Talk:List of sovereign states and dependent territories in Oceania

Correct Grammar in title?

Wondering about the article name, shouldn't it be "Oceanic Countries"? I've always heard it called that. However, I may be wrong, so I will not make any changes. PerfectStorm 05:34, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

• I'm not sure, but I reckon "Oceanic Countries" means "Countries surrounded by or otherwise associated with an(y) Ocean", whereas "Oceanian countries" means "countries of / associated with Oceania"... Regards, David Kernow 04:26, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

• Yes, this explanation makes good sense to me, thought I'm not an expert in the field. Walkerma 05:50, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

• I created two redirects, from "List of Oceanic countries" and "List of countries in Oceania". Walkerma 05:53, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

Mismatching lists

There's overlap with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Asian_countries. Some are in both. I think that's reasonable.

I think it's less reasonable that some which are nearby others listed both here and there are not listed here. For instance Malaysia has some territory ajoining Indonesia, separated from the mainland.

I don't consider myself expert enough on regional geographic agreement to sort this out. Perhaps someone more expert would like to chip in? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.107.38.144 (talk) 15:25, 20 February 2008 (UTC)

Ogasawara Islands

It seems that the Ogasawara Islands should not be in this list, being further north than the northern extent of Oceania.--Jeffro77 (talk) 16:08, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Re-design

I am going to re-design the article to make it more like List of European countries and territories, which looks better and has much more information. McLerristarr (Mclay1) (talk) 12:35, 28 May 2010 (UTC)

Australian Territories

Should the Australian territories be included separately on the list? They are part of a sovereign state which is already included in Oceania. The other territories on the list in that section are either dependent territories (like Niue/Tokelau) or territories of a primarily nonoceanic state (Hawii of the USA). THe Australian territories fit neither. Chipmunkdavis (talk) 10:16, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

On List of European countries and territories, British overseas territories are included even though the UK is in Europe. We should include any non-sovereign territories that are not directly part of another country. The Australian overseas territories (or whatever they are called) are similar to the British ones, as far as I'm aware. They are not part of the main part of Australia – QLD, NSW, VIC, WA, NT, TAS, ACT and SA.

The British overseas territories are in a completely different situation. They are not part of the UK, and are legally classified as such.

The Australian overseas territories, however, are part of Australia. They are as much a part of Australia as NT or the ACT or Jersey Bay (Is there a shorthand for jersey bay?). Chipmunkdavis (talk) 10:36, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

If you mean Jervis Bay Territory, then the abbreviation is JBT. My point is that they are located away from Australia as someone would normally think of Australia. I guess the Ashmore and Cartier Islands and Coral Sea Islands can go from the list but Norfolk Island should stay. McLerristarr (Mclay1) (talk) 14:30, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

I did, thank you very much for that. JBT, must remember that.

Here is a link saying that Norfolk island is an "integral" part of Australia [1]. I will not change it without a third opinion though, don't worry. Chipmunkdavis (talk) 14:39, 31 July 2010 (UTC)

Maps

Every other continental list has maps of where the country is. I'd like to go with the example on the European list and have a standard map of Oceania in which the relevant country is highlighted. This could work for territories as well. The best map I can find that shows all the countries (which, being small island countries, do not show up on your basic map) is: If someone with the technical knowhow can rework that into perhaps standard grey colouration so it is easy to highlight parts of it that would be amazing. If they can make it an svg, even better. If not, a basic png in which countries can be easily highlighted would be very useful indeed. Chipmunkdavis (talk) 08:52, 3 August 2010 (UTC)

Alternatively this map could be edited for smaller areas. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Chipmunkdavis (talk • contribs) 14:29, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Territory maps

Location maps found for the following territoires, not sure if they should be added until they have all been found.

