I was born in a country where the history of our empire is somewhat celebrated. First book I read was a biography of every Hapsburg monarch (though these days, I recognize the Stauffer were superior emperors).
It always was painfully obvious that democracy doesn't work, and can't work because everyone inevitably votes in their own interests without considering the long term, and politicians inevitably lie about what they're going to do. That sent me on a short journey from national socialism to communism (for like a week until I'd read Das Kapital), back to Traditionalist Monarchy, aka feudal, HRE-style monarchy through Hermetic philosophy, with a Distributist economy (aka guilds of craftsmen, and lots of small farmers, with no larger megacorps).