Britain's Obsession with Decline

A long article in the Guardian Weekly a couple of weeks ago tried to choreograph what would happen when Queen Elizabeth finally dies. She has just passed 91, and that gives her a life expectancy of four years, so it will happen sooner or later.

The article was quite a triumph for research. The monarch hasn’t died since 1952, and the author looked up what happened then and made many comparisons. He or she also interviewed many of the people who would be involved – the event has a code name of London Bridge. Not surprisingly many were reluctant to talk about such a sensitive or even morbid subject, and most of those that did chose to stay off the record.

Despite these challenges, a convincing timetable was drawn up to cover the days immediately following the mobilisation of London Bridge. There will be hundreds of notifications and events, all closely coordinated and with communication to the public a key concern. The Queen has many titles, spanning the globe, and transitions will be required for each of them.

I read once that George VI (or maybe George V) was denied a fully natural death by the pressure of such a timetable. It was deemed important that the death be announced within a certain time window, and, in order to achieve that, the death itself had to be either delayed or brought forward from when it would have occurred naturally. Oh, what it is to be a monarch, you can’t even choose when you die!

One of the more interesting revelations (at least to me) was that one part of the process will be to give Camilla the formal title of queen. In the years immediately following the death of princess Diana that would have been a very controversial step, but apparently there is no way to finesse this in royal protocol. The establishment must be hoping this does not create a major backlash when the time comes.

The article attracted a couple of letters published in the following edition of the Weekly. One of these found the article distasteful, in that poring over a demise of anyone is disrespectful to that person, queen or otherwise. The other letter took a republican line, pointing out how anachronistic the royal family sits in a modern society, and arguing that the demise of Elizabeth would be great moment to get rid of it for good.

I have some sympathy for both points, although I don’t see the monarchy doing all that much damage these days and it does have the advantage of attracting tourists and their wallets. I had a different problem with the article, which was about how it used the historical comparisons to position Britain in decline.

This is a very British attitude to take, and it crops up everywhere in British life. Only 100 years ago, the British were the most powerful and influential nation on earth, presiding over a global empire and fantastic wealth. The reign of Elizabeth has seen the decisive phase of the unravelling of that position. This history is one reason the British tend to favour dark humour and self-deprecation, though the latter is often misinterpreted.

The ceremony over a monarchical change was a perfect backdrop for such an attitude. When George VI died, the earth shook. Britain had relations with countries all over the world, and military presence in most of them. The death was headline news almost everywhere, seen with front-page significance rather than as a catchy news feature. Domestically, the national anthem was sung everywhere and people truly felt as subjects.

All this has indeed declined. But was any of it healthy in the first place? And are these in any way valid measures of a country, beyond the rankings of things like military power?

I see development in Britain between 1952 and today in a very different way. In 1952, most people lived in a cramped two-up, two-down terrace, often with an outside toilet and coal sitting in the bath. Men usually toiled physically until their sixty fifth birthday and died of exhaustion soon afterwards, while women ran massive households despite much of the income drowning at the pub on a Friday night.

The great Beveridge, Butler and Bevan reforms of welfare, education and health were just a few years old, and many were still deprived of their benefits. As the article stated, at the grand conference to declare Elizabeth queen, there was only one other woman present out of 150. Homosexuality was illegal, and giving birth outside wedlock a social death sentence for both mother and child. Most people with a mental health issue were locked away in asylums. Class remained everywhere in society as a barrier to fairness and progress.

Abroad, Britain treated former colonies as sources of minerals, and security issues to be managed without any consideration for development and wellbeing of local populations.

And what of today? Is it really that bad? It is true that Britain has lost some weight in international power games, but arguably the nation has built goodwill and influence in softer ways. As a Brit who has lived abroad for twenty years, I have witnessed how our humour is venerated across Europe and how our brand and culture captivate Americans. An astonishing share of good TV in the US has a British component, while British actors ensnare most of the best roles in movies. British science and higher education remain respected globally.

So I find the whole positioning of Britain in decline simply contradicts the facts. And the important part is that this matters, because it influences how people think and behave. It does little damage to venerate the past glories of the monarchy and to mourn their loss, but when that attitude pervades society it does harm.

The whole European debacle stems from a misplaced attitude among Brits about our role in the world. If we believe that we have lost heft, somehow been outmanoeuvred, and that things continue to decline, it is no wonder that we become cynical of international institutions. If offers an open goal for nationalists and populists, one that they succeeded in converting during the Brexit referendum. Apart from its own follies, Brexit has put essentially stopped other government for many years, and it may also lead to the break up of the union itself, something that would cost more time and create more decline.

So the irony is rich. In painting a false picture of decline, people create an attitude that sows real decline. I am convinced that this is not the intention of the liberal Guardian Weekly, so it should take care that its journalism offers something more balanced and that reflects reality more closely.