By Rob Harris
London: The world’s most famous and admired woman leaves behind a fractured and fraying kingdom that now must confront much larger and more challenging questions than her own institution.
At a time of such momentous grief – a nation’s saddest of days in generations – it does seem hard to imagine how it will be possible to overcome them without her. It was the day Britons have dreaded for so long. She is gone.
Mourners gather outside Buckingham Palace following the announcement of the death of Queen Elizabeth II. For 70 years, she was its finest diplomat, its greatest exponent of soft power.Credit: James Manning/AP
The nation has lost its biggest strength – the glue that for so long has bound together the union – just as it is trying to define its place in the world for the decades ahead. For 70 years she was its finest diplomat, its greatest exponent of soft power.
It takes only a quick glimpse at some individuals holding positions of power in the government’s new cabinet to come to the conclusion that Britain’s leadership ranks have taken a severe hit in the past few years.
So many of its institutions appear so outdated or tarnished that the survival of the 315-year-old United Kingdom itself is by no means necessarily assured. The nation is gripped by an economic crisis, is politically and geographically divided and still battling its European neighbours.
The social fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic and Brexit, the 2020 split from the European Union, is only now beginning to be fully felt.
While Britain has emerged as one of the staunchest international supporters of war-battered Ukraine, it is also paying a price for all the obligations that entails.
The country faces its grimmest winter in decades, 40-year high inflation and a cost-of-living crisis not seen since the 1970s.
Recessions come and go. So too do strikes and political and energy crises. But a second push for Scottish independence, shifting attitudes in Northern Ireland and a reconsideration of the monarchy throughout the other 14 countries where she remained head of state threaten to upend everything she held so dear.
An economic dividend from Brexit has not been forthcoming and while it has delivered sovereignty over lawmaking, the Europe debate remains so toxic that any positives that have been forthcoming are hardly recognised.
In many parts of the Commonwealth, demands are mounting for a re-evaluation of Britain’s colonial past, for apology and atonement, as then-Prince Charles and Prince William experienced in difficult trips to the Caribbean during the past year.
King Charles must now begin to grapple with these issues well into his eighth decade, and with nowhere near the same level of public fondness as his mother inspired.
The sincere tribute the Queen received from Irish Catholic US President Joe Biden belies the frosty relationship the two administrations have right now.
As strange as it was to see a leader from Sinn Féin, the Irish republican and democratic socialist political party, express genuine sympathies for those mourning the Queen’s passing, it is hard to imagine such a tone would be replicated in dealings with the new prime minister, Liz Truss, or indeed the new monarch.
Queen Elizabeth’s 70-year reign encompassed the decolonisation of much of the British empire in Africa and Asia, and the consolidation of the Commonwealth. It also saw the emergence of the modern monarchy, open to intense media scrutiny.
Her personal popularity was seen as a key factor in maintaining support for the royal family in recent years. She shied away from political interventions and is known chiefly to her subjects by her presence at public events and her televised Christmas messages, which often emphasised the old-fashioned virtues of service, dignity and integrity. They came to be all the more appreciated the longer she survived.
She was the country’s abiding figurehead through its parallel transformations: from imperial power to European Union member and then post-Brexit standalone, and from a socially conservative, white- and male-dominated society into a more liberal and multicultural state.
Her succession to the throne while still in her 20s, introduced a new-found optimism for post-war Britain, still rebuilding its economy and cities after they were levelled by the Luftwaffe during the blitz.
With war raging in Ukraine, the challenge of climate change and the rise of autocratic regimes, Britain appears weak on all fronts.
She leaves behind a kingdom deeply grieving and badly shaken by her loss. For many, the monarch and monarchy had become indivisible. It is a hammer blow to the British psyche.
The nation in its present condition will struggle mightily to weather her loss.
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