Micronation

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A micronation (cybernation, fantasy country, model country, new country project, pseudonation, counternation, ephemeral state, online nation, and variants thereof) is an entity intended to replace, resemble, mock, or exist on equal footing with recognized independent states. Some micronations are created with serious intent, while others exist as a hobby or stunt. For the most part they exist only on paper, on the Internet, or in the minds of their creators and participants.

A small number have also managed to achieve some degree of recognition. When they do, they converge to some degree with other organizing paradigms that offer, or seem to offer, political or infrastructural independence of some sort.

The term micronation, which literally means "small nation", is a neologism originating in the 1990s to describe the many thousands of small unrecognized state-like entities that have mostly arisen since that time. The term has since also come to be used retrospectively to refer to earlier unrecognized entities, some of which date to as far back as the 19th century. Supporters of micronations use the term "macronation" for any real sovereign nation-state. Micronations should not be confused with legitimately recognized, but geographically tiny nations such as Fiji, Monaco, and San Marino, for which the term microstate is more accurate and descriptive.

Contents

What is a micronation?

Micronations generally have a number of common features:

  1. Micronations may have a form and structure similar to established sovereign states, including territorial claims, government institutions, official symbols and citizens.
  2. Micronations are often quite small, in both their claimed territory and claimed populations — although there are some exceptions to this rule.
  3. Micronations may issue formal instruments such as postage stamps, coins, banknotes and passports, and confer honours and titles of nobility.

A criterion which distinguishes micronations from imaginary countries, eco-villages, campuses, tribes, clans, sects, and residential community associations, is that these latter entities do not usually seek to be recognized as sovereign.

The Montevideo Convention was one attempt to create a legal definition distinguishing between states and non-states. Some micronations meet this definition, while some do not. Some micronations have rejected the Montevideo Convention altogether.

Small, generally recognised states such as Fiji, Monaco and San Marino are sometimes referred to by some as micronations; however, these countries are more properly referred to as microstates.

The academic study of micronations and microstates is termed micropatrology, and the hobby of establishing and operating micronations is known as micronationalism.

Evolution of micronationalism

The 19th century saw the rise to prominence of the nation-state concept, and the earliest recognizable micronations can be dated to that period. Most were founded by eccentric adventurers or business speculators, and several were remarkably successful. These include the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, ruled by the Clunies-Ross family, and Sarawak, ruled by the "White Rajas" of the Brooke family; both were independent personal fiefdoms in all but name, and survived until well into the 20th century.

Less successful were the Kingdom of Araucania and Patagonia (1860-1862) in southern Chile and Argentina, and the Kingdom of Sedang (1888-1890) in French Indochina. The oldest extant micronation to arise in modern times is the Kingdom of Redonda, founded in 1865 in the Caribbean. It failed to establish itself as a "real" country, but has nonetheless managed to survive into the present day as a unique literary foundation with its own king and aristocracy — although it is not without its controversies; there are presently at least four competing claimants to the Redondan throne.

M. C. Harman, owner of the UK island of Lundy in the early decades of the 20th century issued private coinage and postage stamps for local use. Although the island was ruled as a virtual fiefdom, its owner never claimed to be independent of the United Kingdom, so Lundy can at best be described as a precursor to later territorial micronations.

The 1960s and 1970s saw a micronational renaissance, with the foundation of a number of territorial micronations. The first of these, Sealand, was founded in 1967 on an abandoned World War II gun platform in the North Sea, and has survived into the present day. Others were based on schemes requiring the construction of artificial islands, but only two are known to have risen above sea level.

Rose Island was a 400 sq metre platform built in international waters off the Italian town of Rimini, in the Adriatic Sea in 1968. It is reported to have issued stamps, minted currency, and declared Esperanto to be its official language. Shortly after completion, however, it was destroyed by the Italian Navy.

The Republic of Minerva was set up in 1972 as a libertarian new country project by Nevada businessman Michael Oliver. Oliver's group conducted dredging operations at the Minerva Reefs, a shoal located in the Pacific Ocean south of Fiji. They succeeded in creating a small artificial island, but their efforts at securing international recognition met with little success, and near-neighbour Tonga sent a military force to the area and annexed it.

