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Creating a Government Structure and the Legal Paperwork of Micronations (October-November)

To create a stable Government, you must have 3 important points. An Executive Ruler, An Effective Administration, and Military. I plan to structure my government using modern aspects and old ones. This is especially due to the fact that my government i an absolute monarchy in a modern setting. My inspiration for the government structure will be the Ottoman Government Structure, however it will be very different at the same time. Some names/titles will be similarly named/the same, however. To start off, the Top of the entire hierchy will of course be the Monarch, which in this case is the Sultan. Following the Sultan is he Grand Vizier, which will be the closest thing to a "vice-sultan." He will be incharge of a lot of the administration and inner affairs going around the Nation, meanwhile the Sultan focuses on more things occuring outside the Nation.

Sultan

Grand Vizier

The Grand Vizier is chosen by the Sultan out of the Court of Viziers. The Court of Viziers are advisors to the Sultan and one of them gets to become the head of the Court, which is the Grand Vizier (hence the name). After the Court, there's a second Court which is directly for the sultan, called the Court of Pashas. The Court of Pashas are comprised of the Head Ministers of all the main branches of government. This includes:

  • Finance
  • Military
  • Judical
  • Administrative

All main departments of the entire government fall under these 4 catagories, and the Head Ministers of these 4 departments become part of the Court of Pashas, which works with the Sultan. These branches go through the natural rankings and positions and degrees of government that come through the Branches, Deprtments, and Municipalities, all the way down until it reaches the General Population. Back to the Court of Viziers, they'd be comprised of the Nobility and High Class/Scholars/Elites. The Scholars/High Class go down all the way down to the General Population, while the Nobility go down to Landowners/Merchants and finally to the General Population. The Sultan picks out those who become part of the Court of Viziers. Only those who are the most knowledgeable are able to become part of them. Which is why majority of Viziers are comprised of Scholars rather than those with riches. Below is the simplified version of the entire Imperial Heirchy:


Next what needs to happen is to recruit a few people to fill in these roles. We need at least 10 people to fill in high-ranking positions. 4 Viziers, 4 Pashas, and the Sultan and the Grand Vizier. Once we have an effective High Command, we can move down to working on the legality of how the nation can even exsist in the first place.

According to Article I of the Internantional Convenant on Civil and Political Rights (2200A (XXI) of 16 December 1966) - "1. 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. " This being an INTERNATIONAL Law, can be used to justify the creation of Micronations, same accordingly to the Third point of the Atlantic Charter (1941) signed by the United States and United Kingdom. "they respect the right of all peoples to choose the form of government under which they will live;" And finally, a Micronation should be recognized as a legitimate nation according to Article One of the 1933 Montevideo Convention, which state

"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."

A Proper Government must also be able to collect resourses, manage state assets, and be able to gain a steady revenue through trading and taxing those living under the government. This can be done through an agency similar to the IRS, which enforces taxation and it's collection. There must also be many agencies that ensure the Safety of the People and Nation itself. The Military comes to play here, but law enforcement is also necessary for a productive state, especially to reduce crimes. Corruption must also be kept to a very low standard, which you can use part of your revenue to pay to root out corruption.


The Monarchy


The Monarch, or Sultan, has to be able to manage his keys. Those keys are the people that allow access to manage the country. This can be done by using majority of the money collected to pay these keys. Otherwise, a rival could depose you by offering to pay more. Of course, this can be infuriating for the population, so the monarch must use his own revenue to pay back to the population. The more money you give to your keys, the less likely they are to betray you. This is why the Monarchy is important as well, as it insures the lasting of your legacy. Keys become more worried the closer you are to death, and they might begin to look for someone else to replace you even when you aren't dead. Even if there is a possibility of you dying, via old age or disease, then you are already dead to them. This is why you must always put on a mask to hide these facts. However, in a monarchy, death is irrelevant. The keys know that their position as keys is safe, especially since you have an heir and death can be avoided, metaphorically of course. Keys also face the same troubles that you. They have those above and bellow them that want to be in their place, so they also must act the same way the Monarch does. It is better that way for a key to stick with you during a coup, than it is for a Dictator, since they will have no heir compared to a Monarchy, which will have a definite heir to the throne. That is why the Monarchy is IMPORTANT, and it should be held there for as long as possible. Another point is to reduce your keys to the minimum. If you have too much, then less revenue goes to each one, which like was said earlier is bad. If you have a key that is useless now, get rid of the key, that way you can have more revenue to pay your other keys to stay loyal to you, and to help you function the entire government. This is the basic mentality that every single nation leader should have.


The Name


Despite everything, the nation still needs a name. So I have decided for the last few days to research probabal names. I have finally come down and decided that the best name for the nation should be: Marival. I looked at the latin rootwords of Mari, and Val. Mar/i means Sea/Ocean. and Val means strength. So, Ocean-Strength is the meaning. This enties to the micronation's tie with the sea and respect for it. So that is why Marival is the perfect name for the nation, not only because it sounds good/interesting, but also because of it's meaning.


Documents


Now with the Basis of the Structure and the nation's name chosen, next we can move onto the Founding documents of Marival. First, there must be some form of "Bill of Rights." No Constitution however, as it's an Absolute Monarchy.

