Word: monarchal
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...today there are signs everywhere that monarchy is far from obsolete. Spain is preparing to restore its royal house as a way of assuring political stability. In many Asian and African countries, the monarch alone provides a sense of cohesion, without which they would be torn apart by old animosities and new social forces. This is true even of some European nations. Certainly today's rulers have serious problems. Greece's young King Constantine is at loggerheads with the politicians in a country where politics is played like karate (a sport at which Constantine excels). Jordan...
...idea persisted to the threshold of modern times that the monarch was a divine personage with magic powers, including the gift of healing by touch. Belief in the king's divine curative powers vanished as surely as belief in the king's divine right to rule-at least in the West. Today's monarchs can be roughly divided into three types: Europe's chairman-of-the-board king, who presides over his country but is not its chief executive officer; the tribal king of Africa and the Middle East, who most of the time still really...
...amount of real power wielded by modern monarchs ranges from zero in Europe to the Old Testament authority which Emperor Haile Selassie, the seemingly indestructible Lion of Judah, still exercises in Ethiopia. Royal trappings run the same range-from the furled umbrella that Denmark's King Frederik carries to go shopping, to the nine-tiered umbrella throne of King Bhumibol of Thailand. The champagne-and-chorus-girl monarch is gone or going; uncrowned dictators or oil millionaires are much freer to be glamorous wastrels these days than are kings...
...away with the monarchy, if only because Britons can scarcely imagine an alternative. An indication of how seriously Britons take the institution is provided by the earnest current debate on whether Prince Charles should go to a university or not. Most people nowadays seem to prefer an educated monarch, but some feel that too much learning is dangerous for a ruler whose job, after all, is not to rule. Recalling that Elizabeth II was poorly educated when she came to the throne, Journalist Iain Hamilton observes: "She was good on a horse, though; and we have Ben Jonson...
...unifying tradition-plus something to talk about. In Thailand, it is immensely important. King Bhumibol Adulyadej seems all but divine to his Buddhist masses-an impression enhanced by the tradition that people must approach him crawling along the floor on hands and knees. But he is really a modern monarch, using the ancient ways and rituals to carry his country forward. Theoretically he is a figurehead, limited to ceremonial functions. Beneath the surface he keeps up a mosaic of relationships that make him the most influential man in the kingdom; no governmental change could succeed without his legitimizing...