I don't know how I feel about compulsory voting--one side says it's a duty of citizenship, another is it's a mattter of individual conscience--but they're already a republic by any rational and current definition of the term.
Yes, yes, Constitutional Monarchy aside, which is mere formalism in most cases these days, as it certainly is in Australia. The Queen's power is entirely symbolic. As the American Heritage defines a Republic: "A political order in which the supreme power lies in a body of citizens who are entitled to vote for officers and representatives responsible to them."
That's a fine description of most democracies, whether their form is of Constitutional Monarchy, traditional Republic, etc. About the only split remaining today is that there are democratic republics (such as the United States) and thoroughly undemocratic republics (China, Iran). I leave it to pick which type you'd like to live under.
Yes, yes, Constitutional Monarchy aside, which is mere formalism in most cases these days, as it certainly is in Australia. The Queen's power is entirely symbolic. As the American Heritage defines a Republic: "A political order in which the supreme power lies in a body of citizens who are entitled to vote for officers and representatives responsible to them."
That's a fine description of most democracies, whether their form is of Constitutional Monarchy, traditional Republic, etc. About the only split remaining today is that there are democratic republics (such as the United States) and thoroughly undemocratic republics (China, Iran). I leave it to pick which type you'd like to live under.