Sovereignty on the Land:

Which Places Count as Places

McQuillin Murphy
October 28, 2014

The Pennsylvania State University

Geography 020U
Dr. Roger Downs

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As a lover of both geography and international politics, sovereignty has always been a
very interesting topic to me. What is a sovereign state? What defines this human construct? Why
do we have sovereign states? Do all people live in states? Is there a single definition of a state, or
are there varying degrees of sovereignty? These are all important questions to answer. In trying
to do just that, humans have fought wars, signed treaties, cheated others, and formed
international organizations. Even if one was able to qualify a consistent standard for sovereignty,
questions still remain. What rights do the people have in relation to the state they live in? What
rights do states or people have to unclaimed territory? These are all interesting questions and the
world is covered with places that pose them and answer them.
The proper starting point for addressing how sovereign states are laid onto Earths
landscape is to first qualify, or at least attempt to qualify, what exactly a sovereign state is. Here,
language is important. In international politics, the words country, nation, and state are
different things. Nations are groups of people with shared characteristics, such as ethnicity,
language, or traditions. A country is a geographically distinct region and can be without legal
status. For example, Appalachia, the South, England, New England, and even Siberia could all
be considered countries. While France can be both a country and a state, Monaco is not large
enough to be considered a country, but is certainly a sovereign state. States are the legal actors
that take to the world stage; they are sovereign, whereas countries can be subject to a state.
Defining a state is even more challenging than defining a nation or country.
There are two prevailing theories of sovereignty: constitutive and declarative. The
constitutive method of sovereignty essentially states that if another sovereign state recognizes an
entity as a state, it is now a sovereign state. This is the method that has been most prevalent
historically. The other, newer method of determining sovereignty is called the declarative

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method. This stems from the Montevideo Treaty of 1933, which says in its first article that a
state is sovereign if it has a permanent population, a defined territory, a government, and a
capacity to enter into relations with other states. By this definition, a state need not be recognized
by other states, but must have achieved these qualifiers peacefully (Convention on Rights).
Essentially, it must only achieve de facto independence to be sovereign.
Of course, these two definitions run into conflict with each other. Neither explains the
actual state of world affairs perfectly. By the constitutive method of sovereignty, largely
standardized by membership in the United Nations, Taiwan is not a sovereign state. By the
declarative method, the Republic of China has been sovereign over Taiwan since the end of the
Chinese Civil War. The declarative method would make breakaway states like Transnistria and
Abkhazia independent, except for the fact that violence marked their secessions. While those
places are de facto independent, only a few states recognize them and they do not have
representation in the United Nations. The Sovereign Military Order of Malta maintains
diplomatic relations with 104 states and has an observer status at the U.N. (Bilateral relations).
By the constitutive measure, surely this qualifies as a state, but the S.M.O.M. does not make it
onto any maps, because it has no land territory.
The world is covered in anomalies like these. For example, the proclaimed Principality of
Sealand, off the coast of England, could meet the declarative method of sovereignty. However,
no state will officially recognize it, partially because it sits on artificial land, which runs into
conflict with Section V, Article 60 of the U.N. Law of the Sea (United Nations). As mentioned
in the lecture, Antarctica is not owned by any state. Is this land sovereign unto itself? I think a
better description is that the land has shared sovereignty by the whole world, for the purposes of
scientific research. I would consider this situation similar to that of the United Nations

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headquarters in New York City; that land technically belongs to every member state in the
United Nations.
In a sense, it has not been too inconvenient to the world to maintain this shared
sovereignty over Antarctica. Perhaps that is why the U.S. retains the right to make a claim to
the land, just in case one day it becomes more convenient to seize a slice for America (Downs).
Perhaps if it maintains this status quo long enough and obtains a permanent population, future
Antarcticans can assert their right to an independent state. It would be similar to Liechtenstein,
Monaco, Andorra, San Marino, and Luxembourg: states that are likely only independent because
it was never inconvenient to leave them that way.
Antarctica is not the only anarchic territory, though. In many sovereign states, like
Somalia, Afghanistan, Colombia, or Syria, huge portions of the states boundaries are beyond
government control. Are the people in these countries entitled to create their own states? For
many, they remain stateless, in a limbo of international affairs.
These stateless persons are the reason this issue is important. If sovereignty is not defined,
governance of people cannot exist. This is a geography that is changing, dangerous, and relevant
to millions, from Hong Kong to Syria, from Somaliland to Western Sahara. What defines a state
is such a contentious topic, because it determines who gets to rule themselves, who makes it onto
the map, who gets to have a say in world affairs, and who does not. For places like Antarctica,
the land is subject to a sort of moratorium on the question. For now, it is a home to science and
wildlife, even a little tourism. But as the last significant unclaimed land mass on Earth, it may
soon become the battlefield of the worlds next conflict over sovereignty.

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Works Cited

"Bilateral Relations." Sovereign Military Order of St John of Jerusalem of Rhodes and of Malta.
Sovereign Military Order of St John of Jerusalem of Rhodes and of Malta, n.d. Web. 28
Oct. 2014. <http://www.orderofmalta.int/diplomatic-relations/862/sovereign-order-ofmalta-bilateral-relations/?lang=en>.

"Convention on Rights and Duties of States (inter-American); December 26, 1933." The Avalon
Project : Documents in Law, History, and Diplomacy. Yale Law School, 2008. Web. 28
Oct. 2014. <http://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/intam03.asp>.
Downs, Roger. The Ends of Earth: The Ownership of Antarctica. The Pennsylvania State
University. 002 Deike Building, University Park, PA. 21 October 2014. Lecture.

"United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, Part V: Exclusive Economic Zone." UN.org.
United Nations, n.d. Web. 28 Oct. 2014.
<http://www.un.org/depts/los/convention_agreements/texts/unclos/closindx.htm>.