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Curious if when Queen Elizabeth passes away, if there will be a surge in republican interest in the various realms outside of the UK. For the vast majority of t

Curious if when Queen Elizabeth passes away, if there will be a surge in republican interest in the various realms outside of the UK. For the vast majority of the population in those countries, she's the only monarch they've ever known. Once Charles, or perhaps William, takes over, that link to the past will have been severed.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
ggm 5y ago
Australia voted no. Many assume this was older anglo Australians who revere the Queen and hope for a re vote when Charles accedes to the throne. He's a nong, and has much less visible support, and even active opposition. I personally suspect it's the dichotomy of directly elected president or a chamber elected symbolic president which functionally is what the governor general is. Basically the republican vote was split while the royalist vote was clear behind one outcome. I voted for a republic. I wouldn't have, if the intent was to make it a direct election. I prefer the bicameral chambers to do it, a symbolic minor depoliticised role is better to me, than a standard strong popular elected president. Also, referendum being expensive there was another question about a preamble to the constitution recognising aboriginal Australians. Again, this had divided support because of (in my personal opinion) a dishonest claim it discriminated between Australians. Two questions has some evidence causes higher no votes to both questions than one simple question.
- dane-pgp 5y ago
  > a symbolic minor depoliticised role is better to me There would be no harm in directly electing such a person, and it would be good to prevent the government of the day using its majority to elect a president who just rubber-stamps whatever they want. The advantage of having a directly elected president, is that they can act as a check and balance against a government which concentrates executive and legislative power into the hands of one party and effectively one person, the Prime Minister. By limiting the president's powers to just vetoing legislation and resolving confidence/dismissal issues, these levers of power would be available for use, sparingly, and in a democratically accountable way. In return, parliament would have the ability to impeach the president or call a new presidential election. This would prevent the president from interfering unduly in the day-to-day running of the country.
  - ggm 5y ago
    This is something I just fundamentally disagree with. There are far more examples of good democracies with indirectly elected presidents and far more examples of directly elected politicised presidents, than would let me be optimistic for your model. Plus, I think you misunderstand the role of a symbolic president, they are not meant to be the arbiter of fit laws passed in vote by parliament.
    - dane-pgp 5y ago
      I wasn't arguing in favour of a purely symbolic president, but I should have made that clear at the start of my reply, I apologise. The kind of role I was imagining is one that could have a legal continuity with the GG role (and could keep the same name), but their mandate would come from the people, and not the monarch. My point was, by limiting their power, they would be very different from a US style executive president, and ideally (if the government of the day was doing its job properly) this president would indeed find themselves only performing symbolic/ceremonial functions.
  - JamisonM 5y ago
    If you gave an elected official outside of parliament the power to veto legislation they would have a lot more power than the governor general now wields in practice. While royal assent is technically a power held by a GG they don't actually wield it in practice, once that power were given to an elected office then the elections would become about the use of that power and the role would be very different.
    - ggm 5y ago
      Yes, I think this is what I wanted to say.
    - dane-pgp 5y ago
      I would say that if someone has a power and chooses to never use it, that is itself a political act (one which is biased towards the governing party). Giving this power a democratic mandate and legitimacy may make the role "very different", but that doesn't mean the constitutional dynamic would be worse.
- skissane 5y ago
  > I voted for a republic. I wouldn't have, if the intent was to make it a direct election. What is wrong with the Irish model? A President who is directly elected, but also largely apolitical, a mostly ceremonial role with strictly limited powers. A key element of the Irish model is tough nomination criteria - to run for President, one must be nominated either by 20 members of Parliament (9% of the total), or by 4 county/city councils (almost 13% of Ireland’s total). (A former President can self-nominate, although a President can only serve two seven year terms in their life.) This helps stop Presidential candidates coming from the political fringes. Although Ireland has less than one fifth of Australia’s population, its Parliament (the Oireachtas) has almost as many members as Australia’s does, so the 20 member nomination threshold would be approximately equivalent in Australia. The 4 councils nomination threshold does not translate so well, since Australia has three levels of government (federal, state or local) while Ireland has only two (national and local). Roughly equivalent would be nomination by one of the state/territory governments, or by 69 LGAs.
  - throw0101a 5y ago
    > What is wrong with the Irish model? A President who is directly elected, but also largely apolitical, a mostly ceremonial role with strictly limited powers. Nothing necessarily, as long as people understand it is a symbolic position. It is interesting to note that of the top ten countries in The Economist's Democracy Index, eight are constitutional monarchies: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_Index#By_country https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_Index#By_country Ireland and Iceland are the two that are not, and Iceland changed to a republic in "only" 1944. In the top twenty, a lot of the countries also have ceremonial heads of state.
