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This article is about entities that are not recognized by world governments or major international organizations. For information on countries that are generally recognized, but are geographically tiny such as Nauru, Vatican City, or San Marino, see microstate.

Micronations – sometimes also referred to as cybernations, fantasy countries, model countries, and new country projects – are entities that resemble independent nations or states, but for the most part exist only on paper, on the Internet, or in the minds of their creators. Some micronations have managed to extend some of their operations into the real world: examples of this may include currency, flags, postage, etc. These trappings of the more widely accepted nations and states of the "real world" may serve to enhance the suspension of disbelief for people both inside and outside of the micronations in question.

The term "micronation" is a neologism originating in the 1990s to describe the many thousands of small, unrecognised state-like entities that have mostly arisen since that time. The term has since also come to be used retroactively to refer to earlier unrecognised entities, some of which date as far back as the 19th century. In recent years the term "micropatrology" has been used by some to describe the study of micronations; it is not a formal academic discipline.

Micronational hobbyists sometimes refer to real sovereign nation-states as "macronations".

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Definition of "micronation"

Micronations generally have a number of common features:

  1. Many micronations assert that they wish to be widely recognised as sovereign states — but they are not so recognised by established states.
  2. Micronations are quite small, both geographically and in terms of membership. They rarely have more than a few hundred members — and the vast majority have no more than one or two active participants.
  3. Micronations typically issue instruments such as passports, stamps, and currency, and confer titles and awards — but these are rarely recognised outside of their own communities of interest.

These criteria distinguish micronations from imaginary countries, eco-villages, campuses, tribes, clans, sects, and residential community associations, which do not usually seek to be recognised as sovereign.

Micronations should be distinguished from various entities which exercise effective governmental and military control over a territory, despite not being recognised as a state by most or all other states. Examples of such entities would include South Ossetia, Abkhazia, and Transnistria, or many parts of the world controlled by rebel guerilla groups. By contrast, micronations do not exercise effective military or governmental control of any more than a very small area (e.g. the private property of its founders), if that.

Micronations should also be distinguished from entities that have diplomatic relations with other recognized nation-states of the world without being formally recognized themselves by many nation-states or major international bodies (such as the UN). Examples of this include Taiwan, Tibet, and Palestine. By contrast, micronations do not generally have diplomatic relations with recognized nation-states of the world or major international bodies (such as the UN).

Evolution of micronationalism

The micronation phenomenon is tied closely to the rise of the nation-state concept in the 19th century, and the earliest recognisable 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 Rajahs" 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 Long Republic (1819–1820), in what is now the U.S. state of Texas, the Republic of Indian Stream (1828–1835), which is now the town of Pittsburg, New Hampshire, the Kingdom of Araucania and Patagonia (1860–62) in southern Chile and Argentina, and the Kingdom of Sedang (1888–90) in French Indochina. The oldest existent 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.

Martin Coles Harman, owner of the U.K. island of Lundy in the early decades of the 20th century, declared himself King and 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 witnessed 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 English Channel, and has survived into the present day. Others were founded on libertarian principles and involved schemes to construct artificial islands, but only three are known to have had even limited success in realising that goal.

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

In the late 1960s Lester Hemingway (Leicester Hemingway), brother of author Ernest, was involved in another such project — a small timber platform in international waters off the west coast of Jamaica. This territory, consisting of an 8x30 foot barge, he called "New Atlantis". Hemingway was an honorary citizen and President, however the structure was damaged by storms and finally pillaged by Mexican fisherman. In 1973, Hemingway was reported to have moved on from New Atlantis to promoting a 1,000-square-yard platform near the Bahamas. The new country was called "Tierra del Mar".

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 George William Pitt Booth declared the U.K. town of Hay-on-Wye an independent kingdom with himself as its monarch. The town has subsequently developed a healthy tourism industry based on 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.

Micronations in Australia

Micronational activities were disproportionately common throughout Australia in the final three decades of the 20th century. The Hutt River Province Principality was the first manifestation of the phenomenon; it was founded 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, while a German immigrant named Robert Neuman created the Sovereign State of Aeterna Lucina in 1978 in a hamlet on the New South Wales north coast, before later relocating to a large rural property near Cooma. At around the same time an eccentric anti-taxation campaigner named John Charlton Rudge founded the Duchy of Avram in western Tasmania; "His Grace the Duke of Avram" later went on to become an elected member of the Tasmanian Parliament. In Victoria, a long-running dispute over flood damage to farm properties led to the creation of the Independent State of Rainbow Creek in the state's northeast by Tom Barnes in 1979, and mortgage foreclosure dispute led George and Stephanie Muirhead of Rockhampton, Queensland, to secede as the Principality of Marlborough in 1993.

