5 February

Dennis Altman is an avowed Australian Republican. But he was compelled to write this book, because when he looked at the topic, he realised monarchies not only never went away, they keep being restored, and countries with them are generally the most peaceful and prosperous. Like most, he assumes countries choose their system of government, like they choose new shoes. He assumes there’s a ‘system’ too, like most. Neither of those things are true. Also modern public life, which I’ve written about, is invariably a ‘team sport’ between two rival positions. So on this topic, if you discuss it people will immediately assume you’re a republican, or a monarchist. I’m neither of those things. I think human societies are like natural ecosystems. They evolve according to certain material realities in the world, which humans can’t shape. We’re not gods, just as animals don’t get to choose their own evolution. All societies are functionally equivalent. They run on status, the ‘atom’ of human life. The status hierarchies they produce get labelled in various ways, as -isms for example (capitalism, socialism, communism etc.). As ‘systems’. None of those are real, they’re made-up constructs. Refugees from team sports status games of the 19th century, with Marx et al. Just as Ptolemaic epicycles were fictions described to describe the motion of heavenly bodies, until the single root cause (gravity) was found. Status is gravity, for human life. The apparent shift to ‘authoritarianism’ (another fictitious -ism) we see across every supposed system of government is really the restoration of King-like figures. Easily the dominant form in human history, because it’s the inevitable outcome of status-driven life. We don’t choose it, it emerges, it evolves, all by itself.