Meronnia
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Federal Republic of Meronnia République Fédérale de Mèronie | |
|---|---|
 Flag | |
| Motto: Liberté, Solidarité, Prospérité Liberty, Solidarity, Prosperity | |
| Anthem: Le Chant Du Depart "Song of the Departure"  | |
 Official Map of the Federal Republic and Territories | |
| Capital | Senone |
| Official languages | Mèronais |
| Recognised regional languages | Vaalse, Cabecan, Tavitan |
| Demonym(s) | Mèron |
| Government | Federal semi-presidential republic |
• Premier | Pierre-Antoine Tremblay |
| Maximilien Sardou | |
| Legislature | Chambre des Députés |
| Establishment | |
• Crowning of Lothair II | 757 |
• The Philippine Proclamation | 1281 |
• Signing of the Commune Constitution | 1771 |
| Area | |
• Total | 646,571.4 km2 (249,642.6 sq mi) |
| Population | |
• Estimate | 66,762,700 |
• Density | 103.26/km2 (267.4/sq mi) |
| GDP (nominal) | 2020 estimate |
• Total | L551 Billion |
• Per capita | L8,253.10 |
| Gini (2020) | 29.2 low |
| HDI (2020) | 0.889 very high |
| Currency | Livre ((L)) |
| Date format | ddmmyyyy |
| Driving side | right |
| Calling code | +122 |
| ISO 3166 code | MR |
| Internet TLD | .mr |
Meronnia (Mèronais: Mèronie), officially the Federal Republic of Meronnia (Mèronais: République Fédérale de Mèronie), is a nation in Western Lira with several overseas territories. Metropolitan Meronnia is bordered by the Bay of Bicscay and the Inoran Ocean to the West, Lunderfrau to the North, Winst to the East, Arideo to the Southeast, Cisparrania to the South, and Produzland to the Southwest. The capital and largest city is Senone, with 2,812,000 living in the Senone Commune. The country's 47 Communes and 5 other Territories span a total of 646,571.4 km2 (249,642.6 sq mi), with a total population of 66.8 million people.
The country has a primarily mild Oceanic climate, though the metropolitan region varies from warm Mediterranean to Humid Continental. Overseas territories have an even broader climatic range. The nation is a federal semi-presidential republic, with executive authority shared between a directly elected Premier, the First Deputy of the Chamber of Deputies, and the Directory, a limply empowered holdover of the early Republican government.
Meronnia is a center for arts, sciences, and philosophy. Meronnia is a developed country with a very high standard of living and fairly low income inequality, though there have been recent concerns about rising housing prices. Meronnia is heavily involved in international affairs and participates in a number of international bodies. It is the leading member of the OIM, an organization initially founded as a post-colonial community of Mèronais-speaking nations.
Etymology
The origin of Meronnia is as a geographic term, Merona, describing the area the majority of the modern nation exists on, though the origins of this terminology are unclear (it is believed to have originated somewhere in Western Lira). The tribes, and later, kingdoms that inhabited the area became known as the Mèrons, and a gradual linguistic shift over several hundred years was confirmed in 1281 when Philip Rusét in his proclamation claimed the title of King of Mèronie. The Lorian exonym settled on Meronnia around the same time.
Both the exonym and endonym roughly mean Land of the Mèrons. As the word Mèron originally means those living in Merona or Mèronie, the cyclical nature of the meanings of these terms has drawn some attention as a source of humor for linguists.
The modern demonym for the nation of Meronnia is "Mèron" (or Meron/Meronnian in Lorian).
History
Prehistory (before the 6th century BCE)
The oldest traces of human life in what is now Meronnia date from approximately 1.5 million years ago. Over the ensuing millennia, Humans were confronted by a harsh and variable climate, marked by several glacial eras.
Early inhabitants of the region led nomadic hunter-gatherer lifestyles. Meronnia has large numbers of preserved decorated caves of the Paleolithic era, such as the famous Bourdon Caves (approximately 16,000 BCE). As the climate became milder at the end of the glacial period the inhabitants of the region entered the Neolithic era and became sedentary, establishing agricultural communities as early as 6,000 BC.
Improvements in agriculture and demographic changes led to societal development throughout the 3rd Millenia BCE, including the appearance of metallurgy. The earliest metals to have been worked in Meronnia were gold, copper, and bronze. Examples of worked iron date back as far as 1,200 BC.
