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The Tory Pirate

Progressivism & Monarchy

12/17/2015

1 Comment

 
(Originally posted to The Maple Monarchists on November 28th)
It is not a secret that, as a general rule, conservatives seem to support monarchy more than
progressives. While it is true that conservative support for tradition and established authority
make support for monarchy quite natural what aspect of monarchy makes it such an
incomparable ideal for progressives?

This question has played in the back of my mind for a while now. I ponder it as my own examination of monarchy reveals not two incompatible ideals as is commonly assumed but
ones that often gain a great deal from each other. Before I continue with my main argument that
monarchy should be considered a progressive ideal it might be helpful to define what I mean by
both monarchy and progressivism. 

'Monarchy' literally means 'rule by one'. It is the world's most successful system of government
having been adapted for use from China to Peru and from the dawn of human history up to
present day. A system that has been so widely used has to be flexible. And, indeed, monarchy has
many variations. While I could get into the myriad differences between Canada's hereditary
chiefs
 and Imperial Russia's tsars I'd like to move ahead somewhat quickly. Sufficed to say that
while many of the points I will make apply to other forms of monarchy I will be focusing strictly
on constitutional monarchy where the monarch reigns but does not rule. Constitutional monarchy
is a system where the monarch lets elected officials handle the day-to-day governance. The
monarch may have real reserve powers (as in Canada, Denmark, Britain) or they my be limited to a
strictly ceremonial role (Sweden, Japan). Special mention should be made of Monaco and
Liechtenstein who have elected assemblies but whose monarchs do participate in the governing of
the country. And while the Parliament need not be democratic in a constitutional monarchy,
remaining constitutional monarchies are also mostly democratic states. 

'Progressivism' is an interesting belief system due in no small part to the contested definition of it.
I cast a wide net in my search for an adequate definition consulting in their turn Wikipedia, The
Progressive Bloggers
, a couple friends of mine that I would consider progressive, and others.
From these sources I was able to come up with two definitions of progressivism; one formal and
one informal. The formal definition is that progressivism is:
The idea that advances in technology, science, and social organization can produce
improvements to the human condition. Additionally, the belief that the above advances have
worth. A supporting belief is that history is linear, not cyclical (ie. human progress never
reaches a plateau or perfect state but always seeks to move towards it).
My friends contributed much of what I call the informal definition of progressivism:
The idea that society must continue to change, that the status quo cannot be considered
progressive. History itself has a 'story arc' leading to the further advancement of humanity.
Much of this article is meant to show that monarchy is a system that uniquely supports human
progress as defined by the formal definition. Because the informal definition explicitly excludes
the status quo I will show that no other system of government falls within it. ie that the definition
itself adds little value to our understanding of ​human progress. But even then I will argue that
monarchy can be considered a progressive ideal. 

Ok, with a workable definition of what monarchy and Progressivism is we can continue. I'm going
to make a couple assertions that I hope will be uncontroversial: 
1. An ideal is progressive when the basic ideas of progressivism support its existence.
2. An individual is a progressive if they support progressive ideals and undertake to advance
progressive causes.
3. An institution is progressive when its existence supports progressive ​results and is supported by
progressive individuals.

It is my argument that monarchy should be considered a progressive institution/ideal. The primary
purpose of making this argument is to counter the assertion that republicanism is somehow the
more progressive option in all cases.  

As I have written about a number of times before there is some interesting academic research
that has been done on monarchy as a government system. You can go through the links above to
find the relevant studies but to summarize:
Picture
Monarchies handle large institutional reforms better than republics.

Picture
Monarchies may liberalize quicker than republics.

Picture
Directly electing heads of state contribute to a 5-7% drop in votes for legislative elections.

Picture
Electing heads of state does not appear to lessen voter alienation or apathy.

Picture
Constitutional monarchies have a marked preference for consulting the public in times of
political dispute. 

Picture
Monarchies seem to generate, or at least do not harm, generalized trust between citizens.

Picture
There is no correlation between monarchy and income inequality.

Picture
Indirectly-elected presidents are no less likely to be partisan if their position possesses
actual power.

The first point is especially important for progressives. The ability to undertake institutional
changes without negative effects makes progress easier to achieve. If every change to society
results in noticeable difficulties there is a resulting tendency towards the status quo. But overall, I
bring these studies up because progressives believe that scientific knowledge should be taken into
consideration when making policy decisions. If improvements to social organization is a value of
progress it is equally true that those improvements should have a basis in evidence.  

Further, since the above studies show that monarchy has specific advantages when it comes to
promoting economic, democratic, and social progress it can in fact be argued that monarchy is a
progressive ideal
.

