Republican Nationalist Party (the Cape)
Republican Nationalist Party Parduv Restarka Nationalista | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Abbreviation | RNP, PRN |
| Leader | Kil Furey |
| First Secretary | Saoirse Kairtus |
| Standing Committee | Central Committee of Workers, Peasants, and Nationals |
| Founder | Melvyn Kalma |
| Founded |
|
| Preceded by | Political Office of the National Revolutionary Army |
| Headquarters | 12 Republic Ave, Cape Town, Cape Province |
| Newspaper | Restarka the Republic |
| Think tank | National Policy Institute |
| Youth wing | League of Republican Youth |
| Overseas wing | League of Republicans Abroad |
| Education wing | Institute of Revolutionary Practice |
| Armed wing | National Revolutionary Army (1886-1922, 1935-1951) |
| Labour wing | Association of Republican Labour |
| Membership (2021) |  23,981,211 |
| Ideology | Restarkism Populism Cape nationalism |
| Political position | Big tent |
| Colors | Blue |
| Slogan | "The Movement for the Cape" |
| Anthem | "National Chief March"[note 1] |
| National Stanera | 377 / 503
|
| National Auditorium | 22 / 28
|
| Party flag | |
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| Website | |
| www.rnp.rk | |
The Republican Nationalist Party (Cape Coscivian: Parduv Restarka Nationalista) is the founding and ruling political party of the Federacy of the Cape. The RNP currently holds 377 out of 503 (or 74.9%) seats in the National Stanera and is constitutionally defined as the dominant-party of the republic under Planoarita politics.
The RNP was founded as the Political Office of the National Revolutionary Army in 1896 during the Capetian War of Independence. Under Melvyn Kalma, the party was declared a political organization in 1897 and became the founding party of the Federacy of the Cape. It led a period of single-party rule until 1924, when it narrowly won its first free elections against the Communist Party. Following the invasion of the Cape by Paulastra and Arcerion in the Second Great War, the RNP was incorporated as the political wing of the resisting National Reclamation Government. Following the re-establishment of the republic and the party's refounding in 1951, the RNP ruled as a one-party dictatorship until the 1992 Republic Day revolution and the country's subsequent partial liberalization. Since then, it has lead a guided democracy. Political scientists often classify the RNP as a "party of power" and as a "state party" - as, from even its name, ideology, and symbolism, the party has always been intrinsically linked to the very concept of the Capetian republic.
The RNP is the only Capetian party that practices intra-party democracy, with over 40% of Cape citizens voting in its quadrennial open primary elections, choosing candidates for both the Prime Executure and local representatives to the National Stanera. However, the Republican National Congress remains the highest body of the RNP. It is elected by the party's official members, chooses the first secretary, and approves candidates to compete for the Prime Executure.
The party's guiding ideology is Restarkism, described as welfarist, reformist, civic nationalist, and secularist. A primarily social liberal party, a majority of RNP politicians have voiced support for the feminist movement, LGBT rights, and racial equality. Although the RNP has no international affiliation, it maintains connections with a wide variety of parties and groups; from the Kiravian right-wing Coscivian National Congress to the parties of the Pelaxian left.
History
Organization
Ideology
The ideology of the Republican Nationalist Party is Restarkism; a series of four principles - nationalism, republicanism, judicialism, and reformism - developed by Melvyn Kalma. Though originally an ideology based on Occidentization and modernization, Restarkism has changed much throughout the 20th and 21st centuries, and today manifests as a civic nationalist, statist and secularist ideology with a focus on economic growth and popular welfare.
Restarkism posits a phased plan for the implementation of constitutional democracy. The "first stage of national construction", a one-party state led by the RNP, took place between 1951 and 1994. The second stage, Planoarita politics, where the RNP leads a guided democracy, is currently in place. While the RNP remains, in theory, committed to the promise of full liberal democracy, it has been argued that the party has no commitment or ideology and instead takes a nationalist perspective on what is pragmatic for the country’s interests.
Pursuant to this goal, reformism in the Restarkist tradition has allowed the RNP to adopt a wide variety of ideologies from left, right, and centre - sometimes all at the same time. The relationship between ideology and policy in the party's governance is inductive, with decision-making justifying ideology and not the other way around. Each generation of leadership since the 1992 Republic Day revolution, which led to the end of the party’s legal single party rule, has believed that the ideology of the pre-1992 party-state RNP was “rigid, unimaginative, out-of-touch, disillusioning, and deserved of hate and overthrow by the people”. To maintain the popular legitimacy of the particracy under Planoarita politics, the party believes that its ideology must remain fluid and responsive to public opinion through populist politics and mass public participation in the party’s inner workings.
Planoarita politics
Planoarita politics, literally “politics in accordance with the popular will” is the current guiding philosophy on how the RNP should rule. It was envisioned by Melvyn Kalma as a system of guided democracy, where a united party maintains power over a growing multi-party system in a period of political tutelage to build a strong democratic culture.
However, since the reforms of Isnet O’Niall, this conception has been reversed. Planoarita politics today manifests through the centralization of state power within the party, with the party’s structures becoming the arena of democracy and participation instead. The RNP sees this system and itself today as the “gatekeeper of democracy” - allowing within its organization the flourishing of a “democracy of tolerated ideas” while those intolerable are left outside with no influence over the machinery of the state.
The hallmark trait of this “democracy” is the party’s quadrennial open primary elections - where any Capetian voter is invited to vote in a free election for their district’s RNP nominee to the National Stanera.
Factions
Three major, informal factions (referred in the parlance of the RNP as “caucuses”) have grown since the start of Planoarita politics - namely, they are the RNP-Liberals, the RNP-Labourists, and the RNP-Nationalists.
Liberals
The Liberals have been the traditionally dominant faction of the party, having descended from the 1992 revolution’s reformist faction. Prime Executive O’Niall was the founding member of the faction. It is a neoconservative faction dedicated to the continuation of post-1992 economic and political reforms. These reforms include the continued decentralization of power within the state and the party to local government and provincial caucuses respectively, and the continuation of market reforms and the divestment of state assets and services to either their workers or the private sector.
For the first time since 1992, it is currently the second largest faction within the RNP. It is supported by the traditional pillars of party support - namely the established civil service, business leaders, and retired generals.
Labourists
The Labourists descend from the left-wing of the 1992 reformists, having opposed the party-state for its ignorance of worker’s rights and its proletarianization of the Cape. An originally Marxist and socialist grouping, the Labourists today support a “strong market socialist” economy through promoting worker-ownership, establishing stronger worker protections, and subsidizing Capetian industry. It is also a neoconservative faction, having supported foreign interventions in Varshan and Kelekona in the name of the working class of those nations.
It is the third largest faction of the RNP and is supported by the Association of Republican Labour. Restarka, the party’s newspaper, is considered a Labourist stronghold.
Nationalists
The Nationalists are the newest faction of the party - having been established in 2015 with the goal of “bringing forth a great national renaissance” and “setting the stage for constitutional democracy”.
Electoral history
See also
Notes and references
- ↑ The National Chief March remains the official anthem of the RNP, although it has been rarely played since the end of the one-party period. It is now considered as a broadly patriotic song commemorating Melvyn Kalma rather than a song associated with the party.