Portal:Politics/Selected article/2007, week 23

A republic is a form of government maintained by a state or country whose sovereignty is based on popular consent and whose governance is based on popular representation and control. Several definitions stress the importance of the rule of law as among the requirements for a republic.

Often "republics" and monarchies are described as mutually exclusive. Defining a republic as a non-monarchy, a common short definition, is based on this idea. Although largely covering what is usually understood by a republic such definition has borderline issues, for example while the distinction between monarchy and republic was not always made as it is in modern times, while oligarchies are traditionally considered neither monarchy nor republic, and while such definition depends very much on the monarch concept, which has various definitions, not making clear which of these is used for defining republic.