Antiquity (6th century BCE–5th century CE)
There is little written information concerning the first civilizations that inhabited the regions of what is now Meronnia, save what can be gleaned from coins. Therefore, the early history of the region is predominantly a work in archaeology, and the relationships between material culture, genetic relationships (the study of which has been aided, in recent years, through the field of archaeogenetics) and linguistic divisions rarely coincide.
The first societies in what is now Meronnia of which much detail remains are the Collers culture who spoke similar dialects and were organized into a number of small kingdoms centered around a structure of tribes and clans. This people, and their displacement by Tabers and Lorians through the 5th and 4th centuries BC, is discussed in depth in the surviving works of Divicatus of Elusco.
The Kingdoms of Virisimi, Cacudia, Dusella, and Manduissa, all came into existence between 450 and 300 BC, and the linguistically and religiously diverse region saw regular changes in territory and prosperity through minor conflicts, and frequent changing of hands of the position of "Rix Maros" (roughly: "Great King"), the first among equals of the Kings, who was identified as the holder of the Nerto Stone. While etymologically unclear, the first use of the term Merona, to describe the region that abided by the power of the Nerto Stone, was in 285 BC by Brocchia the Taber.
In the First Century BC, Valatonius was the King of Dusella and holder of the Nerto Stone, and he gathered the armies of most or all of the Meron Kings to come to the aid of the Tabers in the campaign against encroaching armies of the Anconan Kingdom. Valatonius's army met King Salus of Ancona, who had declared himself the Orthurian Emperor, north of the Aniene River. In the Battle of Cenos the Meron army were victorious, but in the long term the growth of the Orthurian Empire proved impossible to halt.
In 62 AD, three Meron Kings threw down their swords and surrendered their lands to the Orthurian Empire as a result of the defeat of their armies. King Borso of Cacudia refused to surrender and stole the Nerto Stone. His army was met at a bridge across the Aniene and defeated, with Borso throwing himself into the river with the Stone, which was lost forever.
Merona as a province of the Orthurian Empire served as a frontier with the Kingdom of Taber and the Empire's rivals and a number of forts and walled towns were settled, including Belenora, Litu, Tallius, and Cricero. During this period the Province saw improvements in infrastructure like roads, and public works in the walled towns, leading to significant improvements in overall development. After Emperor Valerius Patisar converted to Verroist Beoin, Beoin churches and missions were established in a number of walled towns in Merona Province, leading to a partial conversion of the local population, most strongly in the south.
Throughout the 4th and 5th centuries, the migration of Gostic Tribes from East of the Kingdom of Taber destabilized the Province as well as the rest of the Empire. Merona bore the brunt of demographic shifts, with many Gostic groups settling land in the Province and intermarrying, very quickly outpopulating Orthurian settlers in the few towns they had established. Gostic groups were violently opposed to orders from Ancona, and a series of revolts saw the final withdrawal of the Orthurian garrison from forts in Merona Province in 387 AD.
Small parts of the former province, in the far south, sought direct aid of the Magi who had been installed in the Fluviatta less than a century before, but the majority of Merona swore fealty to Gostic leaders establishing a new set of tribally based minor Kingdoms.
In 470, Annamatus and Viriata, a co-leading King and Queen of the Kingdom of Licnos, took their armies Southwards after coming to the aid of Gostic forces of Almer the Great in Taber. They signed a treaty with the Magi to recognize the Fosperia territories (those lands of the Merona Province that had requested his aid) and did not loot any of the towns in that region, instead receiving payment and food as they traveled. They went as far as to attack Ancona, but their army dispersed to raid and pillage as they returned towards the North and they were unable to continue their momentum.
Early Middle Ages (6th century-10th century)
What is today Meronnia was divided between a number of small independent societies after the exit of the Orthurian Empire and the failure of early movements to unite the Gostic people who had settled in the former Merona Province. The earliest successes in unification came about with the conquests of Grimoald the Tall who succeeded in unifying the territory of the pre-Orthurian kingdom of Dusella. His dynasty, the Grimoaldings, would go on to be the first force to unify Meronnia from the inside.
Louemagne (Louel the Great) was the great grandson of Grimoald, and his successes in both war and diplomacy led to Grimoalding control over much of the core of modern-day Meronnia. In 698, Louemagne claimed the title of "King of all Merons"; though he would not unify all the Meron-speaking lands in his lifetime this was partially attributable to the origination of a national identity for the disparate people of the region.