motohagiography 5y ago
This actually terrified me, as Britain being willing to give up the commonwealth when the Queen dies may mean serious contests for who gets to write new constitutions. It's not so much a matter of removing the Queen as head of state as unsealing the document, so someone says while you are there, we need this, and we will fight you if we don't get it. You see how this escalates immediately, and all together within months of the Queen's death. What are the odds of over 50 countries ever trying to rewrite their constitutions in a lifetime, and then again what are they to do that simultaneously ? Absurd, impossible odds, total black swan. Except if the Queen dies. I can only hope it will be mostly peaceful?
- muststopmyths 5y ago
  >What are the odds of over 50 countries ever trying to rewrite their constitutions in a lifetime, Why would 50 countries be rewriting their constitutions ? Only 16 "realms" of the Commonwealth actually have the Queen as head of state.
  - motohagiography 5y ago
    I knew there was something dumb about that, and meant to get it in the edit but walked away. Barring the extra dumb part, constitutional conflicts can be contagious, was my point.
- dragonwriter 5y ago
  > This actually terrified me, as Britain being willing to give up the commonwealth when the Queen dies may mean serious contests for who gets to write new constitutions No one is talking about terminating the Commonwealth. Nor does Britain qua Britain have any role in any of this. These are separate constitutional monarchies vested in the same individual but with entirely separate governments. Britain already gave up authority over them when they became independent. > It's not so much a matter of removing the Queen as head of state as unsealing the document In many cases, the documents have been revised multiple times in recent decades. They aren't Holy Writ. And while a less popular monarch may accelerate Republicanism, its unlikely to trigger a simultaneous rush for the exits. > someone says while you are there, we need this, and we will fight you if we don't get it. You see how this escalates immediately, and all together within months of the Queen's death. I see what you arr imagining, but I don't see it as particularly likely. > What are the odds of over 50 countries ever trying to rewrite their constitutions in a lifetime, Pretty high. In fact, pretty much every country on Earth, of which therr are significantly more than 50, has revised their Constituion in living memory, most have done so in the last 20 years. [0] > and then again what are they to do that simultaneously ? Again, there are probably more than 50 working on revisions at any given time. Not unusual at all. > I can only hope it will be mostly peaceful? Why wouldn't it be? The (much fewer than 50) countries sharing a monarch with the UK are largely ones that have revised their Constitutions peacefully multiple times recently. [0] https://comparativeconstitutionsproject.org/chronology/ https://comparativeconstitutionsproject.org/chronology/
Mikeb85 5y ago
I (Canadian) would personally vote to be a republic. Symbolic or not, I think it's absurd that hereditary rule exists in any form in the current day and age.
- rnmwfQ3f 5y ago
  Why is that absurd?
  - kortilla 5y ago
    Because it’s irrelevant.
  - hvusslax 5y ago
    Inheriting constitutionally priveliged positions seems a bit hard to square with everyone being equal before the law.
    - w0de0 5y ago
      Neither position is inherently absurd, nor is their contradiction. A more thoughtful response might have taken the time to contemplate the origins of government and the relationship between “absurdity,” your understanding of government and of virtuous government, and of the post-enlightenment ideologies assumed natural to our societies; in truth the vague syllogism between law and privilege you present is not some physical reality or logical QED but a gestural summation of ideas only very lately arrived to human affairs. Contemplative silence is one among many more interesting responses that were available to you. In short: it’s obvious that ancient institutions and modern humanism are absurdly dissonant. Cleary OP meant to provoke a reconsideration, not a restatement, of the obvious. Ironically it is obvious that one should not bother trying to rescue internet comments from their own pig-headedness - but sometimes I do sorely miss past iterations of HN.
      - hvusslax 5y ago
        You did not need to break your contemplative silence to write this empty pretentious drivel. OP asked a question. I gave what seems to me to be the obvious answer.
emodendroket 5y ago
I listened to someone saying that in Canada it would just be a ton of legal headaches to try and excise the monarchy and most people just don't see the point when they don't expect much would change in practice. I imagine other places would have this issue.
_ph_ 5y ago
Indeed. I wonder how many, who in those states support monarchy, do this because the Queen is a well known entity. People know her as the head of state, mostly keeping herself out of politics. Abolishing monarchy formally would mean that you risk to get a president, who might be a disappointment. Something similar could be observed in Germany: Angela Merkel kept winning elections, because there were enough people who wanted her to keep her office, even if they otherwise might not have voted for her party. This explains - at least to a part - the huge shift in the political landscape when she announced that she wouldn't run in this years election. This was amplified though by her party not being able to find a strong successor and tied up in internal struggles. I am sure, with the death of the Queen, a lot of states might reconsider formally being a monarchy, depending how her succession turns out. Even in the UK itself, monarchy is discussed and there were times in recent history, where the royal family hat little public support.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

