Following on from my recent entry on the monarchy, I wanted to explore a little further some of the issues surrounding my republican tendencies.
Looking at my comments and those on Robert Sharpe’s entry on the same matter, it is clear that tradition plays a strong role here. Well, yes, we figured that one already. And, being benign in nature, our monarchy is viewed as an ideal arrangement between the parliamentary democracy and the head of state. As The Devil’s Kitchen points out, democracy isn’t a panacea anyway and on the matter of costs (which was the issue I was skitting in the post anyway) there are monies arguably brought into the economy by the monarchy.
On the matter of democracy, I’m inclined to agree with the point made. Where a political party can gain around 22% of the vote and yet secure a sizeable majority in parliament suggests something isn’t quite right. Worse, by far, is the utter contempt then displayed towards the majority who did not vote for them. Also, democracy presumes that the majority is, in some way, right. If the majority had their way, the death penalty would return – and, doubtless many of the more draconian measures that the current government are pushing would succeed if put to the popular vote. Democracy is but mob rule with a veil of acceptability disguising the monster lurking beneath. So, no, democracy is not a panacea. However, if we use that system, we should use it throughout. It works elsewhere, so why not here?
The Devil’s Kitchen came to the rescue once more and reminded us of the French presidential elections a few years back. Actually, I was fully expecting this one as I laid the seeds in my original posting and subsequent remark in the comments:
The issue is not one of personality, it is one of principle. Without an elected head of state, we cannot claim to be a democracy – and elected presidents work perfectly well elsewhere.
I was just waiting for someone to mention the crook or racist flavour of the French election in 2002 and I wasn’t disappointed. Digressing for a moment here, the French really had only themselves to blame. The splintering of the left wing vote destroyed Lionel Jospin’s campaign and let Jean Marie Le Penn through to the second round. That they were surprised by this is itself a surprise; the wide range of candidates effectively competing for the same ground and voter apathy led to the rule of unexpected consequences being played out – expectedly, in my opinion. That the French very nearly screwed up does not mean that a presidency is a bad thing even if they have a bad president.
It does in the USA, though. Their system grants too much power to one man for my liking. The system of a ceremonial president and a parliamentary democracy is a preferable approach in my opinion even if not perfect. No system is, but this would be the least bad choice. Far better a ceremonial presidency àla Germany and Eire than the all powerful executive in Washington.
Others will argue that we already have the least bad choice; a monarch with no real power who spends a lifetime training for the role. That, if anything is by far the strongest argument in favour of the monarchy. Coming from a competence management background, I see much sense in it. How many politicians attain high office following effective training for the role? That much, at least, can be said for the monarch. From a personnel management perspective, I believe this to be inherently unfair. Firstly, the candidate may not have the relevant attributes. Prince William appears to, but his sibling does not. Supposing something happens to William? The opposite was true three generations back. In that case, history shows us that the Duke of York was the better candidate and proved to be a sound head of state during war time. How would things have worked out had his brother not abdicated and what about those supposed links with the Nazi leadership?
What if the candidate would rather a different chosen profession? Are they asked? Do they consider it? What are the options? No, it is traditional that the first-born is moulded for the role and no questions are asked. It’s traditional, you see? Well, frankly, it’s a pretty poor tradition.
Tradition is not necessarily a bad thing. It tends to spring from things being done in a particular way because, at the time, that was the best way. In some cases, survival may have depended on it. With time, the reasons get forgotten and they become redundant with only the tradition surviving along with half remembered folk lore. Too much reliance on tradition is equal to too little reliance on critical thinking. What was fine for the restoration and maybe even until late Victorian times may not necessarily be okay in the early 21st Century. Just because we’ve always done things this way doesn’t mean that we always should.
