The Republican State
The social-democratic state existing in advanced democracies is gradually changing into a republican state. The ultra-liberal wave failed because modern societies need a strong, not a weak, state. A republican state is strong enough to protect itself and the public patrimony from private capture. Its strength originates in governments’ political legitimacy, in the active participation of citizens organized in civil society, in a dense public space where social accountability and public debate take place, and on the existence of politicians and civil servants endowed with republican virtues. The republican state that is emerging is fiscally strong because it limits its debts, it is administratively strong because it is engaged in public management reform, and it is politically strong because citizens, politicians, and civil servants know that the principles ruling politics are not the same that rule markets: besides the private, the public interest must be taken into consideration. Undertakes a short survey of the literature on republicanism to substantiate these claims.
Keywords: costs of rights, legitimacy, negative liberties, participation, patriotism, positive liberties, public interest, republican state, republicanism, strong state, virtue
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