Talk:Sovereignty/Archive 1

message: How dare I speak?
I am the truth
I am the reality that is!
Sovereignty will not exist for any nation.
This is not a threat, this is not a joke, it is that that is.
We do not live in a time that respects Sovereignty.
Humanity is subject to the laws of an agenda that does not concern itself with such childish notions. the state of our existence is not subject to any laws we could hope to enforce. I hold no hope that any one will allow my words to stay. I know I am not eliquent with the laws of wikidom. but today I am 50nyears old and today i will speek my heart.
Humanity is not in controle of the Earth. we are like the Bees or the yeast in that we can do here what they can not do.
It is not the job of humanity to become any greater thing. no it is our job to ripen this planet for harvest. We are not ment to evolve we are ment to serve.
Sorry. That is the truth. It nead not be the end.
Part of our contract is thatwe earn our Sovereignty if we can stop the rotatin of our Planet.???
In short we are tools.
Sativarg (talk) 07:58, 21 March 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Untitled

message: From a message to Lee Daniel Crocker -
"Hi!  On talk:False document you wrote, "Confederate currency was the legitimate, useful currency of a sovereign country." A few months ago I got interested in this issue -  whether the Confederacy should or should not be viewed as having been a sovereign country (I consider myself emotionally neutral on this issue). I discovered that no foreign government recognized the CSA. Since this is, I think, the most general, and probably one of the most useful, litmus tests for judging an administration sovereign/not-sovereign, I think we have to say that the CSA was "really" a "territory in rebellion" and not "really" a "sovereign state". Comments?
I would have to say the Confederacy was sovereign over those of it's citizens who consented to be governed by it, and thus must be considered a sovereign State,  the fact that not all of the citizens in the south considerd the government to be sovereign notwithstnding (see my comments below)NOTE: Though itis based on what I know to be well-settled points of Law as opposed to my other notes on this page, this must be considered more of an opinion than a well researched position.Pedant 05:21, 5 Aug 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Confederate currency 

message: I have to take issue with one of the points brought up in the main page: the status of some of the states (particularly South Carolina) before and during the Civil War. There is an important, overriding point that has not been considered here: the original 13 colonies were signatories to the "Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union" which, by its very name, bound all members permanently into a union.
This committment -- as all others under the Confederation -- was grandfathered into the Constitution by the "All debts and engagements entered into, before adoption of this Constitution, shall be as valid against the United States under this Constitution, as under the Confederation" clause of Article VI of the Constitution; hence permanently binding the states that descend from the 13 colonies to the perpetual union they had already signed into under the Articles of Confederation.
Though one may make the case for a later state, like Texas, being allowed to secede, the secession of South Carolina was invalid as per these signed and ratified committments, as well as that of Georgia, North Carolina and Virginia.
This cuts obliquely across the indicated stands originating from Calhoun and the Federalist Papers. The question of sovereignty, with regard to the issue of secession, is thus a red herring. Even if granted the status of sovereignty, these 4 states still were not allowed to secede, as per the very committments just stated that they had signed onto.
Misleading Wording.  I noticed misleading wording in the section:  "each seceded from the prior Confederated union of 1781, whereupon nine of them joined in Constitutional union on June 21, 1788, four states refusing until various conditions were met - including the addition of the Bill of Rights."  It is my understanding that the Bill of Rights was not ratified until December 15, 1791, while Rhode Island was the last of the 13 to ratify the Constitution on May 29, 1790.  In reading the ratification statements there was a widespread agreement that various amendments were needed, but all ratified the Constitution prior to the ratification of these amendments.  This doesn't really change the thrust of the section, but it does correct the timeline to recognize that the Constitution was fully ratified without the Bill of Rights.  Red Harvest (talk) 01:47, 10 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sovereignty and Federalism: Legality of Secession 

message: I recall, in a discussion of territorial claims in Antarctica and/or hypothetical extra-terrestrial territorial claims, that the stated policy of the US was (decades ago, at least) & i conjecture still is that there can be no de jure sovereignty w/o the exercise of de facto sovereignty.  Can anyone update and flesh out that idea? --Jerzy 03:08, 2004 Feb 8 (UTC)
(de facto sovereignty does not strictly speaking exist on it's own, either,  government is by consent of the governed)
Exercising de facto jurisdiction over a country does not make a sovereign.  Sovereignty is the right to exclusive jurisdiction:
*sovereignty may be granted to a government by the people, the government then "has exclusive right to" govern.
*sovereignty may be taken by conquest of a vanquished foe, which in order to survive tolerates the usurper, the government then "has exclusive right to" govern.  However, the right comes from the relinquishing of sovereignty by the vanquished and not by the mere act of conquest. 
*any power granted to government by it's populace may be reclaimed.  
the concept of "no de jure sovereignty without defacto sovereignty" refers to 
(and I am sorry I cannot cite case law on this at this point, but I tender an offer of proof, i.e.,  the case law exists, and were I a government intending to repress it's own Citizens I would have it handy, but I'm not, I don't and hope it will not be necessary ) 
the idea that "A Citizen may invest their government with exclusive jurisdiction over themselves.  
That Citizen by relinquishing their jurisdiction to the State may not then be once again considered Sovereign by mere internal decision of such governed.  
An act of diffidatio is required.  Though diffidatio is a concept from feudal times, the it has not vanished.  An act of diffidatio is simply an overt act, the nature of which serves to inform the entity (govt. or king or usurper or invader) of sovereigns reclamation of their right to exercise exclusive jusrisdiction.  This act may be a cannon shot, a declaration by a politcal body, a formal proclamation to the King, or a duploma.  A duploma might be described best as a written proclamation of a Sovereign.  Such duploma would explicitly state the reclamation of one's rights.
Traditionally a diffidant was allowed safe passage out of the kingdom or jurisdiction.  A diffidant becomes alien to the former 'governor' (King, government, etc.)and vice versa.   
Hope this is of some use.  Pedant 05:09, 5 Aug 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  US Gov't Legal Theory 

