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> Inheritance and monarchy does not make for a good government, and we know this. Monarchy makes for some of both the best and worst governments on record. The

> Inheritance and monarchy does not make for a good government, and we know this. Monarchy makes for some of both the best and worst governments on record. The problem isn't that you can't get good results, but rather the extreme variance.

crowselect 2y ago
[flagged]
- Ichthypresbyter 2y ago
  Or to a slave in a Republic (whether that's the Confederacy, Rome or Athens).
  - crowselect 2y ago
    What does that have to do with monarchy?
    - Ichthypresbyter 2y ago
      The same thing that serfdom has to do with monarchy. In other words, nothing.
      - crowselect 2y ago
        Monarchy does not prevent enslavement. In fact, serfdom is a relatively common feature of monarchy. That’s what those two things have to do with each other.
        quink 2y ago
        There’s no serfdom anywhere in the world currently. There are plenty of monarchies in the world. Meanwhile, currently, slavery is far more common in non-monarchies than monarchies. Your “relatively common” is literally zero in the current reality, unless there’s countries you’re aware of that the rest of us aren’t.
        crowselect 2y ago
        Relatively common in history.
        fc417fc802 2y ago
        It's almost as though the global political landscape has varied significantly over these thousands of years and various societal features (including monarchy, serfdom, slavery, etc) aren't inherently linked to one another. My original point was that a monarchy permits both the best and worst possible outcomes because a single individual has maximal power to enact a unified vision. The observation could obviously apply in degrees to any dictatorship though, regardless of the official classification.
        crowselect 2y ago
        Yeah, that’s the ol’ philosopher-king argument. I get it, but I don’t really buy into it. I.e. if the next monarch is a despot, their rule is a part of the previous monarch’s actions… so even a truly good king will inevitably harm the people under them.
        fc417fc802 2y ago
        You don't actually seem like you're disagreeing with me though? I spoke only to the form of government as it pertains to end results, not to how we should attribute "points" to a given ruler or politician. Credit assignment is similarly difficult when it comes to voters and elected leaders. The end result is higher variance over a long period of time as a dictatorship switches between good and bad leadership. Meanwhile democracies consistently fail to execute on large scale visions. There's a reason corporate structure generally resembles a dictatorship, and that same reason is what eventually leads many of them to fail.
        cyberax 2y ago
        > There’s no serfdom anywhere in the world currently. Tell that to guest workers in Saudi Arabia. Or to people in North Korea. > There are plenty of monarchies in the world. There are very few _real_ monarchies where the monarch has absolute power, with hereditary power transfer: Saudi Arabia, Oman, North Korea.
        defrost 2y ago
        The UK, under a monarch, abolished slavery and set the Royal Navy to blockade slave ships. Meanwhile, the USofA pre civil war under a President with no offical monarch (other than the Little King for a term arrangement) had extensive slave plantations.
        crowselect 2y ago
        The UK abolished slavery by an act of parliament. A parliamentary monarchy is a historical quirk that does not need the monarchy to function.
        defrost 2y ago
        Good that you agree slavery was abolished by a country with a monarch ... you skipped over the second point; the country most associated with industrial scale slavery in the world had no monarch. It's a loose correlation you're making here, very much a "let's build this skyscraper with wet noodles instead of steel" approach.
        crowselect 2y ago
        Slavery was “abolished” in the UK while that same nation continued to traffic and profit from enslavement for quite a long time it’s “abolition”. Is your point that monarchy is good, or that slavery is associated with all forms of government?
quink 2y ago
Which can be mitigated by making the monarch powerless. I’m in Australia and the Trump presidency will be the thing for the next century that we can point to and say that this is why we are not going to ever, ever, ever get rid of the king or queen, in favour of a local president. I suspect that Canada and other countries feel much the same.
- etothepii 2y ago
  I agree that Monarchs are great if they realise their long term legacy is best served by doing very little-to-nothing but still bringing the Prime Minister to account once a week (the A/UK/CA/NZ evolutionary model). However, even the ceremonial power is proving problematic in a world where the government of UK wants King of UK to have Trump for tea and the government of CA wants King of CA to spit in it.
cyberax 2y ago
> Monarchy makes for some of both the best and worst governments on record. The best monarchs were the ones deposed by the revolutionaries, or the ones who abdicated the real power. There are 2 problems: 1. _Nobody_ should be ruling for more than 8-10 years. 2. You can't have a real monarchy without feudalism. And feudalism _always_ sucks.
- quink 2y ago
  lol. I lived under the same monarch, QEII, who has ruled for seventy years, and I assure you that I and my compatriots feel far, far, freer in practice and guided more well than any single American ought to feel currently.
  - cyberax 2y ago
    The UK monarchs don't rule. They are for show only.
    - quink 2y ago
      > or the ones who abdicated the real power Missed that part in your parent reply originally, you're right of course, cheers :)
    - eszed 2y ago
      They don't have power, but they do have influence. Every Prime Minister has a weekly meeting with the... King (still hard to type that, isn't it?), an off-the-record discussion of what they're doing and thinking, with someone who (theoretically, at least) has the long view interests of the nation in mind. Most have said it's immensely valuable. That apart, the "show" function is important, too. It separates the Head of State and Head of Government functions, which makes it easier to dismiss the Head of Government, without disturbing the stability of the State. The US system fuses the two, which (in my view) is part of what makes the Congress reluctant to follow through on impeachment. (To avoid recent examples: had Bill Clinton been (treated like) a British Prime Minister in 1998 he'd have lost a no-confidence vote among his own party, and Al Gore would have served out his term. I think that would have been a better outcome than what actually happened, and followed.)

