Alternative Editorial: End of Which Era?
When considering the AG Editorial this week, we wondered whether to give a second week to the passing of Queen Elizabeth II. After all, given the global mix of our audience, it may not land as a key event for the majority of AlterNatives. For republicans and the members of the former British colonies, its importance is mostly negatively registered.
Even so, given the phenomenal aspect - its reach, the power structure it displays, the emotional register, the developing narrative around past and present - we felt we should continue our reflections. It helps us to ask: what's the alternative?
In so doing, we hope to be open. To look at the causes and effects of monarchy - albeit crudely, with such a limited word-count. To observe the ongoing attraction as it appears in our midst, in the light of the continuing effects of its criminal past.
From the point of view of history, we can only welcome apologies and reparations in their many forms. From the point of view of the future, we can only invite the big questions: what is the attraction of this myth? And what are the new attractors that can meet the desires that the Royal Family met until now? Party politics has already failed in that job.
Given the multi-polar nature of any global audience - whether viewed through social media, the BBC or the United Nations - it was a shock to many that the whole world responded so fulsomely to the passing of the British monarch. We might have anticipated representation from the Commonwealth countries, so the arrival of the Prime Ministers Ardern (New Zealand), Trudeau (Canada) was already a great compliment to the throne.
But the President of the United States, the Emperor of Japan, Jair Bolsonaro, President of Brazi - that’s something to think through. Maybe Emmanuel Macron gave us a clue when he described how “To you, she was your Queen. To us, she was The Queen”.
Was their attendance born from their desire to pay respect to - or affection for - the longest reigning monarch in history? If so, it will primarily have been for the image they saw through the mainstream news media - few would have spent any private downtime with the Royal Family. So little was known of their personal lives that when Netflix created a six part fictional series imagining the truth behind the headlines, it filled the vacuum neatly. That tv drama is just another layer of what we believe we know about the Royal Family as people.
Maybe it was enough for the illustrious vistiors to be seen gathering under the banner of a set of values she espoused - service, globality, family - even if they might not model them at home. Yet they would all have taken active part, consciously or not, in the myth of royalty - the idea that God appointed a person to rule the British Empire, symbolised by an orb, a sceptre and a crown. If questioned directly, would any of them have given that power to an unelected person today?
Similarly, how many of those hundreds of thousands of people who queued up to see the Queen lie in state or lining the streets of her funeral march on Monday would, if asked, describe themselves as her subjects (their literal constitutional status)? In the interviews and messages left with flowers and cards, most imagined a relationship with the Queen closer to that of a mother, someone who served on their behalf. The tears and commitment displayed - some standing 48 hours in the cold and rain to catch a glimpse of the coffin - might look strange in any other setting.
Of course, none of these feelings are accidental. The trappings of Royalty are intentionally awesome, particularly as they can marry with the grandeur of the Church. To be proximate to such towering architecture, to hear the soaring voices of the choirs, to watch the precision of their rituals both inside and on the streets, offers the people a narrative of those in power having full control over themselves and history itself.
While few citizens imagine themselves as 'ruling over' any former colony today, the glamour of responsibility remains. No doubt for the majority, these are less conscious positions than archetypal frames - familiar patterns inherited from the past but active in the present. Noblesse oblige - once singularly the provenance of the aristocracy, now the charitable obligation of a nation. Ameliorating the conditions of the people our ancestors robbed. At times, listening to the Royal marching band leading the way for the royal procession, the sound reminded us of (a slowed down) Star Wars: fighting the effects of the past, but constantly repeating the causes so nothing really changes.
Why do people continue to buy into this power structure while also believing they are doing the opposite? There are many clues in the blanket coverage of the mainstream press: how often is the word love invoked? Or terms like compassion, kindness, care? We are not in the position to know the personality of Queen Elizabeth - she may well have embodied these qualities more than most (she loved the objectionable Prince Andrew as only a mother can). But the constant association of these qualities with her character, made it much harder to criticise her office, as ruler of the Empire.
Similarly, the unsurpassed grandeur of the occasion and its claims to heavenly powers gives everyone taking part - those queueing as well as visiting leaders - status by association. The decision to open up previously secret ceremonies to the cameras, to include community organisers in the Church ceremony and for members of the royal family to shake hands with the public at every opportunity—all of this reinforces the notion that we belong to that power system (albeit each of us knowing our place).
This spectacle is soft power in action: the ability to entrance through stories that meet our emotional needs - even if only in an illusory way. Where the American Dream meets our essential needs for freedom, achievement, purpose, then the British Royal Family meets a collective need for belonging, control, status. These needs are not problematic in themselves - they motivate us to become social, essential for our survival. But when these needs are met unhealthily, promising power that is not forthcoming, we cannot flourish. We cannot regenerate.
Just as the American (or Chinese) Dream covers up a multitude of sins - extreme inequality, corruption, invasion - it can't be ignored that what Queen Elizabeth held as benign, was historically violent and oppressive. Her commitment to upholding - through service and devotion to its subjects - the vehicle of subjugation (meaning the British imperial state), believing it could be transformed, was a choice she made as a young girl. She never wavered from it. Her journey was not an easy one and, for many, not a justifiable one. She certainly had some successes but no game-changers - progressive continuity was her goal.
Illustration by Eleanor Shakespeare from Guardian aricle on The Case for Reparations.
So what's the alternative? This might be a moment to consider whether or not the phenomenon, the official story, the myth and the counter-narrative might not all be converging - namely, that something has come to an end. Some call it the end of the Elizabethan Era; others think of it as the (official) end of the Royal family or maybe the last fantasies of continued Empire. A contrast is not only between the obvious polarities - royalists and republicans - but within them too.
In mourning the passing of Queen Elizabeth, there is not an automatic welcoming of King Charles across the media. Strangely, those who loved her ability to hold a diverse community (class, culture, age, gender) lightly, do not welcome King Charles' history of embracing those diversities openly. Those that never had time for the Royal family, still made time for (now) King Charles. In his 2010 book Harmony: A New Way of Looking At The World, written with the environmentalists Tony Juniper and Ian Sherry, his opening lines were:
“This is a call for revolution. The Earth is under threat. It cannot cope with all that we demand of it. It is losing its balance and we humans are causing this to happen.”
In addition, the King has not only been working for social justice more broadly in society, but also making speeches apologising for past harms, urging members of the Commonwealth to decide for themselves whether to leave or continue their membership. His role as the head of the Royal Family may well be to steward transition to a very different way of acting upon the world.
However, within the current system, there is little opportunity of convergence. Royalists versus republicans creates a divide that has environmental activists weighing in against Charles' agency, even when he would support their cause. And as Trevor Noah explains with admirable self-mastery, why would the oppressed ever seek to make relationship with the oppressor? From another perspective, the conversation between King and Prime Minister will not be a comfortable one - Liz Truss seems hell bent on lifting even the minimal regulations protecting the climate. Fear of an overly active King might cause republican politicians to weigh in with the government. It remains true for all sides that anyone who puts the monarchy at the centre of the solution would be in danger of keeping the old power structures alive.
Getting back to the Alternative perspective, we would think of this post-Elizabethan era as mostly continuing the work of planetary regeneration that has been taking shape for decades and accelerating since the birth of the internet, with or without the Royal family. However, the prospect of a parallel polis, the socio-political system taking shape outside of the current political economic structures would likely offer a more pluralistic, less antagonistic, deliberately creative space within which a post-Empire reality could take shape.