message: ----
the following (quoted from the article) is false
'Sovereignty' is the right of a  political entity to exercise  power. Sovereignty vests in a government.
----
the following is true
'Sovereignty' is the right of a  political entity to exercise exclusive jurisdiction
Sovereignty is vested in the natural person' (as distinct from a corporate person). By overt conscious act, one can willingly transfer their Sovereignty to another, such as a King. Similarly it can be invested in  any other type of governmental leadership.  A government governs by consent of the governed.  No estoppel of one's ability to reclaim sovereignty is granted by temporarily granting such consent.  Further, Sovereignty cannot be obtained by mere conquest.
Pedant 05:11, 5 Aug 2004 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sovereignty 

message: There exist vastly differing views on the moral bases of sovereignty. In this section, we shall discuss rights not as legal concepts, but as moral concepts.
Partisans of the divine right of kings argue that the King is Sovereign by divine right, and not by the agreement of the people.
Most democracies are based on the concept of popular sovereignty: ultimately, sovereignty is vested in the people, who freely grant the exercise of it to the government.
Anarchists and some libertarians deny the sovereignty of states and governments.
---- 
In this section there is 
*support for the fact that sovereignty is vested in the people,
: No. Just the mere statement that this is the idea underlying most democracies.
*there is POV tending to support the idea that the "sovereignty of states and governments" is the natural state, and that to deny such "fact" is abberrant, and further that anarchists and libertarians are the only ones who assert their personal sovereignty
: No. You are free to add other categories to the list of people asserting their own sovereignty.
*there is, placed most prominently in the first position, and with the words King and Sovereign Capitalised, yet libertarians, states and governments are lower-case, implying the lesser claim
:The capital for "sovereign" was an accident. Capitalizing the King was just usage (for instance, legal British texts capitalize the Crown when they talk about the legal entity called the Crown).
*it looks as if the sovereignty that "anarchists and some libertarians deny" is the 'lesser' sovereignty, and that the Sovereignty of the King is the greater
:???
*further, this contains legal concepts nonfactually characterized as moral concepts.
:Let me rephrase. In a country where the legal system is based on the divine rule of kings (say, France under Louis XIV), the legal situation is that the king rules by divine right. You may, however, feel that this is unfair, wrong, but all of these are morall judgments. However, these moral judgments would never have done you good in courts of law.
:This is the difference between "the actual legal situation in a country" (factual legal information) and "the legal situation that one would like to exist in that country".
By what meaning of those words is this an accurate factual nonmisleading non-POV statement,and in what way does this not prejudice the statements made in this paragraph?
---- 
I apologise for being so long winded.  I was trying to express a valid legal point that is of global importance. If I am going to continue this, I will need a new keyboard, as my space bar is dying and it is a huge chore to keep going back and putting in missed spaces. I may not be back for over a day.  But I will be back.
David.Monniaux, if you can suggest a good way to handle this issue satisfactorily, I welcome your advice (and anyone else's of course)
I don't have a personal stake in this, I have already asserted my own Sovereignty... but almost everyone else would benefit by an accurate understanding.  Perhaps we could let two, more knowledgeable wikipedians  take over?  I don't think the communty is well served by us arguing endlessly,and if there is anything I can't resist arguing against, it is a factual error. You are welcome to use my talk page if you want to take this stink where the smell won't offend.  Or here, I don't mind.  I'm not angry, just commited to accuracy.  Please forgive any inadvertent offense I may have caused in my zeal to have the most accurately  factual article possible.Pedant 19:37, 6 Aug 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: I did not mean to offend you. My point is that the article must at no point argue that some conception of who should have sovereignty is "better" or "evident", be it personal sovereignty, popular sovereignty, the right of kings etc... We should simply state various theories that have been proposed throughout times and places, and explain their practical consequences. David.Monniaux 20:25, 6 Aug 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: Different views of sovereignties

