The Kingdom: Difference between revisions
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* Most real-world kingdoms and small countries see themselves as The Kingdom, especially the governments themselves.
** Most constitutional monarchies see themselves this way, especially the ones in Europe and the Commonwealth. This is especially true since the two main powers of the Cold War were [[Good Republic, Evil Empire|the United States (Federation) and the Soviet Union (The Empire)]].
***Constitutional Monarchies are a cross between [[The Kingdom]] and [[The Republic]]. They use a republic to do the legwork of government for several reasons, notably that aristocrats who are trusted with real power can get [[Drunk with Power|pretty wacky]], and in any event a public election is however flawed, felt a better test for competence than total chance. Or more realistically some of the commoners in the past became rich and well-armed enough to [[Asskicking Equals Authority|demand a piece of the pie.]] In any event, in the past the monarch often was a real chief executive even in a constitutional monarchy (which after all has a wide spectrum). But it is more common to use the monarch, and often the vassal nobility as well as "cultural ministers" for supervising national treasures, handing out decorations, directing state events, what not. Sometimes a monarch has a surprising behind the scenes job. For instance the British Secret Service sometimes used it not only because a king was a highly visible distraction when needed, but the privy purse was a good place to launder money they did not want in more official account books.
* For many Brazilians, the Empire of Brazil under [[The Emperor|Dom Pedro II]]. It was a sad inversion of [[Good Republic, Evil Empire]].
* Keep in mind that kingdoms in [[Real Life]] can differ much. There were kings like Louis XIV of France who reigned absolutely and could say "[[L'État, c'est moi|L Etat Cest Moi]]" (well okay, not really, but let's just consider 'absolutist' rulers absolutist for the sake of simplicity, m'kay?), medieval kingdoms where the power of the king was limited by his vassals (ur example for the anglosphere could well be the way the barons of England forced King John to sign the Magna Carta), and nowadays we have many representative monarchies which are essentially republics with a crowned head of state. In the past, there were even kingdoms where the king was elected! (the workings of which paralleled the 'noble republics' of Italy where a small group of wealthy families monopolised power, the only difference being councils of nobles versus councils of wealthy merchants and freemen voting for the top dog. And a certain amount of pomp and grandeur of course.
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