Actually, maybe that should look more like an 8. note For those interested, inside the overlapping circles lies the People's Republic of Bangladesh, Democratic Republic of Timor Leste, the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal, the Dominican Republic, Democratic Republic of São Tomé and Príncipe, and the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka—and that last one is increasingly doubtful.
Sir Humphrey: East Yemen, isn't that a democracy? Foreign Office Official: Its full name is the Peoples' Democratic Republic of East Yemen. Sir Humphrey: Ah I see, so it's a communist dictatorship.
When The Empire tries to masquerade as The Federation, it will often adopt a progressive-sounding name in the process. But often it will go overboard, unable to restrain its own sense of self-importance.
While the true federations around it will usually possess simple, unassuming names — The Federation, The Republic, etc. — the People's Republic Of Tyranny will call itself the People's Republic. If they are really evil and oppressive, the Democratic People's Republic. Indeed, the more words implying freedom the name sports, the more oppressive and generally un-free it is likely to be.
Some regimes will continue this Theme Naming to important buildings and organizations. As a corollary, be wary of any movement, government, or country that is casually referred to by its leaders as "Glorious."
A leader might be cultivating themselves as a Villain with Good Publicity. Or they may believe that their society is genuinely democratic, even more so than (so called) real democracies. Who knows; if they give everyone Bread and Circuses and the Trains Run On Time, people might not even care.
In Real Life, it's odd that westerners associate the word "republic" with democracy. It didn't have that meaning originally, and now we've got these guys using the name! note It may be because it is a relatively recent, but increasingly popular, invention in Real Life. A government that claims to be democratic, even when it's not, is implicitly agreeing that democracy is a good thing... or maybe just recognizes that others think that democracy is a good thing and is blending in for political camouflage.
Note that "socialist republic" and "people's republic" are terms that communist countries use to describe themselves and communism. note The ruling parties of those states claim(ed) their country was not truly communist, but in transition to the communism envisioned by Marx and Engels. Because of this, the term "People's Republic" is often applied jokingly to any locale that's seen as being politically to the left of its neighbors; in this case, it usually doesn't connote tyranny (and may connote the opposite, a head-in-the-clouds idealism).
A form of Newspeak. A subtrope of Super Happy Fun Trope of Doom. Definitely Names to Run Away From Really Fast if you can. Given what these governmentstend to have at their disposal, that's a big "if." It is often headed by The Generalissimo, or/and Just the First Citizen. If they go so far as to have "elections", see Corrupt Politician.
Yuri: Every faction in Africa calls themselves by these noble names - Liberation this, Patriotic that, Democratic Republic of something-or-other. I guess they can't own up to what they usually are: a federation of worse oppressors than the last bunch of oppressors. Often, the most barbaric atrocities occur when both combatants proclaim themselves freedom-fighters.
The Federation in Starship Troopers, the full name of which according to background material is apparently the "United Citizen's Federation". Only Citizens (which is a privileged status one has to earn; there are a few ways to do this, but military service is the easiest, as the news films proudly declare "SERVICE GUARANTEES CITIZENSHIP") are allowed to vote, you need a license to breed (Citizens can obtain a license more easily), corporal and capital punishment is the norm (live at 6 PM!), the media is nothing but government-owned propaganda, and everyone is horribly desensitized to violence. That said, things don't seem too bad for non-Citizens, though we only see the wealthy ones.
Although 'Federation' does not imply any form of democratic government (only the fact that there are several subjects ruled by one authority) and the term 'Citizen's' may even suggest that living in the country entitles anyone to participate in politics, and not every inhabitant is a citizen (much like in Greek poleis).
The book version is simply called "The Terran Federation", and is similarly less fascistic, though they still require service for citizenship.
