Nova Vinelandia

Nova Vinelandia
Flag
Motto:  "Honour the past, reach for the future" (English)
Capital and largest city	L'Anse aux Meadows
Demonym(s)	Vinelandian
Government	Unitary Republic
Legislature	Vinelandian House of Assembly
Population
• Census	64 972 061
GDP (PPP)	estimate
• Total	$1.043 Trillion
• Per capita	$41,240
Gini (2023)	33.0 medium
HDI	0.849 very high
Currency	Vinelandian Rune (VIR)
Date format	dd/mm/yyyy
Driving side	right
Calling code	+42
Internet TLD	.nv

Nova Vinelandia is a nation on Sparkalia. It is bordered by The Mapleville League to the west. It's capital city of L'Anse aux Meadows is it's oldest and most populous, with nearly 36% of the nations population residing in the city. The country is geographically diverse with tall mountains and glaciers in the north slowly rolling into flat wetlands near the coast, where most of the population resides.

The region was formerly a part of the great Nourevian Federation, though it's geography meant the land was never viewed as prime for settling, and little immigration occurred. Only after the Federation's breakup did people begin exiting from the core lands of the federation, seeking a new home. Along the coast, the settlement of L'Anse aux Meadows, meaning "Bay of Meadows" was founded by a group of these emigrants who seeking a peaceful, segregated, and prosperous existence away from the Federation or it's successor states. L'Anse aux Meadows became known as a safe, economically prosperous, libertarian heaven for those who felt unwanted by their home nations. The settlement founded by the Offworlders grew into a diverse multi-species nation and began expanding it's territory inland, eventually reaching the border of The Mapleville League. It was declared officially to be Nova Vinelandia, meaning "New Prosperous Land".

The area is rich in energy resources, particularly uranium, as well as other minerals like iron and zinc. The extraction and sale of these resources still largely powers the Vinelandian economy, though fishing and the services sector contribute significantly as well. The nation does pursue some interventionism when it deems it necessary, but is generally a very free market with low taxes. The total tax rate is around 17% for the average household. The nation is incredibly linguistically diverse and multi-cultural. Though for practical purposes government business is conducted in Arguardian, it is not uncommon to see villages with signs in the local language or dialect, and a variety of schools are available which teach in a multitude of different possible languages. To simplify this, rather then have a centralised public education system, the nation engages in school choice, in which parents are given vouchers by the government to send their children to private schools.

Government and Politics

Democracy

Nova Vinelandia is a democratic republic ruled by a unicameral legislature, The Vinelandian House of Assembly as well as a separately elected head of state, the Governor. The Governor is elected via Instant-Runoff Voting every 5 years on a fixed date. The Governor is officially the commander of the armed forces, and also in charge of appointing members to the various ministries of the executive. The members of the House of Assembly are elected every 5 years as well, exactly 2 years after the gubernatorial election. Members are elected in multi-member districts, called Zones, using the Single Transferable Vote system. Bills are passed by simple majority in the house, in case of an even split the Governor gets to break the tie.

Vinelandian politics have been traditionally split between two major ideologies. The Unitarians, who seek a more uniform, standardised, and centralised state and the Devolutionists, who wish for the Vinelandian state to be as minimal as possible and for people to be accorded the maximum amount of liberties. Traditionally, 3 parties, who were known as the Big Three, were dominant in Vinelandian politics. However recently, there has been a massive rise in mixed-method parties, who believe the ideal state is a balance between the ideologies of the two. in what became known as The Mixed Revolution. The revolution severely disrupted the political status quo, loosening the grip of the Big Three, and opening the doors for previously niche parties to begin playing a bigger role.

List of Parties

Advancement Coalition

The Advancement Coalition was the main party who spearheaded The Mixed Revolution. They are social libertarians who follow the doctrine of the equilibrium of freedoms. The philosophy states that there are positive freedoms (like the freedom of press) and negative freedoms (like the freedom from poverty) and that Nova Vinelandia should aspire to be as free of a society as possible by balancing the two. They largely agree with Together! on many issues, except for the fact that they believe that certain amounts of economic regulation are necessary to protect people's negative freedoms.

Conservative Unitarian Party

The Conservative Unitarian Party was founded very early on, designed to be a more right wing and culturally traditionalist alternative to the Liberal Unitarian Party. However, the party did not see much success, as the LUP successfully pitched itself as a big tent of all Unitarians. This changed due to two factors. First, the LUP was becoming more and more criticized for being stagnant and corrupt, and The Mixed Revolution, which fundamentally altered Vinelandian's perceptions of the political status quo. In an election which became known as "the unitarian schism", the CUP jumped from 0 to 19 seats, most of them being flipped from the LUP.