message: ok.  first, thanks to all for your diligence on this important matter.
I think the critical checkpoint is that the summary does not conflict with the LEGAL DICTIONARY-type definition of sovereignty
as we are speaking in a legal sense almost throughout the article. Second, that the article not state anything that is not generally accepted worldwide as being true in a legal sense of "sovereignty" in general.  
Beyond that I do agree that we should move to a subsection further discussion on materiial over which there is a conflict of legal opinion (as opposed to someone just not thinking it sounds right - which is going to be common, the actual stance of the Law looks very nonintuitively strange) and state the conflicting opinions as opinion.
I agree, monarch should be lower case, as it is general.
To address the point of 'divine right':  even in countries where 'divine right' is the prevalent legal viewpoint, it is well known that in actuality kingship requires fealty (or submission in the case of a conquered nation) and that the political authority actually derives from and is an agglomeration of the authority of the people [not 'the people' as a whole, but the persons, jointly and severally] and in those countries 'divine right' is exercised as a convenient legal fiction.   As the people of such countries long ago and many timesand at many places,  invested a king or feudal lord, king, chieftain with their sovereignty by the act of following electing submitting to etc. such leader.  (Don't we have any French Lawyers here???
:We would probably need French historians rather. French lawyers generally do not have expertise in pre-Revolutionary institutions.
:You are right in saying that ancestors of the rulers "by divine right" were once put in power by mere human power (be it their military prowesses, or often a decision by great feudal lords). The idea of the divine right of kings was encouraged by the kings themselves to counteract the pretenses of the high nobility of having a say in the direction of the country: if the sovereign was put in place by the high nobility, it suggested that he could be removed by the same high nobility; conversely, if the king ruled by divine right, the high nobility had no business in contradicting God's will.
:Note the difference in attitude between Charles X of France who, as far as I know, estimated he ruled by divine right as "King of France", and Louis-Philippe, who ruled as "King of the French", expressing in his title that he derived his power from the people. Similarly, the King of Belgium is actually officially the King of the Belgians.
:David.Monniaux 09:18, 8 Aug 2004 (UTC)
replies: text: Sovereignty is the exclusive right to exercise supreme authority over a geographic region, or group of people such as a tribe, state or nation.  
Sovereignty is generally held to be vested in a government or other political agency, in some it may inhere in an individual.  A monarch who rules a sovereign country can also be referred to as the Sovereign of that country.
A key element of sovereignty in the legalistic sense is that of exclusivity jurisdiction. Specifically, when a decision is made by a sovereign entity, it cannot generally be ovverruled by a higher authority.  Further, it is generally held that another legal element of sovereignty requires not only the legal right to exercise power, but the actual exercise of such power.  ("no de jure sovereignty without de facto sovereignty") In other words, neither claiming/being proclaimed Sovereign, nor merely exercising the power of a Sovereign is sufficient, sovereignty requires both elements.
----
opinions?Pedant 23:10, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)
thread_title: maybe this?

message: I've delinked the term Mainland China from the article.  The article is worded great and the contextual meaning is obvious.  However, the linked term defines Mainland China as not including the regions of Hong Kong and Macau, which this article does not intend to imply. SchmuckyTheCat 02:02, 23 Mar 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Mainland China

message: There's no reason for the Order of Malta to appear here, neither in one sentence nor much less in a whole paragraph. The Order of Malta has been recognized as "observer" by the United Nations, not as a sovereign state. If one wants to argue the reverse, he will have to provide due references. Lapaz
:If you have properly read the paragraph and used the link to the order's page, you should know there are both sources right there and better reasons then what the UN does or not, for no single entity has a monopoly to award or regognize sovereignty, and clearly sovereign nations have either chosen to stay out (Switzerland, host of sevaral UN institutions, till 2002!) or expelled for reasons not pertaining to sovereignty (e.g. South Africa for apartheid, an internal matter). The point is precisely that there is not, never was and probably neer will be one single neat formula, and therefore it is worthwile to devote a paragraph to a special, today even unique case. Yes, there is discussion whether the order is sovereign, and the same goes for many other subjects in international law, which include non-states without any exclusive territory, notably inernational organisations such as the EU, as well as political entities which exerce every internal aspect of sovereignty but are not recognized (as states sec) by some or (nearly) all other states, often because of a claim on their territory by another state (e.g. PR of China versus Taiwan -for decades, only one seat in the UN was allowed, be it a permanent one with veto-right in he security council-, the two republics on Cyprus...). In such cases, each third state decides for itself whether to recognize, and usually (not necessarily) expresses this by diplomatic relations- 94 such formal 'votes' have been casted for the Order, many nations (especially tiny ones) have less. As one of the older sovereign entities of the world (most present republics are younger) the order was explicetly regognized by the two higheest authoritaties at vthe time, in Europe viz. in Christianity: the Holy Roman Empire who formally awarded the full rank of Reichsfürst to its Grandmaster and the Pope who added a rank assimilation to cardinals (i.e. Prince of the (universal) church; unique amongst other heads of state). Fastifex 01:06, 29 January 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Order of Malta spam 

message: Merge with Justification for the state because its the same subject. Santa Sangre 22:45, 1 February 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Justification for the state ?Merge 

message: Is it possible for two countries to have sovereign power over the same area of land?  If so, would anybody living there have dual-nationality? BirdValiant 02:47, 21 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Question 

message: When Dali spoke of being an anarcho-monarchist, he wasn't actually advocating some sort of slef-ownership position, he was trying to get a rise out of some fellow artists who said that their enemies were the anarchists on one side and monarchists on the other. It was a joke. 24.3.229.31 00:23, 6 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Dali & "anarcho-monarchist" 

message: *These articles were apparently created as part of a cover history for User:Liliana Dioguardi, who has been suspected to be in the employ of a Kremlin propaganda effort - specifically in her creation and maintenance of the International Council for Democratic Institutions and State Sovereignty article in support of the public legitimacy of that organization. The prominent international news and business magazine The Economist magazine has reported that this organization is likely a front for a Kremlin-sponsored disinformation effort, and has specifically identified the ICDISS article and User:Liliana Dioguardi as part of this effort. See these articles and the ICDISS article talk page.
*While these articles seem to be legitimate subjects, Dioguardi is responsible for all, or almost all their content - this makes these articles suspect for NPOV reasons.. I urge Wikipedians with a political theory/history/international relations/international law background to help build these articles beyond their sad "cover story" beginnings. Bwithh 05:53, 7 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: [[Westphalian sovereignty]] and [[Contingent sovereignty]] needs attention

message: Wikipedia is not wikidictionary, i understand, however english words that are not phonetically spelled might have a pronunciation guide... unsure if this is in accordance with wiki policy. MotherFunctor 23:41, 31 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pronunciation 

