Republic

See also: Republic (homonymy)

The republic is one of the forms constitutional of the State, which is conceived like consubstantial of the people . Any republic must thus be included/understood, definite and founded in opposition to the monarchical designs or theocratic of the State and the Nation:

  • in a Monarchy, the State, its perenniality and its identity are incarnated by only one person (the king, the queen), often designated according to criteria hereditary and/or of “divine right”; the government itself can take various forms, possibly democratic (case of parliamentary monarchies);
  • in a Théocratie, the State, its perenniality and its identity are represented by God himself (example of the Vatican), even if the temporal representatives of this State can be elected or indicated more or less democratically;
  • in a republic, the State has direction only by the existence and the assertion of people. In this design, the republic is generally associated with the assertion (constitutional or not) of a community property ( LMBO publica ) which it acts to preserve. A simple federation of private interests is not thus enough to found a republic.

On 194 countries listed in Wikipédia, 135 are declared like republics, against 22 Royaume S or Sultanat S, 9 federations or unions, 3 Principauté S: it is thus the most widespread form of State.

There exist many designs of the republic, and as many concrete forms, for example the socialist republics (Vietnam), democratic (Congo), Populaire (China, Bangladesh), Islamic (Pakistan, Iran), federal (Germany, Brésil), Arab (Egypt, Syria), Bolivar ienne (Venezuela)…

To note: the concept of unit and indivisibility of the Republic is a French design specifically . The federal republics do not have necessarily the same requirement. The Laïcité, whose principle is very far from being universally recognized, cannot more be associated automatically with the republic.

If the concept is enough broad to include representative democracies, a republic does not imply inevitably a Démocratie. A State of republican form can be a limited democracy, where certain rights are reserved only to one restricted group: the republic is then dictatorial or totalitarian.

It is more ambiguous to treat the concept of Islamic Republic. This denomination can seem a contradiction in term, and it is undoubtedly obvious for the Iran which presents, under many aspects, the concrete characteristics of a theocracy with partially democratic operation. On the other hand, the case of the Maldives is clearer: it is indeed about a republic, but the Islamic term specifies that the legal system is governed by the Charia, which makes of it a priori a system not strictly democratic.

Etymology

The Greek word that republic for the majority translated, is politeia , which want to say, the walk of the public affairs in a polished or city-state. But the word “republic” is of Roman origin and is created after the expulsion of Tarquin Superb the and the abolition of the Roman Monarchie in -509. Composed starting from two words Latin: the female noun “ LMBO ”, which means the “thing”, and the adjective “ publica ”, that one can translate by “public”, LMBO publica , or “public thing”, initially indicates the public organization of the company (as in the Republic of Plato). But the paternity of the term “Republic”, to the modern direction, is often granted to Jean Bodin which defines it in the six books of the Republic in 1576 like one right government of several households and of what is common for them, with sovereign power .

In its work Of the social contract , Jean-Jacques Rousseau defines the republic as any State governed by laws, in some form of administration that it can be; because then only the public interest controls, and the public thing is something. Any legitimate government is republican.

Evolution of the direction

Three traditional texts transmitted the multiple directions of these two terms to the modern ones: the republic (Politeia) of Plato, the policy (Politike) of Aristote, and Of the republic (Of Re publica) of Cicéron. For the medieval ones, the book of Cicéron was received in the form of quotations of Augustin d' Hippone, the majority in the City of God (Civitas dei) . They had Aristote only in Latin, translated from Arabic, translated from the Greek; and Plato that in fragments, the two full ones with terms confusedly definite. The historical experiment of medieval was of Rome which one can call post-republican, an empire ideal, universal, and monarchical. Thus the Jean de Salisbury, the Thomas d' Aquin had a tendency to define LMBO publica like a regulated state, especially monarchical. They usually wrote, for example, of the Res Publica Christiana under papacy. From the same point of view, several Courtisan S of the 18th century wrote poems where they rented good management by Louis XIV of the republic.

On the contrary, in the cities, émergeantes after the 12th century, one remembered better the forms of government of old LMBO publica Romana , and there reappears, towards 1300, the definition of republic like a state without king, whether it is aristocratic or democratic. The traditional culture being generalized in the nobility at the time, each well-read man had already heard of the Roman République which had preceded Rome by the emperors. The large travellers knew also other examples like the Swiss republic or the République of Geneva. In all these modes, they was voters who indicated each time necessary which would take instead of all, with their delegation, the decisions of the period to come. The scholars in history knew that the dynasty of the Capétiens was also at a time come to power by an election.

The medieval direction survived, in particular in the book of Jean Bodin, a support of the political during the civil wars of calvinists and catholics, and of the absolutists later; but did the urban and humanistic definition of a free state ( free-state , stato libero ), popular state , or state without king being found in Bartolus de Saxoferrato ( Of regimine civitatis , Perugia, towards 1350), Coluccio Salutati ( Of tyranno , Florence, 1400) and Leonardo Browned ( Laudatio fiorentinae urbis , 1403-04), appear at Machiavel in the middle of its Discours on Tite-Live (“Speech” No 16-18, 1513?), gained two great states, the United States of the Netherlands (1581) and the Commonwealth of England (1649), convainquit David Hume and Montesquieu about 1750, revolutionized the English States of North America, and triumphed everywhere in Europe after 1792.

