Yves here. Hopefully readers can look past the author John Ruehl feeling the need to praise Western “democracies” or here, republics, and work in digs about China, Russia, and other apparent sinners in an otherwise very useful and extensive historical review. Perhaps people in glass houses should not throw stones. From Newsweek in 2022, reporting on a study by the Denmark-based Alliance of Democracies Foundation and Germany-based Latana data tracking firm:
When asked whether they believe their country is democratic, those in China topped the list, with some 83% saying the communist-led People’s Republic was a democracy. A resounding 91% said that democracy is important to them.
But in the U.S., which touts itself as a global beacon of democracy, only 49% of those asked said their country was a democracy. And just over three-quarters of respondents, 76%, said democracy was important.
Note this was before the free speech crackdowns in the US became visible to those outside the media sphere.
Chas Freeman, the former ambassador to Saudi Arabia, has argued that Iran has a directed democracy, in which certain topics are outside public discussion and influence, and that’s not very different to the way the US operates. So these lines are not as tidy as those in the Anglosphere would have you believe.
By John P. Ruehl, an Australian-American journalist living in Washington, D.C., and a world affairs correspondent for the Independent Media Institute. He is a contributor to several foreign affairs publications, and his book, Budget Superpower: How Russia Challenges the West With an Economy Smaller Than Texas’, was published in December 2022
The 2024 U.S. presidential election was framed as a crucial test for the nation’s political system, with ongoing concerns over oligarchy, mob rule, a breakdown of equal protection under the law, and the ultimate power of citizens to determine the fate of the nation.
Republics have suffered total collapses throughout history, and there’s no reason why the United States should be immune. The fear of that often prompts a superficial reference to the final fall of the Roman Republic or the end of Greek democracy.
But there’s a deeper history: Republics came into being far earlier in Middle Eastern and Mediterranean civilizations. And we can draw from a much wider range of examples to learn from as we try to understand the challenges and the opportunities.
A true republic is a political system without monarchy or concentrated political power in any office, branch, or individual. Elected officials represent citizens to make decisions on their behalf, with separate branches of government providing checks and balances. While many associate republics with direct democracy in our times, there’s a much wider array of power structures that developed in the formative era of republics.
The 20th century established republics as the global standard, with monarchies declining after World War I and most former European colonies declaring independence as republics following World War II. Fascist and communist countries, which centralized power in individuals or ruling parties, also reduced in number.
Despite their concentration of power, however, many fascist and communist states claimed the title of republics, and while 149 countries out of 193identify as republics today, far less uphold republican principles and blend them effectively with democracy. Examining the historical evolution of republics highlights those best positioned to serve as the most resilient modern examples.
Republics require regular gatherings and assemblies, making them difficult to establish in sparsely populated agrarian societies, while empires generally concentrate power too heavily for self-rule to gain traction. It was in smaller city-states, particularly trade-focused ones, where citizens could form factions, exchange ideas, and influence government decisions and rules for commerce.
Some of the earliest experiments with republican governance appeared in ancient Sumerian city-states (4500–2000 BC), centered in modern-day Iraq. Kings acted more as neutral arbitrators rather than rulers, sharing power with aristocratic families and groups, as well as common citizens. In Kish, citizens could appoint a new king during crises, while in Uruk, assemblies of townsmen and elders had to ratify major military decisions.
The Sumerian city-states fell to the Akkadian and Babylonian Empires by 1750 BC, but Phoenician city-states, emerging about 250 years later in what is now Lebanon, revived republican ideals. Here, monarchical power was often shared with a merchant class and citizen council. Egyptian records dating to the mid-14th century BC describe Phoenician cities sending delegates to represent citizens rather than monarchs, with mentions of alliances and aid requests by the “men of Arwad” and “elders of Irqata.”
By the 6th century BC, the Phoenician city of Tyre had functioned for seven years without a monarch, governed instead under suffetes, or judges, elected for short terms. In Chios, a “people’s council” allowed citizens to debate laws and hold officials accountable. However, beginning in the 9th century BC and continuing over the next few centuries, Phoenician city-states were successively conquered or subjugated by the Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian, and Macedonian Empires.
Like other civilizations, Phoenicians established colonies and trading posts. Carthage, founded by Tyre in 814 BC in modern Tunisia, grew into a powerful city-state with its own republican features. By the early 7th century BC, two elected suffetes from aristocratic families replaced the monarchy. They governed alongside an aristocratic Senate, while newer merchants could gain influence and a popular assembly allowed citizens input on major decisions. Military and religious leaders also held considerable power.
Republican ideals weren’t confined to Mesopotamia and the Mediterranean. Buddhist texts like the Maha Parinibbana Sutta mention Indian republics called Gana-Sanghas in the 6th century BC. Some adopted republican styles of government, while others formed republican confederations, like Sumerian and Phoenician city-states, to make decisions collectively and protect against larger threats. The Indian republics were gradually absorbedby the Maurya Empire (321–185 BC) and other entities.
