Twhile I was waiting, standing, I wondered why I had come. I had found myself a place on Canongate: the lowest stretch of the narrow, in places cobbled and sometimes curved street that runs from Holyrood Palace to Edinburgh Castle. It was around 2:15 p.m. on Sunday, September 11, and crowds continued to pour onto the main thoroughfare from the adjacent lanes. Above me, people were leaning out of the windows of buildings overlooking the street, one of the oldest in Edinburgh.
In previous centuries, the inhabitants threw their waste through these openings, shouting “gardyloo! » (from the French “keep the water”). Today, like all those waiting around me on the sidewalk, they hold their mobile phones pointed in the direction of the palace. The day before, the Queen’s motorcade had meandered slowly from the Highlands to the Scottish capital, and on Sunday her coffin was to be carried up that sloping street – the Royal Mile – to be exhibited in Saint-Gilles Cathedral.
I had always felt a certain ambivalence towards the monarchy; like a strange indifference. Most Britons fall into one of these two camps: they are either royalists or republicans. Personally, I fall somewhere in between. It is true that the monarchy is the quintessential embodiment of inequality, but there are so many other institutions and policies in this country that are far more actively reinforcing inequality – the unelected House of Lords , these twelve years of crushing economic austerity.
Moreover, having a head of state deprived of political power is not without its advantages. If a presidential system were established in this country today, it’s a safe bet that we would immediately elect a demagogue. If this risk is indeed the necessary price of democracy, given the turbulence of the past decade, this option is hardly desirable.
The major problem with the monarchy is that it depends, haphazardly, on the goodwill of individuals. Elizabeth Windsor was completely suited to her role and she devoted her life to it. Like many, I felt a strange, almost inexplicable affection for her, and I like Charles too; he cared about the environment long before anyone else. As the procession passed, however, I heard a man shout and remembered the very real downsides of this constitutional gamble.
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