ggm 5y ago

Australia voted no. Many assume this was older anglo Australians who revere the Queen and hope for a re vote when Charles accedes to the throne. He's a nong, and has much less visible support, and even active opposition. I personally suspect it's the dichotomy of directly elected president or a chamber elected symbolic president which functionally is what the governor general is. Basically the republican vote was split while the royalist vote was clear behind one outcome. I voted for a republic. I wouldn't have, if the intent was to make it a direct election. I prefer the bicameral chambers to do it, a symbolic minor depoliticised role is better to me, than a standard strong popular elected president. Also, referendum being expensive there was another question about a preamble to the constitution recognising aboriginal Australians. Again, this had divided support because of (in my personal opinion) a dishonest claim it discriminated between Australians. Two questions has some evidence causes higher no votes to both questions than one simple question.

dane-pgp 5y ago
> a symbolic minor depoliticised role is better to me There would be no harm in directly electing such a person, and it would be good to prevent the government of the day using its majority to elect a president who just rubber-stamps whatever they want. The advantage of having a directly elected president, is that they can act as a check and balance against a government which concentrates executive and legislative power into the hands of one party and effectively one person, the Prime Minister. By limiting the president's powers to just vetoing legislation and resolving confidence/dismissal issues, these levers of power would be available for use, sparingly, and in a democratically accountable way. In return, parliament would have the ability to impeach the president or call a new presidential election. This would prevent the president from interfering unduly in the day-to-day running of the country.
- ggm 5y ago
  This is something I just fundamentally disagree with. There are far more examples of good democracies with indirectly elected presidents and far more examples of directly elected politicised presidents, than would let me be optimistic for your model. Plus, I think you misunderstand the role of a symbolic president, they are not meant to be the arbiter of fit laws passed in vote by parliament.
  - dane-pgp 5y ago
    I wasn't arguing in favour of a purely symbolic president, but I should have made that clear at the start of my reply, I apologise. The kind of role I was imagining is one that could have a legal continuity with the GG role (and could keep the same name), but their mandate would come from the people, and not the monarch. My point was, by limiting their power, they would be very different from a US style executive president, and ideally (if the government of the day was doing its job properly) this president would indeed find themselves only performing symbolic/ceremonial functions.
- JamisonM 5y ago
  If you gave an elected official outside of parliament the power to veto legislation they would have a lot more power than the governor general now wields in practice. While royal assent is technically a power held by a GG they don't actually wield it in practice, once that power were given to an elected office then the elections would become about the use of that power and the role would be very different.
  - ggm 5y ago
    Yes, I think this is what I wanted to say.
  - dane-pgp 5y ago
    I would say that if someone has a power and chooses to never use it, that is itself a political act (one which is biased towards the governing party). Giving this power a democratic mandate and legitimacy may make the role "very different", but that doesn't mean the constitutional dynamic would be worse.
skissane 5y ago
> I voted for a republic. I wouldn't have, if the intent was to make it a direct election. What is wrong with the Irish model? A President who is directly elected, but also largely apolitical, a mostly ceremonial role with strictly limited powers. A key element of the Irish model is tough nomination criteria - to run for President, one must be nominated either by 20 members of Parliament (9% of the total), or by 4 county/city councils (almost 13% of Ireland’s total). (A former President can self-nominate, although a President can only serve two seven year terms in their life.) This helps stop Presidential candidates coming from the political fringes. Although Ireland has less than one fifth of Australia’s population, its Parliament (the Oireachtas) has almost as many members as Australia’s does, so the 20 member nomination threshold would be approximately equivalent in Australia. The 4 councils nomination threshold does not translate so well, since Australia has three levels of government (federal, state or local) while Ireland has only two (national and local). Roughly equivalent would be nomination by one of the state/territory governments, or by 69 LGAs.
- throw0101a 5y ago
  > What is wrong with the Irish model? A President who is directly elected, but also largely apolitical, a mostly ceremonial role with strictly limited powers. Nothing necessarily, as long as people understand it is a symbolic position. It is interesting to note that of the top ten countries in The Economist's Democracy Index, eight are constitutional monarchies: * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_Index#By_country https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy_Index#By_country Ireland and Iceland are the two that are not, and Iceland changed to a republic in "only" 1944. In the top twenty, a lot of the countries also have ceremonial heads of state.