American Samoa: - Standard map form (that being the most common one on the country maps)

Baker Island:

Clipperton Island: - In french, locates in relation to North America instead of the rest of Oceania

Cook Islands: - Standard map form

Easter Island: - - 2nd is zoomed more, but shows in relation to South America

French Polynesia: - Standard map form

Guam: - Standard map form but with a red circle not in any others

Hawaii: - In relation to Pacific rather than the USA

Howland Island: - Less detailed than similar maps

Jarvis Island:

Johnston Atoll: - Standard map form

Juan Fernandez Islands: - 2nd is zoomed more, but shows in relation to South America

Kingman Reef:

Marcus Island: - In Japanese...

Midway Atoll:

New Caledonia: - Standard map form

Niue: - Standard map form

Norfolk Island: - Shows in relation to Australia and New Zealand

Northern Mariana Islands: - Standard map form

Okinotori Islands: - Uses Japanese name, shows in relation to Japan/East Asia

Palmrya Atoll:

Papua: - Shows in relation to Indonesia, although by slightly editing Papua New Guinea map a better one could be made

Pitcairn Islands: - - First in relation to South America, second in Pacific with outher areas.

Tokelau: - Standard map form

Wake Island: - Standard map form

Wallis and Futuna: - Standard map form

West Papua: - Same as Papua above —Preceding unsigned comment added by Chipmunkdavis (talk • contribs) 14:27, 6 August 2010 (UTC)

Maps now found for all territories

Any concerns? Chipmunkdavis (talk) 15:55, 9 August 2010 (UTC)

Article title

There has been an extensive debate over at Talk:List of European countries and territories about what should and should not be included in the list because of the title. Most editors there support moving the page to either List of sovereign states and dependent territories in Europe or List of European sovereign states and territories. If the European list is moved it is likely this list will be moved as well in the next few days unless there is opposition to such a move here. It would help to avoid confusion and disputes if the all of these lists (countries and territories by continents) have the same title. Saying sovereign state rather than country is a more precise term and is in line with the fact List of countries redirects to the list of sovereign states article.

If you have thoughts on the title please raise them here or ideally join the debate at Talk:List of European countries and territories. Thanks BritishWatcher (talk) 19:10, 9 August 2010 (UTC)

Zealandia

The intro cites that the majority of continental land in Oceania is made up of australia, it might be wise to also mention that the rest is made up of Zealandia since the only other continental fragments in oceania come from that continent.XavierGreen (talk) 19:52, 30 September 2010 (UTC)

Well, the rest isn't, but Zeelandia is the only other major continental shelf. I guess it can be added, I'll hunt around for sources later. Chipmunkdavis (talk) 02:36, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

Fixed the feature for sorting by area

In these lists, the feature for sorting the lists in order by area was not working correctly; I went through and added code for each country to make it work. Also, unlike the others (Europe and Asia) that I've done recently, in addition to the sovereign states, I did the list of dependent territories. I undertook that because in this case there were so many of them--enough to make it worth the trouble. 140.147.236.195 (talk) 16:29, 22 September 2011 (UTC)Stephen Kosciesza

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Reorganization

The rationale for the changes I've done should be self-explanatory, but I'll add some notes nonetheless:

1. Per the discussion on List of sovereign states and the information on associated state, including the Cook Islands and Niue under "non-sovereign territories" is misleading, since it neglects the fact that these entities have a larger measure of sovereignty than other entities more commonly described as dependencies. On the other hand, it must be acknowledged that the recognition of these entities as sovereign is less widespread than those of the UN members in the list. As a result, I have included them in a separate table, separating them both from sovereign states and other territories. I have also tried to incorporate the wording from their respective entries in the List of sovereign states page. I hope this solution is deemed satisfactory.