On April 1, 1977, bibliophile Richard Booth, declared the UK town of Hay-on-Wye an "independent republic" with himself as its king. The town has subsequently developed a healthy tourism industry based literary interests, and "King Richard" (whose sceptre consists of a recycled toilet plunger) continues to dole out Hay-on-Wye peerages and honours to anyone prepared to pay for them. The official website for Hay-on-Wye, however, admits that the declaration of independence, along with the later claim to have annexed the United States and renamed it the "US of Hay" were publicity stunts. [1]

Micronational activities were disproportionately common throughout Australia in the final three decades of the 20th century. The Hutt River Province Principality started the ball rolling in 1970, when Prince Leonard (born Leonard George Casley) declared his farming property independent after a dispute over wheat quotas. 1976 witnessed the creation of the Province of Bumbunga on a rural property near Snowtown, South Australia, by an eccentric British monarchist named Alex Brackstone, and a dispute over flood damage to farm properties led to the creation of the Independent State of Rainbow Creek in northeastern Victoria (Australia) by Tom Barnes in 1979. In New South Wales, a political protest by a group of Sydney teenagers led to the 1981 creation of the Empire of Atlantium, and a mortgage foreclosure dispute led George and Stephanie Muirhead of Rockhampton, Queensland to secede as the Principality of Marlborough in 1993.

Yet another Australian secessionist state came into existence on 1 May 2003, when Peter Gillies declared the independence of his 66 hectare northern New South Wales farm as the Principality of United Oceania after an unresolved year-long dispute with Port Stephens Council over Gillies' plans to construct a private residence on the property.

Micronational hobbyists received a significant boost in the mid 1990s when popularization of the Internet gave them the ability to promote their activities to a global audience. As a result the number of online and fantasy micronations expanded dramatically. The majority were based in English-speaking countries, however a significant minority arose elsewhere in Portuguese-speaking countries as well.

Categories of micronations

In the present day eight main types of micronations are prevalent:

  1. Social, economic, or political simulations.
  2. Historical simulations.
  3. Exercises in personal entertainment or self-aggrandizement.
  4. Exercises in fantasy, creative fiction or artistic expression.
  5. Vehicles for the promotion of an agenda.
  6. Entities created for fraudulent purposes.
  7. Historical anomalies and aspirant states.
  8. Fifth World nations.


Social, economic or political simulations

Micronations of the first type tend to be fairly serious in outlook, involve sometimes significant numbers of relatively mature participants, and often engage in highly sophisticated, structured activities that emulate the operations of real-world nations. One good example of these includes:

  • Talossa, a two-decade old political simulation with its own invented language. It was started by Ben Madison as the Kingdom of Talossa, but today exists primarily as the Republic Of Talossa, a micronation based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The Republic Of Talossa split off from the Kingdom of Talossa on 1 June 2004, and no longer grants Ben Madison his formal iconic status as King Robert I.

Historical simulations

These micronations also tend to be fairly serious, and involve significant numbers of people interested in recreating the past, especially the Roman or Medieval past, and living it in a vicarious way. One good example of these includes:

  • Nova Roma (Micronation), not to be confused with the historical Nova Roma, is a group with a worldwide membership of over 1000 that has minted its own coins, and which engages in real life Roman-themed re-enactmnents.

Exercises in personal entertainment or self-aggrandizement

With literally thousands in existence, micronations of this type are by far the most common. They are ephemeral, and tend to be Internet-based, rarely surviving more than a few months, although there are notable exceptions. They generally involve a handful of people, and are concerned primarily with arrogating to their founders the outward symbols of statehood. The use of grand-sounding titles, awards, honours, and heraldic symbols derived from European feudal traditions, and the conduct of "wars" with other micronations, are common manifestations of their activities. Examples include:

  • The Aerican Empire, a Monty Pythonesque "interplanetary empire".
  • Holy Empire of R�union, a Brazil-based micronation.
  • Republic of Molossia, a Nevada desert-based micronation.
  • Kingdom of Zarahemla, a kingdom in exile awaiting the advance of technology to reclaim homeland in space.
  • Satirocity, a new micronation founded on October 18, 2005 by Prince Jeffrey II in the soburbs of Philadelphia that claims about 40 citizens and a lot of land in space.

Exercises in fantasy, creative fiction or artistic expression

Micronations of this type include stand-alone artistic projects, deliberate exercises in creative online and offline fiction, artistamp creations, and even popular movies. Examples include:

  • Lizbekistan, a popular Internet-based project created by Australian artist Liz Stirling.
  • Upper Yafa, one of an extraordinarily diverse and entertaining array of micronations invented by prolific New Zealand-based artistamp producer Bruce Henderson since the early 1970s.
  • The Republic of Howland, Baker and Jarvis, a highly developed web-based alternative reality project.
  • Neue Slowenische Kunst (NSK), a nation created by a number of Slovene artists, among them the Laibach band.
  • Molvania, a nation that started as a parody of a tourist guide of a fictitious Eastern European untouched by modern dentisty.
  • Ladonia, a nation founded by the Swedish artist and historian Lars Vilks. Ladonia claims a piece of land at a peninsula in southern Sweden as its territory.