Ancient Greek city-states also developed republican ideals. Sparta was governed by a constitution and popular assembly as early as 600 BC, though it remained largely monarchical. Athens established a direct democracy in 507 BC, known as demokratia, meaning “people” and “rule.” Greece’s slave-based economy allowed some citizens time to participate in politics, though this limited political fairness. In 431 BC, Attica, the region surrounding Athens, had an estimated population of 315,000, of which only 172,000 were citizens, and just 40,000 male citizens could vote.
Still, Athens’s democratic system allowed these citizens to frequently debate, deliberate, and vote. They were overseen by the Council of Five Hundred, which was chosen annually by lot to draft laws and manage administration. However, following Athens’s Golden Age, 4th century BC Greek critics like Plato and Aristotle, and later historians like Polybius in the 2nd century BC, criticized the system for inefficiency and vulnerability to charismatic leaders to sway public opinion, leading to volatile policy shifts.
They emphasized balancing public, aristocracy, and monarchical roles to avoid the typical political cycle of chaos and order: first, a strong leader unites a restive society under a monarchy, which evolves into tyranny. It is overthrown and replaced by an aristocracy, which reduces into oligarchy. Democracy eventually replaces it but deteriorates into mob rule, restarting the cycle.
Invasions further weakened Greece’s republican and democratic systems, including in 338 BC, when Greece fell under the control of the Macedonian Empire, ending the independence of many city-states. Despite this, Greek states formed republican confederations to protect against threats, including the neighboring Roman Republic. The term republic derives from the Roman res publica, meaning “public affairs,” emphasizing shared governance, civic participation, and checks and balances. Since its founding in 509 BC, the Roman Republic’s political structure had evolved considerably. Polybius expressed appreciation for Rome’s system, where two tribunes were elected annually to represent the common citizens, while two consuls were elected and held executive power, checked by an aristocratic senate.
Romans were skeptical of Greek democracy, especially in Athens, due to its instability, infighting, and mob rule. Carthage’s republic seemed overly commercial and lacked the civic loyalty the Romans valued. This loyalty was central to Rome’s military, staffed by a citizen army motivated by shared rewards. In contrast, Carthage’s strong, citizen-led navy protected trade routes, but its reliance on mercenaries for land campaigns made them costly and unpredictable.
These factors reduced the ability to push back against Roman rule. By 146 BC, Rome defeated both Greece and Carthage, cementing its dominance and expanding political system. Polybius suggests that Rome’s success over Carthage was partially due to its powerful, aristocratic Senate, while Carthage’s policies were increasingly shaped by popular influence. He believed that Rome’s decisions were made by elites versus the influence of the masses in Carthage.
Yet by this time, Rome was approaching its Late Republic phase. The scholar Harriet Flower’s research argues that the Roman Republic wasn’t a single entity but a series of six republics, each with unique political characteristics. Others have also challenged the notion of a single Roman Republic, placing Republican Rome into three main periods characterized by changing centers of power.
The Early Republic (509–367 BC) was marked by tensions between patricians (aristocratic elites) and plebeians (common citizens). The struggle for plebeian rights led to significant reforms, including the establishment of tribunes, elected by the Concilium Plebis to represent common interests, and often from the plebeian class.
During the Middle Republic (367–133 BC), the Licinian-Sextian laws of 367 BC were passed to again alleviate tensions between patricians and plebeians, limiting patrician land ownership, providing debt relief for plebeians, and ensuring that at least one of the two consuls was a plebeian. However, political power increasingly concentrated in the Senate, undermining these reforms.
During the Late Republic (133–31 BC), Rome’s military success over rivals coincided with the growing influence of ordinary citizens in the judicial system, especially as jurors. Yet the republic was plagued by social conflict, corruption, and civil unrest. Sulla’s march on Rome in 88 BC and his curtailing of the tribunes’ power exemplified rising instability. After, figures like Pompey in the ’70s BC and Julius Caesar in 59 BC began consolidating power, further undermining republican values. In 27 BC, Augustus formally transitioned Rome into an empire, while maintaining the illusion of republican traditions.
Roman orator Cicero, a prominent defender of the Republic, inadvertently accelerated its demise through his support for Augustus, endorsement of dictatorial powers, and willingness to suspend legal norms during crises, showing the dangers of sacrificing republican ideals to manage turmoil. For the next few centuries, republican ideals were largely sidelined.
The collapse of the Western Roman Empire in 476 AD saw feudalism and monarchies spread across its former territories and peripheral regions. This instability nonetheless allowed new republics to emerge, such as Venice, founded in 697 AD. It maintained a 1,100-year run as a republic through a political system that encouraged merchant participation and representation, shrewd diplomacy, social mobility, community cohesion, and an extensive trade network. It was eventually conquered by France in 1797.
During the Italian Renaissance (14th to 17th centuries), urbanization, advancements in communication, and Enlightenment ideals enabled the rise of new city-states. Merchant classes and other groups established republican systems as alternatives to European monarchies elsewhere as well. However, they were ultimately absorbed by empires, partly due to their inability to exploit the expanding Atlantic trade routes that reduced the importance of the Mediterranean.
