South African elections in the 1980s

[Dan the Roman]

The Cold War would have destroyed the white position. IF, and this is a big IF, the regime could have survived to the post 2017 era, I think they would be "fine". Not fine in a a good way. Fine in a dystopian, Venezuela or Nicaragua, or Belarus, we are safe from regime change but at the cost of being a an economic and political basket case where every white who could leave did leaving a radical population behind.

The current norms in Africa and the wider non-Western world where internal repression of groups has been "de-racialized" such that what China does in Xinjiang, or Modi in Kashmir or even to am increasing degree Israel(outside of Europe and the US, white westerners still care) is now written up as an "internal affair" with solidarity among those who do domestic oppression trumping solidarity with people of the same skin color, religion, or background being repressed. Ironically, a white minority regime could probably find kinship with Rwanda, and a PR/Moral absolution modus vivendi with Mugabe Zimbabwe against outside condemnation.

The problem would be getting through the "end of history." Precisely because White South Africans were seen as white, they would have been held to a vastly higher standard than anyone else, including Israelis during the Unipolar moment because the continued existence of the Apartheid regime would have stood as an existential challenge to the triumph of Neoliberalism/Neoconservatism.

I think Clinton/Blair would have basically abandoned any sort of rational calculations to get rid of such a regime. Even by the standards of their often with hindsight nonsensical Balkan policies, I think everyone would look on the sort of lengths they would go and say "wow that was kind of embarrassing for everyone". Not saying there wouldn't be strong political, moral, and strategic reasons to try and oust such a system, but I suspect such efforts would go far beyond that.

It is possible for their to be a double standard and for it not to actually be a particularly exculpatory defense. South African whites by virtue of being whites and many speaking English would have found it almost impossible to survive the 1990s global environment in a way a non-Western regime could have.