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I'm not sure what "inter-war" and "cold-war" refer to, in terms of exact dates. I can guess but I'm from a country which didn't have any wars after independence and wasn't aligned with any cold war powers. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 178.249.193.193 ( talk) 08:09, 5 June 2022 (UTC)
If we are presuming that states with limited recognition generally belong in this list (with a few exceptions), then entries about Abkhazia, Artsakh, South Ossetia, and Transnistria should probably be added to the article. The main exceptions are Crimea, Kherson Oblast, and Zaporizhzhia Oblast, because these entities were annexed by Russia almost immediately after declaring independence from Ukraine and hence never exercised any form of ostensible self-rule. (i.e. I presume that we only care about entities that actually rule/d themselves for a considerable length of time). Jargo Nautilus ( talk) 17:12, 26 October 2022 (UTC)
I would have thought that this was obvious, but it does seem that the article doesn't clarify its scope very accurately. I have already removed Hong Kong, Macau, and Sikkim from the list since they are not countries at the present time (Sikkim historically was a country), and they are instead subnational entities. According to a Chinese nationalist perspective, it could be argued that Hong Kong and Macau were "parts of China" that became independent from European colonial rule; alternatively, it can be interpreted that Hong Kong and Macau function as de facto independent states even though they are officially under Chinese sovereignty. Meanwhile, from an Indian nationalist perspective, it could be argued that Sikkim "became independent from itself" in 1975 after the "authoritarian" Sikkim kingdom was overthrown and replaced by the Indian "State of Sikkim" administration (obviously, this is propaganda, hence why I have specified "nationalist"). In the situation of the Panama Canal, it is somewhat similar; the Panama Canal isn't a country in its own right, so I don't see how it "declared national independence", unless you are counting it as a subregion of Panama in the wider Panamanian struggle for independence (again, nationalism). It's also interesting to note that there are multiple entries for several countries where the independence occurred in stages, such as Australia, which became independent from the United Kingdom in 1900 but still remained under United Kingdom suzerainty (partial sovereignty) until 1986 (allegedly; I myself am not an expert on the topic, even though I am Australian). Jargo Nautilus ( talk) 17:12, 26 October 2022 (UTC)
— Jargo Nautilus ( talk) 18:55, 28 October 2022 (UTC)
— Jargo Nautilus ( talk) 18:55, 28 October 2022 (UTC)
It previously escaped me how this article originally came into being. As it turns out, a quick skim of the history of this article reveals that it was only created approximately one year ago as a SPLIT from the article " decolonization". This article was originally a subsection of that article titled " Timeline of independence" (which, notably, is a bit different from "Timeline of national independence"). This background information explains why this article was so poorly constructed when I began editing it heavily some days ago. The article was already in disarray at its original location, which was the reason that it was split out from its original article in the first place. Jargo Nautilus ( talk) 09:53, 3 November 2022 (UTC)
This list is a very good idea in theory but there's a number of issues with it. I may try and make these edits myself but I want to have the matter here first so people can give feedback on my ideas before I can put them in place.
First off, I think this list should only cover currently extant de facto sovereign states, not ones that have since ceased to exist, since though including now-former states isn't a bad idea, it also complicates matters immensely, both from the number of countries that would need to be added, and from having to assess every single one to decide if they qualify for the list (ie; if they actually gained independence from another country, rather than forming another way such as the uniting of two previously existing countries). The information pertaining to the founding of these countries (such as the Grand Duchy of Moscow, Gran Colombia, Central America, and Texas) would be much better suited for the appropriate "Timeline of geopolitical changes" articles.
Secondly, some of these dates given definitely do not count as the country's independence. For example, Canada is given as 1848, a full 19 years before the 1867 Confederation usually cited as the "start" of Canada as its own country. The granting of self-government is not the same as independence, otherwise we would have to include places like Greenland or Puerto Rico that are largely autonomous but still under the sovereignty of another entity. Other examples like this include Cuba and the Philippines in 1898 (transfer to US sovereignty is certainly not independence.); Australia in 1900, a year before Australia even existed as a single entity; Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and Palestine in 1920 (same issue as Cuba/Philippines); Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos in 1940 (again, like the ex-Spanish islands), Iceland in 1944 (It was already independent since 1918, the referendum just ended the personal union with Denmark), Oman 1970; Tonga 1971 (The UK's relation with Oman and Tonga was more one of alliance or satellite status than a protectorate as I understand it, their independence was never really interrupted.)
