Just a reminder that there is benefit in having a constitutional monarch. I have been interested in history all my life but it has only been relatively recently that I realized just how important kings really are. Australia is again debating becoming a republic.
Monarchy is the way the world has been run for thousands of years and it is impossible to just change it in a short time. We have not eliminated kings, not at all. We usually just don't call them kings anymore. But they are very much still with us.
What happens is that if a nation doesn't have a king, even a tame "constitutional" monarch, it has more tendency to end up being ruled by someone who "acts like a king". Another important factor in understanding international relations is that leaders who are effectively kings tend to support each other and stick together.
Leaders who are effectively kings tend to be rightward. Suppose that we compare Britain and France. Britain has a constitutional monarch while the French monarchy has been eliminated. But France today has a strong far-right political party, dominated by the Le Pen family, that Britain lacks. I see this party as the modern incarnation of the French monarchy.
It was the French Revolution that opened the modern political era. The king and queen were overthrown and guillotined, in order to create a republic, but it ended up in the rule of Napoleon, who was the prototype of the modern dictator. Before being overthrown the king and queen had been America's first allies, and helped it to gain independence. We saw in the compound posting "America And The Modern World Explained By Way Of Paris", December 2015, that America's Republican side is effectively the continuation of the French Bourbon Dynasty. What Donald Trump stands for, in the grand scheme of things, is a reversal of the French Revolution.
Now there is legislation pending in Britain to do away with the hereditary peerages in the House of Lords. But let's be careful, they don't have a lot of real power anyway. Britain is alone among the larger European countries in that it has never been ruled by a dictator. It is also the only one that still has a monarch, although a constitutional monarch, and I don't think that is a coincidence. The real purpose of the hereditary peerages is that they have provided a valuable sense of continuity for many centuries. I would never have written this when I was young but now I realize how important it is.
Why don't we review all about kings, the advantages and disadvantages of having one? Here is a link to "The Theory Of Kings".
www.markmeeksideas.blogspot.com/2022/04/the-theory-of-kings_28.html?m=0
No comments:
Post a Comment