2. As for those entities that remain in the "Non-sovereign territories" page, I found the separation into "dependent territories" and "integral parts of countries located mostly outside Oceania" pretty confusing and counterproductive. The "dependent territories" table included entities which are integral parts of states located mostly outside Oceania (New Caledonia, French Polynesia and Wallis and Futuna, which are integral parts of the French Republic, come to mind). As a result, I believe integrating these tables into one is the most useful solution. Ladril (talk) 00:22, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

I also changed the heading of the last section. "Non-sovereign territories" is a misleading title, since the table contains many territories that are parts of sovereign states. Ladril (talk) 13:09, 21 July 2013 (UTC)

I'm not so sure about point 1 of this reorganisation. "Non-sovereign territories" was a useful catch-all. It was never established on the List of sovereign states discussion that the NZ associated states were fully sovereign, just that they had important aspects of it and were unique. Considering published CI government sources state it isn't a state, it is describing them so unambiguously as a state that is misleading. Considering the other territories of the former second section ranged from fully integrated units like Hawaii to officially integral but unusually autonomous like New Caledonia to officially un-integral dependent territories, I don't see how the inclusion of CI/Niue in this is a problem. Point 2 seems a useful change, but there must be a way to create a shorter title. CMD (talk) 18:05, 2 August 2013 (UTC)

The "fully sovereign" concept you use is problematic (and slippery). As demonstrated by third party sources (this one for example) there are entities that have "important aspects of it and are unique" and yet they are listed alongside UN member states (Palestine is a good example). As a consequence, I fail to see the logic in this:

1. Being designated as a "nonmember state" by the UN is sufficient grounds for including Palestine next to Japan and China.
2. But at the same time, having received full diplomatic recognition as a state by Japan and China means CI and Niue have to be listed alongside Clipperton and the Coral Sea Islands? There must be a much better way around this.
I'm not trying to impose a POV or my own solution here. It's very clear to me that the special status of CI and Niue means they are less widely regarded as fully sovereign states (even though a very good case may be made that they are, based on sources). I agree not just to list them alongside UN members for this reason. Taking this into account, a "status quo" solution such as the one you advocate ("just list them as dependencies") does not seem very reflective of their true status either. Is there a possible compromise solution? Ladril (talk) 02:33, 8 August 2013 (UTC) As for the title of the final section, I agree it's too long, but I had a hard time finding something shorter that sounded elegant. "Dependent territories and parts of sovereign states"? Too vague and just sounds bad. Ladril (talk) 02:39, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

Clipperton does indeed provide an interesting contrast, but I wouldn't feel New Caledonia compares to Kingman Reef either. Is there a possible compromise? Well, I suppose there's two extremes (for the sake of argument) 1) Completely sovereign states on par with the others, 2) Dependent territories of New Zealand. A compromise would perhaps portray it as neither. Perhaps just retitle the current section with them "New Zealand associated state", reducing the implication that they're states, and at the same time remove the "status" column from the table, aligning the presentation more with the states than the dependencies?

I was going to suggest "Other territories" myself. I'm happy with that. CMD (talk) 07:28, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

1. For the record, New Caledonia was listed together with Kingman Reef in the setup prior to this one (diff here). It wasn't a result of my reorganization.

2. The previous setup (diff here), dividing all entities into (quote) "sovereign states" and "non-sovereign territories" and relegating CI and Niue to the second category was very much in opposition to what was agreed on for List of sovereign states. This setup (together with that of List of sovereign states and dependent territories by continent) was generating confusion among the user base and reigniting the debate on whether CI and Niue are sovereign, which in turn propagated back into the main List of sovereign states discussion page and risked starting the protracted discussion once again. We cannot keep having this discussion every time a user comes asking questions. This is why a new solution - which establishes what the CI and Niue are, and implements the same standards throughout the political geography Wikipedia pages - is needed. It cannot just be "sovereign" and "non-sovereign" because, as you have mentioned yourself, the situation of CI and Niue is more complicated.