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

Impact of the internet

Micronationalism shed much of its traditionally eccentric anti-establishment mantle and took on a distinctly hobbyist perspective from the mid-1990s when the emerging popularity of the internet made it possible to create and promote statelike entities in an entirely electronic medium, with relative ease. As a result the number of exclusively online, fantasy or simulation-based micronations expanded dramatically.

The activities of these types of micronations are almost exclusively limited to simulations of diplomatic activity (including the signing of "treaties" and participation in "supra-micronational" forums such as the League of Micronations and the Micronational News Network), the conduct and operation of simulated elections and parliaments, and participation in simulated wars — all of which are carried out through online bulletin boards, mailing lists and blogs.

A number of older style territorial micronations, including the Hutt River Province, Seborga, Sealand, maintain websites that serve largely to promote their claims and sell merchandise.

Recent examples

One of the most recent examples of a micronation is the "Königreich Kreuzberg" (Kingdom Kreuzberg) which was founded in 2002 by Christel Göritz and her son Rick in Zweibrücken, Germany, on land previously occupied by a U.S. military base. Rick took the title of King, his mother that of "King Mum". Eberhard Bayer, a Prosecutor in Zweibrücken, declared that he would not prosecute the Göritzs for the offence of abuse of titles, as the title of 'King' had been abolished in Germany, "and is therefore not protected".

In the Northern part of Saya de Malha Bank in the Indian Ocean, far from the territorial waters of any nation, a steel structure has been anchored at a depth of 11 meters to foster the growth of an artificial coral island, to be called Autopia, which is intended to be a new micronation. However it is likely that project would mimic the failure of the Republic of Minerva which was invaded and annexed by Tonga shortly after it declared independence - Mauritius lay claims to any island that may appear on the bank.

Categories of micronations

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

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

Social, economic, or political simulations

These micronations also tend to be fairly serious, and often involve significant numbers of people interested in recreating the past or simulating political or social processes. Many of these micronations form a loose alliance under the auspices of the "League of Secessionist States". Examples of these include:

  • Nova Roma, a group claiming a worldwide membership of several thousand that has minted its own coins, and which engages in real life Roman-themed re-enactments.
  • Kingdom of Talossa, a quarter century old political simulation with several dozen members and an invented culture and language. It was founded in 1979 by Robert Ben Madison, a high school student from Wisconsin, who appointed himself King Robert I.
  • République du Saugeais (Republic of Saugeais), a fifty-years old republic in the département du Doubs, in France, next to Switzerland. It involves a President (Mrs. Pourchet, elected in 1972), a Prime Minister and many citizens. It was born from a joke between a Sauget (inhabitant of this country) and the Préfet (representing the State in the département).
  • Holy Empire of Reunion — a Brazilian micronation founded in 1997.

Exercises in personal entertainment or self-aggrandisement

With literally thousands in existence, micronations of the second type are by far the most common. They exist "for fun", have few participants, are ephemeral, exclusively Internet-based, and rarely survive more than a few months — although there are notable exceptions. They are usually concerned solely 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, the conduct of "wars" and "diplomacy" with other micronations, and claims of being located on fantasy continents or planets are common manifestations of their activities. Examples include:

  • The Aerican Empire, a Monty Pythonesque "interplanetary empire", complete with silly salutes, a smiley-faced flag and a range of national holidays that includes "Snappy Comeback Day" amongst others.
  • Tarsicia, a project that has undergone a mind-boggling series of reinventions by its teenage creator and currently claims to be a proto-undersea kingdom.
  • Atlasia, a political simulation based on the United States of America that grew out of an US political forum in 2003.

These types of micronations are almost exclusively the domain of male adolescents.

