ECONOMY
Our economy is based around the group of rich people who are controlling the prison. They can invest money in our prisoners on the prison island. In return, the prisoners have to perform some tasks chosen by the investor. These prisoners will be paid in Roebel. But on the prison island itself, there is a trading economy. This means that everything is tradeable including cigarettes, food, drugs, drinks, … .
We will also finance our country by inviting rich people from similar regimes who would like to participate in the “prison game”. There is a pretty high admission fee though. It can vary from 50.000 to 300.000 Roebel according to number of people or which regime they come from.
Other than that, we will take over prisoners from other countries because prisons are overpopulated. But when other countries want to do that, they need to take a part of our nuclear waste. That way we keep investing in nuclear energy but getting rid of our nuclear waste.
GEOGRAPHY
Artevelde is geographically a very rare country. The country is divided into two islands who have special characteristics. Artevelde City, the smallest island is a beautiful place full of casinos, tourist attractions, hotels, shoppingmalls and so much more. The other island, better known as Artevelde Prison is a giant city that accommodates the most hardcore prisoners of the wold and where the prison game is played
But they also have similarities.
For example both islands have a maritime climate with 4 seasons so that you can spend the whole year in our country and experience different weather conditions. Our country also has various mountainous areas with deep and narrow valleys.
TOURISM
We have a mountain into which our former leaders are carved. It’s on the smaller island facing the larger island so our prisoners never forget who our original leaders were.
Other than that, rich people from other regimes can come to our island to participate in our “prison game”. This is explained in the piece our economy and finances.
SOCIAL
The larger island of our country is a giant prison where all of our inhabitants live. There they can live some sort of a normal life. The smaller island is where the rich and most powerful people live. They can invest in certain prisoners. These prisoners do tasks for them to earn more money, food, a better house, …
CULTURE
We can characterise our inhabitants by the saying "Carpe Diem", they don't make plans for something which will take place in 6 months also because they don't know what the following day will bring. Our country is runned by a small group of rich people who are controlling the prison island and the prison camp. The other inhabitants have less private property but it's the same as their neighbours. There is only one TV channel and one newspaper, issued by the government. Social network sites such as Facebook or Twitter are not accessible.
ECOLOGY
Although Artevelde is a legendary country, it still has its flaws. Ecologically seen Artevelde isn't number one in the world because of its radioactive waste.
To maintain orde on prison island, Artevelde city has done a lot of scientific research on nuclear bombs and radioactive wapens incase things would get out of hand and the worst would happen.
Because of all the nuclear experiments, Artevelde is stuck with a lot a radioactive waste and still doesn't have a clue how to get rid of it in a green way.
But no stress we are definitely not dumping it in the sea.
POLITICS
Artevelde has only one political party, the EFE, which means: Everything For Everyone. There is no place for political opponents in Artevelde. Our slogan is, dura lex sed lex, our law doesn't leave any space for any political opponents. In case somebody jeopardizes the regime, he/she will be sentenced to our prison camp and their private belongings will be confiscated.
DEMOGRAPHICS
82 million people live in the great country of Artevelde. Although the number sound huge, we do need to rationalize this numbers. Only 35% of the population are native inhabitants. The other 65% are visitors and investors who occasionally visit the country.
Because of the high death-rate in Artevelde Prison, the population on island fluctuate drastically from day to day.
Our population growth rate is therefore in decline and we drastically need to find a solution. We therefore have no birth control and encourage families to have at least 6 children. Finally we have a worldwide criminal import system that takes over prisoners of other countries to place them in our facilities.
