I have a huge, HUGE hole in my education in the areas of history and geography (history was limited and I was taught no real geography). I am embarassed to admit that I was a senior in COLLEGE when I first learned what a super-power Britain was in the days of the British Empire (thank you, required British History course), but even that was mostly limited to Africa and India and the East India Company.
There is a thread in MPSIMS about the Queen visiting Canada. In the back of my mind I knew that Australia had a relationship with the Queen, and I think I might have known about Canada as well. But I’m confused about the exact relationship. The Commonwealth is made up on nations that are independent from Britain, correct? So what is the purpose of the Commonwealth?
Does the Queen have any power over the Commonwealth nations, or is she just a symbol?
Is there any representation in any of governments (i.e. Britain in the Canadian government or Canada in the British government)?
What is the benefit of being in the Commonwealth? What exactly does it do? Does it have a global voice of some kind?
Those of you who are in a Commonwealth nation - do you think of the Queen as “your” queen? Does she comment or opine about things happening in your country? Do you care about her opinion?
Why did the Commonwealth decide to be the Commonwealth, instead of all the countries just going their own separate ways?
If anyone can recommend a good “British Empire for Dummies” book, I’d love suggestions, but I’m not sure I have the time to work my way through volumes of detail.
The countries of the Commonwealth are typically former colonies of the UK from the time when UK was the dominant world power. They are now pretty much all independent, but that independence has happened gradually over time and there are links of trade and history which make the institution still of some (relatively minor) significance.
Australia is independent of UK in all but name - the head of State of Australia is still the Queen, but she has no real power at all. The power is held by the Prime Minister and Parliament (at a national level). The same is true of Canada and most other countries in the Commonwealth to a greater or lesser degree. None of the Commonwealth countries (outside of the British Isles) has any representation in the UK Parliament or government, but there are diplomatic links, of course.
The main purpose of the Commonwealth now is to run the Commonwealth Games every 4 years (to remind us all that the Commonwealth still exists) and to act as a bully pulpit for countries that get out of line. Many of those countries still have a certain reverence for the old Imperial ways and for the Queen. If the UK government were to criticise a member, then it could be dismissed as just posturing by the party in power. But when the whole Commonwealth does so, criticism is not so easy to dismiss.
Examples of pressure being brought to bear on countires in recent times are the expulsion of Fiji for the coup which put the present government in charge, and diplomatic action taken against Zimbabwe.
To answer your questions, no the Queen has no real power.
No, there is no cross representation between governments.
The benefits are cultural and historical. We are a gang with a common history, language, legal background and “way of doing things”.
As to what we think of the Queen, there is no monolithic answer. Some still revere her and wish things were like the old days. Some think the old dear should fade into the past.
The Commonwealth was originally the Empire. As the apron strings were relaxed with greater or lesser haste, and with greater or lesser acrimony, each country thought there was merit in retaining some links with the Old Country. For example, the Privy Council was used by many Commonwealth countries as an ultimate court of appeal, and some countries still use it as such (although not many now).
The Queen never expresses any political opinion in public, so this is not applicable.
The Commonwealth is mostly just cultural nowadays, but there are a couple minor benefits that I can think of. All Commonwealth citizens who live in the UK for more than 6 months are eligible to vote in UK elections, for example. Professional qualifications (e.g. law and medical degrees) are also much more likely to be mutually recognised between Commonwealth members than between other foreign countries.
At least on paper, Commonwealth members send each other “high commissioners” instead of ambassadors, and their offices are not officially called “embassy” or “consulate”. Nowadays, however, the difference is in name only.
Note that that’s only true for the Commonwealth realms (e.g. Canada, Australia, NZ, and a few others). There are Commonwealth members that are republics and the Queen is not the head of state (e.g. India and Singapore).
This is not true as a general statement about member countries of the Commonwealth, although I believe it is true for some (Canada, etc).
South Africa for example is a member of the Commonwealth but the Queen has no power over or even a ceremonial role within South African government - it is 100% a Republic with not even ceremonial monarchy elements. From a South African - British perspective the Commonwealth is nothing more than a friendly club where the two countries can chat about things and share a cup of tea. Countries within the Commonwealth do have historically strong ties to Britain (for good and for bad), in South Africa’s case the obvious tie being that it used to be a British colony. I believe nearly all countries in the Commonwealth were at one point in history a British colony.
You’re conflating two different things, that the Queen of the United Kingdom is also queen of other countries like Canada, and the Commonwealth of Nations.
The Commonwealth is something akin to a social club for countries. Wikipedia has a good article on it, so I may as well link it , Commonwealth of Nations - Wikipedia. Note that countries like India and South Africa, fully republican countries who don’t have the Queen as Head of State, are members of the Commonwealth.