Republics were not confined to Europe. The Kongsi Republics in modern-day Malaysia, particularly the Lanfang Republic declared in 1777, arose when Chinese settlers recruited by local sultans for mining formed companies to safeguard their interests. Over time, they evolved into self-governing territories with elected leaders and various levels of democratic governance. The Lanfang Republic was eventually defeated by Dutch colonial forces in 1884, with the rest absorbed through treaty or militarily defeated by the century’s end.
The establishment of the United States marked the reemergence of the large-scale republican state. In 1787, after the Revolutionary War, the U.S. formally became a constitutional republic, aiming to eliminate monarchy while avoiding a chaotic direct democracy. The Founding Fathers created a mixed system, balancing public participation with safeguards against aristocracy and emphasizing consent of the governed (though limited to white male landowners). The debates over constitutional amendments and expanding democracy continued for decades, paralleling similar discussions in post-Revolutionary France after 1789.
Today, many republics exist, but their authenticity and stability can be compromised. Being conquered imposes outside authority, while others pursue foreign expansion themselves, centralizing control and subjugating other territories. Republics such as those in 16th century Netherlands, 17th century England, and 18th century U.S. and France grew into empires or reverted to monarchies, adapting in ways whose lessons are still relevant today. These expansionist policies, often justified as essential for wealth and security, led to the abandonment of certain republican and democratic principles.
Republics can also shift toward authoritarianism, with modern policymakers perceiving more open democratic systems as unstable and vulnerable to manipulation. In recent years, China and Russia have seen reductions in public accountability, civil liberties, meaningful political participation, and concentrations of power behind Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin. In North Korea, power has been concentrated in the leader’s office since its founding, with leadership passed within the Kim family. Similarly, a dynasty has developed under the Aliyev family in Azerbaijan since the 1990s, with concerns that Turkmenistan may follow.
Countries with strong presidential systems, common in the Americas, risk concentrating power in the executive branch. Fixed terms limit the removal of unpopular leaders, since, unlike in parliamentary democracies, no “confidence vote” mechanism exists for crisis situations. Partisan loyalty can also weaken checks and balances, and coups can be common.
Alliances and federations of Greek city-states like the Achaean and Lycian Leagues, as well as the Native American Iroquois Confederacy, formed assemblies and councils for representation and collective decision-making, influencing models like the U.S. Constitution and European Union (EU). The statement that the U.S. is “a republic, not a democracy” reflects the original aim to keep political power within the states rather than the federal government. However, authority has increasingly centralized in Washington, D.C., reducing state sovereignty, tensions mirrored in the EU between individual states and Brussels.
Political apathy and extremism can also stem from the influence of billionaires and corporations over the political process, government corruption, and the erosion of social mobility. Social media platforms offer the chance for heightened political participation, but are increasingly vulnerable to disinformation spread by big tech and political actors, revealing new ways in which democracies can veer toward mob rule.
The diversity of republics today reflects their historical variety, with countries still navigating the governance structures in their own contexts. Kazakhstan, initially authoritarian, has seen some shift toward a more balanced system with a more powerful parliament following popular protests in 2022, though it remains less democratic. Similarly, Singapore, often described as authoritarian, is still considered a republic due to some checks and balances, maintaining a blend of controlled leadership and political structure.
An informed and engaged citizenry, supported by a strong economic base, is essential for a successful republic. Citizens must feel the benefits of their system, and these must endure through fair elections, the rule of law, and due process. Effective foreign policy also relies on wide-ranging trade networks and adaptable alliances, while maintaining a strong military and avoiding military overreach or falling into the trap of foreign conquest.
Historically, empire and monarchy have been more common than republics, shaping world order through hierarchical and anarchic systems. Within the global UN framework, which is designed to support the sovereignty and equality of nations (a principle rooted in republican ideals), republics can govern more democratically by collaborating in a way similar to ancient confederations. The Achaean League and Lycian League consisted of states with varying political systems cooperating within a loose, republican-style confederation. Modern blocs like the EU, ASEAN, and African Union allow countries to work together under common principles and boost their voice in the international system.
Changes in domestic politics have meanwhile seen the growth of direct democracy in the 2010s, as more referendums and popular votes of legislative and constitutional issues emerged globally, but especially in Europe. While larger republics like the U.S., Germany, and India still avoid national-level votes on major issues, direct democracy is increasingly apparent at regional and local levels. Challenges remain in terms of deliberation and integration, as states like California and Arizona have seen ballot initiatives often rushed, leaving limited time for meaningful debate.
Modern citizens’ assemblies, based on those originating thousands of years ago, have also elevated these referendums in recent years and provided an alternative to traditional political processes. They have influenced major policy changes, such as climate policies in France to abortion laws in Ireland, with assemblies, typically convened by legislative bodies in partnership with nonprofits, designed to reflect demographics. While they have led to concrete policy shifts, some recommendations have not been adopted, with lawmakers citing the importance of expert-led decision-making.
