In Varietate Concordia (Latin) ("Concord in diversity") | ||||||
| Anthem | "God save the King/Queen" | |||||
| Capital (and largest city) |
Honolulu | |||||
| Other Cities | Port Moresby, Funafuti, Honiara, Port-Vila, Apia, Palikir, Nuku'alofa, others | |||||
| Language Official |
English, French, German (official) Many Pacific islander languages (regionally official) | |||||
| Others | Creole languages, Spanish, Chinese, Hindi | |||||
| Religion Main |
Catholic Christianity | |||||
| Others | Anglican Christianity, Lutheranism, Seventh-day Adventist, Jewish, traditional faiths | |||||
| Ethnic Groups Main |
Polynesian, Micronesian, Melanesian | |||||
| Others | South Asian, White | |||||
| Demonym | Pacific | |||||
| Government | Parliamentary Triarchy | |||||
| Legislature | Parliament of the Pacific | |||||
| Queen/King | Victoria II Georg Friedrich Philippe IX | |||||
| royal house | Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (Victoria) Hohenzollern (Georg-Friedrich) Orléans(Philippe) | |||||
| Prime Minister | 'Aukai Kahale (Talofa Lava, Hawaii) | |||||
| Area | 70,000 km² | |||||
| Population | 4,625,728 people | |||||
| Established | 1937 | |||||
| Admission | 1937 | |||||
| Currency | Imperial Pound Sterling (£) | |||||
| Time Zone | GMT -10 to +10 | |||||
| Summer | no | |||||
| Abbreviations | .pl, .pa, .if | |||||
| Organizations | UN, IF, VB, L-BTO | |||||
The Pacific Union (usually - but incorrectly - abbreviated to Polynesia by Europeans) is a democratic federation of 33 states located in the many islands and archipelagos of the South Pacific Ocean. The Pacific Union, being an island federation, has no land borders, but does border Japan to the northwest, the Philippines to the west, the Papua Republic and the Maluku Union to the southwest, and two fellow members of the Imperial Federation's Federal Council of Australasia, the dominions of Queensland and New Zealand to the south (with borders with international waters to the north and the east). With a special frontier regime developed in the 1937 Pacific Convention, the Pacific Union is the country with the world's largest water area, controlling the better part of the Pacific Ocean.
Straddling the three major Pacific regions of Polynesia, Melanesia and Micronesia, the Pacific Union is composed of thousands of islands, mostly either of volcanic origin or coral atolls (the exact number is not even known to Pacific cartographers), of which many are inhabited. The Pacific Union's five million inhabitants, divided in all states (but mostly concentrated in the larger state of Hawaii) are extremely diverse, with a small Polynesian plurality, but extremely large amounts of European and (mostly South-)Asian settlers, native Melanesians and Micronesians, as well as a very large (and increasingly growing) population of mixed-race people.
The history of the Pacific Union is an odd one. A classic example of the extreme degree of inter-European cooperation in the aftermath of the Great War and the start of the Cold War between the European powers and the United States, everything, from the Pacific Union's unique triarchical form of government to its uniquely recognised extreme maritime borders is developed sui generis, as a form for the three major European powers (the United Kingdom, France and Germany), as well as what remained of a chaotic Spain at the time, to give up their colonial ownership of the region and turn it over to a pro-European democracy. Since then, the Pacific Union has continued to grow and evolve within the framework of a pro-European parliamentary democracy, massively important as a vital location of several major navy bases, phosphate mines, and, increasingly after the 1980s, as one of the world's most profitable tourist destinations. While the Pacific Union remains a mostly rural and relatively poor country, great strides in development have been done.
The Pacific Union has always been, because of its origins, ethnic composition, cultural and economic ties and political aversion to encroachment by the nearby United States, a loyal member of the Imperial Federation and, in general, a deeply pro-Western State. Internal politics have reflected this, with a constant fight between two major political blocs, both deeply anti-American (with the controversial exception of the Hawaii Republican Party). Recent political events, however, have shattered traditional Pacific politics: the elections held in July 28 of 2018 brought a shock wave to the politics of the Pacific Union.