Somewhat confusingly there is also a term “Commonwealth Realms” which describes a group of countries with a head of state who is the Queen of the United Kingdom. She does this as Queen of a legally separate monarchy in each realm, for example she is also Queen of Australia. You’d have to go into the history of each country involved to get the whole picture of how this happened, but generally it involved a continuous devolution of power, with the creation of Dominions around the turn of the 20th century and full legislative independence with the Statue of Westminster Statute of Westminster 1931 - Wikipedia.
1. Does the Queen have any power over the Commonwealth nations, or is she just a symbol?
Her Majesty is the head of the Commonwealth (note: it’s “the Commonwealth”, not “the British Commonwealth.” That is a purely symbolic role. When there is a meeting of Commonwealth heads of government, she does not participate in the real politics; her role is to be above politics and to be the symbol of the organization.
Her Majesty is also the formal head of state for several of the Commonwealth countries, which have retained the monarchical form of government. So in addition to being Queen of the United Kingdom (note: not Queen of England; the last Queen of England was Queen Anne, who died in 1714), Her Majesty is also the Queen of Canada, the Queen of Australia, the Queen of New Zealand, and so on. There are currently 15 countries which have retained Her Majesty as their head of state; they are referred to as “realms.” As Queen of these countries, Her Majesty has the powers granted to her by each country’s constitution. Since all of the realms are constitutional monarchies, she acts on the advice of the elected government of each country, except in very unusual circumstances.
The majority of Commonwealth countries are republics, in which Her Majesty has no constitutional authority whatsoever. Her role in these countries is purely symbolic, as a symbol of the Commonwealth. India was the first Commonwealth republic. That example was followed by many of the former colonies as they gained independence. 2. Is there any representation in any of governments (i.e. Britain in the Canadian government or Canada in the British government)?
No. Each member of the Commonwealth is fully independent. Countries that retain Her Majesty as their head of state exchange High Commissioners with the U.K. and other realms. Those that are republics exchange ambassadors.
Her Majesty acts solely on the advice of her elected governvments in each of the countries in which she is head of state. So Prime Minister Cameron of the United Kingdom has no power to give her any advice about how she should exercise her powers as Queen of Canada, for example. 3. What is the benefit of being in the Commonwealth? What exactly does it do? Does it have a global voice of some kind?
It is essentially a talking shop, where countries that represent a fairly broad cross-section of the globe can meet and discuss issues, and can take action only by a general consensus. One Canadian Prime Minister, Pierre Trudeau, stated that before he became Prime Minister, he thought the Commonwealth was an archaic relic of Empire, but once he started attending the meetings, he found them very helpful in understanding the viewpoints of other countries and in expressing his own viewpoints.
The Commonwealth governments have expressed their common values in a series of declarations, as summarised by the Wikipedia article on the Commonwealth:
The Commonwealth has played a significant role in moral suasion - for example, the Commonwealth was very active in putting pressure on the apartheid regime of South Africa. 4. Those of you who are in a Commonwealth nation - do you think of the Queen as “your” queen? Does she comment or opine about things happening in your country? Do you care about her opinion?
This will vary tremendously from country to country, and among individuals within each country; I don’t think it’s possible to generalise. However, she does not generally comment on political issues in the various realms, because as a good constitutional monarch, her role is to be above the political fray and not to take sides. 5. Why did the Commonwealth decide to be the Commonwealth, instead of all the countries just going their own separate ways?
There’s an awful lot of shared political heritage, particularly amongst those countries which have retained Her Majesty as their head of state. The Speakers of the Commonwealth parliaments meet regularly, for example, to compare notes on developments in key areas of parliamentary procedure. Just a few months ago, the Speaker of the Canadian House of Commons gave a very important ruling on the ability of the Commons to require the Government to produce various documents relating to treatment of Afghan detainees at the hands of the Canadian troops in Afghanistan. That ruling will be cited in other Commonwealth parliaments as similar issues arise, because of the shared parliamentary history.
Similarly, many of the constitutional conventions of responsible government in a parliamentary system are common to all of the constitutional monarchies, and may also have some analogues in the governments of the republics. Precedents of responsible government from one commonwealth country may be useful when a similar issue arises in another commonwealth country.
As well, the older Dominions, such as Canada, initially wanted to retain the British connexion out of a sense of shared political and ethnic links. When the other colonies gained their independence, many of them wanted to “join the club”, so to speak, to show that they were fully equal with the older members of the Commonwealth. There are also cultural exchanges, sports exchanges, and so on.
The OP might find it interesting to check out the following links:
There are some members which were not direct British colonies, but had links to other British colonies, such as Namibia, linked to South Africa. There are two members which were never British colonies or dependencies: Mozambique, which is a former Portugese colony, and Rwanda, a former German colony and then Belgian trust territory. Both of them petitioned to join the Commonwealth and were accepted. See the “members” section of the wiki article.
