How to make a government that you've come to doubt work

Simply put, how do you write a form of government in your stories when you've come to have doubts about it?

For example, a fanfic story i'm trying to make good has a major country be an absolute Monarchy, but, no matter who i ask, people keep saying that monarchies have to either be constitutional (a government that grants the monarch no real power and makes them a figurehead to a more democratic government) or abolished and replaced by a more democratic society. People are firm that Democracy and Republics are the only right form of governments for major countries.

Am i saying Democracy is bad? No. But how can i write a story that has the main lead be an Absolute Monarch if i'm left with little reason to believe that Absolute Monarchy is good and too many hard argue with reasons that it's bad? And simply having the main character abolish the monarchy in favor a democratic government is not an option for me. The show the fanfic is based on had the monarchy in question be generations old, I don't think i could have it end with the main lead. Especially since i want his descendants to be on the throne with real royal power.

Somehow, you have to demonstrate to the reader that he's a benevolent dictator. Trouble is, the term "benevolent dictator" is an oxymoron to our contemporary way of thinking. History is rife with examples of how power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

For your character, you need to find a way to subvert that. I'd suggest trying to depict him as neither a domineering tyrant, nor a self-indulgent degenerate, but as an enlightened despot.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enlightened_absolutism

Hope this helps.

edited 17th Jan '16 5:33:47 PM by pwiegle

There are many ways for you to do this. Take Game of Thrones for instance. The Starks are feudal lords, that didn't stop people from rooting for them.

1. Write in a circumstance that would make transition to democratic rule inadvisable at the present time, such as war, political instability, infighting or the probability of abetting the rise of a fascist dictator out of a farcically weak democracy.

2. Make him a competent ruler in all other respects, but too proud or hidebound to ever really consider democracy as an option- and have this as an acknowledged character flaw internal to the story itself.

3. Have the prevailing culture be one in which monarchy is the expected or traditional form of government, with many people broadly in favor of it. If your society has a predominance of noble houses, they're likely to support a monarch rather than peasants.

I'd also add that democracy on the government level isn't always practical - medieval towns were small enough for mayoral elections to function decently, but anything larger than that would be difficult to implement and easily prone to corruption.

Second, absolute monarchy is the government of choice for war-ridden periods, as people prefer a strong autocrat getting things done and reacting fast to crises, even at the expense of some personal rights and freedoms. As much as this can be abused, the logic behind it is sound.

Conversely, legally absolute monarchies also work well in prosperous days, since nobody feels any need for the government to change - just about every fairy tale kingdom operates like this. Besides, legislation and enforcement have only become closer over the past few centuries. As with the ballot issue, a medieval absolute monarch was a far cry from an always obeyed autocrat.

In general, nobody wants an autocracy, including the autocrats themselves, as the respective forms of impeachment almost invariably come at the tip of a blade. However, there are plenty of situations where the people would feel the need for an autocracy, or at least the lack of need to change an autocratic system already in place.