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If we take a look at country designations, with depressing regularity the most repressive ones call themselves e.g.:

  • Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North Korea)
  • Democratic Republic of the Congo
  • German Democratic Republic
  • Democratic Kampuchea

If you look at the Human Development Index the last entries always begin officially with "Republic of". There are also exceptions: "Republic of Botswana" or "Federal Republic of Germany" have a good record while there are also autocratic kingdoms like Saudi Arabia in contrast to parliamentary ones (United Kingdom, Netherlands, Denmark).

Is this a relatively new phenomenon in the wake of ideologies which promised to build a better system after the demise of feudalism and the outgrowth of the Industrial Revolution, or are there precedents? In history we often do not learn the full designation of countries or state-like entities.

psmears
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Thorsten S.
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    Imperial Rome called itself a republic, and the emperor First Citizen. – Semaphore Sep 07 '15 at 03:57
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    http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/PeoplesRepublicOfTyranny – Golden Cuy Sep 07 '15 at 09:38
  • @Bregalad Not a native speaker, I corrected that. I tried to avoid confrontations by using two very strong examples and two extinct ones and avoided to mention certain political ideologies which are prone to use the terms. But it was in vain, I got already two downvotes. – Thorsten S. Sep 07 '15 at 12:59
  • @AndrewGrimm The link is a treasure trove of examples. Alas, it could have been a very instructive answer. – Thorsten S. Sep 07 '15 at 13:01
  • There's also the Democatric Republic of São Tomé and Príncipe and the People's Republic of Bangladesh. And of course the People's Republic of Boulder, Colorado, USA ;-). – gerrit Sep 07 '15 at 15:23
  • It is generally because they have replaced an aristoracy or dictatorship and were supposed to be something better rather than pure PR. Power corrupts. – JamesRyan Sep 07 '15 at 15:44
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    I don't know about the history of ancient Greece, but that is from where the word originates. So my guess is that the strict date, in answer to your question, will be suffixed BC. But in modern history the word carried negative connotations prior to the 20th century - especially in the southern United States. Did Lincoln use the word democracy? He certainly spoke of government of the people, for the people, and by the people - but I'm not sure democracy was enough in vogue for him to have used it. At a guess I'd say you wouldn't have seen it used much anywhere before WW2. – WS2 Sep 07 '15 at 18:20
  • I think WW2 popularised the word democracy, perhaps especially after Roosevelt spoke of America being the great arsenal of democracy. After that democratic was the thing to be, so lots of unlikely places became democracies - in fact it always seems to me the less likely the system is to be democratic, the more inclined it is to find its way into the country's name. – WS2 Sep 07 '15 at 18:25
  • It's a current trend in business too. – jjack Sep 07 '15 at 20:37
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    In my observation "Republic" is not a red flag in a country name. The red flags are "People's" or "Democratic". I do not believe either of these were ever on a free society. – Loren Pechtel Sep 08 '15 at 03:00
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    @LorenPechtel Actually, the Democratic Republic of São Tomé and Príncipe is a multiparty representative democracy. – Semaphore Sep 08 '15 at 06:01
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    I always thought Mexico's Institutional Revolutionary Party was as about oxymoronic as you could get – Oscar Bravo Sep 08 '15 at 10:08
