Legal Basis

Exploring a possible basis for micronationalism in international law. Please feel free to suggest other interesting examples or ideas to add to this discussion.

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What is a nation? And why should nationality be thrust upon a person, largely at random? What is so special about the current “nation-states”, and what is to say that people can’t simply choose to invent new and different entities that meet their needs?

Human Rights

Article 15 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states:

(1) Everyone has the right to a nationality.
(2) No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality.

You have the right to a nationality and to change your nationality, do you then have the right to determine your nationality?

Nationality and nationalism are an invention of the modern age, pre-modern identities were not based on artificial national boundaries but rather the lingual and religious communities we found ourselves in.

In the post modern age, might people seek out international communities of common interest instead of the outdated model offered by “nation states”?

The Republic of Lavalon certainly hopes so.

Self Determination

Chapter 1, Article 1 part two of the UN charter describes the aims of the UN as:

To develop friendly relations among nations based on respect for the principle of equal rights and self-determination of peoples, and to take other appropriate measures to strengthen universal peace.

This is further codified in international law by the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), article 1 of both documents reads:

“All peoples have the right of self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development.”

Inevitably international human rights law (especially in the case of the Civil and Political covenant) has been an exercise in hypocrisy, however the principle in theory exists, that people should control their own political destiny.

Declarative Statehood

When is a country a country? Is a country just any entity that other countries allow to join the club? This is a common theory…

The penultimate club is the United Nations, but even the UN acknowledges that countries have to be countries to join the UN, they don’t become a country by virtue of membership, and the UN is not the arbiter of what is and what is not a “real” country.

Taiwan, for example, is not a member of the UN, but few would argue that it is in fact a country, no matter how much the Peoples Republic of China dislikes the fact.

The theory of declarative statehood offers a more realistic and useful definition, a state is an entity that does the things states do, irrespective of whether or not other countries recognize it’s right to do those things.

Taiwan does the things a country does, and is therefore a country. This is very much supported by customary international law. The most well known and widely accepted expression of which is the Montevideo Convention:

The state as a person of international law should possess the following qualifications:

a. a permanent population;
b. a defined territory;
c. government; and
d. capacity to enter into relations with the other states.

This was a good definition for the situation in the 19th century, but in the past century the role of a state has been dramatically transformed. In this century it is inevitable that the state will continue to be transformed, and the definition of what does and does not constitute the state will continue to become increasingly blurred.

Article 3 of the Montevideo Convention goes on to state:

The political existence of the state is independent of recognition by the other states. Even before recognition the state has the right to defend its integrity and independence, to provide for its conservation and prosperity, and consequently to organize itself as it sees fit, to legislate upon its interests, administer its services, and to define the jurisdiction and competence of its courts. The exercise of these rights has no other limitation than the exercise of the rights of other states according to international law.

The existence of the state is independent of recognition by the other states.

And what is a state in a world where people are seeking out and defining new identities informed by ideas and values that are not territorially limited?

Conclusion

Is there a legal basis for the Republic of Lavalon? We acknowledge that most would say “no”, but we do not agree that there is anything especial about macro nation-states, or there is anything “fake” or “pretend” about setting up an entity that in existing explores these ideas.