Personally, I blame Oliver Cromwell. If he had carried out effective succession planning, his republic would have had a fighting chance of survival. Yes, he was a despot. Worse, he was a religious fanatic who banned public displays of enjoyment. The Taliban could learn much from him. Maybe they already did. But for all his faults, that revolution gave us the kernel of our parliamentary democracy and with it, one person; one vote. By not properly planning for succession, he left a power vacuum that his son was incapable of filling, leading to the return of the monarchy. Indeed, by the time he died, he was effectively a king in all but name anyway, so had already betrayed his republic. Arguably, Charles II was the right person for the time, but his brother demonstrated once more that monarchy is no less flawed than any other human institution.
At least with the coronation of William of Orange and Mary Stuart, the Stuart ideal of divine rights of kings came to an end and with it the start of the system we see today. It is a system that despite its qualities I find intensely frustrating. On the one hand, I have no say as I am denied a vote in the selection of the head of state. Equally (and contrarily) I am frustrated by the powerlessness of the monarch. No, I don’t want a return to what the Stuarts were. But, just for once, it would be nice if the monarch refused to sign some of the illiberal bills that pass across her desk. Then, perhaps, I might have some respect. Then, perhaps, her independence might serve some useful purpose. Yes, yes, I know, this would provoke a constitutional crisis. Her signature is but a rubber stamp. But perhaps, given the fascist nature of our prime minister and his cronies, a constitutional crisis is exactly what we need? At least the Lords, unelected anachronism that they are, stand between the rabble in the commons and our cherished liberties.
All of which brings me back to the simple objection that I stated in my earlier posting: I did not vote for this person (nor anyone else), therefore I do not recognise that she in any way represents me or my country on the world stage as she lacks the necessary legitimacy of an election and does not compensate for this by standing up against the prime minister and his fascists. If she doesn’t, who will?
I am a citizen, not a subject.
V.interesting post. I think that we can’t have our cake and eat it. The issues giving rise to your objections to Blair et al. are caused by the very fact that they are elected, and a) have had the taste of power, and b) want to be elected again. The unelected Lords, meanwhile, are free to act according to their conscience without fear of being disempowered as a result. Similarly, people who seek political power do so for a number of reasons, not all of which are benign. People who have it thrust upon them by heredity probably yield a more balanced sample of people in terms of the proportion of ego-centric megalomaniacs. So both elected and hereditary power have their pros and cons, and I don’t quite think that one outweighs the other.
I don’t see a coherent argument here though against the monarchy that we have. The assumption that electedness = representativeness is often quite wrong in practice. Look at the war in Iraq. Similarly, unelectedness does not necessarily equal unrepresentativeness – it is a mistake to assume a correlation between the two. Your objection seems to be based on this very assumption, and therefore I do not buy it. In any case, the Queen is only meant to represent the government, and that she does to a fault 🙂 She is not claiming to represent you, in anything like the way that Blair is, under your view.
x
Briefly as exhausted having done my 4th 12 hour day in a row.
Monarch can no longer veto bills, I forget which Act changed that power to being a rubber stamp. Also, monarchy is elective. Parliament can decide to change the monarch if it wishes, but unless Parliament says otherwise, the heir inherits automatically.
It was one of the fundamental changes of the Convention Parliament of 1688.
I’m hoping we can build momentum for another Convention Parliament, but that means rebooting Liberty Central and running with it. Which will have to wait until the autmn for me…
Clarice, hello and welcome. 🙂
The problem, as I see it, is that we get the worst of both worlds. The elected house betrays our trust with its draconian legislation. Although it’s straying away from this topic, a different voting system may make the elected house more representative and less likely to fall prey to the kind of behaviour we’ve seen of late.
The unelected monarch is no effective barrier in the way that the Lords are. For the moment, my objection to the principle of the unelected Lords is on the back burner as we have rather bigger issues to deal with. I would still like to see reform of the Lords in due course while retaining the political independence that they currently show. It cannot be beyond the wit of man to achieve this.
As I mentioned, democracy isn’t a panacea; but we either have it or we don’t. The current fudge is not by any stretch of the imagination a democracy and it most certainly does not work.