Vehicles for the promotion of an agenda

These types of micronations are typically associated with a political or social reform agenda. Some are maintained as media and public relations exercises, and examples of this type include:

  • The "global state" of Waveland, established on the UK island of Rockall by Greenpeace protesters in 1997.
  • The Conch Republic, which began in 1982 as a tongue-in-cheek economic protest by residents and business owners in the Florida Keys.
  • The Freie Republik Wendland, founded 1980 as part of a campaign to prevent the construction of a nuclear waste disposal facility in Gorleben, northern Germany.

Entities created for fraudulent purposes

Given that most people are inculcated with an unquestioning respect and obedience for governments and their symbols from an early age, it is probably not surprising that certain unscrupulous individuals have sought to derive personal financial benefit from the gullible by establishing micronational entities that have a fraudulent intent. The best known of these are:

  • The Dominion of Melchizedek, created in 1986 by a father-and-son team of confidence tricksters named Evan David Pedley and Ben David Pedley (the latter also known as David Korem) to sell fraudulent banking licenses. Melchizedek, which is supposedly an "ecclesiastical constitutional sovereignty", claims a number of territories, and a large slab of Antarctica. According to John Shockey, former special assistant, U.S. Comptroller of the Currency, in an address to the 4th International Financial Fraud Convention in London, May 27, 1999: "The Dominion of Melchizedek is a fraud, a major fraud, and not a legitimate sovereign entity. Persons associated with the Dominion of Melchizedek have been indicted and convicted of a variety of crimes."
  • The Principality of New Utopia (PNU), operated by an Oklahoma City longevity promoter named Prince Lazarus R. Long (born Howard Turney) � and ostensibly a libertarian new country project � was stopped by a United States federal court temporary restraining order from selling bonds and bank licenses. New Utopia has claimed for a number of years to be on the verge of commencing construction of an artificial island territory located approximately midway between Honduras and Cuba, however the selected location continues to remain resolutely submerged by the waters of the Caribbean.
  • The Kingdom of EnenKio, which claims Wake Atoll in the Marshall Islands, has been deemed a scam for selling passports and diplomatic papers by the governments of the Marshall Islands and of the United States.

Historical anomalies and aspirant states

A small number of micronations are founded with genuine aspirations to be sovereign states. Many are based on historical anomalies or eccentric interpretations of law, and tend to be easily confused with established states. This category includes:

  • Seborga, an historic principality located in the Italian region of Liguria, which traces its history back at least 1,000 years.
  • Beaver Island in Lake Michigan was an unrecognized Mormon kingdom from 1848 to 1856, until its leader, James Strang, was assassinated by disgruntled followers.
  • The Republic of Indian Stream, established in 1832 on territory claimed by both the US and Canada.
  • The Hutt River Province Principality, a farm in Western Australia which claims to have seceded from Australia, to become an independent principality with a worldwide population of 13,000.
  • The Principality of Sealand, a "sovereign Principality" located on a WWII-era anti-aircraft platform in the North Sea in what were international waters at the time of its foundation. These waters are now subject to claims by both Sealand and the United Kingdom. Sealand is home to HavenCo, a colocation site that advertises that customer data will be secure "against any legal action."
  • Transnational Republic, a global nation counting several thousand citizens.
  • The Republic of West Florida was an actual 'microstate' for 74 days in 1810. The Dominion of British West Florida continues that tradition, based on 'unusual' views of the treaty of Versailles (1783) and the effect that Napoleon's removal of the 'Rightful Crown' in Spain would have upon it.

These types of micronations are usually located in small (usually disputed) territorial enclaves, generate limited economic activity founded on tourism, philatelic and numismatic sales, and are at best tolerated or at worst ignored by other nations.

