Marxism?

 

[Musketeer513]

Not Necessarily

If there is no WWI there will be no Communism. There might not be Socialism, either. We get a Libertarian America and a Colonial Europe. Europeans would not have died in WWI and II, and the Africans and Asians would have continued to die as the Europeans continued their forced labor, ethnic cleansing, and other genocidal policies.
Would America and Europe have put as much wealth into R and D as they did in OTL? Most wealth in the world is condensed research and development. If we didn't have that, the world's population is not the only thing that would have shrunk, so would the world's Gross World Product.
Can you imagine trying to drill for oil without computers? Can you imagine AIDs getting lose without PCR to find it? Maybe Africa and Asia would not be the only places where the population was shrinking.

If the Whites had won the RCW we still would not have communism. Also before the war Socialism was a growing phenomenon and where the war occurred or not would have taken charge several countries.