Lothair II, the grandson of Louel the Great, announced before his court that if he was successful in his war against those forces in Meronnia refusing to recognize his authority that he would convert himself and his kingdom, formally, to a Verroist one. After his conquest of Toulers, he followed through on his promise and was ceremonially welcomed into the Verroist church. Lothair II was also responsible for a treaty with the Magi in Avelino, which returned the Fosperia territories to Lothair's realm. In 757, much of his conquests complete, Lothair was crowned by the Magi as the Meronnian Emperor.
The Meronnian Empire became one of the most powerful forces in the region, and a number of innovations in sciences and arts were made as the Empire attempted (ultimately fruitlessly) to claim the mantle that the Orthurian Empire had once held in Western Lira. The centralized and prosperous empire would ultimately last a little over two centuries. In 944 the Imperial throne passed to a bastard branch of the Grimoaldings through Louel III, and in 998 the death of Charles Louelling led to an internal conflict over the inheritance, which spiraled into war in 999. The Empire was de facto dissolved by the separation of the lands of the competing claimants to the throne, leading to the period somewhat misleadingly referred to as the Interregnum.
High and Late Middle Ages (11th century-15th century)
The Meronnian Interregnum divided the former empire into a number of independent feudal states primarily based on the borders of Imperial provinces. These included the Kingdoms of Aleamme, Nord, and Le Péninsule. Later states to emerge included the Kingdom of the Vaalsers which broke away from Nord in 1086, and the Kingdom of Blénoir based in the city of the same name which emerged in 1217 and would become the vehicle for reunification of the region.
The Rusét dynasty emerged as a powerful force during the middle stages of the interregnum, prominently due to the efforts of the Duke Louis the Fox who oversaw a number of centralizing reforms of his lands and titles, and through careful war and diplomacy expanded his realm to one of the largest in the Meronnian region, though one still in vassalage to the Kings. Throughout the 1200s, the Rusét family was the main source of power for the nascent Kingdom of Blénoir declared by the Charibertean cadet house to the Grimoaldings. The grandson of Louis, Philip Rusét, married Adelaide of Blénoir in 1279 and claimed the title of King of all Meronnia.
Following a short and decisive conflict, Philip victoriously seized the lands of his rivals and issued the Philippine Proclamation in 1281 which established the legality of the new Kingdom. The Proclamation was notably liberal for its era, for example providing protections for widows and women who did not wish to marry, and establishing new rights for landholders and free cities. These new liberties compelled the large majority of minor landholders and freedmen to support loyalty to Philip I as opposed to their former monarchs, and is largely credited for the stability of the newly united Kingdom in it's first centuries of existence.
The 14th and 15th century in Meronnia under the Rusét kings was an era of uncommon peace and prosperity, and renaissance ideals from Parthonopia were quickly adopted in the wealthy and libertine courts of Meronnian nobility and royalty, leading to an explosive growth in the development of arts and sciences. This was the era in which painters such as Raymon Gachet worked, and when Baudrain Girard pioneered astrological sciences and led the heliocentric revolution.
This was also the period which saw the birth of the first parts of the Meronnian colonial empire, settlements and trade concessions along the northern Meridiqi coast, and later valuable acquisitions in South-Eastern Nori. These colonial endeavours led to a number of minor conflicts with Produzland, the other prominent Liran colonial power of the time.
The Meronnian Renaissance period was decisively halted by the 1477 invasion by the rapidly growing Lunderfrausian Empire which had united in 1412. While the core territories of the Kingdom remained, the expanding Lunderfrau seized more than a third of the Meronnian landmass in it's continued campaigns of expansion which would ultimately push further into the Orthurian peninsula and endanger Arideo and the Parthonopian states.
Early Modern Period (16th century-1730)
The successes of Lunderfrau throughout the early 16th century led to the formation of a broad coalition of southern territories to drive them back. The Siege of Lepanto in 1529 in modern Parthonopia was the turning point at which the Lunderfrausian advance was halted, and through the relief of an intervening coalition of Parthonopian, Aridite, Produese, and Meronnian forces, Lunderfrau was turned back from Lepanto and gradually forced northwards. While the coalition was successful in driving Lunderfrau most of the way back to its historic borders, it would continue to occupy the Vaalser Country for three hundred years.