I realise that the monarch cannot veto bills. However, unless Blair stands over her and physically forces her to sign, if she refused on the basis of conscience what could he or anyone else do? It would provoke a constitutional crisis – a crisis that would, hopefully, draw attention to what is going horribly wrong with our system. Frankly, without the right of veto, she is next to useless. An elected head of state would have the legitimacy to be able to exercise veto in exceptional circumstances – just recently we’ve had a number of bills that should have been vetoed; ID Cards Bill, Civil Contingencies Act et al (I could go on, but you get the drift; all those bills that erode the rule of law and our liberties).
Hello Longrider! Thank you for your warm welcome.
I think it’s a great shame that the issues are getting so muddied on this topic – it leads to erroneous conclusions (such as yours, I believe, and robertsharp’s). I think we need to separate the issues a little more clearly.
So, yes, the present “democratic” government is flawed in the extent to which it is representative of the wishes of the people. That’s orthogonal to the question of the monarchy though – the solution lies in the voting system as you rightly point out.
It is true that the unelected monarch is no barrier to the misuse of democratic power, but why should it have to be? I am no barrier either, does that mean *I* should be abolished? What about my sofa? That’s not a barrier, maybe that should be abolished too… Being a barrier to dubious acts of power is not an existence requirement for anything else on the planet – why should the monarchy be any different? It’s true that if it were a barrier, then that might be an argument for keeping it, but the fact that that argument doesn’t apply is not by itself an argument for getting rid of it.
While I agree that democracy is not a panacea, I disagree with your claim that it is a discrete category, whose membership is all-or-nothing. I also disagree with your implication that having a monarchy makes what we have a “partial” democracy, or a “fudge”. The queen has no executive power, therefore her presence does not in practice speak to the question of our system of government – where our system is a hybrid is the House of Lords – and that as you rightly say is a separate issue.
I would also reiterate the comment I have made on Rob’s blog – if an elected government can’t be trusted (and I agree that Blair and Thatcher have proved that it cannot), what makes you think an elected head of state will be any better? Who should we elect to have power of veto over our elected head of state? And who should we elect to have power of veto over them? You open yourself up to an infinite regress with this line of argument, don’t you?
To say that the queen is next to useless without the right of veto tells me that you have forgotten the positive aspects of the monarch in our culture. While she may not be “useful” in terms of improving our system of government, you still haven’t offered any argument for why her presence is damaging to it. Until you do, there’s no argument for getting rid of her. She helps our country in aspects other than government, and she does no harm in terms of the business of government itself. So what exactly is your problem with her?
Too many intelligent people are jumping on the anti-monarchy bandwagon without having thought it properly through. Ooh, it makes me mad.
:bow:
PS Why do I look like two mating frogs?
They are toads…please…:mrgreen: The gravatars change each time you load the page unless you have your own. You can get your own gravatar if you wish by clicking on the link below.
Perhaps the best example of what I’m trying to get at is what happened recently in France. The French government, democratically elected, went against the wishes of the electorate (that it was probably good law is besides the point). The French President, also democratically elected intervened directly on behalf of the electorate and overturned the legislation.
The Monarch is prevented by law from doing so in this country. I think this is appropriate, given the nature of an unelected monarch – although I would like, just for once, for her to tell Blair that his latest wheeze is illiberal, unBritish and she won’t put her name to it. Just once, I’d love to see the look on his smug face. Just once, please.
An elected head of state would have the mandate to do this and it would provide a final point of appeal for the electorate against bad law. At the moment, the governing majority in the house can pretty much do as it pleases and the Lords are limited in how much they can block laws or the parliament act gets rolled out.
Democracy is, unfortunately the least worst option. What we have now is not even that.
Neither you nor your sofa should be abolished as neither you nor your sofa are part of the state’s political apparatus (so far as I am aware).
BTW – no bandwagons here; I’ve been a republican pretty much since I did history as school.