motohagiography 5y ago

This actually terrified me, as Britain being willing to give up the commonwealth when the Queen dies may mean serious contests for who gets to write new constitutions. It's not so much a matter of removing the Queen as head of state as unsealing the document, so someone says while you are there, we need this, and we will fight you if we don't get it. You see how this escalates immediately, and all together within months of the Queen's death. What are the odds of over 50 countries ever trying to rewrite their constitutions in a lifetime, and then again what are they to do that simultaneously ? Absurd, impossible odds, total black swan. Except if the Queen dies. I can only hope it will be mostly peaceful?

muststopmyths 5y ago
>What are the odds of over 50 countries ever trying to rewrite their constitutions in a lifetime, Why would 50 countries be rewriting their constitutions ? Only 16 "realms" of the Commonwealth actually have the Queen as head of state.
- motohagiography 5y ago
  I knew there was something dumb about that, and meant to get it in the edit but walked away. Barring the extra dumb part, constitutional conflicts can be contagious, was my point.
dragonwriter 5y ago
> This actually terrified me, as Britain being willing to give up the commonwealth when the Queen dies may mean serious contests for who gets to write new constitutions No one is talking about terminating the Commonwealth. Nor does Britain qua Britain have any role in any of this. These are separate constitutional monarchies vested in the same individual but with entirely separate governments. Britain already gave up authority over them when they became independent. > It's not so much a matter of removing the Queen as head of state as unsealing the document In many cases, the documents have been revised multiple times in recent decades. They aren't Holy Writ. And while a less popular monarch may accelerate Republicanism, its unlikely to trigger a simultaneous rush for the exits. > someone says while you are there, we need this, and we will fight you if we don't get it. You see how this escalates immediately, and all together within months of the Queen's death. I see what you arr imagining, but I don't see it as particularly likely. > What are the odds of over 50 countries ever trying to rewrite their constitutions in a lifetime, Pretty high. In fact, pretty much every country on Earth, of which therr are significantly more than 50, has revised their Constituion in living memory, most have done so in the last 20 years. [0] > and then again what are they to do that simultaneously ? Again, there are probably more than 50 working on revisions at any given time. Not unusual at all. > I can only hope it will be mostly peaceful? Why wouldn't it be? The (much fewer than 50) countries sharing a monarch with the UK are largely ones that have revised their Constitutions peacefully multiple times recently. [0] https://comparativeconstitutionsproject.org/chronology/ https://comparativeconstitutionsproject.org/chronology/

Mikeb85 5y ago

I (Canadian) would personally vote to be a republic. Symbolic or not, I think it's absurd that hereditary rule exists in any form in the current day and age.

rnmwfQ3f 5y ago
Why is that absurd?
- kortilla 5y ago
  Because it’s irrelevant.
- hvusslax 5y ago
  Inheriting constitutionally priveliged positions seems a bit hard to square with everyone being equal before the law.
  - w0de0 5y ago
    Neither position is inherently absurd, nor is their contradiction. A more thoughtful response might have taken the time to contemplate the origins of government and the relationship between “absurdity,” your understanding of government and of virtuous government, and of the post-enlightenment ideologies assumed natural to our societies; in truth the vague syllogism between law and privilege you present is not some physical reality or logical QED but a gestural summation of ideas only very lately arrived to human affairs. Contemplative silence is one among many more interesting responses that were available to you. In short: it’s obvious that ancient institutions and modern humanism are absurdly dissonant. Cleary OP meant to provoke a reconsideration, not a restatement, of the obvious. Ironically it is obvious that one should not bother trying to rescue internet comments from their own pig-headedness - but sometimes I do sorely miss past iterations of HN.
    - hvusslax 5y ago
      You did not need to break your contemplative silence to write this empty pretentious drivel. OP asked a question. I gave what seems to me to be the obvious answer.

emodendroket 5y ago

I listened to someone saying that in Canada it would just be a ton of legal headaches to try and excise the monarchy and most people just don't see the point when they don't expect much would change in practice. I imagine other places would have this issue.

_ph_ 5y ago

Indeed. I wonder how many, who in those states support monarchy, do this because the Queen is a well known entity. People know her as the head of state, mostly keeping herself out of politics. Abolishing monarchy formally would mean that you risk to get a president, who might be a disappointment. Something similar could be observed in Germany: Angela Merkel kept winning elections, because there were enough people who wanted her to keep her office, even if they otherwise might not have voted for her party. This explains - at least to a part - the huge shift in the political landscape when she announced that she wouldn't run in this years election. This was amplified though by her party not being able to find a strong successor and tied up in internal struggles. I am sure, with the death of the Queen, a lot of states might reconsider formally being a monarchy, depending how her succession turns out. Even in the UK itself, monarchy is discussed and there were times in recent history, where the royal family hat little public support.