Republic and monarchy

Nothing makes it possible to say that between a monarchy and a republic, one is necessarily more democratic than the other, the election or not of the Head of the State does not predict of anything the nature of the mode. A dictatorship can be called republic with a Head of State “elected” of a Sole party, and a democracy can be called monarchy, with a hereditary Head of State. When the Head of the State does not have as a function to control but arbitrate and be guaranteeing for the whole of the nation, the hereditary principle which can be approved by Référendum (as in Spain) proves in fact more democratic, by its capacity to give to the Head of the State a total independence with regard to the political parties, to the service of all, and thus of the community property (also named LMBO-publica).

The monarchs generally reign with life and are replaced with their death by a relative (one speaks in this case about hereditary Monarchie), either determined by them or or by preestablished rules (one speaks here about Constitutional monarchy). Many current constitutional monarchies are completely democratic, including/understanding a Parlement elected by the people.

The presidents of republics, on the contrary, are generally elected for a limited mandate - just as their successors. Nowadays, of many nondemocratic republics say themselves democratic, and notwithstanding the control of the electoral results maintain the ritual to elect their Head of State regularly; in these States, many Heads of States give up their functions (by resignation or early withdrawal) or there are forced (by constitutional means) by other members of the dominant elite. There are however exceptions - each new emperor of the Saint Roman Empire, for example, was elected by the principal princes of the Empire, although through the centuries the habit evolved/moved until naming with this load the successive members of the same family.

History

The history of the republic as goes up far as old the Akkad. The ancient republic the best known one is the Roman République, which lasted of -509 with -44. In the Roman republic, the principles of yearly recurrence (exercise of the capacity for a only one year mandate) and of Collégialité (exercise of the capacity by at least two men at the same time) were usually observed.

At our time, the Executive power is generally incarnated in only one person, the President or a Prime Minister, but some exceptions are verifiable as in Suisse, which has a council of seven members at his head (called the Federal council) and San Marino, where two people share the capacity. In these last cases, the exercise of the capacity is made in a collegial way .

The Soviet republics were Member States which were to join together three criteria to be thus named:

  1. to be with the periphery of the Soviet Union to be able to benefit from their theoretical right to make secession
  2. be economically able to ensure the Autarcie after the secession
  3. to be named according to the ethnicity of at least a million people which will constitute the majority of the aforesaid the republic.

The States of the United States must be of republican form (just like the federal government), the people being the real holder of the authority. A requirement for States which are supposed to create and reinforce the majority of the domestic laws, except for the zones delegated to the federal government. The Founding fathers of the country awaited a management by the States of the majority of the domestic laws, even if with time the influence of the federal government on those were reinforced little by little. The obligation of a republican form was also a way of protecting the civil rights and of preventing that a State does not sink in the dictatorship or monarchy.

In France, the First Republic was proclaimed in 1792. Today, It is the Fifth Republic which governs the French institutions.

Examples

Currently, the republics are very numerous on a world level. The republican shape of government can be combined with very many economic systems and democratic different. Here some examples to illustrate various republican models:
  • France (as well as Russia and the Ukraine) is a Republic controlled under a semi-presidential mode, in which the extent of the real capacity of the president depends on the parliamentary majority. If the National Assembly is same political edge that the president, it is the latter which controls the country (to be able executive ); if it is not the case, the president preserves only the federative capacity (politics foreign and Defense) constitutionally attached to his function;
  • Italy (for example) is a Republic with parliamentary mode, in which the President is only one “symbol”, does not have any capacity and does not control (it is the Prime Minister which is the Head of the State);
  • Brazil, as well as many States of Africa, is republics controlled under a presidential mode , in which the president (generally elected) holds the executive power directly.
  • the Popular republic of China is directed under the aegis of a sole party: the legislative powers, executive and federative are held by a sole party, which also controls (though indirectly) the judicial power.

It should be noted that:

  • the United States of America, although controlled according to a mode of the presidential type and within the framework of a democratic system, are a confederation and not a republic;
  • the constitutional form of perfectly democratic States like Canada and Australia is not specified, but they are not asserted like republics;

Here some historical republics:

Even if one regarded Sparte as a republic, the Monarchie played a part in its government; and whereas one regards today Athens as being a republic, it was described in Classiques times like a democracy. In Greek, the distinction between Democracy and republic does not exist (the word republic being, like known as higher, of Roman origin). Old authors Greek described modes not-monarchical like Oligarchy S or Aristocracy S (if they were directed by a reduced group citizens), tyranny (directed by a person who had seized the capacity by a coup d'etat) or Démocratie S (if the right to vote and that to be elected were given to a great number of citizens, the lowest classes include).

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