Another similar matter is with countries like Serbia and Montenegro in 1852 and Romania in 1877, where the countries already existed as separate entites, just nominally as vassals to another state, in this case the Ottomans. Though they weren't fully, totally independent, they were still separate countries from the Ottoman state, and I would count their establishment as being when these countries were separated from the Ottoman state, not when they were relieved of vassalage to the Porte. (not to mention the Ottoman vassalage of Montenegro was very tenuous as I understand it.)
There's also some strange choices for giving the countries that a state gained independence from. The three countries to emerge from the Pacific Trust Territory is a great example, with the Empire of Japan given as well as the United States, even though at that point, Japan hadn't exercised control over these islands for more than 40 years, and relinquished them at the end of WWII. The same goes for Palestine in 1994, when Jordan had no control over West Bank at the time, the UK hadn't been in the area for decades, and Egypt doesn't even factor in since Gaza remained under Israeli control for another 11 years. Portugal listed for East Timor 2002 and the SFR Yugoslavia for the dissolution of the Serbia-Montenegro Union are some other out of place ones.
Finally there's the matter of countries with multiple dates of independence. This is definitely a very iffy topic with how complicated it can be, but I think that if an extant country is a resumption of a former period of independence, both can be counted. The Dominican Republic is a good example, I think it would make sense to include both its 1844 independence from Haiti and 1865 independence from Spain. (There's also the question of the 1821 declaration of independence from Spain, but that's iffy if it counts owing to it not having much in common with the 1844 and 1865 states other than location, and one of the reasons this last point is so complicated since defining what does and doesn't count as a resumption of a previously abolished state is kind of nebulous, for example, can modern Montenegro be considered the successor to the 1516-1918 the Prince-Bishopric/Tsardom/Principality/Kingdom of Montenegro, meaning the establishment of both would be included, or would only the 2006 date be used?). Regardless, if we can establish multiple "for sure" dates for a country, both should be included.
That about sums up my concerns. I'll leave this here for maybe a week before I start making alterations so if someone thinks I'm crazy and my ideas are awful they can say so. Crazy Boris ( talk) 01:01, 20 April 2024 (UTC)
This is the
talk page for discussing improvements to the
Timeline of national independence article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject. |
Article policies
|
Find sources: Google ( books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL |
This article is rated List-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
I'm not sure what "inter-war" and "cold-war" refer to, in terms of exact dates. I can guess but I'm from a country which didn't have any wars after independence and wasn't aligned with any cold war powers. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 178.249.193.193 ( talk) 08:09, 5 June 2022 (UTC)
If we are presuming that states with limited recognition generally belong in this list (with a few exceptions), then entries about Abkhazia, Artsakh, South Ossetia, and Transnistria should probably be added to the article. The main exceptions are Crimea, Kherson Oblast, and Zaporizhzhia Oblast, because these entities were annexed by Russia almost immediately after declaring independence from Ukraine and hence never exercised any form of ostensible self-rule. (i.e. I presume that we only care about entities that actually rule/d themselves for a considerable length of time). Jargo Nautilus ( talk) 17:12, 26 October 2022 (UTC)
I would have thought that this was obvious, but it does seem that the article doesn't clarify its scope very accurately. I have already removed Hong Kong, Macau, and Sikkim from the list since they are not countries at the present time (Sikkim historically was a country), and they are instead subnational entities. According to a Chinese nationalist perspective, it could be argued that Hong Kong and Macau were "parts of China" that became independent from European colonial rule; alternatively, it can be interpreted that Hong Kong and Macau function as de facto independent states even though they are officially under Chinese sovereignty. Meanwhile, from an Indian nationalist perspective, it could be argued that Sikkim "became independent from itself" in 1975 after the "authoritarian" Sikkim kingdom was overthrown and replaced by the Indian "State of Sikkim" administration (obviously, this is propaganda, hence why I have specified "nationalist"). In the situation of the Panama Canal, it is somewhat similar; the Panama Canal isn't a country in its own right, so I don't see how it "declared national independence", unless you are counting it as a subregion of Panama in the wider Panamanian struggle for independence (again, nationalism). It's also interesting to note that there are multiple entries for several countries where the independence occurred in stages, such as Australia, which became independent from the United Kingdom in 1900 but still remained under United Kingdom suzerainty (partial sovereignty) until 1986 (allegedly; I myself am not an expert on the topic, even though I am Australian). Jargo Nautilus ( talk) 17:12, 26 October 2022 (UTC)
— Jargo Nautilus ( talk) 18:55, 28 October 2022 (UTC)
— Jargo Nautilus ( talk) 18:55, 28 October 2022 (UTC)
It previously escaped me how this article originally came into being. As it turns out, a quick skim of the history of this article reveals that it was only created approximately one year ago as a SPLIT from the article " decolonization". This article was originally a subsection of that article titled " Timeline of independence" (which, notably, is a bit different from "Timeline of national independence"). This background information explains why this article was so poorly constructed when I began editing it heavily some days ago. The article was already in disarray at its original location, which was the reason that it was split out from its original article in the first place. Jargo Nautilus ( talk) 09:53, 3 November 2022 (UTC)
This list is a very good idea in theory but there's a number of issues with it. I may try and make these edits myself but I want to have the matter here first so people can give feedback on my ideas before I can put them in place.
