We the undersigned Communist and Anti-Imperialist Youth Organisations of countries retaining the British Monarchy as their head of state and members of the so-called ‘Commonwealth’ reject the farce coronation of Charles Windsor and call for the immediate abolition of the British monarchy.
The coronation of Charles highlights to a new generation of youth and working people throughout the countries forced to retain them as head of state that the abolition of the monarchy remains a pressing and important issue.
It is fundamentally clear, now more than ever, that our countries must cast off the archaic monarchy and adopt new democratic and republican models according to the democratic aspirations of working people of our nations. A tiny interbreeding sect of a decaying aristocracy cannot and will never reflect the interests of working people in Britain or anywhere else.
The imposition of an obscenely wealthy, unrepresentative, unelected head of state is offensive to all working people. But this is not just a matter of important democratic and egalitarian principles.
This monarchy continues to be an important symbol and tool of the British ruling class and other capitalist states and their apparatus for maintaining control.
Despite all the talk to the contrary, the monarchy continues to hold significant power under Britain’s broken constitution, including the selection of governments, and will remain a perpetual danger to democratic and social progress while that remains the case. This is also the case, to varying degrees, in many other countries where the British monarch is the head of state.
The Royal Family’s wealth, vast tracts of land and resources across Britain and around the world, are centuries of stolen wealth from the working people of Britain and the oppressed and exploited peoples in Britain’s colonies, including profits from slavery and the slave trade.
The monarch’s position as the head of state not just of Britain, but of various former colonies and as head of the Commonwealth plays an important symbolic and ideological role in maintaining British imperialism around the world.
Britain’s state and monopoly media attempt to canonise the Windsors as a ‘tireless public servants’. No one can genuinely define public service as never working a single day in your life and living in obscene wealth every day while surrounded by poverty and never doing anything to change it.
The Windsors have never criticised Britain’s racist colonial empire or their role in it. They have never stood against the regressive, racist and anti democratic actions of former colonies. They have never shied away from consorting with dictators in the interests of the British imperialism. In fact they have actively participated in and profited from all this. In the midst of poverty they have no shame in using public money for their lavish lifestyles and ceremonies.
The British monarchy are an archaic, corrupt and racist institution. They are the arrogance of hereditary and unchecked power and wealth.
Britain’s and other ruling classes, through the state and the monopoly media, will try to use the coronation to distract from the fresh crisis gripping the capitalist world. We can’t allow their calls for ‘unity’ and ‘respect’, which are in reality demands for class collaboration, to succeed.
Charles should never become ‘king’ and will never be legitimate for the youth and working people.
Young Communists demand:
- The immediate abolition of the monarchy and its replacement with a democratically elected head of state.
- The nationalisation of royal properties and the expropriation of the personal wealth of the Royal Family for the public good.
- Redistribution of and reparation for all wealth stolen by the Windsors from Britain’s former colonies.
Down with the monarchy!
For a republic!
For real democracy and socialism!
Signed:
- 🇬🇧 Young Communist League of Britain
- 🇯🇲 Jamaica Left Alliance for National Democracy and Socialism
- 🇨🇦 Young Communist League of Canada – Ligue de la Jeunesse Communiste
- 🇦🇺 Communist Party of Australia Youth
