It is significant that any event in the world of monarchies is enthusiastically discussed in countries where their own crowns have long been a thing of the past. What is it: envy, historical phantom pains or banal interest? There is no definite answer. It is only clear that even now, when kings and emperors play a more ceremonial role, existing in the form of a kind of living flag or coat of arms, disputes about whether a monarchy is needed at all do not subside. So far, kings and queens continue to exist mainly as a kind of national flavor and a symbol of the stability of the state. A change of state structure, albeit a formal one, is always a political cataclysm, and there are enough upheavals in the world now. Therefore, the regimes can go to the complete elimination of modern herbivorous constitutional monarchies only as a last resort.
However, the ruling classes will hardly be able to attribute their miscalculations to the reigning person, because everyone knows that the crown has almost no influence on the development of a political line and cannot be responsible for obvious failures. Nevertheless, modern constitutional monarchies in every possible way emphasize that they are only symbols of the nation, and not real rulers, in every possible way strengthening their authority by charity, the struggle for the environment and other charitable deeds. So they divert from themselves potential public discontent, which sometimes still breaks out.
Although the decline of monarchies began immediately after the Napoleonic Wars, the twentieth century was truly revolutionary for them. First, in 1910, the monarchy fell in Portugal, a year later the Xinhai Revolution in China swept away the last ruling dynasty of the Celestial Empire. Then the First World War destroyed the Russian, German, Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman empires. World War II destroyed the monarchies of Albania, Bulgaria, Romania and Italy. In the post-war period (namely in the seventies) the monarchies of Greece, Laos and Iran fell, but unexpectedly the crown was restored in Spain. There is another way to liquidate the monarchy, when the troops of the occupiers are eliminating not only the previous state system, but also the state itself. This happened, for example, during the annexation of Sikkim by India in 1975. But such events, fortunately, do not happen often.
For Russia, the monarchical issue also for some reason remains eternally relevant, although no one has ever taken serious attempts to restore such a form of government. True, historians are still actively debating whether it would have been possible to save the Russian Empire if Nicholas II had not renounced both himself and his son, for Alexei, even in the form of a symbol, was popular among the people and among the troops. It is not excluded that an adequate constitutional monarchy, where an authoritative sovereign would be taken out of the brackets of political cataclysms, would be a boon for a huge empire. But to discuss this is already more the lot of historians and alternative writers.
Most of the world's monarchies today are constitutional or dualistic. In the first case, the king plays a small role in politics, in the second - his powers are very large, despite the constitutional restrictions. The dualistic monarch is, in fact, a somewhat stripped-down version of the autocratic sovereign. Also, a small layer of absolute monarchies has survived to this day: Saudi Arabia, Brunei, Qatar, Oman, the United Arab Emirates and the Vatican. Their fate, with the exception of the Vatican, and perhaps Brunei, will be extremely unenviable in the coming decades.
In Europe, the monarchies are Great Britain (together with overseas territories and some Commonwealth countries), Denmark (including the Faroe Islands and Greenland), Spain (together with sovereign territories), Luxembourg, Liechtenstein, Monaco, Andorra, Sweden, Norway, the Netherlands (with overseas possessions), Belgium. Sometimes this includes the Order of Malta and the Vatican. For the most part, European monarchies are constitutional.
In East Asia, the most famous monarchy is Japan, but Thailand, Malaysia, Brunei and Cambodia also have their own crowned rulers. Moreover, an absolute monarchy reigns only in Brunei.
The constitutional monarch has a number of "frozen powers", which he usually does not use, but at a critical moment for the country he can either give a direct order or speak publicly, indicating his attitude to the problem from the height of his authority. This, for example, happened in Denmark during the Nazi invasion, when King Christian X ordered his own armed forces to surrender two hours after the start of the invasion, so as not to cause significant damage to the country. A similar role was played by the Spanish king Juan Carlos I during the attempt of a new Francoist putsch in 1981, who strongly opposed the coup, which decided the outcome of the case. For a number of countries, the modern constitutional monarchy serves as a kind of protector of the political system, which is not provided for in republican forms. In the event of the collapse of the traditional system with parliament and the prime minister, the question of who to transfer the helm is not even worth it. In such conditions, with the consent of the nation, the authoritative monarch assumes special powers, for a time or forever. However, with an unfortunate coincidence of circumstances, an attempt by the crowned person to seize real power can lead to the fact that the monarchy can quickly become a republic. At the same time, history also knows the opposite examples of successful coups, where the decorative ruler eventually became full-fledged.
The laws defining the limits of a monarch's capabilities vary greatly in each country. For example, in the same Great Britain, according to the law, the monarch has quite weighty powers, but in practice he almost does not use them. Theoretically, in a peaceful environment, the constitutional monarch of any country may not sign a law already approved by parliament, but in practice this happens extremely rarely.
The financial issue is also important. The maintenance of the Spanish monarchy costs the budget about 12 million euros per year. Swedish - 135 million kroons. In turn, the Norwegian publication Dagbladet estimated the costs of its own monarchy at 460 million kroons. It is considered too expensive and the monarchy should be abolished for reasons of economy. By the way, a rather ridiculous and populist notion of monarchy in the style of “cut-save” is present in many European countries. This approach, of course, is more philistine and does not take into account many of the nuances of the country's existence. If only because the "symbol of the unity of the nation" is not an empty phrase at all. Initially, the current Great Britain or, say, Spain developed precisely as alliances of different states under a single crown, and only then transformed into full-fledged countries in their present form.
One thing is clear. In the 21st century, the number of crowns will decrease. Moreover, the most at risk are not constitutional, but absolute monarchs of "oil" empires and all sorts of uncrowned "presidents for life", the overthrow of which will certainly not be peaceful.