But what of the monarchs themselves and their families? Well, the Queen's address to the UN
from 2010 sheds some light on what Her Majesty values. Specifically the part that says "I have also
witnessed great change, much of it for the better, particularly in science and technology, and in social
attitudes.
 Remarkably, many of these sweeping advances have come about not because of governments,
committee resolutions, or central directives - although all these have played a part - but instead because
millions of people around the world have wanted them.
" The Queen has also shown a keen interest
in using new technologies to better carry out her roles as monarch. Prince Charles likewise has
used his position as the Prince of Wales to actively promote progressive causes. His advice to
government ministers has likewise been of a progressive nature. The Duchess of Cornwall has
taken up the cause of rape victims. Prince William recently spoke out against bullying and
homophobia in schools. Collectively the Royal Family supports about 3000 charities. All of which is
only to point out that our Royal Family is a rather progressive bunch. Much of this can be traced
back to Prince Albert who was ​a major patron of science. "But", I hear you say, "what about
all those other monarchs?
"

Well, in Morocco the king has agreed to subsidize the kingdom's solar power generation in order
to keep prices low. This step potentially sets the kingdom up to be a green energy superpower.

And who can forget King Juan Carlos I's restoration of Spanish democracy? He isn't even the only
monarch in the modern times to move from absolute rule to democracy. The monarchs of Bhutan
have encouraged democracy in the country since the 1950s which culminated in a full transition
to constitutional monarchy in 2008. Both brought their countries peacefully into democracy.
 
Indeed, monarchy seems to have a tendency to produce leaders who are more progressive than
their subjects. This makes sense when you consider that a low levels of education is connected to
greater political conservatism. Monarchs are trained from birth to rule and also tend to have a
long apprenticeship. The odds are stacked against them becoming conservatives. You could argue
the reason that you see fewer progressive monarchs in the House of Saud is their habit of
avoiding hereditary succession. A couple of years ago VICE ran an article where they interviewed
Baptiste Roger-Lacan who noted that "It's important to notice that nowadays republican France is
more conservative compared with some European monarchies, like the Netherlands, Sweden, and Denmark.
" You could say much the same about Germany.

​But returning to the Canadian Royal Family we can see there is a large number of progressives.
This leads to my third point that an institution made up of progressives can be considered
progressive itself. Nor are the progressives of the Royal Family the only progressives to support
the monarchy. With members promoting progressive causes and the institution itself seeming to
encourage progressive results I argue the monarchy is a progressive institution. 

This concludes my look at monarchy from the perspective of the formal definition of
progressivism. Next up, the informal definition.

My first thoughts on the informal definition is just how common it is among republicans. The
number of times I've 
heard monarchy referred to as an archaic system is unbelievable. That it
seems to excludes 
any form of government makes me question its usefulness. Consider that the
oldest currently existing republic was established in 301 
AD. If progressivism entails a constant
forward advance this 
republic would be excluded. Could we say that any aspect of government is
progressive? Human rights? Nope. The 
concept is quite old. Democracy? Ditto.

Ultimately, tying progress to movement from the status quo always becomes problematic. There is
a way around this. 
Consider human rights as an example. While the concept of human rights
continues as a solid ideal, how we interpret 
them change over time. By the same token while the
basic 
premise of monarchy has remained the same it has gone through major changes. Whether
we look at the monarchy's 
movement from executive to moral leadership, legitimacy via divine
right to legitimacy via parliamentary/constitutional support, rule by 
custom to rule by statute, or a
single imperial crown to a 
multitude of national crowns it is hard to argue that the monarchy has
not changed (and continues to change). But in 
doing so it has kept fundamental aspects of itself
consistent 
because they work. So in a sense you could argue that monarchy meets the informal
​definition of progress. Going 
from a monarchy to a republic isn't so much progress as it is
jumping from one path to another without regard for whether the new path is a progressive one.

Now, while I think I have made a good effort at explaining why I see monarchy as being completely
compatible with 
progressivism I don't expect progressives to agree. I say this because there are
few people who are 
only progressives. Most also ascribe to liberalism, socialism, social democracy,
or 
republicanism. And these ideologies often have their own criticisms of monarchy. But perhaps I
can hope that they will 
admit that their opposition to monarchy stems from secondary beliefs
rather than any intrinsic conflict between 
monarchy and progressivism.
1 Comment

Random Thoughts: Directly-Elected Executives Vs. Legislatures? 