After the success of the war against Lunderfrau, a short military campaign was launched against the small Kingdom of Velarre to the West, in which the Meron king Josset II pressed a vague claim to the territory. Velarre, which occupied much of the territory today classified as Cabeca, became a vassal state of the Kingdom of Meronnia in 1534.
The formation of the coalition thawed relations with Produzland as the two Kingdoms settled a number of treaties outlining a separation of colonial interests, which secured a Produese predominance in Nori and a Meronnian predominance in Meridiq. These agreements were cemented by royal marriage which ultimately led in 1551 to the inheritance of the Produese King Philip to the Meronnian throne through his mother. Philip I and IV led a personal union of the two kingdoms and their other possessions for 32 years, becoming one of the most powerful men in history.
In 1582 on the death of Philip, differences in inheritance law led to Philip's elder daughter Ermelina inheriting the Meronnian throne, while Philip's younger son Vincent inherited Produzland, ending the personal union. Nonetheless, the Produese House of Lugo remained on the Meronnian throne for several generations, retaining a close relationship with that country.
During this period, Meronnia's re-entry into South-East Nori colonialism saw success as the Meronnian Kingdom pursued a trade and concessions focused policy, contrasted with Produzland and others who attempted conquest and conversion of large areas of land. Small coastal trade concessions throughout South-East Nori would coagulate into the Pearl Necklace Cities over the next two hundred years, becoming Meronnia's most valuable colonial territory.
The 1600s in Meronnia (often also including the late 1500s) were a period of extreme unrest in the Kingdom of Meronnia, primarily driven by religious tensions. Verroist Inquisitors from Produzland, brought by the Lugo monarchs, were unpopular in the less fervently devout region which was still host to a significant pagan minority in the Nosoumettron religion. Tensions were escalated significantly with the spread of Recantism, a Beoin breakaway sect which rejected much of the established doctrine of the Verroist church. In 1601, Recantism was made illegal in Meronnia, sparking the period known as the Religious Wars.
The Religious Wars period saw a large number of uprisings and rebellions motivated by religious disagreements, and several monarchs were successfully deposed. Charles X was forcefully removed in 1608 by Louis Touchard who declared himself King, and in 1613 signed the Proclamation of Primacy which recognized the new but rapidly developing Annic Church (then known as the Church of Roses) as the official church of the Kingdom, leading to Louis' excommunication by the Verroist magi. Ultimately, King Louis VI was also overthrown in 1626 by a return of the Verroist Lugo dynasty, but after Guibert II converted to Recantism and was assassinated, the Touchard dynasty was restored to the throne in 1684 with King Alain I, and the Annic Church was brought back to primacy, permanently ending the Lugo line of Meronnian kings.
This period of internal chaos also saw the loss of several major colonial territories on the Meridiqi coast, after Khaymahian tribes united in the Ajnabi War of 1659-1663. These losses split the remaining concessions along the central coast from those that comprised the Carelian colonies.
The Kingdom of Velarre, which was a predominantly Verroist territory which had sworn fealty to the House of Lugo, did not return to its state of vassalage under the new monarchs and once again became an independent state, which would eventually be consumed by Produzland. However, the North-Eastern territory of the Kingdom, Cabeca Alba, was directly annexed by the struggling Meronnian monarchy. The historic Fosperia region, heavily Verroist in population, also broke off during this period and swore fealty to the Magi State to Meronnia's south.
While the Touchard restoration signaled the beginning of the end for the Religious Wars, Meronnia still had many issues to face. As increased emigration from the embattled homeland had ballooned the population of several Meronnian colonies, most prominently Carelia, it had become much more difficult to enforce taxes and tariffs on these overseas holdings. Additionally, the failure of the monarchs to liberalize their rule after the end of religious violence led to the tense atmosphere being redirected, rather than dissipating. In 1730, protests over the price of bread in the city of Senone slowly devolved into a revolution.
Revolutionary Meronnia (1730-1800)
Through the late months of 1730, the city of Senone (which was already the most populous city in the Kingdom at the time) fell into near-anarchy as protests over bread prices devolved into riots which grew increasingly violent, and saw the withdrawal of the King's police from the city. In early 1731 with the city effectively outside the control of the King, a new spontaneous Senone City Committee was established by locals to continue providing essential services such as fire-fighting and policing. Over the month of February, Senone's political scene graduated towards a national revolutionary bent, as opposed to their initial local focus.