First off, I think this list should only cover currently extant de facto sovereign states, not ones that have since ceased to exist, since though including now-former states isn't a bad idea, it also complicates matters immensely, both from the number of countries that would need to be added, and from having to assess every single one to decide if they qualify for the list (ie; if they actually gained independence from another country, rather than forming another way such as the uniting of two previously existing countries). The information pertaining to the founding of these countries (such as the Grand Duchy of Moscow, Gran Colombia, Central America, and Texas) would be much better suited for the appropriate "Timeline of geopolitical changes" articles.
Secondly, some of these dates given definitely do not count as the country's independence. For example, Canada is given as 1848, a full 19 years before the 1867 Confederation usually cited as the "start" of Canada as its own country. The granting of self-government is not the same as independence, otherwise we would have to include places like Greenland or Puerto Rico that are largely autonomous but still under the sovereignty of another entity. Other examples like this include Cuba and the Philippines in 1898 (transfer to US sovereignty is certainly not independence.); Australia in 1900, a year before Australia even existed as a single entity; Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, and Palestine in 1920 (same issue as Cuba/Philippines); Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos in 1940 (again, like the ex-Spanish islands), Iceland in 1944 (It was already independent since 1918, the referendum just ended the personal union with Denmark), Oman 1970; Tonga 1971 (The UK's relation with Oman and Tonga was more one of alliance or satellite status than a protectorate as I understand it, their independence was never really interrupted.)
Another similar matter is with countries like Serbia and Montenegro in 1852 and Romania in 1877, where the countries already existed as separate entites, just nominally as vassals to another state, in this case the Ottomans. Though they weren't fully, totally independent, they were still separate countries from the Ottoman state, and I would count their establishment as being when these countries were separated from the Ottoman state, not when they were relieved of vassalage to the Porte. (not to mention the Ottoman vassalage of Montenegro was very tenuous as I understand it.)
There's also some strange choices for giving the countries that a state gained independence from. The three countries to emerge from the Pacific Trust Territory is a great example, with the Empire of Japan given as well as the United States, even though at that point, Japan hadn't exercised control over these islands for more than 40 years, and relinquished them at the end of WWII. The same goes for Palestine in 1994, when Jordan had no control over West Bank at the time, the UK hadn't been in the area for decades, and Egypt doesn't even factor in since Gaza remained under Israeli control for another 11 years. Portugal listed for East Timor 2002 and the SFR Yugoslavia for the dissolution of the Serbia-Montenegro Union are some other out of place ones.
Finally there's the matter of countries with multiple dates of independence. This is definitely a very iffy topic with how complicated it can be, but I think that if an extant country is a resumption of a former period of independence, both can be counted. The Dominican Republic is a good example, I think it would make sense to include both its 1844 independence from Haiti and 1865 independence from Spain. (There's also the question of the 1821 declaration of independence from Spain, but that's iffy if it counts owing to it not having much in common with the 1844 and 1865 states other than location, and one of the reasons this last point is so complicated since defining what does and doesn't count as a resumption of a previously abolished state is kind of nebulous, for example, can modern Montenegro be considered the successor to the 1516-1918 the Prince-Bishopric/Tsardom/Principality/Kingdom of Montenegro, meaning the establishment of both would be included, or would only the 2006 date be used?). Regardless, if we can establish multiple "for sure" dates for a country, both should be included.
That about sums up my concerns. I'll leave this here for maybe a week before I start making alterations so if someone thinks I'm crazy and my ideas are awful they can say so. Crazy Boris ( talk) 01:01, 20 April 2024 (UTC)