10/10/2015

0 Comments

 
PictureThe US Senate in all its impotent glory.
While commenting on one of Warren Kinsella's older articles
(comment has not appeared as of this writing due either to
connection failure or queuing) I pointed out that when a
country has a directly-elected executive the executive tends to
win in any disputes it has with the legislature. Thinking on this
I realize that while there is a fair amount of anecdotal evidence
to support this position I haven't seen a published study on the
matter. Sure, directly-elected presidents have been shown to
​lower voter turn out for legislative elections and be less
willing to consult
 the electorate than either indirectly-elected
presidents or constitutional monarchs but do they cause
other harmful effects? Is an executive that has an advantage in
any fight with its legislature a bad thing?

And there is an advantage. The US President tends to be vastly more popular than Congress which gives them an
advantage in public disputes. My question is whether this imbalance in public goodwill is cause for concern. Well, cause
for concern for other countries. While our politicians actually have comparable levels of public goodwill to their US
counterparts (ie little) they don't have a directly-elected head of state to put the squeeze to them. They instead have an
executive appointed by the Crown made up of their peers which if it misbehaves ​badly enough can be tossed out. The
Prorogation Crisis illustrates this point. Harper had to work (lie) quite a bit to get the public on his side and he still had to
remove the contentious proposals from the budget bill to get it passed. I wonder if legislatures that have to deal with
directly-elected presidents can do as well. 

0 Comments

The NDP "is not planning any changes to our current form of the parliamentary system" 

10/3/2015

0 Comments

 
It is not often I get to talk about issues related to the monarchy on this blog. I mostly keep that on the other blog I write
for. However the Monarchist League of Canada recently surveyed the main federal parties on their views towards the
Canadian Monarchy. One of the answers was curious though. The NDP's reply was thus:
"The NDP is not planning any changes to our current form of the parliamentary system. Our
focus is on meeting the challenges of middle-class families for better 
jobs, affordable
childcare and reliable healthcare."
Now there are a few things to address here. First, yes they are. The NDP has stated that if elected they will abolish the
Senate which, last I checked, was still a part of our parliamentary system. Now, it could be that the NDP means they have
no plans over the next four years. Senate reform is complex and some feel it could take anywheres from 5 to 10 years to
abolish the Senate completely. So the answer is either less than truthful or very limited in scope.

​The second issue with the response is the fact that it doesn't mention either the monarchy or the sovereign. Giving an
answer to a question without referring to the topic of said question is...odd. More odd when you consider that had the
NDP wrote that they weren't planning any changes to Canada's 'constitutional monarchy', rather than 'parliamentary
system', they could have avoided any potential confusion.

​The third issue is the entire second sentence. It is nice to know the NDP is focusing on these issues but it has nothing to
do with the question asked. Whether you can read a sentiment of "why are you bothering us with this?" into their reply
depends on what you think about the NDP to begin with.

Finally there's the quality of this response compared to all the other ones. Frankly, it was the worst of all four responses.
The Conservative Party have a solidly supportive reply. This is to be expected. While nice to see, for a variety of reasons I
can't vote for them. The Green Party reply is interesting as it merely points to Elizabeth May's comments in the House of
Commons back in 2012. Not that I mind this as to my knowledge it is the most supportive speech ever given for the Canadian Monarchy on the floor of the House of Commons. Indeed, I've not had a problem with Mrs. May's views on the
monarchy. However, the Green Party candidates I've talked to are a different matter. It makes voting Green a very risky
proposition. The Liberal response is the second on the issue I've seen from the Liberals since Justin Trudeau took over as
leader. I had a hand in getting the first one from Justin only a year after he took over as leader (I actually tried to get his
views during the leadership race but, alas, he probably had a lot of correspondence). Here is what he wrote in reply: 
"At the 2012 Liberal Party Convention, delegates were invited to introduce, debate, and vote
on Liberal policy. Delegates explicitly rejected a motion to include severing Canada's ties with
the monarchy as part of Liberal policy. My view is that severing our centuries-old connection
to the monarchy is not a decision to be made lightly. The monarchy remains a cornerstone of
Canada's foundation, and any debate surrounding changes to this institution must include as
many Canadians as possible in the discussion.
"
The more recent quote is more clearly supportive. Now, I take any statement made during an election campaign with a
grain of salt but since the local Liberal candidate has also been positive on this issue it seems I will be voting Liberal this
time around. And I'm not sure how I feel about that.
0 Comments

    James Wilson

    Likes: Government Transparency, Constitutional Monarchy, Politics

    Dislikes: Political Dishonesty, Canadian Republicans, Intellectual Property

    Ambivalent Towards: Pears, the Green Party 

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