User blog comment:JERealize/What lies beyond Panem?/@comment-109.255.99.82-20110621142554

I don't really agree with everyone who thinks that there would have been so many volcanoes, earthquakes and Tsunamis that magically submerge whole continents. There would of course be other, more realistic environmental damages like massive droughts and some flooding (but not at the scale previously mentioned, like Australia being completely wiped off the map)

I think that the world would have faced resource wars as oil became scarce and possibly some nuclear warfare was involved. With less oil whole countries would have collapsed due to a lack of communications and this worsened with climate change. The climate change would have caused sea level rise in some areas and drought. Climate refugees would have to escape from coastal areas only to find famine because of the droughts. This led to massive population decrease and wars over food.

Maybe North America was destroyed by nuclear weapons, (maybe from Iran in one of the USA's oil wars?) which could explain Panem's low population compared to now. Maybe the Capitol was formed Rockies because it was one of the least affected areas by the nuclear war. Maybe the President of the USA escaped there and Panem became the successor state of the USA, eventually taking all of North America. The districts were probably pockets of survivors scattered around.

South America would face many of the problems I listed above. The Amazon is quite low lying so a lot of it could have been flooded. Right now South America seems to be going for economic integration and socialism which might be advantageous in this situation. Things would be rationed and shared, but millions would still die. Some radiation would come from North America, however it is unlikely to be directly attacked with nuclear weapons. So maybe it could even have a higher population than Panem.

Africa would face some desertification, but it would probably be one of the least damaged continents (which isn't saying much). Like south America, it probably wasn't directly attacked with nuclear weapons. It might face radiation from other places though.

The Middle East would have faced the problems I mentioned at the start, and probably also nuclear war after its oil wars with the USA.

Again, Europe would face drought and sea level rise. Netherlands and Denmark would be flooded. Italy, Spain, France, Greece would have terrible droughts. Maybe the European Union held together and barely managed to ration food, or it could have collapsed all together. It may or may not participate in a nuclear war, but it would get some fallout from the Middle East.

Russia probably faced little flooding and droughts. If it was wise, it stayed out of the atomic wars, especially since it already owns enough resources. If it did take part, it might have moved its Capital to the Ural mountains for protection, like the Capitol in the Rockies. Russia would have been somewhat effected by radiation from the Middle East. Its government probably stayed strong and might have invaded its weaker neighbors like Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Belarus and maybe even the rest of Europe since it offered some security from chaos and famine.

A lot of Asia's coasts were flooded. Bangladesh and East China, where it's major cities are, were worst hit. China is an emerging superpower so it could have taken part in nuclear wars. Either way, over a billion people died of famine, disease and war. After years of anarchy, regional governments were formed.

In Australia the usual happened: drought, famine sea level rise and anarchy.