With the U.S. election behind us, reassessing republican ideals, both domestically and globally, is crucial. As the GOP potentially gains control over all three branches of government in a divided nation, how it implements policies will either ease concerns or amplify them. The future of republicanism depends on the U.S. shaping its domestic agenda for the common good and using its influence on the global stage in line with democratic principles.
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I think I’ve mentioned this before, but this is my favourite quote from Will Cuppy:
“Carthage was governed by its rich men and was therefore a plutocracy. Rome was also governed by its rich men and was therefore a republic.”
The idea that a republic requires there to be no concentrations of power sits rather poorly with the powers of the President of the US Republic. However, the author is, I think, simply delusional, as shown by “the U.S. shaping its domestic agenda for the common good”, which certainly hasn’t happened since FDR died, and arguably, never happened at all.
Yeah, how he managed to write so many words about these supposed “republics” across history without even once mentioning the obvious word, “oligarchy” is rather suspicious.
oligarchy is reserved uniquely for eastern people.
I agree
And of course, Rome won and Rome wrote the history. Not much writing by Carthage survives, so perhaps they considered Rome a barbaric tyranny and the concept of “republic” (as opposed to monarchy) was just a disguise for oligarchy/plutocracy. The US won, so the Anglos write the history and spin it to make themselves look good. I guess it could be called typical ethnocentric hypocrisy. “We are virtuous and democratic, while the Other are barbaric, and autocratic”
An interesting historical overview. I find it amusing that the author upholds Venice as a long-lasting republic, whereas in reality it was an oligarchy that was governed by–and for the benefit of–its wealthy merchants. As for his book (Budget Superpower: How Russia Challenges the West With an Economy Smaller Than Texas), he really ought to familiarize himself with the World Bank’s current list of national economies ranked by purchasing power parity:
https://datacatalogfiles.worldbank.org/ddh-published/0038129/DR0046438/GDP_PPP.pdf?versionId=2024-07-01T12:42:31.4736462Z
More importantly: though he mentions the rise of direct democracy and citizens’ assemblies, he ignores the role of the Internet as a potential tool of good governance. His claim that “Republics require regular gathering and assemblies…” is largely obviated by (honestly administered) online voting and chat groups. Even authoritarian regimes can benefit greatly from an alert awareness of their country’s Internet activity. E.g., if the Kremlin sees a sustained spike in Yandex search results mentioning corruption or generally bad governance in Irkutsk Region, then it can guess that its local governor is doing a lousy job and take appropriate action before things spin out of control. I see nothing wrong with this type of benign surveillance (as long as it’s used wisely). To the extent that democracy is nothing more than a feedback mechanism (i.e., a way of ensuring that government officials are taking decisions that reflect the will and best overall interests of the citizenry), one can imagine that the Internet might replace or streamline many aspects of what republican governmental systems have tried to do over the centuries.
Thing is, a republic, as originally conceived, is a special form of oligarchy. In which power is distributed not across a few members of the elite, but the entire elite class.
This is where the author’s analysis starts to feel over-stretched. Prior to the 19th-20th centuries, all republics fit fairly neatly into the old Aristotelian Tyranny-Oligarchy-Democracy model. Venice was an oligarchy where all of the city’s aristocrats got to share in the political power, stand for office, eventually sit on the “council of elders” (or whatever its actual name was), and so on. In Rome, the Senate was selected mostly on the basis of wealth, and notwithstanding occasional constitutional reforms it was the Senate that actually did most of the governing. Those reforms, in fact, were typically passed in order to preserve the oligarchy, and in the end the Republic fell after a series of civil wars between the, crudely speaking, Franklin Roosevelts and Ronald Reagans of the 1st-2nd century B.C. In early US, the founders also chose the wealth principle to establish their republic, such that only 2%-3% of the adult population even had the right to vote.
I mean – the guy’s whole analytical framework feels backwards, because he keeps identifying oligarchies but not actually referring to them as such. Whereas the Greeks, e.g. Thucydides, explicitly focused on the tension between the oligarchs and the demos. And then there is the silly segue into the modern era, where we are meant to pretend that the US hasn’t reverted back to being a de facto, if not de jure, an oligarchy decades ago, after the whole New Deal-Great Society experiment was wound down. [Which itself was more of a Roman “populares” faction alleviating the plight of the plebeians to preserve the power of the patricians, but still.]
IMHO, and to Maxwell Johnston’s point, the unwinding of the New Deal was accomplished by the oligarchs’ (Lewis Powell, et al) reorganization of the First Estate (the clergy) as ‘journalists’.
My reaction precisely — how is it even possible to have a serious discussion about this topic without even once mentioning oligarchy?
Eh I don’t know if that’s the right history of Venice. I recall that the old rich families limited membership in the Venetian Council, then let in some people in one discrete period, then prohibited new families from directly entering the council. I think it was around 1300? A quick google search tells me I’m remembering the Serrata around 1323. So there’s some tension between maybe having a broad distribution of power among elites but actually only including old families in that elite class.
