When I was a little boy I read a story about a family who found a tiny island in the North Atlantic and made an independent nation out of it, establishing a way of life that they preferred. Their adventure came to an end when a regional government sent planes to bomb them because they disputed their claim. I thought it was a pure fantasy, but recently I have discovered a couple of island nations that seem to roughly fit the bill.
WAVELANDOne interesting mini-island is
Rockall, or
Waveland.
Wikipedia says at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rockall
The rock is the summit of an extinct volcano and is located at 57°35′48″N, 13°41′19″W. The surrounding elevated seabed is called Rockall Bank. It is 301.4 kilometres (187.3 statute miles or 162.7 nautical miles) west of the uninhabited island of Soay, St. Kilda, Scotland and 368.7 kilometres (229.1 statute miles) west of the crofting township of Hogha Gearraidh, on the island of North Uist, Scotland. It is 424 kilometres (265 statute miles) north-west of Donegal in the Republic of Ireland. The rock is about 25 metres (83 ft) wide at its base and rises sheer to a height of approximately 22 metres (72 ft). It is regularly washed over by large storm waves, particularly in winter. There is a small ledge of 3.5 by 1.3 metres (11 by 4 ft), known as Hall's Ledge, 4 metres (13 ft) from the summit. The rock's only permanent inhabitants are periwinkles and other marine molluscs. Small numbers of seabirds, mainly fulmars, gannets, kittiwakes, and guillemots, use the rock for resting in summer, and gannets and guillemots occasionally breed successfully if the summer is calm with no storm waves washing over the rock. There is no natural source of fresh water.
The final expansion of the British Empire was Rockall.
On 18 September 1955 at precisely 10.16 am, in what would be the final territorial expansion of the British Empire, the island was officially annexed by the UK when Lieutenant-Commander Desmond Scott RN, Sergeant Brian Peel RM, Corporal AA Fraser RM, and James Fisher (a civilian naturalist and former Royal Marine), were deposited on the island by a Royal Navy helicopter from HMS Vidal (coincidentally named after the man who first charted the island). The team cemented in a brass plaque on Hall's Ledge and hoisted the Union Flag to stake the UK's claim.
The only attempt to populate the island was when Greenpeace activists took up residence on the island.
In 1997 the environmentalist organisation Greenpeace occupied the islet for a short time, calling it Waveland, to protest against oil exploration under the authority of the British. Greenpeace declared the island to be a “new Global State”, and offered citizenship to anyone willing to take their pledge of allegiance. The British Government's response was simply to give them permission to be there, and otherwise ignore them. Indeed the Home Office when asked, responded that since Rockall was part of the United Kingdom, and since the UK was a free country, Greenpeace were perfectly entitled to be at Rockall.
The project continued until 1999, when the company sponsoring it collapsed and the experiment ended. This interlude nevertheless marked the longest continuous habitation of the islet, at forty-two days.
So,
Waveland was created and then abandoned after the company that was bankrolling it went belly up. 15,000 people had signed up to be citizens of
Waveland, but their records were missing due to the dispute over the company.
Now
Waveland had a new identity as a "virtual country" that invites people to imagine a better world. Here is what is at
http://www.waveland.org/Waveland is a new global country situated on the Internet.
It's citizens share common values: co-operation, respect for difference, peaceful co-existence with one-another and with nature.
It exists to allow it's global citizens to meet and imagine how things might be other-wise.
Otherwise? Other than it is in this late phase of informational capitalism and with the attendant phenomena of "globalisation".
To imagine, discuss, share information and stories, commiserate, perhaps plan alternative ways of life.
So you see, Waveland is much more than just a discussion area, it's a state of mind.
It's an imaginative space, a place where we can create new scenarios, report on and conceive new forms of action, new kinds of alliances, tactics and strategies, a new politics that embraces life and makes use of imaginative strategies to realise it's goals.
You'll probably notice that Waveland is altogether unlike most places you'll find on the Internet these days.
For it's quiet you see, some might even describe it as serene....
This is by no means an accident. Waveland is a data-oasis where you should feel that you are as far from the global marketplace as you could possibly be.
When you're in Waveland you won't be tracked, profiled, psychographically assessed, polled, interrogated, scrutinised, subjected to banner ads, interstitial advertising or any of the plethora of intrusive mind-jamming surveillance jags that are commonplace on the Internet these days.
