The Meaning of Republic

• Autor(a) principal: Lafer, Celso
• Data de Publicação: 1989
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: Estudos Históricos (Rio de Janeiro)
• Texto Completo: https://periodicos.fgv.br/reh/article/view/2286

As the organization of the government of the collective life of a people within a territory, the political community has historically found expression in different modalities. The study and evaluation of these modalities forms a recurrent theme in political theory, where they are examined under the heading of forms of government. It is in this context that the term "republic" takes on a conceptual specifity which the author seeks to explore through reference to the Brazilian experience. In the Ciceronian conception, there are two links which make the populus the end receiver of the res publica, where res publica = consensus juris (legal consensus) + communis utilitaris (common utility). The author explores the inherent connotations of these links in order to delineate the meaning of republic. This analysis of the theorical and political significance of the concept also uses the models of the French and American revolutions, two moderns landmarks which founded distinct traditions in how to reason and how to shape the political experience of a republic. These two models had repercussions on the Brazilian experience and marked our tradition of republican thinking. The concept of republic as defined by the author encompasses: an emphasis on the public good, the importance of the role which law plays in preventing violence and in arbitration, the civic virtues of citizenship, and the federalist principle as a formula capable of reconciling size and proximity on both the domestic and international planes.