The Recruiting of Citizens for Government Positions (December)

Now that the basic government structure is complete, name is chosen, and official country website has been mostly set up, the process of recruiting the first citizens to become part of the Marival government must begin. I will create an application of questions to ask them, and they MUST take it seriously. Anyone who isn't competent enough to handle the position that they are being offered are immedietly kicked off the potential candidates list.

Current Candidates:

Connor Cawley, Austin Cawley, Lucas Martinez, Heidi Barlow, Alex Nicolosi, Ian Rose

Connor Cawley: Passed | Position: Grand Vizier

[ ]: Open | Position: Vizier

Austin Cawley: Denied x3 | - Can't have a straight face for more than 5 seconds.

Lucas Martinez: Passed | Position: Vizier

Anthony Dirocco: Passed | Position: Head Minister of Justice

Alex Nicolosi: Passed | Position: Head Minister of Finance

Ian Rose: Passed | Position: Head Minister of Military

Quinn Cameron: Passed | Position: Head Minister of Administration

Thomas Hallows: (Maybe Vizier)


The Economic System of Marival (December-Janurary)

Now that we have the government more or less ready, and now have the people to fullful those positions. We need an Economic System to opperate trade and to give incentive to our citizens.


To begin, we must create and name the national currency. I will chose this currency to be named the Marival Franc. Next I will need to put value into this currency. Similar to how the US had the dollar-gold exchange. We must put value into the Franc so that it has structure. Of course we can't use gold, but perhaps something of value. Postage Stamps from the US Postal service. You can echange 1 Marival Franc for 1 Postage Stamp. So .55 USD = 1 MAF essentially. The rate will change accordingly to the value of Postage Stamps. Since the Postage Stamp value is very stable, it's a good base to start off for creating the economy. And since MAF will have a demand, the value will be consistant.


Now with the value set, comes to create and print out the first MAFs. First there must be rough drafts made, which will be done on note cards. The currency will not include any coins, but only bank notes. 1, 5, 10, 20, 50, and 100 Bank notes will be printed out. After several rough drafts of these designs, comes the creation of the final drafts and the first printing of these. I plan to print out, maybe 5 1s, 3 5s, and 1 10s. Since I can only afford to buy 30 Postage stamps in the begining. (16.5 USD)


Next comes the actual design of the currency, which after a couple days of attempting to perfect the design it would be finished. The design will have several features that would make sure that it isn't reprinted. The biggest part of it would be the Invisible ink, which would be handdrawn by myself. After that is completed, the first batch of these will be created by me. The material that this will be on will still be debated, but I plan to possibly laminate the currency, or maybe something else.


After the currency itself is figured out, next comes in the bank. The bank is planned to be inside a locker, who's locker will be debated, (probably my own) which will have a lock to make sure no one tries to steal the currency. Inside the locker will contain the currency and the postage stamps. Then, the currency will be distributed.

Mass Recruitment and Recognition (Febuary-March)

Now that the stage of finishing up the Economy is done, next is the mass recruitment of citizens. Firstly, before we can tackle that, We need to design a passport and some sort of identification papers to show that you are part of Marival. Afterwards, I will begin to send more citizenship documents out, and perhaps print them if I have the time. The designing phase of the passports will be difficult. As I need to decidine the material and dimentions of the passports, and what will be printed on there. I'll propably not make it out of leather, as it's too costly, so maybe laminated paper. Next comes the research of passports, which I have been doing over the last couple of days, looking at some passport designs, and also looking at other micronation's websites.

The micronation websites that I have looked at have served great inspiration. I have also looked at the US official website, as a referance. I also tried to create the country website at first in HTML, however it bogged down as I realized it would take too long, and I needed to focus elsewhere.

One issue that I came across when creating a passport is, I don't have the materials for it, nor do I have the money to manufacture it. So I may just resort to ID Cards.

Next, I will need to actually be recogized. I have a fair amount of people (Government Staff) already part of the micronation. So I should begin to reach out to other micronations in the following days.

I have successfully reached out to Molossia and we have informal relations.


The Wrap up and Final Adjustments (April-May)

We have a government, and the blueprints for an economic system (unfortunately was thrown out the window due to COVID-19), and now we have members in government, and also contact with another state/official recognition. On the day of April 10th, 2020, I have finally announced the independence of Marival as a functioning state. Now comes the step of working more on the website to make it look more professional. I have managed to get postage stamps to at least represent how the economic exchange could hypothetically work.

Failures and Shortcomings

Due to COVID-19, the plan to mass recruit has been canceled as I cannot get into any contact with anyone else. Lesson to take with this is to simply wait until COVID-19 ends. Another short coming is the inability to reach out to many other Micronations other than Molossia. Even with informal ties with them, it is a sign of recognition of Marival and goes to show that we are a fully sovereign identity. I have tried to create a national anthem, but I ran out of time and unfortunately was unable to do so. What I learned is that I should've probably done that earlier, and do more research into it, but it's too late now. Another issue is that I wasn't able to do an official ceremony for our sovereignty due to COVID-19. Final shortcoming is that I had ambitions to create a passport and more banknotes, but that went nowhere as I ran out of time, so I was content with just 1 banknote done and having it as a representation of what the other ones could look like.