A question about how to deal with Slavery

[Ankios]

In the last trailer, I HAD to notice the legal button that makes the player anable/disable slavery.

I also had to ask how is handled the end of slavery in Vicky II ?

Is this just a fact that slaves disapear ? Or does it has strong consequences ?

I could take any country that had slavery as an example but I'll focus on the USA as it is the closer to my point

In the US, following the war between the States, Slavery has just been put to an end. This meant that every Slave owner was ruined and the core of the economy for the southern States was destroyed. This was followed by years of powerty in the southern States. However, the US could have made the end of slavery with more caution to be sure that those States would not fall into high powerty for both the former slaves that were now unemployed and the former salve owners put from wealth to powerty in an instant (yeah the war of course had an impact on that but it's an other subject I think).

So will we be able to handle how Slavery is ended to be sure things don't go like they did in the Southern States of the US ? Or will it just have a simple consequence ? (like slaves just disappear without any consequences and become regular pops or it has a real consequence but the same for every country whatever we do to remove it)

 

[Alexander Seil]

I think you're rather overestimating the effect of the abolition. Look up sharecropping As for poverty, the antebellum South was dirt poor too, it just wasn't wiped out by a four year war yet.

 

[Andrelvis]

I think you're rather overestimating the effect of the abolition. Look up sharecropping As for poverty, the antebellum South was dirt poor too, it just wasn't wiped out by a four year war yet.

"Dirt poor", aren't you exaggerating? As far as agricultural economies go, they seem to have been pretty prosperous.

 

[krieger11b]

I think it's effects should be limited to just rich pops as they would be the only ones that had them and there should be a permanent revolt modifier to it. An option to try and send them back to Africa should be an option, something the US did in limited numbers after the Civil War and was a priority for Lincoln after the war, had he not been killed by fanatic that did the South far more harm than good.

 

[krieger11b]

"Dirt poor", aren't you exaggerating? As far as agricultural economies go, they seem to have been pretty prosperous.

No he is not, few people were well off there compared to the North. Just the Plantation owners, bankers and middlemen mostly.

 

[Andrelvis]

No he is not, few people were well off there compared to the North. Just the Plantation owners, bankers and middlemen mostly.

Yeah, but that's the majority of the population that was poor, not the country itself.

 

[krieger11b]

Yeah, but that's the majority of the population that was poor, not the country itself.

Here is a comarison on industrial strength, which is related to wealth as a whole.
http://www.civilwarhome.com/civilwarindustry.htm

One major economic result of the war was that it helped change the U.S. from a country with an essentially agrarian society to one dependent on mechanization and a national market system. Only the North possessed an industrial base, small as it was, before the shooting started. During the fiscal year ending 1 June 1860, the country possessed some 128,300 industrial establishments. Of these, 110,274 were located in states that remained in the Union. The most heavily industrialized states, New York and Pennsylvania, each had more industry than all the seceding states combined. In 1860, too, America had a total of $1,050,000,000 invested in real and personal property devoted to business, with $949,335,000 concentrated in the North; Pennsylvania, New York, and Massachusetts each had a larger investment than the South as a whole. Finally, the North contributed 92.5% of the $1.9 billion that comprised the total value of annual product in the country in 1860.

 

[Andrelvis]

Here is a comarison on industrial strength, which is related to wealth as a whole.
http://www.civilwarhome.com/civilwarindustry.htm

Thanks, that's what I wanted to know.

 

[Ankios]

All of this doesn't answer the main question guys !!! I don't want this thred to go into a debate i'd clearly rather have a clear answer about this game mechanics.

And historically I am myself not overestimating the effect of the end of slavery. The way the Union did it simply killed the south economy, even if dozens of years of huge federal taxations and the war was also some effects that ruined it. The fact remain.

krieger11b stated it : it ruined the rich people. Then with the (really historical and economically logical) game mechanics, how do you want southern states to succeed economically if you simply ruin in one click all the people who give money to build and industrialise the southern States ?

The same for European colonies all around the world... the basic end of slavery if a country decide to developp it then just makes it stop with just one click, how can that not have a huge economical impact on the owners ? And the huge poverty in which the former slves are thrown if the end of slavery is not carefully prepred must also have an impact !

 

[krieger11b]

krieger11b stated it : it ruined the rich people. Then with the (really historical and economically logical) game mechanics, how do you want southern states to succeed economically if you simply ruin in one click all the people who give money to build and industrialise the southern States ?

