Eh, the British “countries” are countries in name only. They don’t really fit any of the usual things people would think of as constituting a country.
In reality, they’re constituted like less than the state of a federation like the US, Germany, or Australia. A state has a constitutional right to its governance, and cedes some power to the federal government. The devolved governments of Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland are rights granted by Westminster, and could be taken away at will. Nothing Biden, or Trump, or Mike Johnson wanted could ever take away Maine’s right to its own governance like that.
On a global scale they are synonyms xd
Which is made even more confusing by British “countries” (🏴🏴🏴🇯🇪).
Eh, the British “countries” are countries in name only. They don’t really fit any of the usual things people would think of as constituting a country.
In reality, they’re constituted like less than the state of a federation like the US, Germany, or Australia. A state has a constitutional right to its governance, and cedes some power to the federal government. The devolved governments of Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland are rights granted by Westminster, and could be taken away at will. Nothing Biden, or Trump, or Mike Johnson wanted could ever take away Maine’s right to its own governance like that.
I know. Hence quotation marks.
Oh right, the “quotation marks”
The technical term for quotation marks used that way is “scare quotes”.