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It's called a constitutional monarchy and is quite common in Europe (if that isn't obvious).

A few I can remember with constitutional monarchy: Australia, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Japan, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Monaco, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Spain, Sweden, and the United Kingdom.

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What I find quite ironic is that today in the British Common Wealth, the combination of an almost symbolic monarch, and parliamentary rule leads to -- in practice -- far less centralization of in the hands of the executive branch in comparison to presidential republics such as United States.

What's more troubling is that there's very little history of constitutional monarchies reverting to absolutism and staying that way for a long time. On the other hand, many post-Soviet USSR republics (including Russia) provide plenty of democratic presidents turning into dictators.

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