Federation of Bana
| This page (or section) is a work in progress by its author(s) and should not be considered final. |
The Tavari Union | |
|---|---|
 Great Seal
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Motto: Prosperity, Together | |
Anthem: "A Strong and Mighty Country" | |
| File:New tavari union wiki.png Location of the Tavari Union (dark green) on the continent of Gondwana (grey) | |
| Capital | Nuvrenon |
| Largest city | Good Harbor |
| Official languages | Tavari Banian Raonish |
| Ethnic groups (2020) | Tavari Elven 46% Human 38% Banian Elven 9% Feline 4.5% Other 2.5% |
| Demonym(s) | Tavari |
| Government | Federal parliamentary consociational constitutional monarchy |
• King | Arik Rao |
• Premier | Shano Tuvria |
| Legislature | Assembly of the Union |
| Council of Communities | |
| National Assembly | |
| Establishment | |
• Kingdom of Tavaris established | c. AD 1350-1400 |
• Exile from Avnatra | June 10th, 1499 |
• Good Harbor settlement established | December 14th, 1567 |
• Good Harbor Agreement ratified | June 7th, 2020 |
| Area | |
• Total | 382,538 km2 (147,699 sq mi) |
| Population | |
• 2020 estimate | 22,326,133 |
| GDP (nominal) | estimate |
• Total | $929,980,000,000 |
• Per capita | $41,654 |
| Currency | Tavari Dollar (TAD) |
| Time zone | Tavari Standard Time (UTC -07:00) |
| Driving side | right |
| Calling code | +688 |
| Internet TLD | .ta |
The Tavari Union is a federation consisting of three co-equal, sovereign constituent states: Tavaris, Bana, and New Rania. It is located in northern Gondwana on Urth, and is a member of the Alliance of Northwest Gondwana.
History
Formation of Tavaris
The Tavari nation was initially established on the island of Avnatra (today home to the countries of Acronis, Masceola, and Amerminetos). Elves are believed to have settled on Avnatra sometime between the first and fourth centuries AD, after having left the continent of Concord and traversed through northern Gondwana. From time to time throughout history, various chiefdoms would unite under a single leader to gain strength and control over other chiefdoms. By the beginning of the 15th century AD, every Tavari chiefdom on the island of Avnatra was united in a loose confederation under the banner of a single King. This polity is referred to the Kingdom of Tavaris and is the direct predecessor of the Tavari Union.
Sometime between 1470 and 1480, the Akronist religion - a charismatic religious movement that emerged from northern Tavari folk beliefs - emerged on the northwestern coast of Avnatra and became popular among the chiefdoms in the area. Very quickly, the religious movement inspired political defections among the chiefs as they decided to form a new government inspired by Akronist religious teachings. The following military conflict is called the Tavari Civil War by modern Tavari historians, and is called the War of Foundation in Acronis. Minor violent skirmishes between chiefdoms broke out in the late 1470s, with the emergence of major hostilities sometime between 1480 and 1485. On the one side was the emergent faction of Akronists (called Akronians, now spelled "Acronians") who gradually formed themselves into a state, and on the other were the Tavari chiefdoms united under the King.
The Acronian Empire declared itself an independent state on February 20th, 1496, with the signing of the document known as The Pact. By that time, a majority of Tavari chiefdoms had joined the Akronists. The war would end in 1499, with the Acronian capture of the Tavari capital on King's Island. The Tavari surrendered before the city could be besieged, and in exchange, the Acronians allowed the still loyalist Tavari to leave safely - with the exception of the Tavari king Zaram, who they killed.
Of a total of 1,161 chiefs in the Kingdom of Tavaris at time of the start of the war, only 9 of them remained loyal to Tavaris in their entirety. These 9 chiefs took their loyal citizens, as well as loyalists from other chiefdoms, and left the island of Avnatra for the east. Tavari historians refer to this event as "the exile" because they hold that leaving Avnatra was the only option presented to them without converting faiths. Acronian historians generally hold that the Tavari voluntarily emigrated.