In March, a call was put out to gather a Provisional Assembly for a Meronnian republic, and despite warnings by the royal government a number of participants from across the country traveled to Senone to participate. In their first official sitting on March 27th 1731, the Provisional Assembly agreed to a slim constitution, elected the radical poet Fabien Robiquet the position of Captain (head of state), and issued a unilateral declaration of the establishment of a republic, referenced by historians as the First Republic.
What followed was a brief conflict, with the republicans securing victory after many cities in the former kingdom recognized the new constitution and gathered militias to fight. King Florent II was forced to withdraw with his loyalist forces to the safety of Produzland, and the republicans titled their victory the Glorious Revolution. For the next eight years the First Republic was in control of the majority of Meronnia, though it dealt with frequent uprisings and unrest, while struggling to provide solutions to problems left unanswered by the overthrown monarchy.
Ultimately the First Republic was governed by the Provisional Assembly and Robiquet for it's entire existence, as the Captain continued to output new theory pieces on good governance and the provisional government continued to stamp out dangers that regularly cropped up. By 1739, no elections had been held to fill an official Republican Assembly. It was in this context that the Last Restoration was carried out by King Florent's loyalist army supplemented by Produese military assistance.
Returning as an invasion force, the royalists found the republicans disorganized and demoralized, and on taking and sacking Senone (and concurrently killing Fabien Robiquet outside the meeting hall of the Provisional Assembly) the First Republic was put to an end. The restored kingdom under Florent made some attempts at reform, including the establishment of a legislative Chamber of Commons, and a relocation of the official capital to Senone from historic Blénoir.
Ultimately, these reforms proved fickle, and Florent's successor Ermelina II fumbled an attempt to enforce order in the Carelian colonies, which led to the 1756-1763 Carelian War of Independence, ultimately a success for the revolutionaries and a defeat for the embattled royalists who struggled to maintain any semblance of loyalty from the Meronnian public.
In 1771, Queen Ermelina moved to close the Chamber of Commons after they attempted to hold a vote to block the introduction of a new royal tax. This was the spark that lit the Second Revolution, which spiraled into the Meronnian Civil War. Across the country a number of groups rose up initially under the banner of the Provisional Republic with the primary intent to remove the monarchy permanently, but soon this broad tent divided into a number of competing factions which fought for control of the nation.
Based in the self-declared Senone Commune, the Communards (the blacks) were the faction that was ultimately successful in reunifying the nation, subsuming several other revolutionary movements such as the National Committee and defeating both the Provisional Republic and the Royalist remnants on the battlefield. While the Communards had established control of a majority of the country by 1774, pockets of resistance throughout the country lasted several years beyond that.
The new Meronnia was now made up of a number of constituent Communes, which sent representatives to a Congress of Communes which served as the provisional legislative body. During the bulk of the civil war, the Committee of General Defense served as the collective head of state of the Communard faction. In 1774 after several successful campaigns brought much of the country under Communard control, the Congress of Communes finalized a new constitution establishing the Federal Republic of Meronnia, also creating the Meronnian Directory as a new executive and the Chamber of Senators as a new regular legislative body made up of the representatives sent by commune governments.
The new government moved quickly to establish and legitimize republican institutions. As the military situation became clearer and another royalist restoration became an impossibility, tentative and cold relations were restored with neighbouring monarchies. In 1784 a federal system for public education was introduced, in 1789 Communal militias were banned in favour of complete focus on a federal army, and in 1799 the Chamber of Deputies was established as a lower house for the Chamber of Senators, made up of representatives elected directly from constituencies.
Wars and Industrialisation (1800-1925)
The early Federal Republic was dominated by militant and radical republican views, as the fervently libertine population of Meronnia found itself surrounded by increasingly reactionary monarchical forces, and with only the distant former colony of Carelia as an ally. Consequently, a large military buildup dominated the first decade of the 1800s. This included a broad expansion of the army by conscription, as well as wide-reaching modernization efforts that saw the Meronnian Model Army become the most advanced in Lira at that time.
On September 3rd 1811, General Augustin Calvet, who commanded the Meronnian Southern Army, unilaterally moved his forces across the border into the Magi State, occupying the historically Meronnian region of Fosperia. The Meronnian Directory was compelled to legitimize this move by declaring war on the Magi, and in response a broad coalition of Orthurian Verroist monarchies came to the aid of the Magi and declared war on Meronnia, beginning the Great Continental Wars.