Rather terrifyingly, Bane turns Gotham City into this during The Dark Knight Rises, complete with Kangaroo Courts reminiscent of the Bolshevik Revolution and the French Revolution (the French Revolution part is quite explicit, as Commissioner Gordon actually quotes A Tale of Two Cities at one point, and in an interview, we learn that Jonathan Nolan actually encouraged Christopher Nolan to read the book while he was writing the script). The wealthy are dragged out of their homes by angry mobs of armed criminals and summarily sentenced to death by a kangaroo court led by Jonathan Crane... aka the Scarecrow, who icily informs every defendant that "Your guilt has already been determined; this is merely a sentencing," where it turns out that both sentences are actually the same thing. Bane declares that this is a "liberation" and that he's a champion of "the people." The audience isn't fooled, as he already made his real nature painfullyclear to Batman earlier in the film.
Live Action TV
24: The Islamic Republic of Kamistan has the trope averted: they are a functioning democracy, albeit one plagued by instability (making them sort of a stand-in for Pakistan since Musharraf's resignation).
30Rock: Jack refers to San Francisco as "The People's Gaypublic of Drugafornia".
Angel: Possible Averted Trope on—the Groosalugg is exiled from Pylea once it becomes (as Gunn described it) "some kind of people's republic". Although this is a reference to what often happens in the sort of failed revolution that often produces people's republics (ie, old revolutionaries are branded traitors for disagreeing with the faction that wins), we never find out what Pylea is now like.
Flash Gordon: In the 2007 series, Ming's authoritarian state is called "The United Peoples of Mongo."
Mission: Impossible: Whenever the team was off to Eastern Europe, it was usually operating in the People's Republic of Something.
The Prisoner: the Village is allegedly run by the Citizens' Council (which is always referred to by the administration as "your Citizens' Council"), and the various Number Twos are always quick to loudly proclaim the Village's democratic nature. In reality, the Citizens' Council is a bunch of brainwashed mental vegetables who rubber-stamp whatever the current Number Two says and the post of Number Two itself is seen filled by a rigged election whose results are overturned as soon as they no longer serve the purposes of the Village's true rulers.
QI: In one episode, Jimmy Carr joked that countries describing themselves as 'the Democratic Republic of...' rarely live up to their name. Conversely, a country describing itself as 'the Fascist Junta' should be respected for its honesty.
Revolution: The Monroe Republic is implied to be this, considering that their military force consist of militias who force their citizens to pay taxes with food. Given this throwback to feudalism, and with Monroe leading what appears to be nothing more than a military dictatorship, it's a republic in name only. We can only guess if any of the other "republics" are so in more than their names.
Yes Minister: Lampshaded this, with "East Yemen" playing the role of the People's Democratic Republic of Yemen, better known as South Yemen, which (much the way West Virginia is north of Virginia) was geographically east of the Yemen Arab Republic/"North Yemen".
An episode of Think The Unthinkable featured the team at Unthinkable Solutions scheduled to meet with the Minister of Finance for the fictional African state of Nambitrea.
Sophie: Formerly the Democratic Republic of Nambitrea, when it was Communist.
Ryan: And before that it was the Nambitrean People's Republic, when it was Fascist.
In the BattleTech universe, the five major states are called the Lyran Commonwealth, the Draconis Combine, the Federated Suns, the Capellan Confederation, and the Free Worlds League. At one point, the Federated Suns and Lyran Commonwealth combined to form the Federated Commonwealth, which later broke up into the Federated Suns and Lyran Alliance. The galaxy's Golden Age came about under the rule of the Star League, which was brought down by the machinations of the Rim Worlds Republic. All of these states are monarchies.
But not all are exactly tyrannies. The Federated Suns and the Lyran Commonwealth, for ex, are relatively civilized and mostly law-governed places, the power of the monarch is not absolute in practice, even if it is in theory (they are not figureheads, but neither realm is a despotism, either). The Draconis Combine, OTOH, most certainly is an iron militarism, with harsh regimentation and all the nasty appurtances of a police state. The Free World League barely holds together, and Capella is somewhere in between the civilized monarchies and Draconia in terms of its freedom and decency rating. Nor were the rulers of the collapsed Star League absolute monarchs, though they were most certainly monarchs. The applicability of the trope varies here.
One of the example factions in Tomorrow's War is the Democratic People's Republic of Glory, "Glory" is the only part of the name that isn't a blatant lie, and only because it's the name of the planet they colonized. Their main enemy on Glory is the simply named Republic of Arden and their terrestrial allies include the PRC and Brazil (whose army is known as the "Brazilian National Liberation Army").
