Is it game over for the British monarchy? As yet another scandal rocks the royal family, and another prince limps away from the palace minus his titles, speculation that the clock is ticking for the Windsors has been rife. Calls to eliminate the monarchy have been made, many from the usual suspects. But one especially bold case was made by Will Lloyd, in a cover piece for the New Statesman entitled “Abolish the monarchy”. Will’s case is an important departure from prior attempts, which he rightly dismisses as “the soporific language of accountants and lawyers and NGO managers”. Instead he seeks to make a Cromwellian and populist case for Britain becoming a republic, imagining a future King William at war with a radical government:
What if, say, another high-risk constitutional manoeuvre were made by another populist or, perhaps, simply a radical prime minister is overwhelmingly supported by the public but opposed by a majority of Windsorist MPs, judges and senior civil servants, backed by a future King William V?
It’s an interesting avenue for speculation, but unfortunately we find out very little of what Will thinks the alternative should be. Monarchy is at once scolded as a supine creature of the establishment, and chided for being an arbitrary institution free to intervene in democratic politics. You cannot in the same breath dismiss monarchy as a powerless, corrupt relic based on outdated beliefs, and complain that it is an imminent danger to the political order.
Ultimately, like almost every thoughtless article on the future of the monarchy, it appears as if written in an historical and political void, in which the actual context of day to day British politics and public opinion does not exist. It’s easy to talk in highly abstract terms about the theoretical unsustainability of the monarchy, or the damning nature of the latest scandal, but what would have to happen in reality for a republic to come about?
In the first instance, there is no clear constitutional mechanism for abolishing the monarchy. Judges, military officers and policemen all take oaths to the King — not parliament. British democracy, having been entirely suppressed in Cromwell’s Commonwealth, emerged and took its current constitutional form in the context of a constitutional monarchy. To now eliminate the crown would involve the creation of an entirely new constitutional order. To achieve change on this scale, you would need a decisive, immensely popular government, a deeply unpopular monarchy, and a political consensus in favour of a new form of government.
Back in the real world, only 21 per cent of the country see Keir Starmer favourably, with 72 per cent viewing him unfavourably, making him the most unpopular Prime Minister in British history. By contrast, despite the Prince Andrew scandal, the King is seen positively by 62 per cent of the nation, and the royal family in general is still esteemed by 59 per cent of the country. The heir to the throne is seen still more positively, with 76 per cent of the public backing Prince William. In fact polling shows that the most unpopular royals after Prince Andrew are those who chose to walk away from the institution — Prince Harry and Meghan.
It’s easy to point to the relative decline of support for monarchy and the King compared to the previous decades, yet this is the wrong point of comparison. If you consider monarchy relative to nearly every other major institution today, it has never been more unassailable. Only one in five of the British people trust parliament, and one in five young Britons would prefer an unelected leader to democratic government. Even other neutral institutions, like the civil service, are trusted by just under half of the public. In fact, one of the few institutions that still enjoys mass support — the army, with 79 per cent of people expressing trust in the armed forces — is the one most identified with monarchy.
How, in a period in which politicians are disliked, distrusted and struggle to make meaningful change in government, would any government successfully eliminate a monarch who is personally and individually more popular than they are, and who commands the formal allegiance of the judiciary, the police and the army? Not only is the royal family still safe from removal, but it is obvious that the monarchy has never been more secure. Republicanism was still imaginable in the 19th and 20th century, when liberalism and socialism were powerful mass movements with the ability to intimidate reigning monarchs, and individual politicians enjoyed widespread adulation. Today the words “President Blair” are enough to smother any republican urges in their cradle.
But what of the populists? Could a future Farage or radical left leader clash with the institution of monarchy? Again, this is no longer imaginable. The age of mass politics and the two party system is over. The majority of projected votes is now fractured between five major parties, including Reform, Labour, the Conservatives, the Greens and the Lib Dems. Every single party leader, apart from the Greens, whose leaders the public aren’t aware of, has net unfavourability, and quite extremely so in the case of Badenoch and Farage.
Could a populist party gain greater traction and attempt a constitutional revolution? They might, but you should be very surprised indeed if that included an attempt to abolish the monarchy. The main path to a more executive, post-parliamentary government with the capacity to remake the country is through crown powers. The ability of Prime Ministers to become neo-Presidential figures is unlikely to rest at the end of a long (and as discussed probably untraversible) road towards something like the Irish constitution, and, should it happen, will almost certainly take the easy shortcut of the Royal prerogative and a strengthened Number 10. With no democratic leader able to secure wide support, “hiding behind the Crown and its halo” is going to be even more of a necessity for populists than it was for centrists.
An institution and individual that symbolically embodies British law, tradition and culture is likely to only become more important
Indeed, everything that we know about what Reform is considering in government points not towards a parliamentary power grab at the expense of monarchy, but instead something a lot like a reversion to older norms. The supremacy of the Commons, and the decisive role of a cabinet government drawn from parliament, could very well be challenged in a future Reform government. Zia Yusuf has already outlined plans to create a “US-style” cabinet including many non-MPs, with ministers possibly being drawn from the House of Lords instead. This distinctly pre-1911 constitutional set up could see the country substantively governed, at least in part, from the second chamber for the first time in over a century.
As faith in democracy, parliament and political parties breaks down, the monarchy may well offer Britain vital constitutional flexibility at a time when the French and American systems appear gridlocked. Mounting criticism of unelected individuals has focused not on monarchy, but figures like judges and civil servants who are seen to be enforcing foreign laws that overrule the popular will and British justice. As democratic politics only becomes more divisive, an institution and individual that symbolically embodies British law, tradition and culture is likely to only become more important to future British governments.