3. One solution I can think of is mirroring the setup in List of sovereign states as much as possible. That means, adding a notes column where we state whether states are federal, their autonomous regions and dependent territories. This would serve maybe for establishing the close relationship between New Zealand and its two associates. Also maybe creating a single table for sovereign states in which we divide the states into "UN members and observers" and "other states" so as to make room for CI and Niue? Also retain the explanation about shared head of state, citizenship and full-treaty making capacity in the notes column for Ci and Niue? This is basically the setup which was agreed upon for List of sovereign states. Why should it not work here as well? Ladril (talk) 16:14, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

1) Oh yeah nothing to do with your reorganisation, it's just a weird imperfect world.

2/3) That argument is fair enough. What's wrong with what I suggested above; a slight tweak of your current reorganisation? A third category, like the one you placed, is perhaps a bit slippery slideish, but if it doesn't fit well into either of the others than it might be the best option. The List of sovereign states page has the notes section in part because it doesn't have all the dependent territories etc. listed as well. I don't know exactly how wikitables scale, but at the moment the current tables already fill up my monitor. The explanation about the shared stuff and the independent stuff looks better (on this page) as prose, as you have it now. CMD (talk) 16:57, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

The proposed setup ("UN member states" , "Associated states of New Zealand", "Other territories") is one I also considered. The reasons for rejecting it are MOS:LIST and aesthetics. The proposed categorization is not very tidy; it looks as if we had a list divided into: "Stars in the Milky Way", "Stars around planet X in another galaxy" and "Other stars". Lists should strive to have as few categories as possible (while retaining as many as are necessary for meaningful distinctions) and a single main criterion for dividing them (in this case, stand-alone sovereignty could work as the main criterion and UN membership as a secondary one). Categories should be made to encompass several items with similar characteristics, not be custom-created with one or two items in mind.

(Not directly related to the organizing criteria, but must be noted) It must also be noted that in the specific Oceanian case, full membership of CI and Niue in the Pacific Islands Forum is also a marker of sovereignty among the states in the region, and must be emphasized as much as other aspects. Ladril (talk) 18:26, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

I did note it could look like a slippery slope, but it seems like the best compromise. Your analogy with the stars is misleading because it makes all 3 categories about stars, but this list isn't all similar entities in different locations. It's stars, protostars, and various types of gas giants/nebulae. Where the middle category falls with regards to the other two is a matter of line drawing, and it's a line that's drawn inconsistently in external sources. Drawing two lines as opposed to one isn't custom creation, it's just a second line. Aesthetically, I reckon three lv2 headers is actually cleaner than 2 lv2 headers one of which has 2lv3 headers. CMD (talk) 22:27, 8 August 2013 (UTC)

Alright, maybe I chose a wrong analogy. One closer to what I picture the proposed setup to be: "Stars in the Milky Way", "Class O stars" and "Gas giants/nebulae". The main issue I wanted to illustrate was not the nature of the third category, but how the two first ones use categorizations that have little or nothing to do with each other. This is not a very good way to go about categorizing lists. It also raises the question (just like in sovereign states) of where to put any newly independent states that are not UN members (there are some very real Oceanian candidates for this, as you know). Are we going to create a fourth category for those? Why not preserve the categorization which was agreed on for List of sovereign states?

I venture an answer to the previous question: because this page lists both sovereign states and dependencies? This is what makes awkward moving items from one grouping to the other? Ladril (talk) 00:00, 9 August 2013 (UTC)

The first two categories only look so different because you've called them Class O stars as opposed to what I noted as protostars. If you call them protostars, then there's a spectrum from floating gas to star, just as the 2005 source notes a spectrum from dependency to statehood. I'm hesitant to use the List of sovereign states categorisation as that categorisation was created to deal with just one end of the spectrum, rather than this page which shows most of it (it lacks an Abkhazia-style state for the moment). As for the non-UN states, that's a problem which ala South Sudan hopefully won't happen for more than a day or two. We used the UN more or less to keep Somalia separate from Somaliland, Georgia separate from Abkhazia, etc, since the single-list option was rejected.