message: "Basileus is the Greek concept for "Sovereign", which designs who has the auctoritas, which is to be distinguished from simple imperium, retained by archons (or "magistrates")."
This sentence is, in a word, terrible.  Never mind that "basileus" means "king" or "emperor" -- sovereign in the limited case of a noun, not the adjective.  What's the point of mingling terms from Greek political theory (basileus, archon) with Roman political theory (auctoritas, imperium)?  They aren't the same, you know.  --Jfruh (talk) 03:48, 5 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I was about to comment on this very thing. You are my hero. --76.223.221.122 11:15, 11 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Greek/Latin mishmosh 

message: If sovereignty is free from control external to a jurisdiction, then a certain amount of EU member states' sovereignties are 'pooled' into EU institutions. This is surely an important development in the notion of soverignty; I can't see why this wasn't included already in this article. 86.144.232.162 (talk) 16:11, 26 March 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: To broadly paraphrase Sen. McCain in his most inauthentic moment, my friends, I agree with the principles of the conspiracist posters. The discussion of a North American Union, I repeat, all discourse about a hypothetical North American Union, is inherently speculative. This North American Union, which so many are talking about with trepidation--rightfully so--is only minor part of this article which should concern itself with philosophy and policy in the most general sense with regards to sovereignty. Should we attempt to concentrate on future specifics rather than past and present discussions of the central concept of sovereignty, your opponents, my conspiracist friends, will aptly label you conspiracy theorists. If one assumes the fact that there is a conspiracy to erode sovereignty in both a national and personal sense, wouldn't the conspirators, like the biblical Lucifer, merely 'bide their time until a more opportune moment' should any element of this conspiracy become too unworkable in a particular political climate? There is a page for those topics, which should be touched on in proportion here, but the obvious failing of this page is it's lack of discussion of oppositions and opponents to the sovereignty concept itself, in matters of both philosophy and policy. These are citable from reliable sources, incumbent upon the topic, and serve to inform the reader of the history and currents of this debate. If personal and national sovereignty are undesirable, would not the opponents of these concepts wish to educate us as to why? This is a debate which can definitely be represented in Wikipedia, and right here in this article. ClaudeReigns (talk) 09:36, 21 October 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  What about in the European Union? 

message: :To broadly paraphrase Sen. McCain in his most inauthentic moment, my friends, I agree with the principles of the conspiracist posters. The discussion of a North American Union, I repeat, all discourse about a hypothetical North American Union, is inherently speculative. This North American Union, which so many are talking about with trepidation--rightfully so--is only minor part of this article which should concern itself with philosophy and policy in the most general sense with regards to sovereignty. Should we attempt to concentrate on future specifics rather than past and present discussions of the central concept of sovereignty, your opponents, my conspiracist friends, will aptly label you conspiracy theorists. If one assumes the fact that there is a conspiracy to erode sovereignty in both a national and personal sense, wouldn't the conspirators, like the biblical Lucifer, merely 'bide their time until a more opportune moment' should any element of this conspiracy become too unworkable in a particular political climate? There is a page for those topics, which should be touched on in proportion here, but the obvious failing of this page is it's lack of discussion of oppositions and opponents to the sovereignty concept itself, in matters of both philosophy and policy. These are citable from reliable sources, incumbent upon the topic, and serve to inform the reader of the history and currents of this debate. If personal and national sovereignty are undesirable, would not the opponents of these concepts wish to educate us as to why? This is a debate which can definitely be represented in Wikipedia, and right here in this article. ClaudeReigns (talk) 09:36, 21 October 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  What are the arguments against sovereignty? 

message: In last month I've completely revamped the theory section of both secession and separatism and now working on self-determination, replacing unsourced opinions with reliably sourced facts and opinions. While this article is fairly low on my list of priorities (like maybe end of the year), I would recommend that anyone who has sourced material in there they want to keep should start putting in references after assertions or sections, with page numbers if facts are from books. Just listing books doesn't cut it. FYI, just in case some other compulsive wikipedian interested in this topic comes in sooner and gets rid of all the stuff that can't be easily independently sourced. :-) Carol Moore 22:56, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Yow, just wandered back and it's getting worse!! I've gone off on other tangents, but am tempted to delete away here, so please consider putting in some inline references for all the info in this article :-) Carol Moore 02:27, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

text: "I would recommend that anyone who has sourced material in there they want to keep should start putting in references after assertions or sections, with page numbers if facts are from books. Just listing books doesn't cut it. FYI, just in case some other compulsive wikipedian interested in this topic comes in sooner and gets rid of all the stuff that can't be easily independently sourced. :-) Carol Moore 22:56, 13 May 2008 (UTC)

text: Yow, just wandered back and it's getting worse!! I've gone off on other tangents, but am tempted to delete away here, so please consider putting in some inline references for all the info in this article :-) Carol Moore 02:27, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

text: Sorry if I sounded TOO capricious, but I like to sound dramatic so people who are putting in unsourced info, or who are paying attention and actually want to keep something in will do so.  When I get into I myself only will add sourced info; I'll leave anything that is obviously true, and even source some of it. But there is a lot of WP:original research in there that needs to get tossed. Maybe I'll tag some of it. Carol Moore 13:43, 18 November 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Reference article or see it completely changed 

