Tiny tiny wee groups of people who call a building, an island or a post in the sea a ‘nation’; a micronation. Not recognised internationally these micronations come and go, like sealand.

Micronations – sometimes also referred to as cybernations, fantasy countries, model countries, and new country projects – are entities that resemble independent nations or states, but which are unrecognized by them, and for the most part exist only on paper, on the Internet, or in the minds of their creators.

Micronations also differ from secession and self-determination movements in that they are largely viewed as being eccentric and ephemeral in nature, and are often created and maintained by a single person or family group.

Some micronations have managed to extend some of their operations into the physical world by issuing coins, flags, postage stamps, passports, medals and other items. Such trappings of “real” sovereign states are created as a way of seeking to legitimize the micronations that produce them.

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 ephemeral unrecognised entities, some of which date as far back as the early 19th century.

Is the Vatican a micronation? It’s the smallest recognised nation on earth, a collection of buildings in Rome. So can I declare an area a nation? How do new nations get recognised?

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