Republicanism is focused on political technologies in order to maximise liberty and minimise tyranny such that tyranny is non-existent. The philosophical under-pinnings for republicanism is liberalism which also has the goal of maximising individual freedom. Republicanism is the political science that under-pins liberalism. Since they are heavily focused on the individual and the technologies to support maximal liberty the counter-argument is that they have blind spots to hostility outside of the individual and politics. Conservatives like to call this the cultural wars, but it also encompasses social division and national division.

To Harpurian Republicans violence is a moral failing, whether the violence is individual, majority, minority or even state on state violence. Charles Harpur believed that with the growth of the individual under republicanism and liberalism, war between nations would become morally impossible.

Immanual Kant argued that domestic constitutions and domestic stability could not be resolved until the relations between nations were. Kant believed that adopting Republican Constitutions domestically were the first step toward resolving this issue, but his warning about state on state violence remained.

Harpur's argument is that the domestic constitution, the relationships between majority and minorities, and the relations between nations would suffer violence until the individual is capable of growing morally such violence becomes an immoral interaction.

Dan Deniehy argued that the greatest inhibition to an individual growing morally, or achieving moral perfection, was the tyranny from the state. Deniehy extrapolated from history to reach his conclusion that political inequity and tyranny limited the ability of an individual to act morally. Additionally it ensured that the political leaders, or ruling class, were also incapable of acting outside of that restrictive moral framework. The political structure enforced immoral behaviour at all levels of the state in a massive feedback loop which reinforced and strengthened itself with each iteration.

So how does Republicanism deal with political violence outside of parliament or another restricted environment where the violence of political faction has been taken into account? How does Republicanism deal with political factions dragging cultural division into a question of political violence?

There is a binary choice in politics as to who is the dominant political entity, it is either the state or the individual. Republicanism and liberalism is predicated on the individual being the dominant political entity - as such an individual enjoys universal rights in their relationship with the state. These political rights are intrinsic to the individual while under the jurisdiction of the state.

A second tenet of Republican forms of representative democracy is that the minority accept the will of the majority, but with recognition that minorities will be secure in their rights. This requires a technological structure of constitutionalism such that the mob-branch of government (legislative) and the discriminative-branch (executive) can be sued by the individual who appeals to the judicial branch which must follow the enumerated rights in the constitution.

Consequently an abrogation of an individuals or minorities rights, as well as any violence toward them, especially political violence such as legislative or executive, become a moral failing of the political leadership.

Tyranny does not have to absolute to be destructive. Insidious tyranny, which we commonly call arbitrary governance, is just as damaging. As per the republicanism of Harpur and Deniehy any addition of tyranny or violence into the political system not only indicates the moral failure of the political leadership, but also negatively affects the moral actions and capability of individuals under the government's jurisdiction. The political system becomes increasingly immoral with each application of violence.

Political and cultural liberty are important concepts for the moral health of the individual and the state. The insight from Harpur and Deniehy was that the immoral behaviour of political leaders is not isolated, it is interdependent, having wider effects through the political system and the individuals who have to exist inside it.

More Reading on Republicanism

• Republicanism
• Liberalism
• Hostility
• Charles Harpur
• Dan Deniehy
• Liberty
• The Individualist Streak in Australian Republicanism
• John Boston's Pig
• Political Rationalism
• Australian Republican Identity Politics
• Quotification
• Universalism in Australian Republicanism
• Liberalism, Civic Nationalism and Republicanism
• James Madison on War
• Is Australian Republicanism Radical?
• Copernican paradigm