message: Carol, 
As a fellow compulsive wikipedian as you said of yourself, I say the following in complete respect.
Regarding editing; If you are going to make a proper page, that's great, but just going around wiki deleting things you think are opinions, unfounded, non-sourced, etc. seems as bad as the writers of the lines you are deleting.
I am basing this on the comments you made in the Sovereignty discussion.
:"I would recommend that anyone who has sourced material in there they want to keep should start putting in references after assertions or sections, with page numbers if facts are from books. Just listing books doesn't cut it. FYI, just in case some other compulsive wikipedian interested in this topic comes in sooner and gets rid of all the stuff that can't be easily independently sourced. :-) Carol Moore 22:56, 13 May 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Yow, just wandered back and it's getting worse!! I've gone off on other tangents, but am tempted to delete away here, so please consider putting in some inline references for all the info in this article :-) Carol Moore 02:27, 16 November 2008 (UTC)

text: Sorry if I sounded TOO capricious, but I like to sound dramatic so people who are putting in unsourced info, or who are paying attention and actually want to keep something in will do so.  When I get into I myself only will add sourced info; I'll leave anything that is obviously true, and even source some of it. But there is a lot of WP:original research in there that needs to get tossed. Maybe I'll tag some of it. Carol Moore 13:43, 18 November 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  why delete just for the sake of deletion????? 

message: Why should the Lassa Oppenheim quote be preceding the WP:LEAD paragraph?  Shouldn't the lead paragraph (with the definition of Sovereignty) be the first paragraph (after any redirection notes)? 71.254.7.35 (talk) 05:40, 21 December 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Quotation preceding the Lead paragraph. 

message: I was surprised that there was a lack of medieval sovereignty, and added a brief section on the Wife of Bath and Sir Gawain and Dame Ragnell. There definitely should be something more about the nature of de jure local power noble ("sake and soke" a la Domesday England), as well as imperial power (Byzantium, Holy Roman Emperor, etc.) and the rise of the medieval nation-states (France, England, etc.). This'll do for now, I hope. --Petercorless (talk) 08:23, 10 January 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Added section on medieval sovereignty 

message: For someone who is studying sovereignty, this is all really confusing. It sounds to me like there is no clear cut definition on soveignty and no one truly understands how it can be applied to an individual person, entity, corporation, state, government etc. There needs to be a simple, clear cut, definition of the word and how it can be used regarding individuals, states, governments, etc. How many definitions will there be? How many ways can the word be used? How many ways can you apply the word? Will there be a separate legal definition vs. a standard dictionary version? I think all that I suggest would help those who simply want to know the meaning of a word, how to use it and how to apply it for their own personal benefit. The problem with this is that no one has agreed, thus far, and so in my eyes if there is no agreement on the definition of sovereign and no agreement on how to apply it then it doesn't truly exist and I can apply it as I see fit to do so. I am not being ignorant, I'm simply noticing that there are multiple opinions about this and a word can mean whatever you decide it means for yourself. We, as humans, have defined objects and have defined words, therefore, we humans can redefine things as well. Sovereignty should apply to everyone.
- —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.43.217.88 (talk • contribs) 
:The confusion is understandable - it is a very broad concept and you are right that people do not agree on what it means in a definitional sense, or how it should work in a practical way.  The ambiguity is not entirely a byproduct of Wikipedia.  People in the world as a whole are divided and unclear, and it is Wikipedia's job to reflect the world in all its complexity rather than to tidy it up.  For inspiration could look at some words/concepts with similar problem: rights, law, legitimacy (political), and so on.  Also, this article is pretty basic and needs a lot of work, so what you are seeing is a Wikipedia article in progress.  A better version might start with the dictionary definition as you suggest, then clearly outline and organize the different applications so that if you are interested in one particular aspect of sovereignty (e.g. Native American tribes, US states, or European kings) you could go to that one.  We have the beginnings of that but it could stand to be more clear.  In the meanwhile, Wikipedia is a good jumping off places for further reading - if you want to spend the effort you can follow some of the references as good in depth reading matter. Wikidemon (talk) 16:45, 27 January 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Confusion 

message: I added an “Original Research” tag to go along with the other two tags that have been posted, and evidently ignored, for over a year.  I added some fact tags throughout, but the major problem throughout is that the section more resembles an essay than an encyclopedia article. Throughout there are opinions providing interpretations of primary source documents -- the problem is that the interpretations come from a wikipedia editor   and not from reliable sources (see WP:PRIMARY).
There are so many problems with this section that my intent is, after a few weeks or so, to eliminate most of it and reduce it to a very brief one paragraph stub until either I or someone else starts to add reliably sourced material.  I think Carol Moore at Talk:Sovereignty#Reference article or see it completely changed was accurate in her analysis.
In the meantime I eliminated a series of paragraphs that were set off by the sentence, “An update forwarded from the discussion page:”.  Other than the obvious style problem, the material added was simply more undocumented, original research. Tom (North Shoreman) (talk) 21:33, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I returned to implement the above and found another editor had already implemented the changes and renamed the section.  Good job. Tom (North Shoreman) (talk) 14:40, 19 February 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: [[Sovereignty#Sovereignty and United States federalism]]

message: In the article is written: "Another case, sui generis, though often contested, is the Sovereign Military Order of Malta, the third sovereign mini-state based in an enclave in the Italian capital". The first is the Vatican City. Who is the second? Alinor (talk) 09:20, 10 May 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Three mini-states based in Rome??? 