I was reading an account of Venice and it was not the sort of place that you wanted to shout out your opinions if you were a pleb. They had ways of dealing with such people and they were not good. And they had plenty of snitches as well. Come to think of it, it was a bit like ancient Athens that way where you had to watch what you said.
“…a republic, as originally conceived, is a special form of oligarchy.”
Indeed. There really is such as bright line delineating one form of government from another as certain promoters of democracy and republicanism would like people to believe.
Rome overthrew its kings and not long after the Republic was founded, the Conflict of the Orders started, with the plebs revolting because they knew they were getting screwed by the wealthy elites.
Same thing in ancient Greece – the “tyrants” of the 6th century BC gave way to democracy, but a pretty good argument can be made (I think Michael Hudson made it in a recent book) that the Greeks had a more equitable society under the “tyrants”. Ruling aristocratic families like the Alcmaeonids, which produced the self serving Alcibiades, certainly didn’t do the Greeks any favors.
In more modern times, the USSR broke up peacefully into a more republican form of government. One reason given for the dissolution of the USSR is that the ruling class under that system was taken care of pretty well with nice apartments in Moscow for example, but their rulers’ lifestyles paled in comparison to Western leaders, jet setting around the globe with their multiple residences and fat bank accounts. The reason USSR leadership allowed the breakup was because they wanted to cash in, and in the 90s they did just that – with a lot of help from oligarchs hailing from the US “democracy”.
Historically a republic was basically a government without a king (or emperor). It doesn’t mean that *all* people had representation, that would have been unthinkable for most ancient civilizations. Citizenship was strictly limited, and usually hereditary. That is my understanding, though I am not a political scientist.
Aristotle’s model is more complex. The Tyranny-Oligarchy-Democracy model is just half of it, the half acting not for the interests of the whole community, but for the particular groups in power. The good triad is represented in Aristotle’s mind by power holders acting for the betterment of their whole communities, and calls them Monarchy-Aristocracy-Polity.
> reality it was an oligarchy that was governed by
Well, yes. But the propaganda seems to have made them think it was a republic, which probably did influence their behaviour. During the plague in the 16th century, foreigners were surprised by the record amounts spent by the government to help the poor during the lockdown, while the Venetians themselves were proud of this effort.
…and another thing! [Yells at cloud.]
So I followed through one of the links to the Thorkild Jabobsen “Primitive Democracy in Ancient Mesopotamia” piece. Behold a quote from said:
“When the Babylonian empire ruled Mesopotamia, it is striking how many democratic features existed within the empire. Anyone could turn to the king with complaints. He investigated the complaints and then delegated the cases to a suitable court for decision. A court of royal officials and ‘judges of the king’ then dealt out justice…town mayors and elders settled minor local disputes…”
Is the esteemed Mr. Jabobsen inhaling mushrooms while taking crack cocaine intravenously? This literally describes how monarchy, i.e. a tyranny, works, with judicial power concentrated in the person of the king. In a smaller or less developed kingdom, he has to hear and settle cases and disputes personally, while in more advanced forms, he delegates this power to royal judges. None of this has anything to do with democracy!
Good god…
…incidentally, this reminds me of certain periods in the Chinese Empire days – which, for long stretches of time, functioned as a sort of a platonian republic, with the scholar-aristocrat class collectively running things and the emperor being a figurehead – where there were so many complaints and lawsuits being brought by the populace to the local courts, that a rule was instituted whereby every plaintiff would be subjected to torture in order to test the veracity of his claim. As well as every witness, of course. Talk about a creative way to reduce case load…
I’m reminded of Jacques Elull: From his intro to Propoganda
I am in favor of democracy, I can only regret that propaganda renders the true exercise of it almost impossible. But I think it would be even worse to entertain anv illusions about a co-existence of true democracy and propaganda. Nothing is worse in times of danger than to live in a dream world.
Democracy is based on the concept that man is rational and capable of seeing clearly what Is in
his own interest, but the study of public opinion suggests this is a highly doubtful proposition.
Heh. He sounds like he might have been cribbing from HL Mencken (or maybe it was the other way around). One of my favorites quotes from him –
“Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.”
Great quote. And Ed Bernays laid out how propaganda/public relations psychologically manipulates people to act against their interests. It is like a socio-psychological conditioning into collective Stockholm Syndrome. At least that is an analogy I use.
We could argue that the population was more capable of seeing their own interests before modern PR/propaganda emerged. After a lifetime of disinformation, emotional manipulation, and junk education, the average US “voter” often acts against their interests. Combine that with lack of meaningful choice and a corrupt electoral process, and we have public relations Democracy Inc. that is controlled and directed by the oligarchy. I would think that the US has developed the most pervasive, comprehensive and sophisticated system of disinformation and psych manipulation in the history of the world.