crowselect 2y ago

[flagged]

Ichthypresbyter 2y ago
Or to a slave in a Republic (whether that's the Confederacy, Rome or Athens).
- crowselect 2y ago
  What does that have to do with monarchy?
  - Ichthypresbyter 2y ago
    The same thing that serfdom has to do with monarchy. In other words, nothing.
    - crowselect 2y ago
      Monarchy does not prevent enslavement. In fact, serfdom is a relatively common feature of monarchy. That’s what those two things have to do with each other.
      - quink 2y ago
        There’s no serfdom anywhere in the world currently. There are plenty of monarchies in the world. Meanwhile, currently, slavery is far more common in non-monarchies than monarchies. Your “relatively common” is literally zero in the current reality, unless there’s countries you’re aware of that the rest of us aren’t.
        crowselect 2y ago
        Relatively common in history.
        fc417fc802 2y ago
        It's almost as though the global political landscape has varied significantly over these thousands of years and various societal features (including monarchy, serfdom, slavery, etc) aren't inherently linked to one another. My original point was that a monarchy permits both the best and worst possible outcomes because a single individual has maximal power to enact a unified vision. The observation could obviously apply in degrees to any dictatorship though, regardless of the official classification.
        crowselect 2y ago
        Yeah, that’s the ol’ philosopher-king argument. I get it, but I don’t really buy into it. I.e. if the next monarch is a despot, their rule is a part of the previous monarch’s actions… so even a truly good king will inevitably harm the people under them.
        fc417fc802 2y ago
        You don't actually seem like you're disagreeing with me though? I spoke only to the form of government as it pertains to end results, not to how we should attribute "points" to a given ruler or politician. Credit assignment is similarly difficult when it comes to voters and elected leaders. The end result is higher variance over a long period of time as a dictatorship switches between good and bad leadership. Meanwhile democracies consistently fail to execute on large scale visions. There's a reason corporate structure generally resembles a dictatorship, and that same reason is what eventually leads many of them to fail.
        cyberax 2y ago
        > There’s no serfdom anywhere in the world currently. Tell that to guest workers in Saudi Arabia. Or to people in North Korea. > There are plenty of monarchies in the world. There are very few _real_ monarchies where the monarch has absolute power, with hereditary power transfer: Saudi Arabia, Oman, North Korea.
      - defrost 2y ago
        The UK, under a monarch, abolished slavery and set the Royal Navy to blockade slave ships. Meanwhile, the USofA pre civil war under a President with no offical monarch (other than the Little King for a term arrangement) had extensive slave plantations.
        crowselect 2y ago
        The UK abolished slavery by an act of parliament. A parliamentary monarchy is a historical quirk that does not need the monarchy to function.
        defrost 2y ago
        Good that you agree slavery was abolished by a country with a monarch ... you skipped over the second point; the country most associated with industrial scale slavery in the world had no monarch. It's a loose correlation you're making here, very much a "let's build this skyscraper with wet noodles instead of steel" approach.
        crowselect 2y ago
        Slavery was “abolished” in the UK while that same nation continued to traffic and profit from enslavement for quite a long time it’s “abolition”. Is your point that monarchy is good, or that slavery is associated with all forms of government?

quink 2y ago

Which can be mitigated by making the monarch powerless. I’m in Australia and the Trump presidency will be the thing for the next century that we can point to and say that this is why we are not going to ever, ever, ever get rid of the king or queen, in favour of a local president. I suspect that Canada and other countries feel much the same.

etothepii 2y ago
I agree that Monarchs are great if they realise their long term legacy is best served by doing very little-to-nothing but still bringing the Prime Minister to account once a week (the A/UK/CA/NZ evolutionary model). However, even the ceremonial power is proving problematic in a world where the government of UK wants King of UK to have Trump for tea and the government of CA wants King of CA to spit in it.

cyberax 2y ago

> Monarchy makes for some of both the best and worst governments on record. The best monarchs were the ones deposed by the revolutionaries, or the ones who abdicated the real power. There are 2 problems: 1. _Nobody_ should be ruling for more than 8-10 years. 2. You can't have a real monarchy without feudalism. And feudalism _always_ sucks.

quink 2y ago
lol. I lived under the same monarch, QEII, who has ruled for seventy years, and I assure you that I and my compatriots feel far, far, freer in practice and guided more well than any single American ought to feel currently.
- cyberax 2y ago
  The UK monarchs don't rule. They are for show only.
  - quink 2y ago
    > or the ones who abdicated the real power Missed that part in your parent reply originally, you're right of course, cheers :)
  - eszed 2y ago
    They don't have power, but they do have influence. Every Prime Minister has a weekly meeting with the... King (still hard to type that, isn't it?), an off-the-record discussion of what they're doing and thinking, with someone who (theoretically, at least) has the long view interests of the nation in mind. Most have said it's immensely valuable. That apart, the "show" function is important, too. It separates the Head of State and Head of Government functions, which makes it easier to dismiss the Head of Government, without disturbing the stability of the State. The US system fuses the two, which (in my view) is part of what makes the Congress reluctant to follow through on impeachment. (To avoid recent examples: had Bill Clinton been (treated like) a British Prime Minister in 1998 he'd have lost a no-confidence vote among his own party, and Al Gore would have served out his term. I think that would have been a better outcome than what actually happened, and followed.)