The Tavari left Avnatra by boat and migrated east to the coast of mainland Gondwana. Because the jungle on the mainland is very dense, it took the Tavari three attempts and 68 years to establish a settlement that could sustain them. They named the settlement Good Harbor, and the official date of establishment is considered to be December 14th, 1567. Good Harbor is located on the eastern coast of the Strait of Vultuca. Over the course of time, the Tavari expanded their holdings further east to the coast of Lake Unar. On the shore of the lake they established the city of Nuvrenon, which would become the political capital of the country. The government agreed to divide the country into nine regions that would each fall under the control of one of the nine chiefdoms that remained loyal to Tavaris. These chiefdoms remain in place today as divisions of the state of Tavaris, nominally controlled by a hereditary chief descended directly from the nine original loyalist chiefs. Tavaris had several different constitutions over time, and in 1963 adopted a constitution that named the state "the Tavari Union."
Good Harbor Agreement
In 2020, the independent countries of Bana and New Rania, as well as Tavaris itself, ratified a treaty called the Good Harbor Agreement, which was negotiated in May of 2020 at the city of Good Harbor. The agreement, which would amend the constitutions of each country as well as serve as a constitutional document itself, would both admit Bana and New Rania into the extant Tavari Union as states and significantly amend the system of government of the Tavari Union itself. The ratification was confirmed by referendums across all three countries held simultaneously on June 7th in which 56% of voters in total approved the treaty. At the same election, members of the Council of Communities as well as the Banian and New Ranite members of the National Assembly were elected. (They joined the already-extant Tavari National Assembly, which the Agreement transitioned into the lower house of the national-level legislature.) The treaty officially took effect on July 6th, 2020, on which date the Council of Communities elected Arik Rao, the former President of New Rania, as King of the Tavari Union.
From a legal standpoint, the Tavari Union established after the Good Harbor Agreement is not a "new" creation - the states of Bana and New Rania joined the Tavari Union that already existed, and that Tavari Union continued afterward. The Tavari Union maintained the same membership in international organizations and continues to be subject to all the treaties and obligations as it did prior to the Agreement. However, it quickly became common to colloquially refer to the "new" Tavari Union and the "old" Tavari Union to refer to the governments as established before and after the Good Harbor Agreement.
Government
The Tavari Union is a federal system, with the three states having their own governments that have the ability to control affairs within their borders. As amended by the Good Harbor Agreement, the Constitution of the Tavari Union establishes that the central government has only those powers that are explicitly delegated to it in the constitution, with all other powers belonging to the states. On the federal level, the executive of the country is the cabinet, led by a Premier. The legislature is the Assembly of the Union, which consists of two chambers: the Council of Communities and the National Assembly.
The Council of Communities, which serves as an upper house, has seventeen members, one each elected from constitutionally-defined communities within each state. Tavaris has nine Councillors, one for each traditional chiefdom. Bana has six Councillors, with two designated specifically for Bana's autonomous communities of elves and four for the rest of the state. New Rania has two Councillors, one for the city of Ranisport and one for what is known as the out-country. As an upper house, the Council of Communities is designed to be a consultative body, and it is ultimately less powerful than the lower house. It has a unique voting system, referred to as a "qualified majority," in which a majority must have at least one member from each state voting in favor in order to pass the body. In order for legislation to become law, it is typically required to be passed by the Council of Communities as well as the National Assembly. However, if the Council rejects a bill passed by the National Assembly, the National Assembly can pass the bill again with a two-thirds majority in order to override the council, or it can pass the bill by a normal majority and send it again to the Council to reconsider. If a bill is rejected twice by the Council but passed three times by the National Assembly, it is considered to have passed the entire legislature. The Council of Communities is also the body that elects the monarch. A two thirds majority of the membership, in which at least two thirds of each state delegation votes in favor, is required to elect a monarch.
The National Assembly is the larger and more powerful of the two chambers. It consists of 825 members: Bana has 403 members, Tavaris has 385 members, and New Rania has 37 members. The Constitution requires that each state be given a number of seats proportional to their share of population, and each state has the authority to determine how their members are elected. Bana and Tavaris elect their members from single-member, first-past-the-post districts, with the exception of the Autonomous Elven Communities of Bana, which each act as multi-member districts that use an alternative vote proportional system. New Rania elects its members via a party-list proportional system.
