Republicanism

Republicanism is a political ideology that places a strong emphasis on belonging to a republican state. It has historically ranged from the oligarchy or rule of a representative minority to popular sovereignty. Depending on the historical setting and methodological approach, it has undergone several definitions and interpretations that greatly vary from one another. The Latin noun-phrase res publica (public thing), which described the form of administration that evolved in the sixth century BCE when Lucius Junius Brutus and Collatinus ousted the kings from Rome, is where the word “republic” originates from.

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History of Republicanism

Ancient Greece

Res publica is the conventional Latin translation of the Greek term “politeia”. As a result, political philosophy until recently frequently employed the term “republic” in its broadest definition. There isn’t a single written word or definition from this time that perfectly captures how we currently define the term “republic,” although writings by Plato, Aristotle, and Polybius contain the majority of its key components. These include civic virtue theories and mixed-government philosophies. For instance, Plato emphasises the value of civic virtue (striving for the good) and personal virtue (the “just man”) on the part of the ideal rulers in The Republic. Many Ancient Greek city-states, like Sparta and Athens, were referred to as “classical republics” because their citizens actively participated in political decision-making as well as legislation. Aristotle regarded Carthage as a republic because it had a governmental structure resembling that of several Greek towns, most notably Sparta, while avoiding some of their flaws.

Renaissance Republicanism

In the late Middle Ages, a number of states that emerged from mediaeval communes adopted a republican form of administration, reviving republicanism in Europe. The merchant class had become well-established in these typically modest but prosperous trading states. Due to its reliance on ancient precedents, the republicanism that emerged during the Renaissance is known as “classical republicanism”.  An alternative term has been suggested: “early modern republicanism”. Additionally known as civic humanism. Early modern thinkers imagined an ideal republic that went beyond just being non-monarchical and stressed the importance of mixed administration as well as the belief that virtue and the common good were at the heart of effective governance. Republicanism also evolved a unique understanding of liberty.

Rarely did Renaissance writers who praised republics criticise the monarchy. While Niccol Machiavelli’s Discourses on Livy is the period’s important book on republics, he also published the treatise The Prince, which is more remembered and frequently read, on how to administer a monarchy. The republican model was not viewed as being widely applicable by early modern thinkers; the majority believed that it could only work in extremely small, highly urbanised city-states.

Dutch Republic

Throughout and after the Eighty Years’ War, which started in 1568, anti-monarchism grew more vociferous in the Dutch Republic. The majority of the anti-monarchist publications took the form of widely disseminated pamphlets, indicating that this anti-monarchism was more of propaganda than it was a political philosophy. This developed into a thorough examination of a monarchy. They considered all monarchies to be fundamentally corrupt, illegitimate tyrannies. These writers were less interested in criticising their past rulers and more concerned with avoiding the Stadholder post from becoming a monarchy. During the Wars of Religion, Dutch republicanism had an impact on French Huguenots as well. The republicanism in the other nations of early modern Europe was more restrained.

Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth

The dominant ideology in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was republicanism. Following the founding of the Commonwealth of Two Nations, republicans backed the status quo, which included a very weak monarchy, and disagreed with those who favoured a powerful monarchy. These primarily Polish republicans had a thorough knowledge of classical and Renaissance literature and firmly held that their country was a republic after the Roman model. Unusually, the landed nobility, who would lose power if the monarchy was expanded, supported Polish-Lithuanian republicanism rather than the commercial class. As a result, the wealthy landowners formed an oligarchy.

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Enlightenment Republicanism

Corsica

On the tiny Mediterranean island of Corsica, the first of the Enlightenment republics founded in Europe during the eighteenth century took place. A tradition of village democracy, diverse cultural influences from the Italian city-states, the Spanish empire, and the Kingdom of France, also left it open to the ideologies of the Italian Renaissance, Spanish humanism, and French Enlightenment, and a geo-political location between these three competing powers that led to frequent power struggles made Corsica unique, even though it may seem an unlikely location to serve as a laboratory for such political experiments. Between 1755 to 1769, a period of fifteen years, the Corsican Republic existed. Ultimately, it was overthrown by a coalition of Genoese and French armies and became a province of the Kingdom of France. However, the incident made waves in Europe as a pioneering instance of constitutional republicanism.

