Queen Elizabeth II celebrates her platinum jubilee from Thursday, June 2, which corresponds to her 70th anniversary of reign. For four days, celebrations are planned across the UK. But the most famous of crowned heads is not the only active monarch. If we include all forms of monarchical regimes, 44 countries are concerned in the world, or just over 20% of the planet. This figure is quite stable.
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We find all around the globe at the same time kings, emirs, sultans (as in Oman, in the Persian Gulf), emperors (as in Japan) or special cases such as the Vatican because the pope is a form of monarch . This figure of 44 countries also takes into account the 15 countries that belong to the Commonwealth since all have the Queen of England as sovereign.
Europe is the continent with the most monarchies, with 11 regimes in total, including six in the European Union (Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Denmark, Sweden and Spain). But in Europe, we speak of constitutional monarchies, where the sovereign does not strictly speaking have political power. In all these countries, there is a parallel democratically elected government that conducts the affairs of the country.
The situation is quite different in the Middle East and Asia, the other two most affected regions of the world. There are many quasi-absolute monarchies, where the sovereign concentrates all the powers. The emblematic cases are Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates or Qatar. The power of the monarch is also central to Morocco.
Apart from Queen Elizabeth, other sovereigns have been in power for a very long time. She is the oldest with her 70-year reign. The next is the Sultan of Brunei, 54 years in power. Brunei is a very small territory at the tip of Borneo, in Indonesia: 5,000 km² but a lot of oil and therefore a lot of wealth. Hassanal Bolqiah is 76 years old and has all the powers: Sultan, Prime Minister, Defense Minister, Finance Minister, etc. He is extremely wealthy at a time, in fact, he was ranked the richest man on the planet. His palace is three times the size of Buckingham and is passionate about cars: he owns more than 5,000.
Then comes Queen Margrethe II of Denmark: she is 81 years old and has been on the throne for 50 years. It is a constitutional monarchy, like in the United Kingdom. She is a character: occasional artist, poet, designer and painter, passionate about archeology, polyglot, married to a Frenchman, first woman to ascend the throne in Denmark after 1,000 years of unchallenged reign of men…
Finally, we must cite the case of King Sobhuza II of Swaziland in Africa. If he is no longer of this world, he reigned 82 years, until 1982, 12 years longer than Queen Elizabeth II. This is the absolute record. He had been crowned only six months after his birth!
All these monarchies are holding up, either because they are absolutist regimes where protest is prohibited, or because the monarchs are popular, as is the case in England and northern Europe. There are still places where it’s booming, like in Thailand in recent years.
There is also the particular case of the Commonwealth, these 15 countries falling under the authority of the Queen of England. There are cracks there. In the fall of 2021, the tiny Caribbean island of Barbados distanced itself and became a Republic. Several other countries are beginning to wonder: other Caribbean islands and larger countries like Canada or Australia. They remain loyal to Elizabeth II today, but it may be different with her successor.