The late British journalist, Robert Fisk, said the US is even worse than the UK: he said every time he flew to the US, it was like entering a hermetically sealed bubble of misinformation and a sort of parallel universe
And of course, point of marketing is to convince consumers to buy stuff they don’t need, don’t want, and can’t afford. And what’s more to buy the stuff on credit and make oneself a debt peon. To be crude: much of our society and culture is based on half-truth, illusion, and even outright falsehood.
“…The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. …We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of…” Edward Bernays, Propaganda (1927)
Re: 83% of people in China saying their country was a ‘democracy’ vs. 49% of Americans saying the US was a ‘democracy.’
Even allowing for the vagaries of polling, the discrepancy between the the views of the populations is stark.
So, the meaning of ‘democracy’ (etymology, demos, people and kratos, rule) is subjective? If the population of a nation believes its needs are being met, that life is good, that their children and their grandchildren and their community are thriving and will even get better in the years ahead …. then they define their system of governance as a ‘democracy.’ Because, at the root, the people, and their welfare, the common good, rule.
Poli Sci 101: a system governs with the consent of the governed.
China has a very, very long history of revolution, chaos, and anarchy when the elites lose consent of other elites, or the people. The current “Communist” system is only 75 years old.
Then throw in the concept that Chinese elites (like Xi) are joining a long line of “strong men” leaders who want to propel their country’s development. Bread + circuses = consent.
Some systems (post-WW2 West) arguably “manufacture consent.” And when bread and circuses = too expensive, you get 2016, 2024 elections
I read a revisionist argument that the “democratic” direct election of US senators helped to cause more corruption in DC—as the original system of election by state legislators produced US senators more dependent on the support of state elites. I kinda agree.
Arguably, you don’t necessarily need direct elections to produce “democracy”—depends on the circumstances of each system.
The People’s Republic is the first avowedly socialist republic and deserves closer study by republican scholars.
When Mao designed it, he struggled with the tension between democracy and leadership, “What does democracy consist of? On what forces does it rely? How does it express itself? To some extent, of course, it expresses itself in the ballot box. It also expresses itself in the deliberations of the village councils, in the opinions seeping up through the ranks of the army, in the resolutions of county governments, in the overt signs of change which appear in the political atmosphere of the times. The main task of the leader is to keep his ear to the ground.” [On The New Democracy]
When a Reuters reporter asked him what kind of government he was planning for China, Mao replied, “It will implement Dr Sun Yat-sen’s three principles of democracy, Lincoln’s principle of ‘of the people, by the people, for the people,’ and Roosevelt’s Atlantic Charter. It will assure the independence and unity of the nation and cooperate with all democratic powers. [Takeuchi Minoru, Collected Writings of Mao Zedong, Tokyo: Hokubosha, 1970-1972].
Yet he retained the Chinese tradition of professional political leaders organized in what Daniel Bell calls a ‘just hierarchy’ of moral, intellectual, and functional ability. That’s why the People’s Republic of China is run by geniuses, recruited by examination, with IQs of 140+.
Alas, more of “the best and the brightest” …
Well, I wonder how many of our (U.S.) “leaders” have even heard of those things…
If what i have read is correct, you probably need to be very intelligent to get to the first step on the ladder. After that you climb the ladder, usually rather slowly, by showing good performance in a series of posts. Xi, apparently reached his current position after a lot of grunt work in the provinces to begin with if the wiki is accurate.
What you get at higher levels in administration are people with years of government experience, probably across several provinces.
If i understand correctly Trump’s pick for Secretary of Defence is a Fox News anchor. I’m sure he is smart.
The central problem with the piece is that it equates form and substance. It links the form of a republic, having no monarch, with the substance of a res publica, that the government answers broadly to the needs and interests of each class. It links the form of a democracy, like having voting procedures, with the substance of people having agency to direct the state to serve their interests. These are not the same things.
You can see this in how the author treats Mesopotamian and Roman cultures. He allows that Sumerian kings were accountable to the people, but he exaggerates the extent of their deference to leading classes. He then completely separates traditions of the Akkadians, Babylonians, and Assyrians from the Sumerian monarchies. However, there is no such distinction. A comparison of The Sumerians by Samuel Kramer with Assyria by Eckart Frahm would be a good place for the author to start. Even a king like Sargon of Akkad was doing things to build social capital in Uruk and Nippur. Even calling his an Akkadian empire and not just a big Sumerian empire is silly!
Likewise, the author seems to assume that the Roman republic was responsive to the needs of the people and that the empire was not. However, this is not straightforwardly clear. Most Romans thought of the emperor as the single biggest check on the patrician class. The popular assemblies in Rome didn’t get veterans citizenship and land in the colonies; it was emperors. Newer histories of the Roman empire even into the eastern empire in the medieval period highlight this expectation of responsiveness. I’m not going to list an early empire history, but the ideology of the responsive, dare I say “republican” emperor, has currency throughout modern scholarship–try asides about the emperor in Through the Eye of a Needle by Peter Brown or try The New Roman Empire by Anthony Kaldellis.
