[FORUM] What do you think of monarchy?
Jun. 6th, 2009 09:12 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rfmcdonaldAs the introduction to my photo post on Philosopher's Walk mentioned, the trail's north gate was built "at the instigation of the Imperial Order of the Daughters of the Empire, and to commemorate the visit of Prince George, Duke of Cornwall and Mary, Duchess of Cornwall" in 1901. It goes without saying that monarchy has shaped Canada greatly, indeed, that without the monarchy as a defining element of Canadian national identity we'd all be part of the United States or some such entity. Even now, Canada remains a monarchy to this day, I've been told earlier here, with Elizabeth II serving as Canada's Queen as well as Britain's (and Australia's, and ...) owing to the Queen's role in the Commonwealth.
Canada's only one of a dwindling number of monarchies, though. The smaller countries of northern Europe and the United Kingdom are constitutional monarchies, as is Japan, while the monarchies of the Persian Gulf area are relatively stable despotisms, but monarchies elsewhere have disappeared. Nearly all of continental Europe's went in the 1870-1945 period, the rulers of the various petty states of the Raj being assimilated into independent India and Pakistan, and so on. These defunct monarchies aren't coming back: the Braganças in Brazil seem to be celebrities, the last crown Prince of Italy Vittorio Emmanuel can go into Italy again but has a terrible criminal record, Simeon Saxe-Coburg Gotha was only prime minister of Bulgaria and then only for the 2001-2005 period, and so on. The only instance of a successful restoration is in post-Franco Spain, and occurred there only because of chance things coming into alignment. The list of threatened monarchies is continuing to grow, with the king of Thailand putting his position in jeopardy through his alliance with anti-populist conservatives, the kings of Tonga and Swaziland being in like positions, and so on. Nepal's new republic has added an amusing complication to the Traveller role-playing unierse, where a planet orbiting Fomalhaut has been ruled by the Nepalese royal family into the 57th century.
And yet, despite all this, even deposed monarchies and royal families retain a certain amount of prestige, as preservers of national ideneity, as celebrities, and so on.
So, what do you think about monarchies? Are they anachronisms pure and simple, or can they be reforms, or might they even be useful? (I'll point here to Canada's example.) Do you care about the monarchs in your areas of the world, are they at all relevant, are they gaining relevance? Do you want a republic, or do you want to restore a royal family?
Discuss.
Canada's only one of a dwindling number of monarchies, though. The smaller countries of northern Europe and the United Kingdom are constitutional monarchies, as is Japan, while the monarchies of the Persian Gulf area are relatively stable despotisms, but monarchies elsewhere have disappeared. Nearly all of continental Europe's went in the 1870-1945 period, the rulers of the various petty states of the Raj being assimilated into independent India and Pakistan, and so on. These defunct monarchies aren't coming back: the Braganças in Brazil seem to be celebrities, the last crown Prince of Italy Vittorio Emmanuel can go into Italy again but has a terrible criminal record, Simeon Saxe-Coburg Gotha was only prime minister of Bulgaria and then only for the 2001-2005 period, and so on. The only instance of a successful restoration is in post-Franco Spain, and occurred there only because of chance things coming into alignment. The list of threatened monarchies is continuing to grow, with the king of Thailand putting his position in jeopardy through his alliance with anti-populist conservatives, the kings of Tonga and Swaziland being in like positions, and so on. Nepal's new republic has added an amusing complication to the Traveller role-playing unierse, where a planet orbiting Fomalhaut has been ruled by the Nepalese royal family into the 57th century.
And yet, despite all this, even deposed monarchies and royal families retain a certain amount of prestige, as preservers of national ideneity, as celebrities, and so on.
So, what do you think about monarchies? Are they anachronisms pure and simple, or can they be reforms, or might they even be useful? (I'll point here to Canada's example.) Do you care about the monarchs in your areas of the world, are they at all relevant, are they gaining relevance? Do you want a republic, or do you want to restore a royal family?
Discuss.
