Talk:sovereign state

Completely independent

@Geographyinitiative: Please, let's discuss. A sovereign state is not completely independent. Saying that it is "independent" is more than enough. --Dan Polansky (talk) 08:47, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

If you're not completely independent, then you're not sovereign, someone else is. I think of it through this analogy: the princes under the Holy Roman Empire were 'incompletely independent' and hence were not sovereign states until the Peace of Westphalia, after which point various sovereign states, construed as completely independent, were created. I'm trying to think of some other incompletely independent states. --Geographyinitiative (talk) 09:00, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

But hardly any sovereign state is completely independent. States of EU are not completely independent since they have to implement EU directives. And many states are not completely independent since they depend on others for defense via alliances. Many European states have foreign military stationed long-term on their territory yet are considered to be "sovereign states". Former Eastern-Block countries were not completely independent on Soviet Union but were considered to be "sovereign states"; they were no part of a federation. One may quibble about whether they "really were" sovereign, but they were so considered. Sources do not use the word "completely". Do you have a source that says "completely"? --Dan Polansky (talk) 09:35, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

Wow, I had not thought about it from that perspective. But to me, the EU's position is one that does limit sovereignty and would result in them becoming less than sovereign states, that is, I believe the States of the United States were originally conceived of as sovereign states (they have sovereign immunity) but they are for practical purposes not sovereign states today. The EU is kind of "on the border" there. I have no source for "completely". --Geographyinitiative (talk) 13:35, 5 October 2022 (UTC)