Micronationalist

A micronationalist is a person involved in micronationalism. Most micronationalists are the founder or leader of their own micronation, or more broadly are or have been a citizen of a micronation at some point, sometimes recreationally. As a hobby, micronationalists typically do not seek statehood or believe that statehood is unachievable, occasionally include tongue-in-cheek elements in their micronations, and make adaptations to conform with most aspects of macronational laws in order to avoid legal consequences. In contrast, hard secessionists go to great lengths to present their micronations as fully independent sovereign states, often causing conflicts with macronational authorities over issues such as taxation and other aspects of the law. Micronationalists often combine this interest with other hobbies, especially politics, geography, history, economics, journalism and heraldry.

The term "micronationalist" was first used in a 1964 book on secessionist movements in Sub-Saharan Africa to denote a micronation, rather than an individual. Its first use in the context of a person was in a 1987 book on the same topic, and in 1997 it appeared in a post by Anthony Lawless on the Usenet forum alt.politics.micronations. This led to the term's wide usage on said forum, later spreading into common vocabulary among micronationalists all over Usenet. Since the mid- and late 2000s, with the rise of the Internet, the term became commonly accepted among micronationalists and non-micronationalists alike, including journalists.

The micronational community is decentralised, forming various communities and sectors around micronational spheres of influence or websites, such as MicroWiki and its associated Discord server, other wikis or social medias such as Facebook, Twitter, Reddit or YouTube. Geofictionists may call themselves micronationalists, however this is erroneous.