The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was No Consensus.. CitiCat ^♫ 16:06, 8 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Date of independence of European countries (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log)

Very few sources, seemingly arbitrary definition of independence, claiming continuity between modern day nations such as Ukraine, Bulgaria and Montenegro and ancient empires spread over same or similar territory that have little to do with the modern states. I cannot see how this could possibly be maintained in an NPOV and factual fashion. +Hexagon1 ^(t) 10:39, 27 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete Inge 12:56, 27 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep This is what lists are for. There are a finite number of European nations, which all appear to be on this list. There is only one date of creation/independence possible for each current nation. These dates should be easily verified and referenceable (which is needed here). -- Flyguy649 ^talk _contribs 14:51, 27 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep I think this is a good article idea and clearly needs some work, however I don't believe it needs to be deleted. Just a little bit of work and sources and clarification and it should be a good article in no time. Wikidudeman ^(talk) 15:13, 27 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Redirect to List of countries by date of statehood and allow the usual editorial process to figure out how the various related lists will be merged or otherwise handled. See a debate over a similar article at Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/List of states by date of self-determination. ɑʀкʏɑɴ 15:46, 27 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete or merge into List of countries by date of statehood as per Arkyan. "Independence" is somewhat a new world or colonial world concept. Few, if any, of the countries on this list came to be sovereign through some sort of "independence" event. For many of these countries, it's not possible to say who they became independent from - there was no previous dominant power. Agent 86 22:11, 27 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep as per Flyguy649, Wikidudeman. Edward321 04:13, 29 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

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Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so that consensus may be reached.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, El_C 19:49, 31 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete or rewrite from scratch. The dates given here are 100% arbitrary, several countries are listed multiple times at arbitrarily cherrypicked dates, and besides, what exactly is "independence"? The article has to begin by clearly stating what definition of the term it will apply, and then stick to it. Otherwise, it makes no sense whatsoever. --Targeman 20:02, 31 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Redirect/merge per User:Arkyan. The List of countries by date of statehood covers substantially the same material, is more complete for Europe, and is not so long that it's unmanageable as a worldwide list. Argyriou (talk) 21:11, 31 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep/redirect/merge, an article needing a spot of work is not a reason for deletion. Mathmo ^Talk 00:02, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Delete: All the work of the world can not eliminate the problem of the article. The article tries to use the concept of nationalism on structures, which do not know this concept. Almost every entry can be disputed. --Thw1309 09:53, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

• Delete Most European countries simply didn't become "independent" on some arbitrary date. In the case they did, then there is List of countries by date of independence and List of countries by date of statehood.--Victor falk 10:48, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep as per Edward321. Missing citations are not a reason for deletion unless after repeated efforts such sources cannot be found (see WP:DP) -- this is obviously not the case here, or even close. The ambiguity argument is a fair one, but "arbitrary definition of independence" is a blatant exaggeration. The ambiguity is not so extreme that it cannot be dealt with and we should give up on trying to date independence. A more appropriate solution would be to establish consistent criteria for date selection through the article's discussion page. --XDanielx 19:56, 1 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Comment Can't see voting to keep. Maybe it's the title; but what the article illustrates is the changing map of Europe, not a list of when countries became "independent". Did Russia really become independent in 1991? Or Austria in 1918? As a list, it's misleading. Mandsford 00:32, 2 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Keep per Edward 321. 172.191.100.66 19:33, 4 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]
• Very string delete per Hexagon1. Absurd misuse of some concept in much different contexts. Reminds me an attempt on WP to invent "father of the nation" for every modern country ignoring all the historical reality. Original research and of very low quality. Pavel Vozenilek 16:24, 6 August 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.