No Easy Answers: A royal pain?
- Andrew Conroy
- Apr 13
- 3 min read
There’s a possibly apocryphal tale about a tourist on a guided visit around the sprawling rural estate of a minor British royal. Awed by the sheer scale and loveliness of the surroundings and giddy on the unmistakable fumes of serious old money, he couldn’t contain himself when spotting the gentleman of the house, nursing a well-earned lunchtime G&T after a couple of solid hours deadheading his prized geraniums.
‘So how’d you manage to end up with this place, pal?’
‘Oh... it’s been in my family for generations.’
‘Yeah? Must’ve cost a bloody fortune?!’
‘I think one of my ancestors won it on the field of battle, actually.’
‘YEAH?! I’ll fight you for it!’
Whether there’s even a grain of truth to this, it’s an anecdote that says something about hereditary power and how it has patiently gained legitimacy over long stretches of time, as ‘traditions’, invented or otherwise, have swept its uglier tendencies and histories under the Persian carpet. A consequence of this is that the elevated social positions of royals have, historically, come to seem as if they’re part of the ‘natural’ order of things.
That’s at least how it’s been since time immemorial. More recently, the legitimacy of certain forms of monarchical power no longer seems quite so... legitimate. The UK royal family has spent the twenty-first century battling those on the outside who say that it— and monarchy more broadly — has no place in a world where inclusivity, social democracy and the levelling up of opportunities should be enshrined as core values, with inherited titles and all that they imply relegated to history. At the time of writing, arguably the greatest threat to the UK monarchy comes from the inside, with the actions of the late queen’s alleged favourite child, sibling of the reigning
monarch, and eighth in line to the throne seriously compromising the institution’s hopes to present itself as fit for— and in step with— the 21st century (and beyond).
But as the UK royal family finds itself under increased scrutiny, other types of monarchy seem, conversely, to be gaining in power. In the early 2000s, after pointing out that ‘all government is essentially monarchical’ and that ‘monarchy is the natural default form of human government,’
Americans elect a president, who is the monarch... the US presidency exemplifies the absolute capacity of one individual to change everything. If George W Bush had lost the last election, all foreign policy relations and huge swathes of domestic policy in America would have changed like throwing a light switch. The only other form of government that normally does that is hereditary monarchy, when one monarch dies and another one comes along.
In a period when huge numbers of Americans attended the recent No Kings March, and when the current incumbent of the White House is witheringly referred to by his opponents as a ‘king’, Starkey’s point seems to be even more apt, and there are more than a few concerns that the US government has come to resemble an absolute monarchy. With the current president even teasing that he may seek an unprecedented third term— in spite of the Constitution being clear that ‘No person shall be elected to the office of the president more than twice’— we find ourselves in strange times, where the relationships between monarchy and democracy have become unusually tense.
For some, monarchical power is outmoded and anachronistic in the extreme; something that’s supported by little more than sentimentality and a misguided sense of tradition. The consequence of this, so the argument goes, is that elites find new ways to weather criticism and keep their seat at the top of the table. For others, monarchy is an essential part of collective cultural identities and shared histories, and key to the stories that we tell about ourselves. But do the problems at the House of Windsor suggest that monarchical power had its day? Or do events in the USA suggest that it’s finding new ways to extend its power and reach?
Monarchy will be under the spotlight in April’s edition of No Easy Answers, a monthly discussion group that provides all OCA students with a space to have their say on some of the hot topics and critical issues of the day. We’ll be getting underway at 6pm UK time on Wednesday 15th April.
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