Last Friday morning, it was difficult to escape the unpardonable level of attention that was being given to a wedding between two individuals in Britain whom the vast majority of us should theoretically care little about.
It could be argued that an article like this only serves to call further attention to this spectacle. However, it also provides a unique opportunity for reflection on the politics of this monarchical tradition and its impact on the rest of us commoners.
My reflections begin with the contrast of interest in the wedding and the excitement over “invites” in the Caribbean, which has a long and not so distinguished colonial past.
It is curious that the prime minister of St Vincent and the Grenadines attended, along with his wife, and one wonders how this blends with the Unity Labour Party’s republic campaign of 2009 which culminated in a proposal to leave the Queen behind for a republic, albeit within the Commonwealth.
It is also curious that the list of invitees was discussed and the focus was almost always on which leaders were on or off the list. In so doing, we avoided the more relevant discussion related to why any leader in the Caribbean would want to spend around US$30 000 to attend a 90-minute wedding that no one would even notice their presence at.
In all of this, it is clear that as a Caribbean people, we do have an inflated sense of our importance and relevance in this world. Moreover, we actually believe that an invitation to such a royal event actually means that someone within the walls of Buckingham Palace or better yet, Clarence House, actually cared to see us among the 1 900 people at the wedding.
People supporting our attendance at such events are various and among these is the suggestion that it is “rude” to decline an invitation that comes from any of the royals, although the royals routinely decline invitations from us commoners.
I am told that to politely decline would make us look “bad” and one wonders to whom we would “look bad” and who exactly would either know or care.
Other slightly more plausible arguments suggested that one’s attendance is good for tourism. However, this only makes sense if one’s presence is noted and distinguished from the thousands of other visitors who advertised their presence in London on Facebook.
In all of this, we seem hard-pressed to accept the reality that nothing that either Buckingham Palace or Clarence House does regarding the Caribbean is motivated by their personal affection for this region, but instead is born of their need to appear favourably disposed towards their “subjects” who continually clamour for attention.At the global level, there was also considerable interest in places such as the United States where they disposed of the monarchy by revolution, and also in France where they butchered their royals.
This interest is buttressed in the Caribbean by CADRES poll data which often speaks to public disinterest in moving further away from our monarchical past. This apparent trend provokes thought from two perspectives.
On the human side, all of us love pomp, pageantry and splendour since these satisfy some emotional deficit, and if we associate that type of thing with an institution, then it is not surprising that we support the institution.
In life, however, such emotional expressions are controlled by practical factors such as the cost to maintain the monarch or the extent to which it imposes itself on our day to day governance.
We in the Caribbean are fortunate since we can enjoy the emotional aspects of the monarchical traditions and our belief that we are actually part of this framework “free of cost”.
We maintain the office of Governor General, but do not contribute to the maintenance of the British monarch and still receive knighthoods from the Queen and invitations to royal weddings.
The British pay just over US$60 million for this privilege which is skilfully marked there as a per capita cost of less than one pound per person. We instead spend our US$60 million paying the economic cost of students at the University of the West Indies so we can happily enjoy the euphoria of their (British) party while we get on with our own business.
The other sobering issue of impact on governance is a non-issue because the British monarch has even less impact on our governance than it does in Britain.
It therefore seems to be a perfect arrangement where the monarch helps to lend prestige to our local governance framework at no cost and with no negative impact on our governance.
It therefore seems like this institution will survive in the Caribbean until the British find better things to do with their money.
Peter W. Wickham is a political consultant and a director of Caribbean Development Research Services (CADRES).