When you're in Waveland you are a citizen and not a sovereign consumer
Waveland citizenship is supposedly available at
http://www.waveland.org/nameform.htmlbut
doesn't seem to work right now. Citizenship implies
accepting the
Waveland pledge:
"Without violence and by bearing witness,
to defend nature, to protect the global commons,
to reform industrialism, and to secure peace,
believing in action, rather than words."
SEALANDMore real and actually populated is
Sealand.
Sealand is a real place and it is actually populated, but I cannot find out by how many. Here is some history from
http://www.fruitsofthesea.demon.co.uk/sealand/index.htmlDuring the 1939-45 War, Great Britain established an artificial island on the High Seas.
This island was equipped with radar and heavy armaments and occupied by some two hundred servicemen.
The task of the island and its inhabitants was to guard the approaches to the Thames Estuary, where large and vulnerable convoys of shipping were assembled.
Some time after the cessation of hostilities, the island was derelicted and abandoned by the British Government.
In the winter of 1966, a British family took possession and commenced the task of equipping and restoring the island. On 2 September 1967, they hoisted their own flag and declared the existence of a new state - the Principality of Sealand.
Their rights and claims of Sovereignty over the island and its territorial waters have been ratified time after time over the intervening years by National Courts and leading international Jurists.
European states, during disputes involving Sealand, have stated that they have no rights or authority in Sealand and the major European states have repeatedly given de facto recognition to the existence and the Sovereignty of Sealand.
Over the years since the declaration of Statehood by Sealand, the family lived a free-frontier lifestyle. They made and enforced the laws of Sealand. They faced and drove off armed attackers and on one occasion, a member of the family was actually kidnapped by armed men and taken to a foreign country against his will.
Sealand came under threat from hostile naval units from other states and, in the early days of independence, there were the most determined attempts made to isolate and starve out the island.
The elements and the sea had to be fought constantly with a relentless determination. It was a very busy, active and adventurous life for the family and their fellow Sealanders and they all thrived on it.
Gradually, over the years, Sealand has become increasingly secure and internationally accepted. More and more, the international Lawyers and other Jurists stated that Sealand fulfilled all the legal requirements of a State and that the Sovereignty of Sealand was absolute and unquestionable. The major states of Europe have now accepted this as a fact.
The government website is at
http://www.sealandgov.org/index.html and tells their story. They did have a fire in the electrical generating room that did quite a bit of damage but they are back up and running. Pictures of the fire damage and reoccupation can be found at
http://www.bobleroi.co.uk/ScrapBook/SealandFire_3/SealandFire_3a.html You can also get a good look at the place and even see inside the living quarters. There has to be some, since 400 military personnel were once there.
There is about $1 million in damage and they are trying to raise money. One way to do this is to apply to be made a Lord, Lady, Baron or Baroness of
Sealand. You can do this by going to
http://www.redsave.com/index.asp?pageType=3&pid=2091&catId=21&track=SealandShopLinkand plunking down some cash.
They have cultural activities, sports teams (based in Denmark) and international
athletes. Pretty goof for a tiny platform.
King Roy indicated that the island of
Sealand might be for sale. One group very interested in buying it was The Pirate Bay
http://thepiratebay.org/ a
BitTorrent site that was interested in avoiding all rights regulations for the stuff they let people download, and
Sealand seemed like the ideal place. But, it
appears as if King Roy isn't that interested. Here is a report from
http://www.broadbandreports.com/shownews/81084As recently mentioned, the principality of Sealand (really just a rusting platform off the UK coast) is for sale. BitTorrent search website The Pirate Bay said they were considering buying it as an offshore data haven to avoid pesky legal problems, though it was more marketing than practical, since they'd never raise the needed $750 million. It looks like the current owner of Sealand, Prince Michael, isn't sold on the idea of selling to pirates anyway. "It’s theft of proprietary rights, it doesn’t suit us at all," he says. "In fact, I’ve written a book and Hollywood is making a movie out of it, so it would go right against the grain to go into the filesharing thing." The Pirate Bay claims they are eyeing other islands and micronations -- in order to gain more attention and please ad partners like Walmart.
So
Sealand still exists, and it is trying to rebuild. Good luck to them.
See, what once seemed like a fantasy is a reality in a number of different ways.
Oh, and by the way, Stephen Turner tried living in one of the abandoned sea towers that is not yet claimed, and he made it for 35 days before leaving. See his story and a lot of interesting photos at
http://www.bobleroi.co.uk/ScrapBook/SeafortProject/Seafort.htmlI guess if I really want my own tiny island nation there is still hope.
