Australia: The politics of becoming a republic

Journal of Democracy

Volumn 11, Issue 3, 2000, Pages 148-150

  Higley, John ^a   Case, Rhonda Evans ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 23044520385     PISSN: 10455736     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1353/jod.2000.0058     Document Type: Article

References (24)

1. Toronto Globe & Mail, 4 November 1999. On 30 October 1999,
2. the Globe & Mail editorialized that "[a]t this stage of our evolution as a nation, it is embarrassing to have a foreign-born head of state who lives in London SW1."
3. Sydney Morning Herald, 19 November 1999.
4. The change to a republic in Canada is assessed in broad comparative and historical perspective by David E. Smith in The Republican Option in Canada, Past and Present (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1999).
5. Caribbean news website, www.cweek.com, accessed 13 November 1999.
6. Ibid.
7. th quarter 1999): 28-29.
8. Consider how the attempt to make basic constitutional changes in Italy during the last five years has been stymied by entrenched party and other interests.
9. Israel and Switzerland might be added, though they are somewhat 5111 generis - Israel because of its directly elected prime minister, and Switzerland because of its seven-person executive body, the Federal Council, which is elected by parliament.
10. Giovanni Sartori, Comparative Constitutional Engineering: An Inquiry into Structure, Incentives, and Outcomes (New York: New York University Press, 1997), 101-4.
11. Austria, Germany, India, and Switzerland are, of course, federal republics, and many regard Italy as increasingly federal, but in Austria, Germany, and India, the federal chamber cannot force an election by blocking lower chamber bills; in Switzerland, the lower chamber is elected for a fixed four-year term and cannot be dissolved; and in Italy, the same electoral system is used for both chambers (with a 4 percent threshold for the lower chamber) so that the governing coalition controls both.
12. Morgan Poll, cited in National Multicultural Advisory Council, "Australian Multiculturalism for a New Century: Towards Inclusiveness" (April 1999),
13. Statistical Appendix, 46. Survey data on voter altitudes about a republic in 1996-98 are summarized by Bruce Tanter, "Australian Head of State: For the People or by the People?" Social Research and Social Change 6 (November 1999), 119-43.
14. See polling data summarized by Malcolm Turnbull, Fighting for the Republic: The Ultimate Insider's Account (Melbourne: Hardie Grant Books, 1999).
15. As early as 1993, a survey indicated that one in five coalition MPs in the Commonwealth Parliament favored a republic. Lenore Taylor, "Survey Results Boost Republic Push," The Australian (Sydney), 15 September 1993.
16. Opponents of the voluntary postal vote argued that less educated voters, especially the large number of recent migrants not fluent in English, would fail to participate and that this would stack the convention with delegates opposing a republic. After once rejecting House legislation for a postal vote, the Senate finally consented on the basis that defeating it would enable the Howard government to wriggle out of its commitment to pursue the republic question at all.
17. A blow-by-blow account of the Con-Con is provided by Malcolm Turnbull, Fighting for the Republic, 43-77.
18. Most of the "No" leaders making these claims were, of course, politicians.
19. Malcolm Turnbull, Fighting for the Republic, 245.
20. Giovanni Sartori, Comparative Constitutional Engineering, 143.
21. Giovanni Sartori, Comparative Constitutional Engineering Ibid., 187.
22. Paul Kelly, "Indirect Model Can Overcome History's Ghosts," The Australian (Sydney), 20 October 1999.
23. Malcolm Turnbull's insider account of the republic struggle repeatedly highlights the Senate problem and how republicans like him tried to circumvent it. See Malcolm Turnbull, Fighting for the Republic .
24. Sydney Morning Herald, 10 March 2000.