Politics and Government[]
Administrative Divisions[]
The Pacific Union is divided in 33 States: The Kingdoms of Hawaii, Fiji, Samoa, Tonga, Tahiti, Futuna, 'Uvea, Rapa Iti and Rapa Nui, and the States of the Solomon Islands, New Caledonia, Vanuatu, the Marianas, Palau, Yap, Woleai, the Carolinas, Pohnpei, Kolonia, Nauru, Santa Cruz, Rotuma, Tuvalu, Kiribati, Tokelau, the Cook Islands, Rarotonga, Penhryn, Niue, the Society Islands, Tubuai, and Tuamotu. Kingdoms and States are functionally identical, with the only difference being that the Kingdom has a local King that rules as Head of State of the Islands.
All States have the capacity to draft their own Constitutions, establish their own government structures (albeit almost all are parliamentary democracies), determine their official languages, their own policy regarding public services, and their own security policy. The judiciary of each State is independent (although the national Cassation Court can listen to cases from any State, and has the capacity of judicial review over all State laws). States also used to have the capacity to determine large swaths of their own fiscal policy before reforms in 2005: a new legislative initiative is also planning to strip States of their healthcare autonomy to create a new National Health Service.
The large and decentralised nature of the Pacific Union is seen in its many cultural, political and economic idiosyncracies, with many conflicts between the States occurring. The Federal Court of the Pacific Union is in charge of resolving conflicts between States. The Pacific Congress, furthermore, is in charge of the drafting of general policy and legislation all States must adhere to, international relations and international trade, military policy, the operation of public superior education (in the form of the many campuses of the University of the Pacific, one of the world's foremost educational institutions), fiscal and monetary policy (including taxation) and the usage of natural resources (notably, Nauru's now-depleted phosphate supplies, removed from State jurisdiction).
The Pacific Union is a parliamentary triarchy, with a ruling Monarch's Council composed not of local kings, but of the joint monarchies of France (it itself a diarchy, is represented by the President and the King, but has only one vote), Germany and the United Kingdom. These three monarchs appoint their own representatives to conform the Council, which acts as Head of State. The Head of Government is vested in the Prime Minister of the Pacific Union, chosen after quadrennial parliamentary elections by the Parliament of the Pacific, the country's chief legislative power.
Politics[]
Electoral results of the 2018 Pacific General election.
The Pacific Union is a multiparty democracy. The 189 representatives that compose the Pacific Parliament are chosen every four years by every citizen of the Union, in (generally) proportional fashion in fair and free elections. Politicians from each State tend to agglomerate amongst State-level parties, completely autonomous in regards to their policies and decisions, but generally aligned to national-level parties, which run their own candidates in national elections (in a political system similar to that used in Canada). These national-level parties are, in turn, divided into two blocs.
Historically, the Pacific Union had five major parliamentary parties: from left to right, these were Talofa Lava, the Pacific Sector of the Workers' International, the Liberal Party of the Pacific, the Wanahau Party and the Party of Kapu. A sixth party, the Pacific of Nations and Freedom, never had major parliamentary representation, but was always represented. Usually, politics were dominated by the centre-right bloc, with Wanahau being by far the most common party of government in the Federation. However, political events following the Hawaiian general election, 2016 brought a shock wave crashing into Pacific shores, through the division of the Liberal Party of the Pacific in two factions, the great weakening of the Wanahau Party (which passed from first place to fifth) and the Party of Kapu (which passed from third to fourth) and the rise of the massively influential Pirate Party of the Pacific. As such, the current political system is as follows:
Talofa Lava[]
As its name (a reference to a Samoan greeting of affection and love similar to the more popular Hawaiian aloha) suggests, Talofa Lava is a left-wing, relatively socially liberal party, with very close ties with the Green-Mensheviks in Eurasia and the Green Left in Germany. Talofa Lava has become the largest political party in the left-wing bloc, overshadowing both of its coalition partners with 41 MPs, or 21.69% of the Parliament, as well as the Prime Minister. They are a notably left-wing party, with strong ties with environmental groups, and for that reason have grown in prominence in later years, especially in smaller islands that seek to find a more radical response to global warming.