How bad are they you ask? They had one of their special ops forces pose as "Ardenian bandits" and raid one of their own border villages, the DPRG objective in one example scenario is to wipe out that village because their men got sloppy.
The well-known line "The first thing we do, let's kill all the lawyers" (Henry VI, Part II) is set in a less well-known context of the speaker's intention to tear down the existing social order and make himself a dictator:
Cade: I thank you, good people — there shall be no money; all shall eat and drink on my score, and I will apparel them all in one livery, that they may agree like brothers, and worship me their lord.
Video Games
The Commonwealth in Red Faction II. A commonwealth being essentially a republic, this one is nevertheless ruled by a dictator, then by another after a coup. The player can remedy this.
An in-joke revolving around Uru: Ages Beyond Myst is that DRC — the D'ni Restoration Council, the in-character face of the game company — secretly stands for the Democratic Republic of Channelwood.
The Democratic Republic of Sahrani from ARMA : Armed Assault. Also, Chernarus from ARMA II is a former bearer of this trope (and a certain political faction wants to return the country to that state).
Fallout 3 has The Republic Of Dave, which teeters on this trope. It's not too bad a place, but President Dave will have visitors shot if they don't adress him properly, legalised presidental bigamy so he could have another wife, teaches incorrect facts in school, and has convinced everyone he is the only viable candidate, so even though they hold regular elections, they only have one choice, unless the player passes a speech check to convince them otherwise. The place used to be the Kingdom of Ted before Dave ousted his father in a coup, believing that a republic is better. If his son, Bob, wins the election, he will turn the place into the Empire of Bob and become isolationist. (According to background material, this same process has gone on for several generations.)
In one developer demo for Tropico 4, the dev says "This island is the People's Democratic Republic of Tropico, which isn't democratic, isn't a republic and isn't for the people."
In Mass Effect, despite the Batarian government styling itself as a Hegemony, no-one in Citadel Space buys it.
Web Comics
The website hosting Le Avventure Del Grande Darth Vader plays with this in an article where the title character states he "freed" a newsgroup (actually, he just decided to post again into an abandoned newsgroup) and issues a "new manifesto" stating, in order: that the newsgroup is now a "democratic popular republic"; that he owns full legislative, executive and judiciary powers within the newsgroup; that ideas different from his own are always off-topic; and finally that he can delete off-topic messages any time.
In Last Res0rt, Celigo's full name is the People's Republic of Celigo (often shorted to P.R.O. Celigo). Supposedly it's not a bad place to live... as long as you have wings, anwyay.
A Miracle of Science has the People's Republic of the Moon, which isn't actually all that bad; it's a drab grey place, but then it was Luna to start with. (It's Venus, with no such nominative pretensions, that you really have to be careful visiting.) Luna is a communist state, whose economy is described in comic as "managed" and "a mess", where consumer goods flow like water (in order to show how prosperous it is) while essentials are often in short supply - everyone has sunglasses, but few have shoes.
Don't forget the rather bizarre inversion in the form of Tyraniria. Its ruler was a kind, benevolent man who genuinely wished for peace and prosperity. Tarquin disagreed with this idea.
During the Florida vote tabulation snafu between George W. Bush and Al Gore, The Onion ran an article where Bill Clinton took control of the United States and renamed it the "Holy United Imperial Americlintonian Demopublic."
Western Animation
The Transformers has the Socialist Democratic Federated Republic of Carbombya, led by Supreme Military Commander, President-for-Life, and King of Kings Abdul Fakkadi. The horribly offensive stereotyping provoked Casey Kasem to quit the show.
That's right. It was a joke so awful and racist that it broke Teletraan 1.
In American Dad near the beginning of the episode Rodger Codger is a sign for the fictional country "Republic of Balkavia" when the camera pans down you see that 5 people are hung from it. As a bonus the sign also says "Freedom, Peace, Unity". However it is probably a subversion as it turned out to be a CIA training course.