Meronnia was ultimately successful in defeating the Verroist coalition after making significant concessions to convince Produzland to enter the war on their side. Following the defeat of the Parthonopian states, General Calvet then moved to betray his Produese ally, reversing the gains Produzland had made and installing a puppet king on the Produese throne. While parts of Eastern Arideo were never fully occupied, the Meronnian army successfully aligned the Orthurian peninsula in a series of puppet states and "Sister Republics".
During this period, General Calvet became infamous for his continued flagrant disrespect for the commands of the Meronnian Directory, establishing new states personally loyal to himself and issuing commands with questionable legality to the commanders of other sections of the Meronnian army. While Calvet's sidelining of the Directory was seen by many of his contemporaries as a significant risk to the continuation of the Republic, he was extremely popular among the Meronnian people for his continued bold victories.
Initiating the final phase of the war, Calvet assembled an army including forces from Meronnia, most of the Sister Republics, and volunteers from as far as Carelia and Jashnagar, which invaded the Lunderfrausian Empire, still the largest state in Western Lira. The war with Lunderfrau was extremely costly on both sides, but gradual Meronnian successes led to the occupation of the Vaalser Country, much of the territories that would later become Winst, and several other small areas that were provisionally organized into further Republics.
While Calvet's army made significant progress northwards, they were unable to push to Labenhugel, the Lunderfrausian capital, and the harsh winter that followed led to the establishment of very firm lines on both sides, with any level of victory very costly. While still holding their occupied territories, the Meronnian position gradually weakened over the next year due to external factors. Increased tensions within the still partially occupied Produese Kingdom, growing difficulties keeping the reduced Parthonopia in line, and most significantly the Sarzon Betrayal which led to the Duchy of Vinch returning to Lunderfrausian control, all led to question as to the feasibility of securing victory against the remaining enemies of Meronnia.
Ultimately, the assassination of General Calvet would lead to the inconclusive end of the War. After the General's sudden death, the Meronnian Directory reasserted its authority over its armed forces, and immediately sought terms of peace with its enemies. The vast majority of Meronnia's gains were reversed, with the reactionary order restored to Lira, but the Federal Republic retained the Fosperia and Vaalser territories seized during the war. The inconclusive end of this conflict has led to much debate among historians as to which side may have been victorious if there was no peace settlement.
Following the end of the war, the Meronnian Directory undertook a number of reforms to the constitution of the Federal Republic. Most significantly, the role of First Deputy of Meronnia was introduced, establishing a more directly representative executive and empowering the Chamber of Deputies significantly.
The Great Continental War is largely attributable for the end of the Lunderfrausian occupation of the Duchies of Vinch and Ester, later Winst, which was successful in its own republican revolution between 1827 and 1829. Shortly following this revolution, the new Revolutionary Republic of Winchester joined with the Meronnian Federal Republic in the Gostic Union, a superstate of the two republics which shared a language and similar cultures.
This Union was short-lived, with the idealistic foundations unable to respond to significant disagreements between the two republics, predominantly the difference in treatment of nobility and remaining anger over the Sarzon Betrayal. In the early 1830s the Union was dissolved, and the two Republics went their own ways. They retained a close relationship, though one interspersed with occasional disputes and often likened to a rivalry of siblings.
In 1835 Noel Boulanger was elected to the position of First Deputy, which he would hold for sixteen years. The domineering politician defined the predominant position of the First Deputy which is still part of the Federal Republic's convention today, and other than his controlling nature Boulanger became best known for forcing through a number of national projects to drive Meronnia into an industrial revolution, including railways and public factories.
Boulanger's economic policies saw Meronnia arise as an early industrial power, which quickly recovered economically from the damaging first decades of the 19th century. His positions also defined the mixed-economy Dirigisme model of economic intervention which has been maintained by successive governments across the political spectrum.
The middle and late 19th century in Meronnia was a period of economic growth, and one in which a new political norm was established of power swinging between the Liberal and Radical factions of the republican movement - since 1851, no independent has served in the position of First Deputy. This period became dubbed as the Époque Dorée as it was characterised by optimism and regional peace, scientific and cultural innovations, increased prosperity, and the maturity of the second Colonial Empire defined primarily by small but valuable trade territories across several continents.
While the late Meronnian colonial empire was primarily cemented by trade and land purchases, military options were occasionally employed. The most famous of these was the Al Wazifa Expedition of 1874 which led to the conquest of territories that, combined with existing concessions, would make up the modern Benardie Territory.