I’m sure the author doesn’t really even grasp how European monarchies had to manage their states. Sure, monarchs had a lot of power and could be repressive. But the overwhelming majority of them had to answer to councils, ranging from the parliament, to the estates general, to the cortes of Castile and Aragon. Monarchs always had to balance the sentiment of various classes and the interests of nobles, and it’s more a spectrum of how much voice the peasants might have had than a notion that the monarch had no limits. I find it a very outdated conception of history that all monarchies were unchecked despotisms until the Glorious Revolution and French Revolution made kings limited rulers. It would be better to say that all kings were limited to their resources (money, military, and political capital) until kings with nearly unlimited capital like Charles V threatened elimination of traditional constitutional checks–and were met with responses like the Dutch revolt and even the revolt of the comuneros in Spain.
It ultimately amounts to the idea that form can substitute for substance, which is mighty convenient for the wealthy and powerful in our society, but actually wrong. It also implies that the only way to hold a ruler accountable is to demand voting procedures, not to demand enactment of substantive policies, which again is mighty convenient for people who don’t want actual policies to change.
Nice rebuttal.
I think David G and David W did a great work putting a proper foundational stone with “The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity” exposing the smorgasboard of political inovations people from times immemorial and from all over have come up with.
Also, as Pres Xi noted, it is ultimately the outcome that matters, does it benefit the population? Does the government provide on its promises? I think Thomas Paine said something on the line – a good government is one that governs the best, or something to that effect.
So, how we get such governments and how we maintain such governments?
In my view, on the long run, the best check is sortition for ellection of representatives and executive officials, with thorough and from infancy good education, with the biggest emphasis on ethics. Might give us a chance…
“Republics have suffered total collapses throughout history, and there’s no reason why the United States should be immune.” I agree, and imo having collapsed twice we are in our third republic or even a fourth republic.
The first republic endured roughly 80 years and ended in 1861 when the Civil War began. Lincoln campaigned in opposition to the expansion of slavery in the new western territories. He soon realized, perhaps before anybody else, that it was not enough to defeat the Confederate army. Instead, the entire southern system, its slave economy and culture had to be eradicated and the US itself had to fundamentally change, which it did with the 13th, 14th, and 15th Civil War Amendments. The US was a different country after 1865.
I think a good case can be made that the onset of the Great Depression in 1929 ended the second republic and ushered in the third with the election of FDR and the radical expansion of the federal government with the New Deal.
There is also a reason to suggest the fourth republic began when President Harry Truman signed the 1947 National Security Act which, among other things, created the CIA and helped make the US a global military/intelligence state, but I’m not sure if that is enough to qualify the US as a new republic.
While I’m confident the Civil War and New Deal made the US a better country, however, we might not be so lucky with the Trump presidency and what appears to be the cusp of a political realignment and which might prove very good, very bad, or both depending on the internal resistance and external events.
Nonetheless, the collapse of the republic and birth of a new one need not necessarily be a bad thing if the people and elites support sensible and equitable policies.
American Ferengi – Rules of Acquisition. By coincidence, last night I reviewed the Ferengi Rules of Acquisition at the site I link below. Above the list is this comment on the Ferengi, which is a perfect description of the values of Wall Street imposed on us normals (my bold):
“Ferengi are a species from StarTrek that was particularly highlighted in Deep Space 9. Their religion is commerce and their society is determined by profit.”
https://projectsanctuary.com/the_complete_ferengi_rules_of_acquisition.htm
Not that most here don’t already recognize this as the true state of “our democracy”.
I should have added that I disagree with the statement here that neoliberalism is defined by the often referenced 2 Rules which we all know here. I firmly believe that neoliberalism values are more like the Ferengi Rules of Acquisition. My favorite for understanding insurance is rule #1. “Once you have their money, never give it back.”
To clarify my reason for posting on this article about republics, once the “Ferengis” are in charge the claim of being a republic is an illusion.
The Ferengi likely represent the mirror put in front of American viewers to see who they really are, deep down. They are just a carricature or a model, a bit exagerated, but nevertheless, a workable one, for understanding reality…
The Roman Republic had regimented citizen armies. Regimented armies tend to do pretty well against the competition, and Rome had a habit of coming back after they lost twice.
Anyways, regimental armies are useful, but when they are not engaged in warfare, the State risks revolt unless it can bind their loyalty with say the perks of citizenship.
In the early American Republic, flintlock days, regimented citizen armies had enormous capabilities for concentrated fire power. However, the Whiskey Rebellion showed that armed citizens could be a liability as well. The Republic helped to bind the loyalty of the trained, regimental conscript troops.
I’m not sure that Republics (at least on Roman or American lines) make a lot of sense outside of a context in which regimented citizen armies can sweep the field (like in Napoleonic period or WWI). Warfare is going to become increasingly capital intensive, fought by unmanned drones and robots, and elites will just be able to mow down the plebes with their dog robots if they get unruly. Here’s looking forward to tomorrow! /sarc.
