An irreconcilable difference
By Tony Smith
As the century slides to a close, it is clear that the much criticised leadership of Prime Minister Howard has prevailed in one important area.
Many people envisaged the republican debate as an opportunity to consider possible futures for Australian society. Howard has managed to influence the debate so that questions of citizenship and constitutional reform have become conflated into the choice between monarchy and a republic.
Apart from inhibiting broader questions, his approach to the partly elected constitutional convention has ensured that any discussion of the monarchical system has been confined to its contribution to constitutional stability.
The psychosocial aspects of monarchy have been sidelined because republicans have embraced the minimalist model and "revolutionary" notions have been quashed. The republicans do not wish to frighten little-old-royalists, and their opponents know that the broader monarchical system cannot be defended in terms acceptable to modern generations.
In the late 1890s, a similar consensus over constitutional matters prevailed only after a dramatic purge of revolutionary ideals at the beginning of the decade. This process is documented in Anne Whitehead's Paradise Mislaid (University of Queensland Press, 1997).
Whitehead spent 20 years researching and documenting the history of the New Australia colonists who were led to Paraguay by journalist and socialist visionary William Lane in 1893.
The tale provides some parallel with the 1990s, in that Lane's plans for a diaspora began when it became plain that Australia was not a workers' paradise after all. The defeat of the great strikes of 1891, especially of shearers and maritime workers, caused widespread disillusionment.
But while most Labor people sought to achieve their goals through parliamentarism, Lane was determined to found a new society. In the most unlikely event that the present push for constitutional reform should fail, the republicans of the 1990s will not react as William Lane did.
Monarchists seem to have more personal feeling invested in the debate, but it would be absurd for them to be wildly disappointed when the republic comes. In terms of the social system, they will not be discomforted at all.
It is the irreconcilable difference between the monarchical and republican alternatives which is not receiving adequate attention.
A monarchical system depends on a social hierarchy based on birth. It is inherently class based and gives rise to acceptance of other inequalities.
Republicanism is built on an assumption of political equality which is possible only when there is a degree of socioeconomic equality.
What the polite debate about constitutional forms neglects is that the two social systems are radically different. In their ideals, monarchy is exclusive and elitist while republicanism is inclusive and egalitarian.
That is why notions of a "crowned republic" are totally muddle-headed. It is precisely because that is what we seem to have that change is so vital. The confusion must be removed.