"Three Ways"

1978 Aldiss, Brian [Wilson] (1925-2017). “Three Ways.” The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction 54.4 (April 1978): 39-58. Rpt. in his New Arrivals, Old Encounters: Twelve Stories (London: Jonathan Cape, 1979), 25-51. Merrill, PSt

Men (no women were on the ship) return to Earth after a long trip to find it entirely under five dystopias. After a new ice age and two nuclear wars, most people live underground and there are constant wars among the dystopias, Corporatia, Socdemaria, Communia, Neutralia, and Third World. Widespread poverty and few human rights. The men end up in different countries, but their situations are much the same, except for one who moves to Zealandia, a colony of Australia, where he becomes a colonial boss. The others return to space.