ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of key concepts discussed in subsequent chapters of this book. The book explores how new states are created through the process of secession. Until relatively recently, new states were mainly created through decolonization. There are, however, only very few territories left which are regarded, by the United Nations, as colonies or dependent territories. In the period from 1947 to 1980, around 90 colonies mostly in Asia, Africa and the Pacific gained independence from European colonial powers and became sovereign states. Among them, to mention only the largest, were India, Indonesia, Nigeria, Algeria, Angola and Congo. Secession has always been a highly controversial topic. Violent secessions, for example the secession of the Southern Confederacy from the United States, have been subject to protracted public debates both in the countries in which they have taken place and outside them.