The Pacific Sector of the Workers' International[]
As its name suggests, the PSWI makes part of the Workers' International, together with the SFIO and SEIO in France and Spain-in-exile, as well as the Social Democrats of Germany and the United Kingdom, New Labour in Eurasia, and many other traditional social-democratic parties. The party has, historically, been the party of labour unions, the urban left, and Asians, and now controls most government in historically German states (most notably, Samoa), as well as Tahiti. In Parliament, they have 32 MPs, or 16.93% of the Parliament.
The Pacific Pirate Party[]
The Pacific Union is the first country to have a major presence of a Pirate Party in its parliament (despite Eurasia and China having nominal representation for a few years now). The PPP is now by far the most relevant Pirate Party in the world, with its ideology rapidly being adopted by many Pirate Parties. The PPP ideology was set out in the 2016 Honolulu Convention, which established five fundamental principles: Ecologism, Economic Democracy', 'Freedom of Information, The Sanctity of Life, and Social Equality. The PPP is mostly popular in urban areas and with the youth, and, in its first federal showing, jumped to third (after coming in first in the traditional right-wing bastion of Fiji), with 31 MPs, or 16.41% of Parliament.
The Independent Liberal Alliance[]
The Liberal Party split in half over the corruption scandal that erupted around the heavily corrupt, US-influenced Republican Party of Hawaii - those which wanted to expel the Republicans from the national Liberal Party, and replace them within Hawaii by local celebrity Nani Pelakai's political party, the eDemocrats, eventually lost the vote, and left the LPP, instead creating the loose ILA. The ILA is a mostly centrist political party, adhering to social liberalism or mild neoliberalism, as well as direct democracy. They have 13 MPs, or 6.87% of Parliament.
The Liberal Party of the Pacific[]
Today (and, according to detractors, historically) the LPP is mostly the vehicle of the Republican Party of Hawaii, the tool of choice of the US Democrats to destabilise the Pacific Union and hopefully bring Hawaii into American influence. While this rhetoric has mostly been toned down after the end of the Reagan dictatorship, the LPP still is heavily corporatist, the only US-friendly political party in the Pacific Union, and an odd, ragtag group that seems mostly to adhere to Libertarianism. With the secession of most of its political parties, the LPP has 10 MPs, or 5.29% of Parliament.
Wanahau Party[]
Wanahau is the party of the right, a traditional liberal-conservative apparatus created in the 1950s to convince young voters to vote more right wing and remaining an important political movement. Historically the party of government of the Pacific Union, the falling out with its 60-year coalition partners in the Party of Kapu and strong implications of Wanahau's Hawaiian party (Ohana) in Republican corruption scandals have made them get their worst electoral result ever - 25 seats, or 13.22% of Parliament. They currently sit in the crossbench, refusing to join opposition.
Party of Kapu[]
The Party of Kapu is the party of good morals, religion and the Monarchy in the Pacific Union, and mostly appeals to old people, rural inhabitants, and Pacific Islander natives. Deeply monarchistic, deeply religious and very deeply conservative, the Party has been slowly losing ground to both liberals and leftists, but defeats in its traditional strongholds of Fiji and the Solomon Islands has set them reeling. They currently have 26 seats, or 13.75% of parliament.
A Pacific of Nations and Freedom[]
The PNF is a ragtag group of Boulangist parties that look for the independence of their own island nations, the removal of any foreign influence, and the return to 1800s-style cultural conservatism. Because of their radical stances, they are deeply unpopular, only supported by 4.23% of the people and earning eight MPs, their largest ever representation.
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