Hi again, yes, I figured out about the frogs the minute I posted my ps :whistle:
The fact that the French President intervened in a postitive way is ORTHOGONAL to the fact that he is elected. People will use their power well or badly regardless of how they got it. Although I would add the qualification that people who stand for election to political power are more likely to possess the characteristics that would or could lead to them using their power in ways not beneficial to or representative of the electorate, relative to the general population. If the French example is the best example of what you’re getting at, then I’m afraid I remain unconvinced of the argument you are using that example to support. That you are unhappy with Blair is a symptom of the imperfections of democracy, and nothing to do with whether we should or shouldn’t have a symoblic monarch. Presumably, you’d still be unhappy with him if we had an elected head of state, and/or one that could keep him in line. While the facts of Blair’s behaviour do demonstrate that the system is flawed, and I grant you that the French example shows one way that such a flaw can be remedied, there is nothing about that example that rules out the possibility that the elected head of state could fail to intervene, or intervene in a way opposed to the wishes of the electorate. So it’s just passing the buck really, which as I have said, doesn’t solve the underlying problem and leads to an infinite regress. An elected head of state could provide a final point of appeal, but that outcome is not entailed by having one, and therefore such a system is subject to the same flaws you are trying to resolve, and as such is only a very very minor improvement on what prevails at present.
What we have now is a version of democracy (diluted only by the Lords and the voting system). The Queen has nothing to do with the extent to which the system is a democracy. So that is a non-argument for getting rid of her.
The thing is, until we can find a means to combat the corrupting effects of power, and the unpleasant characteristics of those who seek elected power, then the flaws in our democracy will most probably remain. Getting rid of the Queen would be like trying to put a house-fire out by having a sip of water.
As an active (ie voting) member of the electorate, I do feel that I am a part of the state’s political apparatus, since if people didn’t vote, then we couldn’t have a democracy. Your argument seems to be that existence conditions for things which are a part of the SPA should be different from all other things, namely that they should be barriers to the misuse of power. I agree with this, but I would go further. There are many things within the SPA (beside the queen) which are not barriers to misuse of power (The Prime Minister’s Office being one of them), but I do not see you calling for their abolition, which strictly, you should be doing for the sake of consistency. Do you see my point?
I think what you’re saying is that an elected head of state would improve our political system, and therefore, since the monarchy happens to stand in the way of this, it should be abolished. What I am saying is that I’m not at all convinced that an elected head of state would by defninition yield a great enough improvement to justify the losses that it would entail.
And finally, it seems we have something in common: I’ve been a monarchist pretty much since I did history at school 😯
Undoubtedly – the evidence bears this out. Until there is greater engagement in the system by the electorate at large, I don’t see this changing. This is why come the next election, I have no idea whatsoever which way to vote as none of the parties reflect my desire for smaller, more accountable government. But that’s digressing.
The issue about the French president is that being elected he had the moral authority to intervene as he was a direct representative of the electorate. The monarch is not and lacks that moral authority. As such, it was a prime example of the reasoning. I would expect the same level of authority to exist in a similar post in the UK government. Having that veto would concentrate the minds of the governing party.
You are quite right, I would despise what Blair has done to due process, the rule of law and our civil liberties regardless of the political system. As it stands having been betrayed by parliament, we have no recourse to a higher or independent authority. And, yes our democracy is deeply flawed. What I want to see is something that is more representative, has greater checks and balances and inhibits the power of the executive. If a democracy is what we are to have, then it should be elected throughout. There is no inconsistency in my position.
The doing of harm is not just by commission, but also by omission. Every time the monarch signs an illiberal bill, she becomes complicit. An honourable person would act according to conscience and refuse to sign, despite the consequences, despite the law. When the law is wrong or bad, the honourable thing to do is to disobey it. An example here would be appreciated. I mentioned earlier in this discussion that we could do with a constitutional crisis. I stand by that.
One small area where I agree with Blair is that of modernity – except that to me this means moving forwards to a better system that puts power back where it belongs; with the electorate, rather than just stealing civil liberties. That we have always had a monarch (apart from the 1640s) is not a good reason to deny the electorate the opportunity to vote for their head of state.
Getting rid of the monarch would involve no loss whatsoever (the money argument is unconvincing) – simply tradition, which is rarely a good reason for doing anything.
Er, you are rather stretching my definition beyond breaking point here. Come on, you know that’s not what I meant… 😉