Exercises in fantasy or creative fiction

Micronations of the third type include stand-alone artistic projects, deliberate exercises in creative online fiction and artistamp creations. Examples include:

  • Lizbekistan a popular Internet-based project created by Australian artist Liz Stirling.
  • Upper Yafa and Oeccusi-Ambeno, two 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.
  • The nation of NSK - Neue Slowenische Kunst, a nation created by a number of Slovene artists who satirically claim to be part of a voluntary totalitarian collective, among them Laibach.
  • In the 1948 Margaret Rutherford / Stanley Holloway movie Passport to Pimlico, the then London Borough of Pimlico supposedly declares independence from Britain and becomes a micronation.
  • The Republic of Kugelmugel, founded by an Austrian artist and based in a ball-shaped house in Vienna, which quickly became a tourist attraction.
  • The Copeman Empire, run from a caravan park in Norfolk, England, by its founder Nick Copeman, who changed his name by deed poll to HM King Nicholas I. He and his empire are the subject of a book (ISBN 0091899206) and a website.
  • La Republique de Rêves, a combined exercise in fiction and art by G. Garfield Crimmins.
  • San Serriffe, an April Fool's Day hoax created by the British newspaper The Guardian, in its April 1, 1977 ion. The fictional island nation was described in an elaborate seven-page supplement and has been revisited by the newspaper several times.
  • The Duchy of Grand Fenwick featured in the movies The Mouse that Roared and The Mouse on the Moon.
  • Syldavia featured in several Tin Tin comic books, and included a fully developed artificial language.

Vehicles for the promotion of an agenda

These types of micronation 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 North Atlantic 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. It calls itself an independent state, and while Conch Republicans speak with great pride of their "nation," this is generally seen as more of a playful game than a real attempt at independence.
  • The Kingdom of Anse-Saint-Jean, started to promote tourism in a small Quebec town.
  • 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.
  • The Independent State of Aramoana, a secessionist state founded in 1980 to oppose the proposed construction of an aluminium smelter in an environmentally sensitive area of New Zealand.
  • The Gay and Lesbian Kingdom of the Coral Sea Islands, founded in June 2004 on the uninhabited Coral Sea Islands off the coast of Queensland, in response to the Australian government's refusal to recognize same-sex marriage.
  • The Republic of New Africa, a controversial separatist group seeking the creation of an independent black nationalist state across much of the southern USA.
  • The "conceptual country" of Nutopia, declared by John Lennon in 1973, a "state" designed to uphold Lennon's ideals such as those portrayed in "Imagine". This declaration was done to advocate Lennon's philosophies, and is believed to also be intended partly to protest the trouble Lennon was having emigrating to the United States.
  • The Maritime Republic of Eastport, a part of the City of Annapolis, Maryland, that 'seceded' from the rest of the city. It still exists as a charitable and publicity vehicle, and runs a unique fund-raiser in the form of a cross bridge Tug of War.
  • Cascadia, an idea first conceived in the 1940s that seeks to unite British Columbia, Alaska's Pan-Handle, Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Northern California to form a new nation.
  • Proposed demolition and redevelopment of the Freston Road area in north Kensington in 1977 prompted the local residents to declare independence as Frestonia (see 1 2). This delayed the redevelopment scheme and forced the Greater London Council to renegotiate.
  • Protesters against the M11 motorway link road through Wanstead in north-east London in 1994 proclaimed two areas of squatted homes to be the Republics of Wanstonia and Euphoria.

Entities created for allegedly fraudulent purposes

A number of micronations have been established for fraudulent purposes, by seeking to link questionable or illegal financial actions with seemingly legitimate nations.

By far the most successful of these was the Territory of Poyais, invented by Scottish adventurer and South American independence hero Gregor MacGregor in the early 19th Century. On the basis of a land grant made to him by the Anglophile native King of the Mosquito people in what is present-day Honduras, MacGregor wove one of history's most elaborate hoaxes, managing to charm the highest levels of London's political and financial establishment with tales of the bucolic, resource-rich country he claimed to rule as a benevolent sovereign prince, or "Cazique", when he arrived in the UK in 1822. MacGregor's appointed diplomatic representatives were even received at the Court of St. James's, and thousands of investors subsequently parted with hundreds of thousands of pounds (equivalent to many millions today) in exchange for Poyaisian bonds, land grants, and official government appointments and commissions. The hoax was exposed when several shiploads of immigrants arrived at "Poyais" to find a fetid, uninhabited swamp instead of the thriving European-style metropolis that MacGregor's guidebooks and maps had led them to expect. Hundreds died of disease, and the remainder relocated to Belize - yet amazingly, MacGregor escaped prosecution, lived out his days in Venezuela, and was honoured with a state funeral upon his demise.