I don't think the title is that important, or should be a constraint as opposed to a general indicator. Originally, these articles were called "List of countries and territories" in X. They were changed to the current form due to a dispute over whether England etc. should be included in the Europe list. CMD (talk) 09:54, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

I understand this optic of the "free association" being transitional between "sovereign" and "dependent". Still, the reasons for dividing the page (based on "sovereignty" and "dependent status" concepts) should be clear enough for the reader. As I explained in the talk page for List of sovereign states, the concepts "association" and "free association" are ambiguous and can be interpreted as anything resembling a sovereign state (such as Marshall Islands/Micronesia/Palau) to a dependency (Puerto Rico). UN membership (which is a marker of sovereignty) is much less ambiguous and will make it easier for the reader to figure out what the page is trying to convey: that in terms of degrees, the CI and Niue are "less sovereign" than the UN members but "more sovereign" than the other territories.

Just creating a category saying "associated states of New Zealand" is likely to generate a "so what?" reaction from the reader. It's not going to be very illustrative.

If you want to understand my position from a different direction, I do not want that just because we have agreed to emphasize CI and Niue's sovereign aspects, we have to end up creating ad hoc categories for them in every Wikipedia page. They should be made to fit into a general organizing scheme as much as possible (without confusing the reader, of course). Ladril (talk) 17:30, 10 August 2013 (UTC)

I've added a new subsection for the associated states of NZ. If any new states become sovereign/independent, they can be separated by being put in a separate subsection within the "States not members of the United Nations" section. I hope this is enough for the moment. Ladril (talk) 17:31, 12 August 2013 (UTC)

It's workable. I'd prefer just bumping that lv3 header up to lv2 until another situation arises, but that's a matter of aesthetics. Source should be added, although we can just take them from other pages. CMD (talk) 14:11, 14 August 2013 (UTC)

Associated States section

I 'm going to change name of sections: 1. "UN member states" into "Sovereign states" 2. "States not members of the UN" into "Associated states". Also, I want to correct some information on the topic: for example, I'm trying to note that CI/Niue have unique status, but they are not sovereign (because there are sources we have already found saying they are not separate and sovereign states), however their status is equivalent for independence. Nevertheless, User:Ladril doesn't agree on the matter. I can't understand why. Who agree or disagree with me? If disagree, explain please. User02062000 (talk) 17:55, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

I disagree with you because there are sources that say that CI and Niue are separate and sovereign states. There is a consensus about the matter that you hopefully are not trying to override. Ladril (talk) 14:51, 29 January 2014 (UTC)

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Capital names

Says the names of the cities themselves? Why should we repeat the capital names when they are the same in the various languages?? Wow!! Thanks for the helpful translation that "Wellington" in English is "Wellington"!! The languages are already listed for the translations of the country name so no information is lost by removing this pointless duplication. And no, this is hardly a "major change", sheesh. Reywas92^Talk 01:11, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

I agree with User:Reywas92 - sheesh! His change was perfectly reasonable. (Besides, because "en.wikipedia.org" is the English-language Wikipedia, we'd only need note the English-language spelling of each capital name, even if it were different (which it's not).)

Unless I hear a credible objection within a few hours, I'll reinstate User:Reywas92's change. Ross Finlayson (talk) 01:52, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

OK, done now. Ross Finlayson (talk) 05:42, 10 September 2018 (UTC)