The Olympic War led to the violent end of Meronnia's period of prosperity. This global conflict was the deadliest in history, and Meronnia experienced casualties in the hundreds of thousands throughout the 1910s. Politically, Meronnia came under the domination of Pierre-Marie Jaubert during the War period, as his grand coalition of Radical Liberals maintained a supermajority of the Chamber of Deputies for three election cycles.
Influencing the Directory and dominating the legislative, Jaubert is credited as having successfully brought Meronnia through the Olympic War victoriously, though Meronnia made few gains other than securing its influence over Cisparrania. Following the war, Jaubert undertook a number of sometimes controversial constitutional reforms. The Directory which had threatened to block the reforms ultimately acceded to them after Jaubert threatened to call a Congress of Communes instead. These reforms, among other changes, established the Premier as the new head of state, and introduced proportional representation in the Chamber of Deputies. The first proportional election in 1923 was won by Parti Socialiste, and Roland Bozonnet served as Meronnia's only First Deputy from a socialist party.
Contemporary Period (1925-Present)
The Bozonnet government, while only lasting a single term, established a number of the key institutions of the modern social welfare net of Meronnia including the Federal Health System and several key pensions schemes. Bozonnet was also responsible for the nationalisation of several key sectors of the Meronnian economy. Ultimately, the Bozonnet Government's advocacy for social upheaval in neighboring nations would be its downfall, as war-weary voters favoured a return of Jaubert to the First Deputy's seat.
Jaubert's last government was a compromise which was primarily focused on maintaining the status quo and continuing reconstruction from the Olympic War, but was marred in 1926 by the Atomic Affair that shook Meronnia. While the First Deputy was not involved in the affair and modern historians largely attribute the strong federal response to him, the scandal destroyed the reputations of many high-ranking politicians and quickly ended any chance of a second term for Faction Liberale.
The 1930s and 1940s in Meronnia were a period of social unrest and economic troubles, exacerbated by the onset of a number of overseas conflicts as the Meronnian colonial empire drew near its close. This led to the rise of socially conservative movements which had previously struggled in the libertine republic, predominantly led by Parti Conservateur which was the major partner in the governing coalition between 1939 and 1943. Moderate politicians were unsuccessful in their attempts to transition the colonial empire into a theoretical Commonwealth of Merophone Nations which would have retained Meronnian oversight over nominally independent member states.
First Deputy André Prudhomme of Faction Radicale was elected with a strong mandate after the failure of Silvain Beaumont's government, and became one of the most controversial leaders in Meronnian history for both his internal and foreign policies. Prudhomme abandoned the idea of the Commonwealth and instead pursued a downsized but stable Inter-Continental Nation, starting with the return of the Pearl Necklace Cities to the now united Kingdom of Jashnagar in 1952. At home, Prudhomme re-privatized much of Meronnia's publicly owned industry, but significant pushback from coalition partners led to the retention of strategic sectors such as rail transport. In 1954, Prudhomme also oversaw the first successful detonation of a nuclear weapon developed in Meronnia.
Prudhomme's government was ended in 1955 with the return of Ludovic Crevier as Conservative First Deputy, a role he had also held twelve years before. The Far-Right coalition continued for two more elections, though Parti Conservateur became the minor partner to Parti Pays-National from the 1959 election, starting the government of Jean-Philippe Lahaye.
Lahaye is commonly polled as the least popular First Deputy in Meronnian history. He took a hardline stance to colonial secessionists, and at home implemented several laws for policing and immigration policies with open racial biases, he also implemented policies to suppress the use of the Cabecan and Vaalser languages. Gaétan Barrande, the Premier of Meronnia for the entirety of Lahaye's term, spoke very poorly of him but nonetheless implemented the Lahaye government's foreign affairs agenda. While ties with a number of overseas democracies such as Carelia and Lykens weakened, the Lahaye government was successful in thawing relations with a Produzland dominated by the dictatorial President Frederico Deusto.
The 1963 Nuclear Incident led to the downfall of Lahaye's government. The detonation of a nuclear bomb over a city in colonial Khmongata which was attempting to remove itself from Meronnia's colonial empire, while to this day claimed to be an accident, resulted in a vote of no confidence that collapsed the coalition, and Premier Barrande agreed to hold a new election. The result was a massive swing towards Faction Radicale led by Carine Cortot who would be the first female First Deputy, commonly called maman for her maternal style of politics.