For a bill to become law, it must technically receive Royal Assent, but the Constitution strictly disallows the monarch from vetoing a law passed by the Assembly of the Union. The monarch also technically appoints the Premier and the members of cabinet, but is obligated to select the Premier nominated by the National Assembly and the members of cabinet named by the Premier. The monarch does not have formally established reserve powers, but is empowered to give advice and counsel to the government and may advise the Premier to send a bill to the Constitutional Court if they feel it is unconstitutional.
States
Tavaris
Tavaris descends from the Kingdom of Tavaris established on the island of Avnatra in the latter half of the 15th century. After the Tavari Civil War that ended in 1499, the remaining Tavari loyalists were exiled and largely sailed to the Gondwanan mainland to the east. At that time, that region was populated predominately by a feline polity based in the interior of the continent who largely disapproved of Tavari settlement. Between 1499 and 1567, the Tavari loyalists established several different settlements that each failed due to feline aggression as well as because of disease and lack of food. In 1567, the loyalists landed at the point they named Good Harbor for its placid waters sheltered from harsh weather they were experiencing when they discovered it. By this time the felines had grown weaker politically and had begun to retreat back in to the interior of the continent. They were able to establish a more permanent settlement there, and eventually began expanding eastward. Within a generation, they had reached the shores of Lake Unar, where they established the city of Nuvrenon. The Tavari consolidated power over this region and gradually established nine provinces - one for each loyalist chief's family line.
The area of land the Tavari had established control over was relatively small, especially compared to the holdings of the Banian humans to their immediate north, and the Tavari established very early on that they would need to grow in economic strength in order to be able to survive. In contrast to the Acronians whose religion taught careful stewardship of the environment, the Tavari quickly began cutting down the forests not only to sell the wood but also to build ships to trade with other countries, especially the growing Asendavian presence in the region. Later, trade relationships were established with Salovia as well. With the dawn of the Industrial Revolution and capitalist economies, Tavaris very quickly established an economy of heavy manufacturing. Additionally, Tavaris established the first financial market in the region, and the Tavari Stock Exchange continues to the present day.
Tavaris launched several attempts to re-conquer their former territories on Avnatra between 1617 and 1714, none of which were successful. Tavaris also fought against Acronis in the Great War, during which time it seized control of the disputed territory Metrati Anar. Tavaris has never formally ceded claim to either Metrati Anar or the island of Avnatra, which it holds it was forcefully exiled from. Except for a brief period at the end of the 19th century, Tavaris and Acronis have remained bitter enemies and never had formal relations until relations were normalized in 2020 after the Good Harbor Agreement was ratified. Prior to the Good Harbor Agreement, international relations between the two countries were handled between the Asilican embassies in each country.
Tavaris is the smallest state in the Union, at 64,918 square kilometers in area, but it has the most powerful economy and is generally considered to be the leading political force in the Union. Modern Tavaris remains an economic power in the region, with strong manufacturing and financial sectors. It is also the most densely populated state in the Union, with 10,413,625 people as of the 2019 census - less than 500,000 fewer people than Bana, which is several times larger in area. It is significantly more urbanized than the other states, although Good Harbor and Nuvrenon remain the major population centers. Tavaris has long depended on agricultural imports from Bana, New Rania, and other countries for its food supply.
Bana
Bana is a primarily human nation with significant elven populations in the northern and eastern regions. Both populations are considered to be indigenous to the region. The polity of Bana was established as a city-state on the coast of the Strait of Vultuca in the seventh century AD and became the seat of a powerful human kingdom that conquered nearby human states. Bana saw significant periods of war with both the elves and the felines in the region for hundreds of years until the felines began to decline in the 16th century. By the 17th century, the elven tribes in the region were largely incorporated into Bana, but there was significant unrest in the region until they were granted a form of autonomy by a Constitution passed in 1910.
