There has to be. The taxonomy of Republicanism is wide enough that it is not one hardcore strand of ultra-rationalists. One of Charles Harpur's insights was that until the time of moral perfection, there will be some role for the state, which inevitably lets in the 'political' into any form of social organisation. So what political narrative can Australian Republicanism adopt that is consistent with its view of liberty, political equality and moral improvement?

Despite ten years of pro status-quo government, it was only recently that popular support for a republic dropped below fifty percent to forty-nine percent. This suggests that republican sentiment runs across political, social, cultural and economic lines - the end result being a pluralist view of just what republicanism means.

The dominant form of republicanism in the 20thC has been the Identity Republicans. This was kicked of by Geoffrey Dutton and Donald Horne in the 1960s. It described Australia as an independent republic that ha kicked off the immaturity of its reliance on Britain and a monarch - it was largely a constitutional name change than anything else - but one which would bring political, social and cultural benefits through this new nationalist and patriotic awareness of Australian uniqueness. Consequently, this form of republicanism continued the tradition of avoiding and ignoring the political.

This was the same tactic and approach that the Australian Republican Movement [ARM] adopted in the 1990s during the run up to the referendum. Mark McKenna writes:

Australia in the 1990s seemed to have produced the first republican movement in history without a political platform. Pandering to the populist disdain for all things political, the leaders of the republican movement insisted constantly that the republican movement was not a 'political movement'.

They gave this novel approach a name - minimalism.

The minimalist republic (a variation on the well-worn, small-target strategy) was, if nothing else, patriotic. Like many other republicans, I could not understand how limiting the vision of an Australian republic to the nationality of the head of state would prove to be an effective political strategy.

Telling the people that republicans wanted minimal change may have made the republic appear less threatening, but it also made it less interesting. Minimalism was not only an awful word, it was uninspiring and dull politics.

I tried to argue that the late 19thC period of Australian republicanism focused sufficiently on the individual that it repudiated the political enough that it looked to the technologies of republicanism to create an administrative structure, rather than political, in which the individual's moral progress could flower and grow.

McKenna is arguing that reforming or modifying the constitution is inevitably a political act, and consequently any republican stance must adopt a political narrative for the present and future. Consequently republicanism in a constitutional monarchic system must have a 'political' where it describes itself in the abstract terms of values, issues and policy.

I am comfortable with that. The earlier incarnation of this site, partly inspired by McKenna's writings, took to the task of establishing an Australian Republican doctrine that could inform policy as well as constitutional structure.

Additionally, if the users on this site had to choose one modification they would make to the Australian political system - there is a high probability that it would be a Bill of Rights: probably unanimously. While it may appear an administrative and technological change to protect the individual from the tyranny of the state - because it involves the state, and the state is a political structure, it is a political issue and requires a political narrative.

Many moons ago before SSR existed I wrote a diary on k5 that contained a section with the heading Greater Australia . Like many things I have written, my views have changed slightly as I have learnt and been exposed to more knowledge, but the sentiment is right.

Greater Australia is about casting off any last vestiges of political, social, cultural and economic cringe. Australia becomes a great power, not through military might, or political hegemony, but through moral, cultural, economic and technological advance.

This inevitably means constitutional and political improvement as well. An important technology in Greater Australia becomes Engagement. In the same way that sovereignty is in the people in a liberal democratic system; under Greater Australia the people become the active arbiters and developers of Australian 'clout' through their moral (liberty), social, cultural, economic and technological improvement. This place the political narrative within the potential of globalisation and the realities of immigration and the Australian Diaspora in a globalised world.

Yes it becomes a national project, and it requires some sacrifice - for instance getting the Australian economy as large as Germany's, Britain's or France's will require increased immigration and less of a reliance on the sheep's back or quarry Australia - but the possibilities are massive, for not only transforming and progressing Australia morally, but through cosmopolitanism, globalisation and the diaspora - progressing the world forward.

This requires the complete embrace of Australian republicanism: constitutionally, technologically, politically and globally. Now there is a narrative! Which incidentally, is very easily, and quickly, achievable for Australia.