Small state

The island nation of Malta in the Mediterranean sea, from space.
Malé, the capital of the Maldives. This island nation is made up of nearly 1200 islands in the Indian ocean,[1]
Saint Kitts and Nevis in the Caribbean, which is the smallest state in the Americas.

Small state is a generic term for a small country, that has limited land, population, or resources. The term "small state" is similar to the term microstate or ministate, a sovereign state having a very small population or land area, usually both. However, the meanings of "state" and "very small" are not well-defined in international law.[2] Two important definitions for a small state are World Bank, which defines small state as those with less than 1.5 million people, which is about 40-50 countries, and the U.N. Forum on Small States which has higher threshold and includes about 100 countries, most of which are under 5 million people.

In practice small state is a usually inclusive to microstates;while microstates can be considered small states, not all small states are microstates. There is different criteria for defining small states.

  1. ^ "About the Maldives | Neoscapes Maldives Holidays".
  2. ^ Warrington, E. (1994). "Lilliputs Revisited". Asian Journal of Public Administration, 16(1).