Talk:Flag of Solomon Islands

Requested move 25 August 2014

 * The following discussion is an archived discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section. 

The result of the move request was: Page not moved: no consensus Ground Zero | t 16:57, 9 September 2014 (UTC)

Flag of the Solomon Islands → Flag of Solomon Islands – 1. To distinguish between the nation state of Solomon Islands and the Solomon Islands (archipelago) which cover different geopolitical areas. 2. To bring the naming convention into line with the naming of Solomon Islands pages elsewhere and to conform with the actual gazetted name of the country. Currently move is blocked by a redirect page. – E x nihil (talk) 17:36, 25 August 2014 (UTC)
 * This is a contested technical request (permalink). Anthony Appleyard (talk) 21:00, 25 August 2014 (UTC)
 * 1. To distinguish between the nation state of Solomon Islands and the Solomon Islands (archipelago) which cover different geopolitical areas.
 * 2. To bring the naming convention into line with the naming of Solomon Islands pages elsewhere and to conform with the actual gazetted name of the country. Currently move is blocked by a redirect page. – E x nihil (talk) 17:36, 25 August 2014 (UTC)


 * Oppose. Use of "the" is perfectly acceptable (and the norm). Number   5  7  17:56, 25 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Oppose. Common usage per . Philg88 ♦talk 19:00, 25 August 2014 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Title of article must be changed to "Flag of Solomon Islands"
The title of the article must be changed to reflect "correct/official" name of Solomon Islands. No "the". — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.162.220.155 (talk) 05:21, 14 December 2016 (UTC)
 * It is indeed true that the official name of the state is 'Solomon Islands' without the definite article, but does anyone actually in practice leave "the" off when referring to the state and its flag? Hogweard (talk) 12:50, 7 July 2017 (UTC)


 * Consensus for Solomon Islands.

In belated answer to Hogweard. Yes, Solomon Islands  is in common usage in Solomon islands, I used to work there as an advisor in the Ministry of Justice. There was actually a consensus on the name change at Talk:Solomon_Islands in favour of "Solomon Islands" but the name change was thwarted by the, maybe overly hasty, conclusion to the Move discussion above. The change is now locked out

All of the many Solomon Islands articles, including this one bar the title, use Solomon Islands when refering to the nation state and The Solomon Islands when referring to the archipelago, which covers a different geographic area or refers to the British administration. The correct term is legally defined as Solomon Islands without the definite article. Note from the consensus discussion that:

The name is first defined in the Constitution of Solomon Islands, as Solomon Islands and starts off "We the people of Solomon Islands, proud of the wisdom and the worthy customs of our ancestors, mindful of our common and diverse heritage and conscious of our common destiny, do now, under the guiding hand of God, establish the sovereign democratic State of Solomon Islands.

The United Nations gazetted English language name for the nation is: long form term Solomon Islands, short form term also Solomon Islands

Diplomatic protocols always get it right, which is why all the foreign embassies and high commissions and consulates are named similarly to The Australian High Commission, Solomon Islands or the Japanese Embassy, Solomon Islands and RAMSI was the Regional Assistance Mission to Solomon Islands because the legal agreement under which RAMSI was permitted to operate had to reflect the legal entity name.

The Queen invariably uses the term Solomon Islands herself when addressing the nation as in The Queen's message to the Governor-General, Solomons Islands: "I was deeply saddened to learn of the devastating floods that have affected Solomon Islands during the last week." She tends to get these things right because she is good at these things, by contrast, her webmaster slips a bit and sometimes refers to her as the Queen of Solomon Islands and sometimes incorectly as the Queen of the Solomon Islands. I have the charter appointing the Governor General, which I cannot find a link to, but I can assure you when she appointed Frank Kabui he was appointed as the Governor General, Solomon Islands

The national anthem starts off : "God Save our Solomon Islands from shore to shore" and repeats this throughout.

Solomon Islanders would like people to call it Solomon Islands partly to distance themselves from their colonial history but they are facing an up-hill battle. Confusion arises from at least five sources:


 * 1) The pre-independence term The British Solomon Islands Protectorate, which was an administrative description rather than a name.
 * 2) The fact that the nation is sometimes referred to as the sovereign State of Solomon Islands (note the lower case s in sovereign because it is not part of the title) and the article gets transferred on truncating but that term is a description not the title.
 * 3) The Solomon Islands is a legitimate term referring to The Solomon Islands (archipelago) as this is a group of islands sharing similar ecological and geographical features but covers a different geographical area from the nation of Solomon Islands and includes bits of Papua New Guinea.
 * 4) During World War II the campaign referred to the Solomon Islands, meaning the archipelago, including the British Solomon Islands Protectorate and other bits belonging to other people conveniently included for military reasons. That was fine, and the nation of Solomon Islands was yet to exist.
 * 5) Lastly the misnomer was perpetuated in websites such as Wikipedia, but users have since seperated the nation from teh archipelago and it's pretty staright now.

It would be good to get this page changed but I am a little weary of it. Perhaps a workaround is that the page isn't actually dedicated to the national flag but deals with all the flags that referred, historically to the Solomons. It might be better to rename it Flags of the Solomon Islands. E x nihil (talk) : Ex nihil (talk) 11:25, 9 May 2019 (UTC)

Provincial flags needed
Sections needed to cover these.WisDom-UK (talk) 20:26, 19 August 2020 (UTC)


 * Not in this article. Similar article to List of Canadian flags should be made for the Solomon Islands. —Bloom6132 (talk) 20:27, 19 August 2020 (UTC)