Green Party

The Green Party was, in many ways the original mixed-method party. Their first slogan was "Not unitarian. Not devolutionist. Environmentalist". They received a minor boost from The Mixed Revolution and have since maintained a small presence based on environmentalism and green politics.

Liberal Unitarian Party

The Liberal Unitarian Party is the oldest party, and one of the original Big Three, founded by a group of the original founders shortly after the establishment of the republic. They are a Unitarian party and have long been the main party representing the ideology. They are traditionally the rivals of Together!, a party which has similar policies except for being Devolutionist. They are social-liberals, self described centrists, and support a free-market with some state interventionism. In power, they have typically accomplished projects of centralisation and standardisation, like the adoption of a Arguardian as the official language of government.

Solidarity

Solidarity is the only non-centrist party of the original Big Three, being a left-wing party. While the party positions itself as an alliance of all leftists, it skews very strongly Devolutionist, being in favour market-oriented left-libertarianism. At their most radical, they believe that a state should collect taxes, distribute welfare to the needy, and do nothing else. They also distinguish themselves as one of the few strongly anti-military parties. Solidarity is notable that, in holding with their anarchist views, they do not have a party leader. Instead, they practice collective leadership, in which the roles and responsibilities traditionally assigned to a party leader are divided and shared amongst all the party members. They wish to abolish the Governor and have the role replaced by a similar kind of collective leadership, though they still do appoint a spokesperson who runs in the gubernatorial elections out of obligation.

Together!

Together! is the second oldest party, one of the original Big Three, and was the main rival of the Liberal Unitarian Party for several elections. They fall under the Devolutionist category, and are self described centrist libertarians. Their stated goal is to be a broad alliance unifying the left and right in a desire for freedom and personal independence. Typically while in power Together! has sought to pull back government regulations and restrictions. They are not fundamentally opposed to taxes and social spending as long as it doesn't infringe on personal freedoms, they were the pioneers behind the nation's school choice system.

True Freedom

True Freedom is a minor minarchist party which criticizes Together! for being fake libertarians. They go beyond typical Devolutionists in wanting an extremely minimal state to the point of near anarchy.

Elections Summary

The members of the 7th term of The Vinelandian House of Assembly

Party colour key
	Advancement Coalition		Conservative Unitarian Party
	Liberal Unitarian Party		Solidarity
	Together!		Green Party
	True Freedom

No.	Year	Summary	Government		Official opposition		Third party		Fourth party		Fifth party		Sixth party		Other	Total seats
1st		The Liberal Unitarian Party takes a narrow majority against Together! the only other party in existence at the time. Due to the lack of parties a large number of independents are elected.		146		87		-		-		-		-	9	242
2nd		Due to the addition of Solidarity, the Liberal Unitarian Party is reduced to a minority and Together! is pushed down to third place in a very close 3-way split house.		85		78		73		-		-		-	6	242
3rd		Despite predictions of a collapse, the Liberal Unitarian Party made a surprising comeback, improving their seat count. The Green Party also wins their first seat.		105		88		40		1		-		-	16	250
4th		Together! finally unseats the Liberal Unitarian Party taking a majority in their only time in government.		130		78		32		5		-		-	5	250
5th		TheLiberal Unitairian Party returns to power, largely thanks to several blunders made by Together! during their governance.. The Advancement Coalition makes their entrance, triggering the beginning of The Mixed Revolution		103		63		58		21		3		-	2	250
6th		The Mixed Revolution bears its fruits as the Advancement Coalition wins a plurality. The political status quo becomes thrown into question as the Liberal Unitarian Party and Together! both see their worst results of all time.		93		62		42		40		6		3	4	250
7th		The Advamcement Coalition improves its seat count, but barley misses out on a majority. Meanwhile in a sudden event that becomes known as the unitarian schism, the Liberal Unitarian Party looses nearly half of its seats to the up until this point fringe Conservative Unitarian Party		103		48		44		27		20		5	3	250

Culture

Names

Vinelandian society views names as a form of personal expression. It is easy and common for a person to change their name to reflect a change in the course of their lives. Due to the nation being a mosaic of various cultures, each with their own practices with regards to family names, it is not uncommon for people to have no surname, or conversely, multiple surnames. To simplify this, it was decided that official Vinelandian documents will not display surnames, and the "legal name" consists only of their first name and, if applicable, their honorific. Additional names, if desired, are simply used colloquially with no officiality or oversight from the government.