Dependent colonies are territories governed by a foreign power whose residents cannot choose their own form of government and lack full political rights. The United Nations calls them Non-Self-Governing Territories, and 17 remain on the official list, administered by four countries: the United Kingdom, the United States, France, and New Zealand. International law treats this status as temporary. Each territory’s population holds a recognized right to self-determination, and the administering power is legally obligated to help them exercise it, even if the political reality often lags far behind the legal principle.
The 17 Territories Still on the List
When the UN General Assembly first compiled its list in 1946, it contained 72 territories. Waves of decolonization brought the number down to 17.1United Nations. Non-Self-Governing Territories
- United Kingdom (10): Anguilla, Bermuda, British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Falkland Islands (Malvinas), Gibraltar, Montserrat, Pitcairn, Saint Helena, and Turks and Caicos Islands.
- United States (3): American Samoa, Guam, and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
- France (2): French Polynesia and New Caledonia.
- New Zealand (1): Tokelau.
Western Sahara sits on the list under unusual circumstances. Spain withdrew in 1976 and told the Secretary-General it no longer considered itself the administering power. Morocco has controlled most of the territory since, but the UN has never recognized Moroccan sovereignty, and no administering power currently reports on it.1United Nations. Non-Self-Governing Territories The International Court of Justice found in 1975 that neither Morocco nor Mauritania held ties of territorial sovereignty sufficient to override the population’s right to self-determination.2International Court of Justice. Western Sahara
Some territories administered by these same powers are not on the list. Puerto Rico was removed in 1953 after adopting its commonwealth constitution, and the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands entered a covenant with the United States that took it off the list on a different track. Whether removal reflects genuine self-government, especially for Puerto Rico, is still contested.
What Dependent Status Actually Means
The governance pattern across dependent territories is remarkably consistent. The administering power appoints or heavily influences the selection of a chief executive, usually a governor or commissioner, who holds broad authority over day-to-day administration and typically retains the power to veto legislation passed by local bodies. Local legislatures exist in most territories, but their authority is subordinate. The metropolitan parliament can legislate for the territory on any subject, and local enactments that conflict with metropolitan law are void.
Defense, foreign affairs, and the judiciary almost always remain in the metropole’s direct control. Courts in the territory frequently mirror the metropolitan legal system, and the final court of appeal often sits outside the territory itself. Constitutional frameworks, whether Orders in Council for British territories or Organic Acts for U.S. territories, are drafted and enacted by the administering power rather than by the territory’s own population. That absence of constitutional authorship is one of the defining features that separates dependent status from real self-government.
The Legal Framework Behind the List
Chapter XI of the UN Charter provides the foundation. It defines Non-Self-Governing Territories as those “whose peoples have not yet attained a full measure of self-government” and describes the responsibility of the country administering them as a “sacred trust” to promote their political, economic, social, and educational well-being.3United Nations. Chapter XI – Declaration Regarding Non-Self-Governing Territories
Article 73(e) requires administering powers to regularly transmit statistical and technical information on economic, social, and educational conditions to the Secretary-General, subject to “security and constitutional considerations.”3United Nations. Chapter XI – Declaration Regarding Non-Self-Governing Territories Those reports feed the work of the UN Special Committee on Decolonization, known as the C-24, which monitors each territory’s progress toward self-government.1United Nations. Non-Self-Governing Territories
The right to self-determination has grown from a political principle into one of the strongest legal norms in the international system. The International Court of Justice has recognized it as a peremptory norm, meaning no treaty can override it. Its 1975 Western Sahara opinion affirmed that self-determination requires “the free and genuine expression of the will of the peoples of the territory,” and no historical claim of sovereignty by a neighboring state can substitute.2International Court of Justice. Western Sahara
General Assembly Resolution 1514, adopted in 1960, made the political commitment explicit. It declared that subjecting people to foreign domination “constitutes a denial of fundamental human rights” and called for the immediate transfer of powers to the peoples of dependent territories “without any conditions or reservations.”4Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples
Three Legitimate Routes Out
Resolution 1541, adopted the same year, defined the three ways a Non-Self-Governing Territory can reach full self-government:
- Independence: the territory becomes a sovereign state.
- Free association: the territory enters a voluntary, formal political relationship with an independent state while retaining the right to end or modify the arrangement through democratic processes.
- Integration: the territory fully merges into an existing independent state, and its people gain equal political rights.
Each option has requirements. Free association must result from a free and voluntary choice and must preserve the ability to change the arrangement later. Integration requires that the territory’s people have reached an advanced stage of self-government with functioning political institutions and can make an informed choice.5Refworld. UN General Assembly Resolution 1541 In practice, the C-24 typically facilitates the process through a supervised referendum or election before the territory is removed from the list.6United Nations. C-24 Visiting Missions
Why So Many Territories Are Still on the List
The gap between the legal framework and actual outcomes is the story of modern decolonization. Some territories have held multiple referendums without resolving their status. Others have populations too small or economies too dependent to see independence as viable. In at least one case, the promised referendum has never happened at all.
