The issue of monarchism v republicanism is not a side issue, something that can be left for later while we grapple with the economics or even the principle of self determination. It’s at the heart of the matter, the glue that bind us with the union, that seals us into our class system, poisons and romanticizes our traditions and stands in the way of our scrutiny of them. More pertinently, when the ownership of large estates is tallied, we can start to weigh that up against our own power as a nation.
Sir Walter Scott hosted and romanticized king George 1v’s visit to Edinburgh in 1822, a turning point for much of the appropriation, assimilation and corruption of Scottish land and highland culture by royalty and aristocracy. The edginess about Anglicisation prior to his visit was sedated by royal acceptance, personalised tartans and well-tailored kilts. By the early 1850s Victoria and Albert were outright owners of Balmoral, giving rise to a privileged access to tax breaks that continues today by succession.
As a nation we have a lot of soul searching to do about our place in history: Our involvement in slavery and colonial wars. It’s our quest and responsibility to work out what a modern Scotland can and cannot accommodate from the past, for instance, in terms of militaristic pipe bands and pageantry. It’s not just our grannies who enjoy a night at the Edinburgh Tattoo, but in the context of a scorchingly expensive and union-sealing visit of entitlement on 5th July 2023 by Charles Windsor, a senior member of one of the UK’s most publicly dysfunctional families, it all felt like an insult, a raspberry in our direction.
It’s quite possible that the vast majority of those lining the streets for this show of UK establishment strength were visitors, and who would blame them for alighting on a spectacle of pomp and ceremony during their visit. The cost of the ceremony, which included the Red Arrows flying overhead, spewing toxic red, white and blue vapours would likely make a significant dent in the need for UK wide foodbanks. If you’re not entirely sold on pageantry, or on the fairy-tale nature of royalty, but think that we need them to bring in tourism, the crowds of tourists who were not engaged in waving flags at anyone with a silly hat, gives the lie to that.
Despite Scotland’s revolutionary socialist past, growing up in the 60s in central/west Scotland it was not at all unusual for working class kids to enjoy a Summer gala, chocolate biscuit in one hand, union jack in the other. The embodiment of Bread and Circuses. We never questioned flag waving. But then we never really wondered why we were waving at Russian president Kosygin in 1967 either. We just did, he was a dignitary*
The referendum and decades of entitlement by the Labour Party forced the voting population to ask questions and make decisions about the constitution, but the issue of monarchism v republicanism is not a side issue, something that can be left for later while we grapple with the economics or even the principle of self determination. It’s at the heart of the matter, the glue that bind us with the union, that seals us into our class system, poisons and romanticizes our traditions and stands in the way of our scrutiny of them. More pertinently, when the ownership of large estates is tallied, we can start to weigh that up against our own power as a nation.
Radical land reform really should and must be at the centre of a serious shift of power. For all the cultivated public image of Charles as a man of the land and lover of nature, a closer look at the management of Balmoral should alert us to the hype and hypocrisy behind the image and it’s not his only estate ravaged by grouse shooting. He is not a benign and powerless figurehead.
Scotland has nibbled away at the edges of land reform over time, with relative progress in terms of access and community buy-out projects for instance. REVIVE, the coalition for grouse moor reform, commissioned a lengthy report in 2021 Our Land, and describe it as a realistic and legal path to change within the current framework. Until we address these wastelands we are tinkering around the edges.
The Queen had extensive immunity to many laws, including the investigation of wild-life crimes on the Balmoral Estate, presumably inherited by King Charles. Only independence would give us a clean sweep from the archaic traditions and restrictions that monarchy brings in its wake. Nevertheless, the saying attributed to Alastair Gray*, ‘work as if you live in the early days of a better nation’ would be significantly more empowering than the grim allusion of Scotland as a colony, that has been adopted by many in light of the continued refusal by the UK government to accept Scotland’s right to self-determination.
It is no co-incidence that established media outlets and opposition parties have balked at the idea or any hint of our previous and current First Ministers as leaders on an international stage. Neither Nicola Sturgeon nor Humza Yousaf have strayed too far from protocol on royalty issues, despite their own republican beliefs or leanings, but this has not appeased Scotland’s viceroy-like Secretary of State Alister Jack.
Nothing will be ceded easily, nor ever has been, and I do not underestimate the struggles ahead. However, our perceived captivity is in the hands of Scotland’s voting public in the first instance and when we get off our knees the establishment will notice and change will follow.
* On the 11th of February 1967, Soviet Premier Alexei Kosygin visited the UK including Glasgow, the Hunterston Power Plant in North Ayrshire, and a Kilmarnock v Rangers match at Rugby Park Troon.
* Work as if you live in the early days of a better nation, from a poem by the Canadian author, Dennis Leigh.