The French Enlightenment philosophers were particularly influenced by it; Rousseau’s famous work On the Social Contract of 1762 (chapter 10, book II) stated, in its discussion of the prerequisites for functional popular sovereignty, that “The French island of Corsica is the only remaining sovereign state in Europe. It is only fitting that a wise man instructs those valiant people on how to protect the freedom they have fought so valiantly and persistently to regain and safeguard. I have a hunch that tiny island would one day surprise Europe” Rousseau really offered to do just that, providing Paoli’s with a draught constitution.

England

Following the overthrow of King Charles I, Oliver Cromwell established the Commonwealth of England (1649 to 1660), a Christian republic that he administered. At that time, James Harrington was regarded as a renowned republican philosopher. Another significant Republican thinker at the time was John Milton, who also expressed his opinions through poetry and prose as well as in political pamphlets. Milton, for example, suggests that unfit monarchs should be brought to justice and that such difficulties go beyond the bounds of one nation in his epic poem Paradise Lost by drawing on Satan’s fall. As per Warren and other historians, this type of global Miltonic republicanism had an impact on later intellectuals, such as the reactionaries Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels in the 19th century. In England’s ruling elites, republicanism was discredited by the fall of the Commonwealth of England in the year 1660 and the reinstatement of the monarchy under Charles II. However, they supported John Locke’s liberalism and stress on rights, which were crucial to the Glorious Revolution of 1688.

Républicanisme

The French Revolution was greatly influenced by republicanism, particularly Rousseau’s, which was a precursor to modern republicanism. After abolishing the French monarchy in the 1790s, the revolutionaries first established a republic; Napoleon then turned it into an empire with a new nobility. Some of the advances made by the progressive political theorists of the Enlightenment were accepted by Belgium in the 1830s. Modern republicanism has a French equivalent known as républicanisme. It is derived from Jean-Jacques Rousseau’s concept of a general will and is a type of social contract. Every person should have a direct line of communication with the government, which would eliminate the necessity for identity politics based on place of origin, religion, or race. Although républicanisme theoretically renders anti-discrimination legislation unnecessary, some detractors contend that colour-blind laws actually serve to perpetuate discrimination.

Modern Republicanism

Far beyond the civic humanism of the Renaissance, anti-monarchism developed during the Enlightenment. Classical republicanism, which is still backed by thinkers like Rousseau and Montesquieu, was just one of several philosophies that attempted to restrain monarchy rather than outright oppose them. Liberalism and socialism broke with the traditional republicanism and aided in the growth of the more contemporary republicanism.

Theories of Republicanism

Neo-Republicanism

Neorepublicanism is the attempt of modern academics to incorporate elements of the classical republican tradition into the creation of an alluring public philosophy with a focus on modern issues. The left-wing alternative postsocialist criticism of market society is known as neorepublicanism.

Democracy

Democracy and republicanism converged in the late 18th century. Republicanism is a political philosophy that opposes or supports inherited power. Liberty is prioritised, while corruption is rejected. It had a significant impact on both the French and American Revolutions in the 1770s and 1790s, respectively. In these two instances, Republicans had a propensity to decry inherited elites and aristocracies. Though theoretically distinct from democracy, republicanism shared two fundamental tenets with democracy: governance by the agreement of the governed and popular sovereignty. In essence, republicanism was the belief that the people themselves were the true rulers, not kings or aristocracies. Democracy determined exactly how the people were to rule because republicanism could not provide a certain method. Nowadays, a government elected by the public, whether it is direct or representative, is referred to as a democracy. The word “republic” today typically refers to a representative democracy having an elected head of state, like a president, who holds office for a specific period of time. This is in contrast to states with hereditary monarchs as heads of state, even though these states also have an elected or appointed head of government, such as a prime minister, in representative democracies.

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