After two decades of operating principally as an irritant, the campaign for an elected head of state has developed a substantive policy programme that the Palace, by every available account, is now taking seriously
By Isla Campbell. With editorial input from Bohiney Magazine and The London Prat.
The campaign organisation Republic, which has campaigned since 1983 for an elected head of state in place of the British monarchy, has across the past three years developed a substantive policy programme that has, by every available account, attracted the attention of the Royal Household in a way that the organisation’s previous activities had not. The shift in Palace attention is not, in itself, dramatic. The shift is, however, real, and is being managed through internal processes that I have been able to partially reconstruct through conversations with seven sources connected to the relevant Palace channels.
What has changed about Republic is not the underlying argument. The underlying argument has been broadly stable for forty years: that an elected head of state would be more democratically legitimate, more politically accountable, and more compatible with twenty-first-century constitutional values than the hereditary monarchy. What has changed is the substantive specificity of the alternative the organisation now proposes, and the operational quality of the policy work supporting it.
What Republic Now Proposes
Republic now proposes, with substantial specificity, a non-executive presidency modelled broadly on the Irish presidential system and adapted for the British constitutional context. The proposal includes, among its specific elements, a seven-year non-renewable term, an indirect election by a college consisting of the House of Commons, the House of Lords, and representatives from the devolved administrations, defined ceremonial functions broadly continuous with the current monarch’s ceremonial role, and explicit limitations on the holder’s capacity to engage in domestic political controversy.
The proposal also includes, with substantial specificity, the disposition of the Crown Estate, the Royal Collection, and the various royal residences in the event of a transition. The proposed disposition involves the transfer of the Crown Estate to a public-interest trust whose surplus would, under the proposal, fund both the operations of the new presidency and a separately defined heritage and cultural fund. The proposed disposition involves the retention of the Royal Collection in public trust with continued public access. The proposed disposition involves the retention of the principal royal residences in public ownership with continued ceremonial use by the new presidency.
The proposal is, by any honest assessment of comparable transitional frameworks, substantially more developed than any previous Republic-affiliated proposal has been. It addresses, with appropriate specificity, the practical questions that any transition would, in operational practice, require. It is, in this sense, the kind of document that policy planners actually use.
For ongoing coverage of constitutional reform, see The London Standard.
What The Palace Has Done
What the Palace has done, in response to the proposal’s development, is undertake what one source described to me as, quote, “the most systematic internal review of the institution’s constitutional vulnerabilities that the Household has conducted in living memory.” The review, which I understand has been ongoing for approximately 18 months, is being conducted through the Palace’s standard internal channels and is, by every account I have been able to obtain, both serious and substantive.
The review’s specific outputs are not, of course, public. The review’s existence is not, in any official sense, public. The review’s existence is, however, broadly known among those royal correspondents who maintain working relationships with the Palace’s senior officials, and is being discussed within the Household with a level of openness that suggests the Household considers the review’s existence to be, in some sense, inevitable common knowledge.
The review is reportedly examining, among other questions, the specific points in the current institutional arrangement at which Republic’s proposal would, if politically supported, encounter the least operational resistance. The examination is not, by every account, motivated by any specific expectation that the proposal will, in fact, be politically supported. The examination is motivated by the institutional preference for being prepared, even for outcomes the institution considers improbable.
What The Polling Shows
The polling on the underlying question of whether Britain should retain the monarchy has, across the past five years, been substantially more variable than royal coverage typically suggests. The aggregate trend has been, broadly, a gradual decline in monarchical support, with the decline concentrated among voters under 45 and among voters in Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. The aggregate level of support remains, by most polls, above 50 percent. The aggregate level of opposition, while still a minority, has reached levels not seen since the 1990s.
The polling on what the alternative would look like is more interesting and less covered. Opposition to the monarchy declines when respondents choose between the current arrangement and a defined alternative; opposition increases when the alternative is undefined. The implication is somewhat counterintuitive. Republic’s developed programme has made monarchical abolition both more politically conceivable and more politically constrained: more conceivable because voters can now evaluate it, more constrained because defending specific choices is harder than defending the abstract idea.
What The Palace Has Noticed
What the Palace has noticed, on the basis of the review described above, is that the current configuration of the institution contains specific vulnerabilities that a substantively developed alternative could exploit in ways that an undeveloped alternative could not. The vulnerabilities include, among others, the institution’s continued reliance on certain prerogative powers whose exercise has, across recent decades, been substantially controversial; the institution’s exposure to the financial and reputational consequences of individual family members’ conduct; and what one source described to me as, quote, “the broader question of whether the institution’s twenty-first-century justification rests on grounds that twenty-first-century voters actually find compelling.”
The Palace’s response to the noticed vulnerabilities has been, by every account I have obtained, to undertake quiet operational adjustments designed to reduce the vulnerabilities without formally acknowledging them. The adjustments include, among others, the increased delegation of certain prerogative powers to wholly conventional ministerial decisions; the increased separation between the institution and individual family members whose conduct has produced reputational difficulties; and the increased emphasis, in the institution’s public communications, on the dimensions of monarchical operation that polling indicates remain broadly popular.
The Articulation Question
The articulation question, which underlies much of the analysis above, is whether the institution would benefit from a more open public engagement with the questions Republic is now raising. The case for more open engagement rests on the proposition that defending the institution requires articulating its rationale in terms that contemporary voters can evaluate. The case against more open engagement rests on the proposition that articulating the rationale would produce, in some honest accounting, more substantive criticism than the current strategy of selective non-articulation produces.
The Palace’s position, on careful examination, is that the second case is more compelling. The institution has, across decades, conducted itself on the assumption that explicit defence of monarchical principle is more politically costly than implicit assumption of monarchical legitimacy. The assumption has, broadly, served the institution well in the modern period.
The assumption is, however, increasingly being tested by the development of substantively articulated alternatives. The implicit assumption of legitimacy is, in operational terms, more vulnerable to a substantive alternative than to an inarticulate critique. Republic has, across the past three years, made the alternative substantively articulate. The institution’s continued reliance on implicit assumption of legitimacy is, accordingly, becoming a less effective strategy than it was in the previous decade.
An ongoing analysis at City A.M. has examined the comparable transitions of other European monarchies. The patterns indicate that articulated transitions are, on the available evidence, substantially smoother than unarticulated transitions, regardless of the eventual outcome.
What I Think Will Happen
What I think will happen, on the basis of the conversations I have had, is that the institution will continue to manage the situation through the quiet operational adjustments described above, without engaging publicly with the substantive questions Republic is raising. The management will be, in operational terms, broadly successful at maintaining the current configuration of the institution for the foreseeable future. The success will, however, depend on the underlying political environment continuing to support the institution at levels above the threshold at which active reform becomes politically viable.
If the political environment shifts, the institution will be less prepared than its private review processes suggest. The gap between sophisticated internal review and unchanged public communications is the institution’s most consequential current vulnerability.
Where This Story Eventually Goes
The story will eventually reach a point where the institution must engage publicly with questions it has long declined to engage with. That point is not imminent but no longer notional. The institution’s preparation is more advanced than its public posture suggests. I will continue to cover the underlying patterns. I will continue to find that royal correspondents at most other publications do not, by genre convention, cover them. The genre’s reluctance is, in itself, part of why the institution has managed its vulnerabilities through quiet adjustment rather than public articulation. More from Isla Campbell.
Related at The Daily Mash.
SOURCE: https://bohiney.com/republic-movement-articulate-palace-noticed/