  • @LorenPechtel Look at the Human Development Index in Wikipedia, start from the bottom with Niger, look at the official designation ("Republic of ...") and work upwards. You will see a certain pattern. – Thorsten S. Sep 08 '15 at 12:01
  • @LorenPechtel What you must understand is that democratic is a highly contested word. Many Marxists would argue that what you describe as a free society is in fact democratic. This is no place to conduct a dialectical debate, but as historians we have to recognise that democracy is dichotomous. – WS2 Sep 10 '15 at 12:48
  • @ThorstenS. And what might that pattern be? If you start from the top, Germany, Ireland, France, South Korea, Austria or Italy calls themselves “Republic”. Further down the list (but still quite high), most countries in Central-Eastern Europe and South and Central America also do. Sure, you have a bunch of monarchies in Northern Europe and poor African countries tend to be republics but that's not much of a pattern. – Relaxed Aug 16 '17 at 13:20
  • @Relaxed I already said that there are exceptions. I will compare the usage of "Republic" with best/worst from the table. Europe: 2 best / 8 worst. NA/Caribbean: 4 best / 6 worst (Very high: 0/2 Low/medium: 5/5). South America is an inversion with 2 republic at highest. continued... – Thorsten S. Aug 17 '17 at 19:59
  • @ThorstenS. And what I am saying is that there are so many exceptions that there is just no trend or correlation. Also, why look at it by region, artificially creating tiny samples? And why dichotomize? For example, most of these European republics are not “repressive” by any stretch of the imagination. So you're just restating what I have just explained: Scandinavian countries are monarchies, which is an historical accident and has nothing at all to do with “dictatorships” calling themselves anything. – Relaxed Aug 17 '17 at 20:09
  • By contrast, “Democratic Republic of something” are dreadful regimes, I am not sure I could name even a single exception (OK Semaphore found one). – Relaxed Aug 17 '17 at 20:11
  • Asia: 3 best / 9 worst and Africa: 9 best / 8 worst. So with the exception of South America and Africa we have a visible discrepancy between the usage for "Republic" for (relatively) nice and bad countries. – Thorsten S. Aug 17 '17 at 20:13
  • @Relaxed I invite you to make it better: Make a bar chat with different levels of HDI and display both red (Republic) and blue (no republic) of all states. Then we will see if there is "no trend or correlation". – Thorsten S. Aug 17 '17 at 20:19
  • @ThorstenS. So if we remove all evidence of the contrary, we have at best a modest trend towards slightly less high-scoring countries being republics (which are not necessarily dictatorship or repressive as you claimed in your question)? I might do a plot if I am bored tomorrow but in the meantime I can agree to that statement. In actual fact, I would expect a moderate link, only because there are many countries in Africa but that's not meaningful at all. – Relaxed Aug 17 '17 at 20:25
  • @Relaxed Ah, at least a modest trend instead of no trend. You know as I that "dictatorship and repressive" is very hard to quantify, so I need to use some secondary measure like the HDI even if there are notable exceptions (Brunei, Singapore, Saudi Arabia: very high HDI, but quite authoritarian.and India, which has a quite low HDI, but is an accepted democracy). – Thorsten S. Aug 17 '17 at 20:42
  • @ThorstenS. Yes, a modest trend “if we remove all evidence to the contrary” like the fact you found the exact opposite in about half the regions you defined yourself (2 out of 5). And “dictatorship and repressive” might be difficult to quantify but to find a trend in Europe you need to put 8 countries in “worst”. What are those? Portugal, Italy, France, Austria? Let's be serious, I don't know what you know but those aren't dictatorships. In your eagerness to prove your point, you end up implying things that make no sense at all. – Relaxed Aug 17 '17 at 21:56
  • Let us continue this discussion in chat. – Relaxed Aug 17 '17 at 21:58

