It also employs the concept, for instance, of a constitutional republic in which a court system is involved in matters of jurisprudence.
[4] Suffrage is commonly restricted by criteria such as voting age,[5] and sometimes by felony or imprisonment status.
Prior to the American Revolution in what is now the United States—and before the coming of age of the "crowned republics" of constitutional monarchies in the United Kingdom and other European countries—democracy and republic were "used more or less interchangeably",[6] and the concepts associated with representative democracy and hence with a democratic republic are suggested by John Adams (writing in 1784): "No determinations are carried, it is true, in a simple or representative democracy, but by consent of the majority or their representatives.
[8] Likewise, Africa's oldest democratic republic, Liberia (formed in 1822), has had its political stability rocked by periodic violence and coups.
Algeria,[13] Democratic Republic of the Congo,[14] Ethiopia,[15] North Korea,[16] Laos,[17] Nepal,[17] the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic[citation needed], Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan do not hold free elections and are rated as undemocratic "hybrid regimes" or "authoritarian regimes" by The Economist Democracy Index.