OK I will try to put his in real life/game mechanics. Slavery ending in this time era would in reality not effect all that much game mechanic wise, as often they ended up in the same kind of fields they were in as slaves, however now they were free to build their own farms. So game mechanics wise it should make them a farmer or labourer. There is nothing in the game mechanics that would represent anything else they were set back by, except maybe 0% literacy rate might some what help to make it more realistic. There is no game mechanic to represent that it was extremely difficult for them to rise in societies ranks, they might become craftsmen in small numbers in the North, but almost never clerks. However the great migration of Southern Blacks to the North did not occur that much until the 1950's/1960's on where the North became much more friendly to black workers, in perticular allowing them skilled jobs and free from lynchings, KKK, etc.

Ok and lets say this freeing of slaves is done peacefully, it would not collapse the Southern Economy, it would hurt it a bit from many freed slaves no longer wanting to pick cotton. However it is not devastating. It would actually make for cheaper labor, the North figured out way before the South that Wage Slavery > Forced Slavery. You do not have clothe, feed, or house a free man as you do with a slave (unless you want that expensive and money making assest to wither away and die)

As far as causing the Civil War, well look up Shermans March to see how the Southern Economy got devastated, all while the same economic policies that kept them poor continued (like high import tarrifs for finished goods that caused tarriff wars that sharply increased imported cotton tarriffs).

I can go into detail about this, but in summary the Southern Colonies for a long time did not have much slavery, they much prefered the far cheaper and more productive indentured servants, it was not until King George the III I think, severely curtailed indentured servitude, only then did Americans go heavily into looking to African slaves as a new source of labor for hard work in the fields as no one is going to pay the huge fee back then to cross the Atlantic to get paid very little to do tedious and intensive labor, they could have done that back home. The North promised (but did not for the first generation usually give) a chance for a much better life if they went to work in American cities/factories. So they got the bulk of the new immigrants that chose to be labourers instead, though many chose to be Colonial Artisans or Land Owning Farmers. There is a reason the name Smith, and Schmidt are very common in the US

As far as European slave owning colonies, hell if I know.

 

[unmerged(6766)]

It would make sense in game terms if the farmer POPs who are slaves take no income from their work(also have low CON/MIL), but that income goes instead to capitalists or aristocrats (who have high CON and vote). Therefore when you unclick the slavery button, a whole lot of rich (read: influential voters) will see an immediate drop in income and this will make them very mad. So there will be a big problem if you just do it willy-nilly.

 

[Aragos]

In game terms, perhaps this might be a good compromise--

--if event driven (ACW) then have automatic drop/downgrade of aristocrats and capitalists, etc. at the end of the war (reflecting loss of $$)

--if player driven (you choose to end slavery), you get the same thing above plus revolts everywhere that slaves exist (reflecting both slave uprisings and/or slaveholder revolts).

 

[unmerged(75409)]

Well, the best way to implement the slavery-button-feature (and the easiest way to mod this whole thing) would be to trigger an "on-action" event when you press the "abolish" button. Kind of like when you trigger a decision.

Depending the country, you would then get different events... most countries would probably be happy with a generic event that makes the rich people angry and frees the slave POPs. However for the USA or other major slave holders (Spain, Brazil, Portugal etc) the devs and later the modders could put in more specific events... in Brazil or the USA you would get a massive civil war if you press the button willy-nilly, or alternatively the devs could put in not a single event but a sequence of events which model a stepwise abolition. In less slavery-dependent nations like Portugal or Spain, when you press the button you just get some colonial unrest.

 

[Ankios]

Well, the best way to implement the slavery-button-feature (and the easiest way to mod this whole thing) would be to trigger an "on-action" event when you press the "abolish" button. Kind of like when you trigger a decision.

Depending the country, you would then get different events... most countries would probably be happy with a generic event that makes the rich people angry and frees the slave POPs. However for the USA or other major slave holders (Spain, Brazil, Portugal etc) the devs and later the modders could put in more specific events... in Brazil or the USA you would get a massive civil war if you press the button willy-nilly, or alternatively the devs could put in not a single event but a sequence of events which model a stepwise abolition. In less slavery-dependent nations like Portugal or Spain, when you press the button you just get some colonial unrest.

This would clearly be more like it !!!

But it seems like Paradox already know there is things to do about it in an extension as they are already thinking about the War between the States for their first extension : http://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/showthread.php?t=477323