As always, political terms may have multiple meanings, and different interpretations.
Republic, from the Latin: res publica (public affair/thing) as opposed to res privatae.
In our culture it has come to mean:
“a: a government in which the power belongs to a body of citizens entitled to vote and is exercised by the leaders and representatives elected by those citizens to govern according to law”
but definition c seems more accurate in today.
“c: a country, state, or territory that is headed by someone other than a hereditary monarch but whose citizens do not hold real power”
https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/republic
We’re formally a, actually c. Not so different from Russia, or even Chinese local elections if you consider the power of the duopoly over viable nominees to be as strong as the power of the CCP. Our civil liberties are of course much better but don’t translate to real political power, and ultimately are used to subvert the power of the state that the people need over the power of money, through the perversion of 1st Amendment doctrine.
I would say our “civil liberties” being “much better” is highly debatable: After reading about the Palmer Raids, McCarthyite purges, COINTELPRO, FBI corruption and abuses etc…and now with what happened to anti-genocide protesters I would not be so sure that our civil liberties are “much better”.
Journalists, academics, govt officials, and politicians can be purged and blacklisted if they step out of line: Chris Hedges, Scott Ritter, Dennis Kucinich, Ron Paul, Cynthia McKinney, Joe Lauria, Norman Finkelstein and many many more. Shireen Abu Akleh (journalist and US citizen) was shot in the head in broad daylight by Israeli snipers – it was recorded on video even. The US did NOTHING.
Civil liberties? We can ask Ed Snowden about that as well.
Can’t argue with that.
From a journal in Phylosopy or such, an article on US political system, the conclusion was that the US is a Plutocratic demagogic democracy: plutocracy rule, making heavy use of demagogy, and validated its stay in power through a fake democratic process…
John Ma has recently written a magnificent 736-page book entitled “Polis: A new history of the ancient Greek city-state from the early Iron Age to the end of antiquity.”
In his analysis, he argues that the six and a half centuries from 350 BC until AD 300, from the Hellenistic to the Roman world, should be reconceived as a single long classical period of stability, prosperity, and egalitarian self-government in the Greek polis. Ma maintains that it was only in the 4th century AD, when systematic financial and military crises led to a dramatic centralization of Roman imperial government, that the old city states finally declined into mere urban centers. (See review of this book in the Times Literary Supplement Oct. 25 2024).
Ma basically maintains that the Greek city-state did not merely survive under the Roman Empire but managed to shape that empire in its own image, from the bottom up.
His kind of historical analysis, coupled with some of what Ruehl relates above, gives me great hope.
That doesn’t ring veryt true… as in where are Draco and his laws, and Solon and his “revolution”…
I find Collapse of Antiquity (Hudson, 2023) to be a more helpful analysis.
https://www.amazon.com/Collapse-Antiquity-Michael-Hudson/dp/394954612X
It is interesting that little distinction is made between a republic and a democracy. Plato’s criticism of democracy was that it easily degenerates into mob-rule. Through his effort, the idea of a republic was codified as something very different than a democracy. In short, a republic is based on using reason in attempting to do the Good. Reason gives us the power to examine ideas as to whether or not they will effect the Good. Of course that begs the idea of what is the Good. To my mind, it is that which expands and develops the power of consciousness in the universe to exist. As Elon Musk might say, that means we need more people at a standard of living commensurate with that which is needed to nurture the creative powers of mind unique(so far as we know) to the Human.
For reference you might want to look at: What is God, that Man is in His image? by Lyndon LaRouche [https://www.scribd.com/document/351149012/Larouche-What-is-God-That-Man-is-in-His-Image]
Plato also had “Guardians” to preserve his Res Publica and they sent their offspring to select schools to produce Future Guardians a bit like the European School in Brussels where Eurocrats send their children as with Boris Johnson and VdL both of whose fathers were Eurocrats
Plato’s Law of Revolution was that inly a split in the Ruling Class could facilitate Revolution
I think of the PayPal Gang – Musk and Thiel as a counter group to the Zuckerberg-Brin faction in Silicon Valley Oligarchy
Monarchies did not „decline“ post WW1. They were violently overthrown even to regions like Bavaria or Saxony or Thuringia which ALL became Free States in 1923 and faced Communist violence. Even Poland was created as a Republic in 1918 instead of the tradition of an Elected Monarchy but turned into a dictatorship by 1935
Greece overthrew its monarch in 1947 despite Churchill trying to keep it in place during a civil war and Prince Philip married Elizabeth II in England
Republics die which is why France readies for a Sixth and Germany watches the 2nd Berlin Republic implode – Weimar was temporary home for the First Berlin Republic since Communists controlled Berlin
Fascinating discussion; unfortunately, most of the American electorate have no clue what you’re talking about. In large part, because of the “junk education” mentioned above, they don’t even understand Eclair’s reference to “the common good”. Even more fundamentally, they’re opposed to the very concept and have no desire to share anything with any of the common