Some thoughts on royalty as spectacle

Last week, I posted some thoughts on "what it means to be royal" here. Today, I want to talk about about royalty from the perspective of, well, the non-royal.

To some extent, royalty and nobility exist as spectacle, as visible "betters" (using that word carefully) for the commoner. And while this seems on first glance to be unfair and undemocratic, today I am going to argue that there are concrete benefits for the nation and for the citizenry.

First, the trappings of royalty, such as regalia, coronation ceremonies, and jubilees, provide a deep sense of tradition and history through their symbolism. Elected officials come and go, and political parties bring different sensibilities to the representational houses, but (as I've stated before) the monarchy endures. In so doing, they provide a sense of constancy for the nation, and the regalia and ceremonies help build that sense.

Second, and relatedly, the royalty of a nation provides a symbol of national identity and unity. No matter which political party is in power, all citizens are subjects of the Crown. Furthermore, the Crown can exert some measure of control over the elected government in the name of the citizenry, even in a modern monarchy like the United Kingdom, although such power obviously needs to be restrained and used sparingly.

Finally, while the Crown amasses wealth in the form of property and treasury, that wealth is not truly owned by the individual that wears the crown. Rather, it is owned and managed by the Crown on behalf of the country and its citizens, particularly the future generations. Ideally, the citizens don't look at the palace and think of it as ostentatious hoarding of wealth, but as upkeep and preservation of that wealth for their descendants.

I will close this out by, again, quoting from The Crown, a wonderful Netflix series (six seasons) about the life of Queen Elizabeth II.

“Monarchy isn’t rational or democratic or logical or fair. Haven’t we all learned that by now? People don’t want to come to a royal palace and get what they could have at home. When they come for an investiture or a state visit, when they brush up against us, they want the magic and the mystery and the arcane and the eccentric and the symbolic and the transcendent. They want to feel like they’ve entered another world. That is our duty, to lift people up and transform them into another realm, not bring them down to earth and remind them of what they already have.” (Imelda Staunton as Queen Elizabeth II, The Crown, Season 6, Episode 6, “Ruritania”)