@User:Reywas92 and @Ross Finlayson, I apologize for having reverted the elimination of the information on capitals in their respective countries' native language without having looked at the particular information being deleted. I recently did some clean-up editing in the article entitled List of countries and dependencies and their capitals in native languages, and found that the names of capitals in their respective countries' native languages often differed quite a bit from English (for example, "Brussels" is "Brussel" in Dutch, "Bruxelles" in French and "Brüssel" in German, while "New Delhi" has 14 different names in India's 14 other official languages). When I saw that the capital names in native languages were being eliminated from the List of sovereign states and dependent territories in Oceania article, I thought of all the work that had gone into researching and inputting such information in the List of countries and dependencies and their capitals in native languages and assumed that it was a major change that would leave the article poorer. After actually looking at the information that was eliminated from the Oceanian countries' article, it is clear that, in the case of the names of capitals in Oceania, there really is no need to provide their names in a language other than English, as in most cases the English name is the same as the native name (although I do note that the Maori name for "Wellington" is "Te Whanga-nui-a-Tara"). So, again, I apologize for having reverted the changes instead of asking about it in the Talk page (or simply having read the article before and after the changes). AuH2ORepublican (talk) 18:52, 17 September 2018 (UTC)

A Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion

The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page has been nominated for deletion:

• LocationTonga.png

Participate in the deletion discussion at the nomination page. —Community Tech bot (talk) 14:08, 24 January 2019 (UTC)

Oppose I went to the nomination page above and could not make head or tail of it, maybe I'm a bit slow but I could see no way into any discussion about this file. Meanwhile, I would urge caution before deleting as it is part of a large body of work that has created a set of uniform maps of Pacific countries, a project which in itself has been the subject of discussion. You can see more maps in the same style here. Deleting LocationTonga.png will break the coordinated style work and would indicate that the entire set needs to be destroyed. What is being proposed will cause a great deal of damage. The images are valuable and have clearly been done for Wikipedia, before deleting any of the set, if the images have not been properly attributed I suggest that a deal of effort be made to rectify this before deleting any of them. Ex nihil ^(talk) : Ex nihil (talk) 10:22, 25 January 2019 (UTC)

new timeline article

created new timeline article 2019 in Oceania. this is partially because we did not have individual timeline articles for some countries, eg 2019 in Samoa, 2019 in Tuvalu, 2019 in East Timor, 2019 in Kiribati, 2019 in the Marshall Islands, 2019 in Nauru, etc etc. --Sm8900 (talk) 13:20, 17 September 2019 (UTC)

East Timor, Indonesia, the United States and Japan

An IP account just removed East Timor and Indonesia from the article, and it was reverted so that the issue can be discussed in the Talk page. Until I saw the deletion and reversion, I had not noticed that Indonesia and East Timor were listed as UN member states within Oceania. I don't know when they were added, but it appears to me that the article historically must have included in its list of UN member states only the 14 that are mostly within Oceania (and thus are traditionally considered to be Oceanian states), given that the introduction to the section refers to "all 14 states" (which happens to be the number of UN member states that lie mostly within Oceania).

East Timor is considered to be a Southeast Asian state by the overwhelming majority of geographers, as it lies west of the Lydekker line; in fact it even lies west of the Weber line. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Lydekker#/media/File:Map_of_Sunda_and_Sahul.png In addition, East Timor is a member of Southeast Asian regional organizations, and is classified by the UN as part of the South-eastern Asia subregion. East Timor is not part of Australasia, Melanesia, Micronesia or Polynesia, so it should not be included in this article.

Indonesia, on the other hand, does have a portion of its territory within Oceania (western New Guinea and a few neighboring islands, but its Oceanian territory comprises less than 25% of Indonesia's land and less than 2% of its population. Indonesia's relationship with Oceania is not very different from that of the United States, which has a small portion of its territory and population within Oceania (the State of Hawaii and several territories, most prominently Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands and American Samoa). Also, Japan's Micronesian Islands (Bonin Islands, Volcano Islands, etc.) are administratively a constituent part of Japan (the Ogasawara Village), so Japan is also an Asian state that is partially located on Oceania.

