Queen Elizabeth II: An exception, not the rule

The last few days have aptly summarised the odd relationship between many postcolonial nations and their former oppressors. On Friday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi spoke at the installation of the new statue of Subhas Chandra Bose in the long-empty canopy near India Gate in New Delhi — from which a statue of George V, Queen Elizabeth II’s grandfather, had been removed after independence. Mr Modi’s speech — and the renaming of Rajpath to “Kartavya Path” — was pitched as a reminder of British oppression from which we in India are finally emerging. Constant links were derived between current government policy and decolonisation; for example, the New Education Policy was hailed as reducing the influence of English. (No mention was made in this paean to decolonisation, sadly, of any plans to remove the worst colonial hangovers in our state: The sedition and related laws infringing on free speech will remain on the books.)

Within minutes of finishing his speech, however, the prime minister had to deftly change course and remind us all of the continuing relationship between India and Britain: The death of Queen Elizabeth made it necessary for him to recall the warmth of their meetings and the closeness of the Indo-UK relationship. And the enduring relationship between Britain and the Commonwealth countries was underlined this week when the new cabinet of the United Kingdom took office — with, for the first time, no white men occupying the high offices of state. Britain’s chancellor of the exchequer, the foreign secretary, and the home secretary are all descendants of migrants from the former empire: Kwasi Kwarteng is the son of Ghanaians, Suella Braverman the child of Indian-origin migrants from East Africa, and James Cleverly’s mother was from Sierra Leone. And here is a list of the last three chancellors prior to Mr Kwarteng: Nadhim Zahawi, who was born in Baghdad to Kurdish parents; Rishi Sunak, whose parents were both from East Africa, but of Indian origin; and Sajid Javid, who still has family near the town of Toba Tek Singh in Pakistani Punjab.

Elizabeth II’s passing, in some sense, severs our last living link with the age of World Wars and finally brings to an end the post-War period. Her long life saw her little island decline from ruling half the world to losing its voice even within the powerful European bloc. And yet the influence it still possesses and whatever dynamism it retains in international and economic affairs is partly because one of the legacies of its imperial past is a relative openness to capital, trade, and people. And, of course, that numinous quality we call “soft power”. Ashok Malik, a former official in the Indian foreign ministry, correctly pointed out on Twitter that the queen “both as a symbol and as an individual, helped Britain punch well above its global weight.... She epitomised soft power before we knew what the term meant”.

This late queen was not a good representative of the real quality of monarchs. By the standards of that class, she was exceptional not just in her longevity but in her careful avoidance of controversy and interference, as well as in her careful attention to the duties assigned to her role. Victoria, who ruled for 63 years to Elizabeth II’s 70, is a useful comparison: After her husband died, the 19th-century Queen-Empress withdrew from much of her public work and became a recluse. Some previous English monarchs — George IV and Edward VIII, for example — happily caused constitutional crises. Indeed, other than her own father George VI, most of the queen’s predecessors back to the 18th century were just not very good at the job. That is, unfortunately, the usual case with monarchs.

It is true that constitutional monarchies have some benefits when compared to presidential systems in particular. Presidential systems, such as those in the United States, France, or the Philippines, can often claim that the elected head of state embodies the nation in the same manner a monarch does — but without the restraints placed on monarchs by history (and, usually, their own political ineptitude). This allows for greater partisanship and opens the door to autocracy. When, in our own country, Indira Gandhi began to put out feelers on whether there was support for a presidential system, this is what lay behind it.

King Charles III — as we are now supposed to call him — will have a task nobody can envy. Who wants to start a new job at age 73? Nor is he in disposition anything like his formidable mother; famously, he has written multiple letters to ministers in the past on legislation related to his own hobbyhorses from alternative medicine to organic farming to modern architecture. It is very doubtful that the British monarchy would have survived unreformed for this long if not for the specific character of the woman who died, after 70 years in the job, this week.