message: In this article about the IFRC ICRC it is described as association under Swiss law (eg. registered in Swiss courts register, abiding Swiss procedures for legal persons, etc.) with some special priviledges, but this does not make it sovereign (like SMOM and states) - its members only employ SOME priviledges that in general are applied to representatives of sovereign entities. In contrast to SMOM that conducts regular diplomatic relations with the sovereign states, on equal footing, etc. 
I think that we should better describe the IFRC ICRC status, but in any case the current line "Another case of sovereign non-state entitiy is the Red Cross" is wrong. Alinor (talk) 07:33, 23 July 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: The IFRC is not soveriegn the ICRC is, they are two entirely different organizations under international law. In what way is the ICRC not soveriegn, it has diplomatic relations with other states and is treated like a peer by states in international law.XavierGreen (talk) 22:13, 11 October 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: IFRC above was a typo, it should read ICRC (the private swiss association), not IFRC (the international federation of national societies) - as corrected. Both are not sovereign. Both doesn't have diplomatic relations with states and are not treated as peers by states. The ICRC is a private association registered in Switzerland (unlike SMOM which is a subject of international law in its own right, on par with Switzerland and other states). It only enjoys some special priviledges given to it by Switzerland and maybe other states and is tasked with some responsibilities by the Geneva conventions. And just saying....this article sux Alinor (talk) 10:04, 3 March 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Red Cross - not sovereign 

message: This article is very problematic, and has been tagged for over a year. I propose a redirect to Westphalian sovereignty, which is not so bad. Joe Bodacious (talk) 12:16, 20 January 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the way to handle that would be to either merge the two articles or delete one of the articles. I'm thinking that this should not be done unless there is some history of discussion first. However, I don't have a strong opinion one way or the other. Famspear (talk) 02:57, 22 January 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: If it is necessary to delete and article, I would vote to delete this one, although to my understanding, it is common practice to just leave the weaker of the articles as a redirect. This article is poorly sourced and seems to be rather dubious in the conclusions it offers. The Westphalian sovereignty article seems far more solid. Joe Bodacious (talk) 22:11, 22 January 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Does anyone else have a strong opinion? I think that the present article is pretty useless, and we have a decent article elsewhere on the same topic. Joe Bodacious (talk) 22:20, 23 January 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Redirect? 

message: User:Joe Bodacious proposed merging this article to Westphalian sovereignty without leaving an edit summary. The discussion is at Talk:Westphalian sovereignty#Merger proposals. — Blue-Haired Lawyer t 19:36, 29 January 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: See my post directly above yours. Joe Bodacious (talk) 15:05, 13 February 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Merge to Westphalian sovereignty 

message: The user Nug has been inserting a ref to indicate that sovereignty must be "legitimate" - that is, internationally recognized and diplomatically legal. This is to fit an argument he's having on a RfC he created. The current lede uses Encyclopedia Britannica as its source, and shouldn't be molested with other refs/words in the middle - because that's not what EB said, and this turns into original research. Comments before this turns into an edit war?--Львівське (говорити) 23:17, 9 February 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: The purpose of Nug's edits are mainly to fit the opening to the mainstream sources. Everything else is just your assumption of bad faith. --Jaan Pärn (talk) 21:04, 10 February 2013 (UTC)
replies: text:  I do assume bad faith in motive given the circumstances, but I assume good faith in introducing the cited material properly into the article. The first edit skewed the lede that came from EB, the recent edit added textbook WP:SYN material, to suit the same purpose. I can call a spade a spade.--Львівське (говорити) 21:37, 10 February 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Please stop reverting my attempts to contribute to the article, you do not own it, nor is there is any justification for your bad faith. --Nug (talk) 00:26, 11 February 2013 (UTC)
replies: text:  I too am trying to contribute positively to the article. It's unfortunate that every one of your edits so far has been in some violation of OR/SYN. Even your most recent one, you altered the source to push your POV; you can't interject one source into another, then it's a misrepresentation of what the original source said. Combining secondary source opinions together to form statements is a form of original research, and you know this.--Львівське (говорити) 00:57, 11 February 2013 (UTC)

text: Since no page have been provided, I conclude the editor who added that text meant the page 3. However, the main idea expressed by the authors on this page is not that "territory, population and authority - in addition to recognition - are important aspects of sovereignty". The authors' major point is that it would be incorrect to provide any specific definition for this term, which is permanently changing and developing, because "the modern state system is not based on some timeless concept of sovereignty". Therefore, I would say the Birstefer's opinion has been taken out of context.--Paul Siebert (talk) 18:32, 12 February 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Birsteker's material has been separated into a separate sentence for clarity, I think an intermediate edit added some confusion. I don't think what Birsteker states is incompatible with Krasner, given that he describes four forms each with different weighting of particular aspects. --Nug (talk) 18:40, 12 February 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Again, Birsteker's point is that any universal definition of sovereignty would be ahistorical and misleading. That is what should be said if you want to use this source.--Paul Siebert (talk) 19:17, 12 February 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Birsteker makes lots of points in his book on state sovereignty, that there exists four aspects is one of them. --Nug (talk) 21:12, 12 February 2013 (UTC)
replies: text:  perhaps that would be best suited for the state sovereignty article? --Львівське (говорити) 22:07, 12 February 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Krasner is also talking about state sovereignty. --Nug (talk) 23:22, 12 February 2013 (UTC)
replies: text:  my bad --Львівське (говорити) 15:36, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

text: pg 50. the same page in the citations: "Sovereignty is a legal right [that is] transferrable." He is clearly speaking of sovereignty in the legal sense on this page. He's a legal professor for crying out loud. Also, it helps to paraphrase material you are citing rather than copy & pasting copyrighted material verbatim without attribution or quotations, which is plagiarism.  --Львівське (говорити) 22:35, 13 February 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Opps, missed that, fixed. Making false allegations of copy and pasting now? The text I inserted is paraphrased, certain phrase like "illegal incorporation of the Baltic states" are fairly standard in the literature --Nug (talk) 22:45, 13 February 2013 (UTC)
replies: text:  I apologize, it read identically on the first over. My mistake.--Львівське (говорити) 23:12, 13 February 2013 (UTC)