3 Answers3

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It started at least with the rule of Gaius Octavius, a.k.a. Augustus. He was a dictator (Imperator) but Rome was continued to be called republic, consuls and Senate continued to be "elected". But the supreme power became lifetime, and the Imperator appointed a heir, usually a real or adopted son.

Since then, this is a custom in some dictatorships.

The term "People's democracy" was invented by Stalin (Soviet dictator, who claimed that he rules a democratic, constitutional state). The first "People's Democracies" were Eastern European states, PRC and North Korea. Then some countries in Africa and Asia followed the example.

Usually such countries have all attributes of democracy: a constitution and parliaments, even an "elected president". But really this is a rule of one person, who is secretly elected by a small band, called Politburo of the Communist party, usually for life time, unless the same Politburo stages a coup. The only difference is that in some of these countries this power is hereditary and in others it is not.

Correction. As Bartek Chom noticed correctly in his comment to another answer, the term was not invented by Stalin, but it was also used by the short lived Ukrainian and Belorussian People's republics. However these states were not communist dictatorships.

Alex
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    Be careful with your titles. Dictator was a specific Roman title. Julius Caesar was a Dictator, Augustus was not. Not all Imperators were emperors. – Neil Kirk Sep 07 '15 at 18:59
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    In my answer I used the word "Dictator" in the modern sense, not in the ancient Roman sense. I am aware of the difference. In practice, August and his descendants were absolute, lifetime rulers, and they decided who the next ruler will be. – Alex Sep 08 '15 at 03:27
  • Interestingly I think there is a reason that the switch from a republic to an effective monarchy (and therefore hereditary dictatorship) is not so perceived as historic incident. It is the peace, security, prosperity and tranquility of the resulting epoch, the Pax Romana. (Yes, there were still border wars, but they did not disturb the inner provinces of the Roman Empire). It is an unusual strong contrast to the usual violence and atrocities, suppression of inner resistance, cleptocracy and favoritism usually associated by an installment of a dictatorship. – Thorsten S. Sep 08 '15 at 09:33
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    @Thorsten S: Yes, surprisingly, the system established by Augustus turned out to be very effective. It ended civil wars for a long period. – Alex Sep 08 '15 at 11:27
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The names People's Republic (more common), Democratic Republic or Democratic People's Republic come from Marxist-Leninist ideology. The idea is that socialist states (they never claimed to have fully realized communism) serve the interest of the vast majority of the people, whereas traditional or bourgeois democracies are not really democratic and only serve the elite. That would readily account for North Korea, Cambodia and the GDR but that's probably, in a loose way, the source of the name Democratic Republic of the Congo as well.

The country came to be known under that name for the first time under Mobutu. Although he was mostly aligned with the US and the West and had a difficult relationship with both China and the Soviet Union, he established a style of government highly reminiscent of some People's Republics (one-party rule, cult of personality, pioneer organization and propaganda). Later on, he embarked on a campaign to reestablish African authenticity and had the country renamed Zaïre (the whole project is called “zaïrianisation”) and abandoned the name “Democratic Republic”.

After he was forced to flee, in 1997, his successors, while not particularly democratically-minded got rid of all that and reverted to a more classical style of cronyism and authoritarianism. But renaming the country République du Congo would once again create an homonymy with the neighbouring Congo-Brazzaville so it was renamed République Démocratique du Congo, I assume without any particular political or ideological undertone. Nobody would call the country anything else than simply “Congo” without that homonymy.

Incidentally, “GDR”, “DDR” (in German) and similar acronyms in other languages similarly became very widely used because you could not simply call either part of the country “Germany” when it was divided.

Relaxed
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    This does not say how this trend started – Bregalad Sep 07 '15 at 13:44
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    @Bregalad Not sure I understand what you mean nor whether I agree there is a single “trend” to speak of. If you are a looking for a general explanation, then Marxist-leninist ideology would seem to be a good one. The minutiae of the when and how it happened in a given country could also be interesting but that's going to be very limited in scope and even further from explaining the global use of these names. – Relaxed Sep 07 '15 at 13:48
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The term people's republic was coined by the loyalist side in the Spanish civil war. It was intended to suggest a republic which would guarantee the welfare of all its citizens; their economic rights as well as political.

It was adopted by the east European countries, as a supposed third way between bourgeois democracy and the dictatorship of the proletariat. Of course now we know that all the coalitions were just a stepping stone to communist takeover. Presumably the non-communists who used the term, like Eduard Benes of Czechoslovakia, were sincere when they used it.

Edit: a user pointed out that Ukraine and Belarus called themselves people's republics during their brief independence from ~1917 to ~1922. In the same period, several countries, including Azerbaijan, Georgia and Hungary called themselves democratic repulbic. All of these countries were more or less genuine democracies, as much as the war and general chaos would allow, but none of them survived.

So to answer your question, before ww2 if a country called itself democratic, it probably was. After ww2, it probably wasn't.

Ne Mo
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