In 1948, four years before his forced abdication, King Farouk of Egypt remarked there would soon only be five kings: of hearts, spades, clubs, diamonds and England.
By this measure, kings have done better than might have been expected over the past century or so, but they’ve also done little to combat their gradual decline as a political model. Even today, with governments all around the Mediterranean struggling with crises of legitimacy, no one has been brave enough to fight fire with fire, to embark on a massive program of democratic deficit spending, to replace the whole hated political elite with one unelected regnocrat. No one has been brave enough to propose bringing back the monarchy.
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