text: Okay, how about "however these concepts are not precisely aligned" --Nug (talk) 23:55, 13 February 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Legitimate" sovereignty 

message: This article is not general enough. It confuses the more modern concept of "state sovereignty" with the general concept of "sovereignty" and even in the topic of "state sovereignty" there is nothing on the topic of the city states or tribal 'states' from even earlier times (pre-Babylon). Granted, the word "sovereignty" is rooted in Latin, but the concept(s) that the word refers to are so much older.
While state sovereignty is certainly an aspect of the more general topic of sovereignty, it is only a part of the whole. Even the portions on state sovereignty are biased to and/or rooted in the Roman school[s] of thought - It's flavor dominates the whole article. Further, while people will certainly find many cites coming from Roman school[s] of thought (i.e. post roman European scholars - Like Hobbes, Vattel, Rousseau, etc..), it doesn't justify the bias. This article must rise above Rome's doctrines and present a more complete treatment of the topic.
Further still, among the earliest concepts and claims of sovereigns and sovereignty from the Myths (world wide) depicted the various Pharaohs, Kings/Queens, Emperors/Empresses, Chiefs, etc.. as living Gods and/or Divine beings. Even to this day, the current Queen of England claims her position is by the grace of God, as does the Pope... others?
On a similar note, and also among the oldest and most important concepts of sovereignty, is that of the sovereignty of the Soul/Ātman over the body, and subsequently over one's life/property (and then, perhaps over a community of people). This principle is what gave birth to the modern concept of Democratic Republics (as opposed Aristocratic Republics), and the foundation of the United States of America in the first place. It's the inspiration behind the words in the Declaration of Independence that "All People are created Equal" (to the King of England,) and this in turn gave birth to the concept of delegation of a portion of each of the people's inherent sovereign Powers and Duties to a state of public servants dedicated to protect the individual sovereignty of each member of the society.
I present these criticisms and additional concepts for discussion before I start any editing as they will require a somewhat major reworking of this entire article.Christopher Theodore (talk) 14:26, 3 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Neutrality of this article 

message: The roots of the concepts of Sovereigns and Sovereignty are so old they are lost in myth and precede recorded history, and someone decided Rome would be pointed out as the point of origin and no one balked at this fallacy?
Hammurabi was the sixth king of Babylon and Babylon existed long before Rome. And the concepts of Sovereignty existed long before Babylon.
Further, there is only a small minority of people on Earth that don't believe in God in some form or another, and the majority of Earths current population would point out that God is the original Sovereign and all concepts of Sovereignty are based on God (and if we look further back into Earths history when pantheism was more wide spread, the Gods - Like Zeus or Ra for example).  Christopher Theodore (talk) 14:26, 3 November 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  History - only back to Rome? 

message: Cut back to bare facts per the tag request. Please apply the OR tag to specific §§ so they can be addressed as well. 198.255.198.157 (talk) 12:19, 5 June 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: signing after the fact and post the move to only identified editing. Lycurgus (talk) 01:42, 14 July 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Lede redact 

message: Looking at recent edits, I think that there is too much emphasis on legal jargon. This is a difficult subject, and we need to make the article accessible to the layman. Joe Bodacious (talk) 14:53, 5 June 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Legalese 

message: Indeed, the whole issue of whether a government is sovereign or not pertains to the relationship it has with God.  Narrowing the issue to John Locke's Two Treatises of Civil Government which dealt with the issue of whether a king possessed absolute power, John Locke wasn't challenging a wayward monarchy -- the possession of absolute power wasn't their idea -- but that supposition belonged to an underling of theirs named Sir Robert Filmer which was formulated in his work entitled Patriarcha.
Sovereignty dealt with the lone supreme power of the unapproachable Truth.  In contrast, the endeavor of law dealt with the lessor false powers of manipulation, or "necessary evil doing"   
In the Old World, law, or what was legal, pertained to the long standing traditions of legal precedence.  This amounted to chaos or the implementations of the law for the sake of law.  Christianity altered these long standing traditions of the Old World by throwing off the corrupt authority of the emperorship and replacing that authority with the a Chosen Vessel the Apostle Paul and the Apostleship beneath him (The Chosen Vessel is the supreme authority over all other apostles and kings).  In other words, the king and the royal family were sovereign in their authority because of scripture written in the New Testament by the supreme authority, the Chosen Vessel Apostle Paul.  His commandment to obey governing authorities as sovereign are in Roman's chapter 13:
13 Let everyone be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. 2 Consequently, whoever rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves. 3 For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong. Do you want to be free from fear of the one in authority? Then do what is right and you will be commended. 4 For the one in authority is God’s servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for rulers do not bear the sword for no reason. They are God’s servants, agents of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer. 5 Therefore, it is necessary to submit to the authorities, not only because of possible punishment but also as a matter of conscience.
While the sovereign power the royal family possessed was legal concerning Roman's 13, the king and the royal family were also sovereign by the blessing of the church.  This explains the ceremony of the pope crowning the king.  The pope, in turn, gets his authority through the authority of the Apostle Peter, supposedly the first pope of the catholic (universal) church.  
I'm certain many in here will have opposing opinions, but just understand that such has nothing to do with what is rightful sovereign authority which pertains to God.  After all, in putting Romans 13 in perspective, there did exist such evil as false authorities in the guise of false prophets, anti-christs, and so on.  If we simply followed after every authority like sheep, then there wouldn't have been a reason to include the Book of Acts.  The Book of Revelation is also a warning provided to us directly as Christ's divine prophecy.
Revelation 13:18:  This calls for wisdom. Let the person who has insight calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man. That number is 666  
In that prophecy, we are told about an authority figure, a false principality and power, whose name John had coded as the number 666.  Popular consent establishes that name to be Caesar Nero.  As God was not against flesh and blood, and as it was Saul of Tarsus who was the most evil man to ever live, then the anti-christ was not the person Nero, but the designated authority of emperor in general.  As kings ruled over kingdoms, these emperors ruled as war mongers over a world of kingdoms.  As kings were symbiotic, there emperors were parasitic propagating their authority over others by destruction and fear.                              
I say the person Saul of Tarsus was the most evil person to ever live because he was the one who offended the Holy Spirit:
Mark 3:28:  I promise you that any of the sinful things you say or do can be forgiven, no matter how terrible those things are. 29 But if you speak against the Holy Spirit, you can never be forgiven. That sin will be held against you forever.  
This has spiritual significance however as God put the evil Saul to death by way of transforming him into the chosen vessel Apostle Paul.  
What Sir Robert Filmor and others were to the royal family, so Saul of Tarsus and others similar to him were to the corrupt emperorsUncle Emanuel Watkins (talk)Uncle Emanuel Watkins   — Preceding undated comment added 19:33, 8 August 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  further on the subject of Legalese 