Fifth World nations

These nations are of recent formation. Fifth World nations claim to fill the great chasm between Fourth World nations and the nations of the micronational community, the latter sometimes referred collectively by micronationalists as Sixth and Seventh Worlds. Fifth World nations have completely rejected most international treaties that are normally viewed as sacred cows by micronations, and have accepted new legal concepts radically different from the Roman law standard, such as the Cesidian law legal concept called jus cerebri electronici. An example of these:

  • TTF-Bucksfan, a virtual state with citizens who are real world former Ministers of Parliament, but TTF-Bucksfan even has Internet scientists among its illustrious citizenry. A corporation of TTF-Bucksfan, the Cesidian Root controls 12 alternate root top-level domains, two of which are controlled for the House of Savoy and the Italian Republic. TTF-Bucksfan even controls an IPv4 network as powerful as the one of the Falkland Islands. TTF-Bucksfan also runs a multi-school university, a real and virtual library, a church, news agencies, and has founded an international governmental organisation of Fifth World nations: the Fifth World Council. The official languages of TTF-Bucksfan are English and Italian.

The Boodlesmythe-Tallini System of Classification

In an attempt to predict the future potential of micronations, entities that in many cases are born and die within the same year, micronational researchers have, over time, devised various systems of classification. The most ingenious of these systems is the Boodlesmythe-Tallini System.

Quantitative Classification (Boodlesmythe)

  • "Online" versus "Bricks and Mortar" — an "Online" micronation exists solely in the server space it occupies; whereas a "Bricks and Mortar" micronation might have an online presence, but would continue to exist if the server hosting their space ceased to exist.
  • "Tiny" versus "Small" versus "Sizeable" — a "Tiny" micronation would have from 1-10 members/citizens; a "Small" micronation would have from 11-50 members/citizens; and a "Sizeable" micronation would have 51 or more members/citizens.
  • "Community" versus "Statehood" — a "Community" micronation exists as a group of people with a shared set of goals or aims; whereas a "Statehood" micronation seeks to form a functional government and acquire sovereign territory.

Qualitative Classification (Tallini)

  • 7th World — Under the best of circumstances: a flaky micronation. Under the worst: a total joke.
  • 6th World — Under the best of circumstances: a serious micronation with potential, but it will need an attractive culture to florish. Under the worst: a sizeable community, more than a nation.
  • 5th World — Under the best of circumstances: serious competition for Sealand. Under the worst: a small community with great potential if it develops an attractive culture, and a committed few.

The Whole Picture (Boodlesmythe-Tallini)

  1. Online, Tiny, Community — 7th World
  2. Online, Tiny, Statehood — 7th World
  3. Online, Small, Community — 7th World
  4. Online, Small, Statehood — 7th World
  5. Online, Sizeable, Community — 6th World
  6. Online, Sizeable, Statehood — 6th World
  7. Bricks and Mortar, Tiny, Community — 6th World
  8. Bricks and Mortar, Tiny, Statehood — 6th World
  9. Bricks and Mortar, Small, Community — 5th World
  10. Bricks and Mortar, Small, Statehood — 5th World
  11. Bricks and Mortar, Sizeable, Community — 5th World
  12. Bricks and Mortar, Sizeable, Statehood — 5th World

Academic attention

Despite its prevalence there has been only limited academic attention paid to the micronation phenomenon; such attention that has been given has for the most part been concerned with the apparently anomalous legal situations affecting such entities as Sealand and the Hutt River Province Principality, or in the creation of role-playing entities for instructional purposes.

In August 2003 a Summit of Micronations took place in Helsinki at Finlandia Hall, the site of the Conference for Security and Co-operation in Europe (CSCE). The summit was attended by delegations such as the Principality of Sealand, NSK, Ladonia, the Transnational Republic, and by scholars from various academic institutions.

In August 2004, the Reg Vardy Gallery at the University of Sunderland (UK) announced the impending launch of an exhibition on the subject of group identity and symbolism, with specific reference to historic micronations. The exhibition — which ran from November 7 through December 17 — focused on numismatic, philatelic and vexillological artifacts, as well as other symbols and instruments created and used by a number of micronations from the 1950s through to the present day.

Related topics

  • Christiania — a partially self-governing neighborhood in the city of Copenhagen, Denmark
  • Hartola a small Finnish town with anomalous claim to being a royal parish of the Swedish monarchy.
  • Joshua A. Norton, San Francisco resident who proclaimed himself "Emperor of the United States"
  • Partenia, a cyber-diocese but with a real bishop
  • Seasteading — a self-sufficient floating platform

External links

Micronations

Other Relevant Sites

References



Adapted from the Wikipedia article, "Micronation" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micronation, used under the GNU Free Documentation License.
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