New Caledonia shows how contested the process can become. Under the 1998 Nouméa Accord with France, the territory held three independence referendums. The first two, in 2018 and 2020, saw turnout above 80% and returned results against independence by roughly 57% and 53%. The third, in December 2021, was different. Pro-independence groups refused to participate, arguing the vote should have been postponed because of the COVID-19 pandemic’s disproportionate impact on the Indigenous Kanak community. Turnout fell below 44%, and the result, over 96% against independence, was immediately disputed as illegitimate by the pro-independence movement. The UN has continued to list New Caledonia as a Non-Self-Governing Territory.
Puerto Rico is off the UN list but has held its own status votes. A 2020 referendum asked a simple yes-or-no question on statehood and returned a narrow 52.5% majority in favor. A 2024 referendum offered three options: statehood drew about 59% support, free association roughly 30%, and independence about 12%. Neither result binds the U.S. Congress, which holds the constitutional power to admit new states. This is where the self-determination framework meets its deepest tension. A territory’s people can express a preference, but the administering power decides whether to act on it.
The UN has marked the slow pace by declaring successive international decades for the eradication of colonialism. The current one, the Fourth International Decade, runs from 2021 through 2030 under General Assembly Resolution 75/123.7United Nations. International Decades for the Eradication of Colonialism Reaching a fourth such decade says something about how slowly the process moves when administering powers lack political will.
A Closer Look at the U.S. Territories
The United States governs its territories under a legal framework that shapes daily life for the roughly three million people living in them. The constitutional foundation is the Territorial Clause in Article IV, which grants Congress the power to “make all needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory or other Property belonging to the United States.”8Congress.gov. Article IV That one sentence gives Congress broad discretion over territorial governance.
How far that discretion extends was the question at the heart of the Insular Cases, a series of Supreme Court decisions from 1901 to 1922. In Downes v. Bidwell (1901), the Court held that territories acquired by the United States could be “subject to the jurisdiction of the United States” without being fully “of the United States.”9Library of Congress. Downes v. Bidwell, 182 U.S. 244 The doctrine divided territories into two categories: incorporated territories, where the full Constitution applied and statehood was anticipated, and unincorporated territories, where only “fundamental” constitutional rights were guaranteed. Every current U.S. territory except Palmyra Atoll falls into the unincorporated category, meaning Congress decides which additional constitutional protections apply.
The practical consequence surfaced most recently in United States v. Vaello Madero (2022), where the Supreme Court held that Congress is not required to extend Supplemental Security Income benefits to residents of Puerto Rico. The majority found Congress may treat territories differently from states in tax and benefits programs as long as it has a rational basis for doing so. Justice Gorsuch, concurring, wrote that the Insular Cases “have no foundation in the Constitution and rest instead on racial stereotypes,” pointing to the original opinions’ explicit reasoning that the Constitution need not fully apply to “alien races, differing from us in religion, customs, laws, methods of taxation, and modes of thought.”10Supreme Court of the United States. United States v. Vaello Madero, No. 20-303 The majority did not formally overrule the Insular Cases.
Citizenship and the Vote
If you were born in Puerto Rico, Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands, or the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, you are a U.S. citizen at birth. That citizenship comes from federal statute, not from the Fourteenth Amendment’s Citizenship Clause, which does not apply on its own force in unincorporated territories. Because the source is a statute, Congress theoretically holds the power to change the terms. American Samoa is the exception. People born there are generally considered U.S. nationals, not citizens, unless they naturalize.11U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services. Chapter 2 – Becoming a U.S. Citizen
Living in a U.S. territory means you cannot vote for president.12USAGov. Who Can and Cannot Vote The Electoral College is tied to state representation in Congress, and territories are not states. Each territory sends a non-voting delegate to the House, or in Puerto Rico’s case a resident commissioner. Delegates can introduce bills, speak on the floor, serve on committees, and vote in committee, but they cannot vote on the House floor and are not counted for quorum.13Congress.gov. Delegates to the U.S. Congress – History and Current Status Territories have no representation in the Senate.
Obligations flow more freely than rights. Male residents of Puerto Rico, Guam, the Virgin Islands, and the Northern Mariana Islands must register with the Selective Service at 18. American Samoan nationals must register when they are habitual residents of the United States or have resided in the country for at least a year.14Selective Service System. Who Needs to Register
Federal Benefits and Funding
Federal program disparities are where dependent status hits hardest for the U.S. territories. Medicaid funding for the 50 states is open-ended: the federal government matches state spending at a rate that varies by per capita income, ranging from 50% to 83%. Territorial Medicaid programs are capped instead. Once a territory reaches its annual cap, it either absorbs the full cost of additional services or suspends them until the next fiscal year. Puerto Rico’s federal matching rate is temporarily set at 76%, scheduled to revert to 55% after September 2027, while the other four territories receive an 83% match, but only up to their capped amounts, which for smaller territories run as low as $66 million annually.15Congress.gov. Medicaid Financing for the Territories
The pattern repeats across federal programs: territories depend on allocations set by a government in which they have no voting representation. That dynamic sits at the center of what makes a dependent territory dependent, and it is the reason the international framework for self-determination continues to matter even seventy-five years after decolonization began.