Australia:
Bessie Windsor is our Head of State. So she has real power. Can dismiss the elected government without consultation. Titular head of the armed services. Constitutionally, she wears the trousers. And, were she to break a lifetime of convention discretion and actually exercise that power then Australia would be become an independent republic in a couple of news cycles. Her ceremonial duties are carried out by the Crown’s Representative who acts according to the advise of the Prime Minister, who isn’t actually mentioned in the constitution.
(FWIW PT is governed almost exclusively by females. My local councillor, city mayor, state MP, State premier, State governor, Prime Minister and Governor General are all sheilas. The only bloke in the chain is my federal MP, a unremarkable factional twonk best known for putting into Hansard a complaint about the size of the stroganoff portions his wife was served in the Parliamentary canteen. **Prat **)
The Commonwealth has no direct representation. CHOGM (Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting) covenes biennially and may lecture or even impose economic sanctions on wayward members, principally in regard to democratic conventions. There’s usually one black sheep e.g. South Africa, Zimbabwe, Pakistan and Fiji.
The benefits are simply shared history, cultural and sporting ties. Investment between Commonwealth countries typically form a very substantial bloc. They almost all share the same democratic model. Precedents and conventions can often be drawn from other Commonwealth members. There is also the not insubstantial shared involvement in both World Wars.
Probably the only time she’s heard speak nowadays is the telecast of her Christmas message.
Northern Piper’s is by far the best summation. I’ll just add a few things:
Commonwealth Citizens have the right* to vote in UK parliamentary elections, to get elected to both chambers of Parliament, to hold public office, and to join the military (standard restrictions about national security/sensitive jobs, though)
Commonwealth citizens may also be granted preferential voting rights (i.e. you can vote w/o being a citizen) in other Commonwealth nations.
*the caveat, here, is that Commonwealth citizens, by virtue alone of being a Commonwealth citizen, are not granted Right of Abode (i.e. permanent residency) in the UK, so exercising these rights is a bit impossible. However, if you were made a permanent resident in the UK, you could do these things without becoming a British citizen.
Just to flesh it out completely. The Queen is the sovereign of those monarchic commonwealth lands. Governor Generals represent the Crown in the day-to-day pageantry when the queen is chilling in Britania. So the Governor General of Canada or Australia, for example, is the de facto “head of state” for those countries when the Queen isn’t physically present.
In federal systems (at least in Canada, don’t know in Aus), each sub-national entity also has royal representative (a viceroy): the Lieutenant Governor
Thanks for all the informative replies. This is all very interesting stuff to this Yank. I’ve always admired Queen Elizabeth - and now I know how much more of a symbol she is. Cool!
The idea that the GG (and the monarch) are merely decorative and have no say in the governing of a Commonwealth Realm is flat-out wrong, off the top of my head I can think of two historical occasions here in Australia where the GG and/or monarch have interfered in events that they (in my opinion) should have stayed the hell out of:
However, in both cases I can’t imagine those situations turning out any differently under any different form of democracy - the methods would have differed but the results would have been the same anyway, so neither event is a good argument against being a Commonwealth Realm.
I used to want Australia to become a Republic, now I’m against it. I think there are excellent reasons for retaining the British monarch as Head of State.
The reserve powers that Shakester refers to are rarely used, and never by the Queen herself in CW countries. It is fair to say that the Queen has no real (as opposed to theoretical) power in those countries that still have her as head of state and are not part of the British isles.
As **Noel Prosequi ** points out the Queen has no real power, the power is with the Governor General, who is appointed by the Prime Minister.
In answer to the original question, As an Australian, I do consider her to be “my Queen” but I think I’m in the minority. She is little more than a figurehead now anyway, and the only reason I am against Australia becoming a republic is that it would cost alot of money for very little gain.
But does even the Governor General have any power either? I always thought they were just there as the Queen’s representative and only acted under her direction? What powers do they actually hold?
The Governor-General actually has quite broad powers but by convention they are not used except on the advice of parliament. The Governor-General technically has the power to, among other things, dissolve the House of Representatives, dissolve Parliament, withhold assent from bills, and appoint or dismiss ministers. The GG could cause a lot of havoc if they wanted to. What happens subsequent to that would depend on public opinion I suspect. If the GG was acting against the majority of public opinion I’d say there’d be a revolution pretty quick, if they were acting with public opinion and against a renegade government it may go down differently.
Anecdote: before the UK joined the EU (or EEC, I forget which), it gave certain trade preferences certain Commonwealth countries. However, European free trade agreements made these illegal.
The island my grandmother was from, Dominica, used to sell bananas at a “fairtrade” price to the UK; however, this practice stopped due to EU legislation, and the switch to other suppliers devastated the economy of the island, which has now been forced to diversify its exports.