The best known modern example, the Dominion of Melchizedek, is known for the banks it licensed that were linked to fraudulent banking activities 3, and for the involvement by one of its founders in the attempted secession of the Fijian island of Rotuma.

Another micronation called New Utopia, operated by an Oklahoma City longevity promoter named Prince Lazarus R. Long (b. 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. 4

Historical anomalies and aspirant states

A small number of micronations are founded on historical anomalies or eccentric interpretations of law. This category includes:

  • Seborga, a town in the Italian region of Liguria, near the southern end of the border with France, which traces its history back to the middle ages.
  • the Hutt River Province, a farm in Western Australia which claims to have seceded from Australia to become an independent principality with a worldwide population numbered in the tens of thousands
  • Sealand, a World War IIra anti-aircraft platform built in the English Channel beyond Britain's nautical limit, seized by a pirate radio group in 1967 as a base for their operations, and currently used as the site of a secure web-hosting facility. Sealand has continued to promote its independence by issuing stamps, money, and appointing an official national athlete.
  • Llanrwst, a town in North Wales declared a "free borough" by a Welsh prince which unsuccessfully applied to the United Nations in 1947 and has the motto "Cymru, Lloegr a Llanrwst" (English: Wales, England and Llanrwst) as testament to its apparent independence.
  • Republic of Indian Stream, now the town of Pittsburg, New Hampshire - a geographic anomaly left unresolved by Treaty of Paris that ended the U.S. Revolutionary War, and claimed by both the U.S. and Canada. Between 1828 and 1835 the area's residents refused to acknowledge either claimant.

These types of micronations are usually located on small (usually disputed) territorial enclaves, generate limited economic activity founded on tourism and philatelic and numismatic sales, and are at best tolerated or at worst ignored by the nations from which they allege to have seceded.

New country projects

New country projects are attempts to found completely new nation-states. They typically involve plans to construct artificial islands (few of which are ever realized), and a large percentage have embraced or purported to embrace libertarian principles. Examples include:

  • The Atlantis Project, an early 1970s New York-based libertarian group that built a concrete-hulled ship called Freedom, which they sailed to the Caribbean, intending to anchor it permanently there as their "territory". The ship sank in a hurricane and the project foundered with it.
  • Republic of Minerva, another libertarian project that succeeded in building a small man-made island on the Minerva Reefs south of Fiji in 1972 before being ejected by troops from Tonga, who later formally annexed it.
  • Principality of Freedonia, a libertarian project that tried to lease territory from the Sultan of Awdal in Somaliland in 2001. Resulting public dissatisfaction led to rioting, and the deaths of several Somalis.
  • Oceania (also known as "The Atlantis Project", but unrelated to the 1970s project of the same name), another libertarian artificial island project that raised US $400,000 before going bankrupt in 1994.

Academic, literary and media attention

There has been a small but growing amount of attention paid to the micronation phenomenon in recent years. Most interest in academic circles has been concerned with studying the apparently anomalous legal situations affecting such entities as Sealand and the Hutt River Province, in exploring how some micronations represent grassroots political ideas, and in the creation of role-playing entities for instructional purposes.

Several recent publications have dealt with the subject of particular historic micronations, including Republic of Indian Stream (University Press), by Dartmouth College geographer Daniel Doan, and The Land that Never Was, about Gregor MacGregor and the Principality of Poyais, by David Sinclair (Review, 2003, ISBN 0755310802).

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 of the Principality of Sealand, the Kingdoms of Elgaland & Vargaland, NSK-State in Time, Ladonia, Transnational Republic, the State of Sabotage and by scholars from various academic institutions.

From 7 November through 17 December 2004, the Reg Vardy Gallery at the University of Sunderland (UK) hosted an exhibition on the subject of group identity and symbolism as they relate to micronations. The exhibition 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.

An exhibit of micronations, attended by representatives of Sealand, Elgaland-Vargaland, New Utopia, Atlantium, Frestonia and Fusa, was also hosted as part of the exhibition, and was featured in a 5-part BBC light entertainment television series called How to Start Your Own Country presented by Danny Wallace (which told the story of his founding of his own micronation Lovely based in his flat 5), which screened in the UK in August 2005. The exhibition was reprised at the Andrew Kreps Gallery in New York City from 24 June - 29 July. 6

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