Bana had long been the major economic power in the region, more powerful even than Tavaris, with a broad economic base in agriculture, manufacturing, and trading. Their control of two rivers from the interior of the continent to the Strait of Vultuca, the Miku in the north and the Loko to the south, meant they could command far more resources in trade than Tavaris, and Bana even began to rival the Acronian economy. Bana became famous worldwide for bananas, a tropical fruit they are credited with introducing into international trade. However, in 1939, a civil war broke out between the nationalist government of the time and a communist uprising supported in part by the more rural west and some of the elven tribes.
The Banian Civil War raged from 1939 to 1953. The war led to the destruction of every major population center in the country. Usage of trench warfare and chemical weapons by both sides caused significant damage to the environment and led to tens of thousands of deaths. Nearly one half of the population of Bana died in the civil war. In 1954, a ceasefire was signed and the Democratic Republic of Bana was formed. The new constitution enshrined permanent autonomy for two elven communities, the Northern Bana Autonomous Community and the Eastern Bana Autonomous Community. For a time, both communist and nationalist political parties were banned. It would take Bana until the year 2018 for their population to re-eclipse the population of Tavaris.
Bana sees the most tourism out of the three states of the Tavari Union, and has the most land available for agriculture. The Banian agricultural sector produces rice, wheat, beef, chicken, goats, and dairy products primarily, as well as lumber, paper, and paper goods. Bana also has significant reserves of gold and some precious gyms. Bana also remains the world's largest exporter of bananas. It had a population in 2019 of 10,908,110 and an land area of 242,687 square kilometers.
New Rania
New Rania is the smallest state in the Tavari Union by population, and while its' 71,248 square kilometers is larger than Tavaris in land area, much of New Rania's territory is undeveloped. With a population of 1,004,398, the other two states each have a population larger by nearly a factor of ten. New Rania is also relatively impoverished compared to the other two states, having long been economically dependent on Tavaris for most imports. The New Ranite economy is largely based in textiles, although manufacturing and the service industry have been seeing gains in recent years as New Rania's minimum wage laws are attractive to international business.
New Rania was founded in 1747 by a group of religious outcasts exiled from feline lands in the interior of the continent. "Old" Rania was a location in the interior from which many of the first exiles had been from. They had to migrate through both dense jungles and over a range of mountains, a journey the New Ranites called "the Long Walk." After the long walk, the New Ranites settled in a city they called Ranisport, which was built atop the ruins of an abandoned former feline city. They very quickly formed a friendship with the Tavari, with whom they empathized as fellow exiles from their homeland. Originally organized as a strictly religious colony, New Rania went through a process of democratization in the 19th century, although the New Ranite Church maintained representation in the National Council and the theoretical power to remove a President from office until 1954.
The New Ranite Church is a religious belief centered around the teachings of a prophet called Ori, who taught that the traditional pantheon of the northern Gondwanan felines was false and that the afterlife would only be open to people who followed his teachings. Ori taught about the holiness in "ordinary work and toil" such as craftsmanship or farming, and calls for women to serve primarily as wives and homemakers. While the Church no longer holds official power in New Rania, more than two-thirds of the New Ranite population continues to follow the faith. The High Prophet of the New Ranite Church remains a powerful figure, although since the separation of church and state, the law in New Rania has gradually established protections for things such as women in the workplace and restrictions on child labor.
Nearly half of New Rania's population is in the Ranisport metropolitan area, with the outer areas (called "the out-country") much more sparsely populated. The areas of New Rania to the east, south of the Loko River and Lake Unar, are known as "Translokonia" and is largely a protected wilderness area. New Rania purchased Translokonia from Bana in 1957 after Bana offered it for sale to raise funds for reconstruction after the Civil War. New Rania was scheduled to make payments on the land to Bana until 2057, however the debt was waived as part of the Good Harbor Agreement. New Rania has significantly less transit infrastructure than the other states in the Union, with fewer highways and only one rail line. As an independent country, it maintained almost no standing military, with defense provided by Tavaris. This military connection with Tavaris caused the Acronian government to limit trade with New Rania, for which reason New Rania has long had a dispute with its western neighbor.