If The UK decided now to eliminate the monarchy....

[Kablooie]

What would the effects be on the United ?dom and British life?

Has anyone come across any articles exploring this possibility?

[Violet_Crumble]

1. Don't know. But it would have a terrible detrimental affect on Australia...

We've got a public holiday on the 22nd for a national day of mourning. If there wasn't a monarchy and we weren't part of the Commonwealth, we wouldn't get it. My only gripe is it would have been a bit more considerate to have made it a Friday so it could be a long weekend and I could go down the coast, but I'll take what I can get

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/sep/11/australia-to-have-public-holiday-to-mark-the-death-of-queen-elizabeth-ii-anthony-albanese-announces

[Kablooie]

2. Commonwealth -- that's the word I couldn't think of.

I started to write about the British Empire but thought, empire? That can’t be right anymore. Kingdom is the only thing that came to mind but that wouldn’t quite work in this context either.

[Violet_Crumble]

4. The Commonwealth is the remnants of the British Empire...

Much, much smaller than the British Empire was, though. My guess is that Commonwealth countries will slowly become republics rather than the UK do away with the monarchy. The Queen held it all together and while she was alive there was no chance Australia would become a republic (a referendum in 1999 failed), but depending on how Charles carries out the role, things could change in the next few years. Which will be a pain as coins and notes will need to be changed, our many buildings and national parks with the title Royal will need to change, what to do with the Governor General residences in each state and territory, and most importantly, will the Queens, oops, Kings birthday long weekend be replaced, or will we lose it?

[Kablooie]

5. For most of my childhood the word Commonwealth was...

Only the name of Commonwealth Ave that was a block from my house.

[muriel_volestrangler]

11. We're getting ours on the day of the funeral (19th), which makes more sense

The funeral is in the morning here (so it'll be your evening, but still Monday), and they know loads of people would have stayed at home anyway to watch on TV (and many in London will be in the streets, I expect), so they may as well make it an official holiday.

Which is why the OP question can't really be answered - there's no noticeable movement to get rid of the monarchy here now. So we can say what the effects on the UK and British life would be - because it would be people with a different attitude, so the reaction would be different.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

16. I'm predicting you will feel ill on the 23rd. A trip down the coast might be the cure.

Oh, and look! You get the 22nd off as a bonus! Four-day weekend!

[303squadron]

3. It would hurt the tourist trade

Americans would not come to England in the numbers that they do if it wasn't for the pageantry of the Crown. Look at the ratings for the Hallmark Channel movies in which a prince, duke or some other "noble" gets together with a "commoner" in some invented European country. The fantasy of "royality" seems to hold sway over a part of the population. You would think that every American would have read ALL of the Declaration of Independence instead of just the preamble. Apparently not!

[treestar]

6. The media would be very sad

There's a new People magazine, heading "25 years without Diana"

My first thought was the media having to do 25 years without Diana. So sad for them.

[RandySF]

7. The U.K. loses its mystique.

I can’t think of anything else.

[OnDoutside]

8. They remind me of Wile E Coyote running past the edge of the cliff

....and haven't looked down yet.

[OnDoutside]

9. Keeping or removing the monarchy isn't going to make a lot of difference

at this stage, as the empire is long gone, the push is there for Scotland to split and Brexit has made them hugely isolated.

[moondust]

10. There's this.

How the Queen's soft power has helped keep the United Kingdom together

And this:

The Commonwealth is a voluntary association of 56 independent and equal countries.
~
https://thecommonwealth.org/about/joining

I don't know how similar the "voluntary" association of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) would have been to the voluntary association of the Commonwealth but some would probably argue that China is more aggressively threatening without the TPP thanks to TFG killing it. To some extent there may be a common defense factor that could also be affected by Russia's new aggression.

[sanatanadharma]

12. The UK without the Monarchy would be like the USA without Democracy

The heart and soul of the people and a nation, national-personal-identity, would be hollowed out (changed) if the UK or USA ceased to have their unique centuries-old loci of identity that, perceived as the 'what-it-is' that sets them apart from all other nations.

Individuals with confused identities do not lead easy lives. Confused national-identities can break up nations.

[LenaBaby61]

13. Not if but when OP ....

I foresee the monarchy of England leaving the building like Elvis did. In most of the solid and reliable polling I've seen, the younger folks either don't care about the monarchy in Britain or they want to do away with it all together. Life is difficult for people, and money is growing more scarce daily, and the monies keep trickling upward and making those types of people richer, and I just can't see where folks will continue to be 'okay' with Royals anywhere living a lavish lifestyle while they, the "peasants" continue sinking into hell and ruin financially and in so many other ways.

Wills and Kate will be the 'last' monarch's we'll see IMO.


10 countries that abolished their own monarchies



https://www.insider.com/countries-used-to-be-monarchies-abolished-history


Young British people want to ditch the monarchy, poll suggests
Reuters

https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/young-british-people-want-ditch-monarchy-poll-suggests-2021-05-20/


TONS of articles out there signaling that the British monarchy might as well start packing NOW.

[patricia92243]

14. They would lose a giganic part of their country's money. Then, there would be

thousands and thousands of people lose their jobs. All those uniform - cloth buttons, people who make them, the mementoes - again the people who sell them and the people who make them. The list goes on and on and on. Just the staff of all the different palaces would be a staggering loss of employment.

The monarchy and the money it brings in are about the only thing that keeps England from sinking into just another tiny island that nobody cares about.

[Swede]

15. In 2022 Great Britain had the 5th largest GDP.

It's not going anywhere.

[Emrys]

17. Eliminating the monarchy outright is an unlikely prospect at the moment.

With Elizabeth gone, my own suspicion is that over the course of Charles's reign and then beyond, it will downsize of its own accord, probably moving closer to the model of some of the nordic countries' royal families. That will be in keeping with the sentiments among the younger generation, and quite a few of we older ones, too.

Charles is a prickly figure where the media are concerned, for a variety of reasons, and during his reign the monarchy is unlikely to sustain the popularity it enjoys in certain UK quarters (I'm not a royalist, and I always feel that DU is surprisingly more pro-royal than most folks I've socialized with in my 60-odd years of living in three different countries in the UK). The relationship between the public, the media and the royals is always ambivalent, and has long been so for many, many generations. There's a tendency to build them up only to knock them down - often savagely - as with any other celebrities, especially ones steeped in unearned privilege.

For most of us, life goes on without the royals, except as media fodder, which many of us try to ignore as far as possible. Our lives will not change radically whatever the fate of the royal family. Indeed, their absence would likely provoke a healthy re-examination of what it means to be a resident of these isles without the trappings and distractions of an outmoded institution.

As for those who claim that tourism will suffer without the prominence of the royals, that hasn't been the French experience - their palaces and other leftovers from their royals after they dispatched them still attract millions every year. Without a royal family in residence, public access to royal edifices will be freer and easier.

When I visit Stirling Castle, for instance - a castle that hasn't had any royals in residence for centuries - for a not inconsiderable entrance fee I can wander more or less at will through the magnificently preserved public buildings, and an actress amply fills the role of Mary Queen of Scots on a daily basis for those who have a yearning to see a royal, albeit one long dead.

More modern mythologies will fill any gap the lack of flamboyant royals leaves. There's already a thriving tourist industry based on Outlander and similar series, for example.