Given that territory within Oceania constitutes an integral part of Indonesia (the provinces of Papua and West Papua), Japan (the Ogasawara Village) and the United States (the State of Hawaii and the incorporated territory of Palmyra Atoll), but that none of them are Oceanian countries (Indonesia and Japan are Asian and the United States is North American), it seems to me that there should be a section for non-Oceanian UN member states that are partly located within Oceania. Relatedly, the article's section on dependent territories (labelled "non-sovereign territories," but, of course, the article's title speaks only of "sovereign states" and "dependent territories") should not include the Indonesian provinces of Papua and West Papua, the Japanese sub-prefecture of Ogasawara Village, the U.S. state of Hawaii and the U.S. incorporated territory of Palmyra Atoll. Those political subdivisions of non-Oceanian sovereign states should be described in their respective nations' entries in the section for non-Oceanian UN member states that are partly located within Oceania.

What do other editors think about my proposal? I am pinging the registered editors who have edited the article during the past six months:

@Gadfium: @Mareto0910: @Chrom3ium: @James2813: @Certes: @Nanky Blert: @Chipmunkdavis: @Atelerixia: @Chinamoonroll: @Wiz9999: @Jan CZ: @Buidhe:

AuH2ORepublican (talk) 01:58, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

This has always been an issue, lots of people with back and forth opinions and few sources on the matter. The same thing happens on the Asia page with Christmas Island and Cocos Keeling. I see the potential value of such a section, but it would need a different title. "non-Oceanian" is an inherently circular concept, and there's nothing that makes a state intrinsically "Oceanian". The solution in the Europe page was just to lump all countries onto the single list, with explanations in the text preceding it, without getting into subdivisions, so this proposal matches that in a way. There'd have to be some inclusion criteria though, Britannica has no less than 4 definitions of Oceania in its article, from including the entirety of Japan to not including Australia. CMD (talk) 02:14, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

This article has clearly been expanded beyond its scope and original purpose. The first line of the article is "This is a list of sovereign states and dependent territories in the geopolitical region of Oceania." This category of "Non-sovereign territories" is a lumping together of the dependent territories (in scope) and fully constituent parts of sovereign states (out of scope) of the article. The entries that are not on the list of dependent territories (e.g. Easter Island, Galapagos, Hawaii, Ogasawara Village, etc.) should be pulled out of the section, and the section be renamed as "Dependent Territories" to match the scope of the article. The entries that were pulled out can still be referred to in this article, if need be (in their own smaller list if you wish), but the emphasis must be on those soverign states that are fully associated with Oceania, and those dependent territories that are associated with Oceania, i.e. those entities of which that could be considered to be within its boundaries. It should be noted that the idea of including East Timor as an entry specifically is more justifiable, since, as the article states in the lede, "The boundary between Asia and Oceania is not clearly defined." (Boundaries between the continents of Earth#Asia and Australia). - Wiz9999 (talk) 10:39, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

The original scope was "countries", soon "countries and territories". The current title actually has nothing to do with this article, it is a result of the continuous addition of England etc. to the Europe article, following which all of these articles were moved. We shouldn't be basing the article scope or structure on the specific title semantics. CMD (talk) 11:51, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

Hi. I just did a minor edition one time, hahaha. Anyway, I won't speak a lot but I suggest following the criteria of most geographers. The UN not necessarily follows this criteria, but rather a political one so I don't think we should guide ourselves only by the UN. Also, we could include a new section with countries that are partially in Oceania, like Chile, my country. Greetings to everyone, James2813 (talk) 11:38, 30 March 2021 (UTC)

Exclusive Economic Zones map oddity

Palau and Marshall Islands are put in America blue instead of independent grey, bizarre given them being independent for decades. As it even says on this very article! 2601:643:C003:6DF0:28B7:B067:B56C:24 (talk) 15:53, 21 August 2022 (UTC)

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Fiji

when you go to sort by land area 2601:404:D281:A30:C926:38CC:7C9:B176 (talk) 23:13, 16 March 2023 (UTC)

Fixed. CMD (talk) 09:25, 24 March 2023 (UTC)

missing: orthographic projection SVG

like other continents have, in this same pattern: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Africa_(orthographic_projection).svg 177.86.22.177 (talk) 21:25, 22 November 2023 (UTC)