That brief answer constitutes a good short blog entry, which everyone will appreciate, as time is such a precious thing in our busy time. It is also in line with my agnostic view of the world. However, it does not keep me occupied for long, and I have a few minutes to fill out this evening, so let me expand "nothing" to... well... "something". But not much.
There is no good definition of "monarchy". There have been kings and queens with crowns and without. There have been kings and queens that were elected, and some who inherited their job, a little like Kim Jong-il (김정일, 金正日) in North Korea. I do not know Kim's exact title, but the common epithet "Dear Leader" (chinaehan jidoja, 친애한 지도자) could probably be replaced by "King" without changing much in practice.
What is important for any country is that the leader does not make a mess of things, like killing millions of people or declaring silly unnecessary wars at the other side of the globe. Kings have done some really silly things, but so have presidents, Reichskanzlers and general secretaries of the ruling party. The important thing is neither the title nor the way the title was given. The important thing is the result.
"It does not matter if the cat is black or white, as long as it catches mice", as Dèng Xiǎopíng (邓小平) said. (Bùguǎn báimāo hēimāo, dàizhù láoshǔ jiùshì hǎomāo. 不管白貓黑貓，逮住老鼠就是好貓。) He was talking about something else, but the proverb works on titles of rulers as well. Ironically, he himself was regarded as China's real leader, even when his only official title was honorary chairman (róngyù zhǔxí, 荣誉主席) of the China Bridge Association (Zhōngguó qiáopái xiéhuì, 中国桥牌协会).
In other words, if a country has a king or a queen or a president or a dear leader as head of state does not really matter, as long as the person behaves in a decent way.
6 comments:
How is it that at google search for such a well-known quote only returns one hit, to this blog: "Bùguǎn báimāo hēimāo, dàizhù láoshǔ jiùshì hǎomāo".
Thank you for responding! I agree with you of course, what's not to agree with? Actions are all that matters. What confuses me is monarchs whitout (real) power such as sweden, norway etc, I really don't know what to think..
Malte, I'm not sure why there is only one hit, but usually the Chinese do not write in pinyin, of course. In addition, one can write pinyin in different ways. "Báimāo" means "blackcat", but some people may prefer to write it "bái māo", "a black cat". Further, the quote is not literal. There are several variants like 抓到, 会捉 or even 能抓到, where Wikipedia (my source), has 逮住 for "catch". I have also seen some version where the "white" cat is yellow, and where the mouse is not a 老鼠 but a 耗子.
Further, it is very likely that I introduced some typos.
Dear Anonymous, I do not think there is any simple explanation why there are constitutional monarchies, but it would probably be even more complicated to explain why they disappear, when they do so. Often it is just a matter of inertia, of course. They were there yesterday, and there is no additional reason to remove them today, so they stay until tomorrow, when today becomes yesterday, and so on.
On Arte there recently was a program about the Japanese emperor, and how he managed to keep his throne after WWII as the Americans needed him to peaceful bring democracy to the country. He definitely served a purpose even though he had no power (according to the program).
In case you can figure out some way to watch the program over the internet, here are the program links: http://www.arte.tv/fr/semaine/244,broadcastingNum=1030949,day=5,week=42,year=2009.html and http://www.arte.tv/de/woche/244,broadcastingNum=1030949,day=5,week=42,year=2009.html depending on if you prefer German or French.
I don't know about monarchies,seems like the stupid masses need them sometimes. I have in mind the example of Greece, which was a monarchy until 1967. The royal family want to interfere in politics, even though the country's system was supposed to be democratic. What happened is that monarchy was deposed by the dictators at first and then it was replaced by constitutional democracy. However, since then we seem to have all sorts of kings: one (or two, according to some) royal family of the conservative party, one royal family in the socialist party and lifelong communist-like secretary-generals of the Stalinist (or 'consistent') communist party. And in contraat to previous Monarchs, current ones are being constantly elected by the people. It goes like this: they elect the grandfather, then the nephew or son or daughter, then the grandson! These new 'Monarchs' play the role of ideological 'symbols' for the masses or something, I sincerely ain't got a clue. And it's not like they're successful managing state affairs, as all of you know...
I don't know about monarchies,seems like the stupid masses need them sometimes. I have in mind the example of Greece, which was a monarchy until 1967. The royal family want to interfere in politics, even though the country's system was supposed to be democratic. What happened is that monarchy was deposed by the dictators at first and then it was replaced by constitutional democracy. However, since then we seem to have all sorts of kings: one (or two, according to some) royal family of the conservative party, one royal family in the socialist party and lifelong communist-like secretary-generals of the Stalinist (or 'consistent') communist party. And in contraat to previous Monarchs, current ones are being constantly elected by the people. It goes like this: they elect the grandfather, then the nephew or son or daughter, then the grandson! These new 'Monarchs' play the role of ideological 'symbols' for the masses or something, I sincerely ain't got a clue. And it's not like they're successful managing state affairs, as all of you know...
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