message: This sentence: "Jean-Jacques Rousseau's (1712–1778) definition of popular sovereignty (with early antecedents in Francisco Suárez's theory of the origin of power), which only differs in that he considers the people to be the legitimate sovereign." 
... has a couple of issues:
1) It's not a complete sentence.
2) Only differs from what? From Suárez, or Hobbes?
66.254.237.163 (talk) 15:44, 19 January 2015 (UTC)
replies: text: I tried to clean it up a bit. Because of the awkward wording it's a bit difficult to understand what the meaning is supposed to be. Famspear (talk) 22:08, 19 January 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  An unclear sentence 

message: Derived from Latin through French souveraineté, its attainment and retention, in both Chinese and Western culture, has traditionally been associated with certain moral imperatives upon any claimant.
Little or no relationship between the bold part and the non-bold part.  I've never liked this grammatical device, even though it's heavily used in journalism.  — MaxEnt 06:32, 8 December 2016 (UTC)
replies: text: Hmph! I noted that language, and thot or maybe even wrote yet unkinder things about it. Like "non sequitur". (I used to love to say with enthusiasm "Non sequiamur!", but ) ... in any case here, my objection is that the part you bolded is an adjective that has no noun or noun phrase to sensibly modify. "lts" has an adjectivial role and is not eligible for beiing described (as a surrogate for "it" -- sov'ty) by the adj'l phrase "D.f.L. ", as the defective syntax demands.Shame on any professional journalist who utters or condones the syntax that asserts that what the word experienced  involved those"imperatves"!   IMO our mutual colleague was too impatient to use as many words as were required to get across what they wanted to communicate.--Jerzy•t 02:25, 15 July 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't have a problem with the current version (and I'm not a "journalist", my activity in this venue notwithstanding). 98.4.124.117 (talk) 02:23, 29 July 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Tacky tack-on 

message: Would it make sense to add a section on how different nations' governments handle the process of recognizing a new sovereign nation?  Which branch of government has the responsibility, etc.? --Jim Henry (talk) 15:16, 18 February 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  Processes for recognizing sovereign nations 

message: Verbose | Integrity | Vague | Perplexity | Confusion | Obtuse Sufficient use of material to meet the goal of the article's quality standards. Suijur (talk) 14:43, 7 January 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Verbose 

message: How can we Americans become Sovern and not share our Sovereignty with the government? We can Govern ourselves better than they do. I am a child of God and want my freedom and my God given rights. Scottpj (talk) 05:51, 14 March 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sovereignty 

message: smooth 212.60.86.48 (talk) 16:04, 11 January 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  sovereignty meaning 

message: Whole body of a state 49.126.15.43 (talk) 14:05, 26 February 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Social 

message: Soberanyang panloob 112.198.66.68 (talk) 16:44, 2 April 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Aral pan 

message: As many have suggested, there are multiple problems with this article. I believe that the article should be completely rewritten but not deleted. 
*First, it would be useful to discuss the two faces of sovereignty (internal and external sovereignty). Second, this article lacks an in depth explanation of sovereignty and its function in international relations. This concept lays the foundation for how states interact with each-other and therefore requires an more in depth analysis. Furthermore, it is hard to discuss sovereignty without also discussing anarchy and hierarchy. These three principles intertwine in international relations. 
*This article also fails to show the transition from "old sovereignty" to present sovereignty which deals greatly the movement of a state across borders and its inability to control those movements. Furthermore, this article would not be complete without discussing how sovereignty implies that a state can enter into any treaty it wishes.
*Among the gaps in this article, there is no mention of the treat of Westphalia of 1648. This treaty ended the Thirty-Years war that killed half of Europe and created a blue print for sovereignty. This treaty also created the foundation for the system of states we still utilize today. It may be useful to add that many researchers consider sovereignty a social construct and therefore open to a changing interpretation. Krasner mentions that sovereignty is a principle that is here to stay but is open to a different interpretation as time goes on.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Crystalnicole47 (talk • contribs) 20:34, 18 November 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  The Deeper Roots of Sovereignty