Cortot's government won an absolute majority in the 1965 special election, and the following two regular general elections. She oversaw the dismantling of the colonial empire with Meronnia's withdrawal from all but a few overseas territories, and the introduction of the Organisation Internationale de la Mèrophonie which retained the cultural and historic links between Meron-language territories, without the controlling caveats of the former idea of a Commonwealth. The OIM would later be expanded to become a vehicle for Meronnian foreign aid and investment into member states, and an organisation for scientific and cultural cooperation.
Cortot also reversed the Lahaye government's racist policies, and replaced them with strong protections of civil liberties. In 1971, she presided over Meronnia's space agency, the CNES, launching the Roch Leblanc into space as the first spationaut. Her restoration of Meronnia's international reputation, refutation of racism and authoritarianism, and the frequent attribution of the 1970s-1980s Meronnian Economic Miracle to her steady governance lead to Cortot frequently being listed as one of the most popular First Deputies in history.
Culturally, the 1970s was largely a refutation of the influx of socially conservative opinions, seeing the growth of avant-garde art and support for feminist movements and LGBT+ rights. Conservative and far-right political movements collapsed into obscurity, particularly after the assassination of Jean-Philippe Lahaye in 1972. Far-right elements of both Parti Conservateur and Parti Pays-National were ejected from their parties during this period, leading to the gradual moderation of these parties. Expelled nationalists and populists formed a number of minor parties which would split and combine, gradually leading to the formation of Intérêt National in 1998.
The Economic Miracle presided over by Cortot and the following governments was primarily spurred by a broad reduction in military spending, replaced instead by significant public investment in infrastructure and industries. Other factors include the increase of foreign trade and investment, as international conflicts became rarer and international trust increased. During this period, Meronnia cemented itself as a hub for the international financial market, primarily active in the investment management sector. Meronnia also saw a technological revolution during this time period, developing a broad-based export market in industrial chemicals and electronic components.
After Cortot confirmed she would not be running in a fourth election, her party's polling plummeted from its dominant position back to around 40%, and ultimately the 1975 election was won by Faction Liberale's Christophe Thibault, who promised a single-term government focused on structural change. Thibault's most significant success, in 1977, was the abolition of the Chamber of Senators which was accepted in that chamber by a majority of only one vote.
The Quiet Decade, Meronnia's politically stable period from the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s was ended by the sudden and potent rise of Grégory Antegono, a politician from Cabeca Alba who became the leader of Faction Liberale in 1994 and First Deputy in 1995. The Antegono government is most famous for publicly dismantling and destroying the Meronnian arsenal of nuclear weapons. Other achievements included the series of referendums that saw the confirmation of Meronnian withdrawal from most remaining overseas territories, and which also provided a mandate for the establishment of an Associated State in Taveteaux and the continued existence of the Benardie Territory.
Antegono also brought new attention to the minority cultures of metropolitan Meronnia, establishing legal recognition of the Sahridi travelling people, and introducing legislation to protect the use of Cabecan and Vaalser languages. While broadly popular, the perception that Antegono's government was weakening Meronnia's international position led to the rise of a new wave of nationalist politics under the banner of Intérêt National which was formed during his government. Antegono's sudden death in 2002 destabilized the country, and Meronnia went seven months before the 2003 election replaced him.
After the 2007 election, Intérêt National had won a large enough proportion of seats to deny either the Liberal or Radical factions from governing alone with their usual coalition partners. To maintain the unspoken cordon sanitaire of that party, the two major factions formed a grand coalition, the first since the Olympic War nearly a century before. The Radicale-Liberale coalition returned stronger after the 2011 election, but a number of scandals discredited First Deputy Justin Beaux. In 2013, a Vote of No Confidence was called by the leader of Faction Liberale, Maximilien Sardou, ending their coalition and collapsing the government. Premier Pierre-Antoine Tremblay, who had been elected a year before, agreed to a new election.
The 2013 special election resulted in no possible majority, but a plurality held by a broad-left coalition brought in Sardou as First Deputy. Securing a large plurality in 2015, the Sardou government was able to achieve many of its policies by collaborating with cross-bench parties. These included a significant new funding package for public transport, strong environmental policies, and a complex foreign policy strategy designed to reduce the risk to Meronnia in any eventuality. In 2019, Sardou's government was successful at securing a majority in the Chamber of Deputies, allowing them to implement stronger economic measures, especially in response to the 2019-2020 Global Recession.