By Sarah Mills

LONDON (Reuters) – As Queen Elizabeth celebrates her seventieth 12 months on the throne, there are questions on whether or not the Commonwealth of Nations, which she was instrumental in creating and stays one in every of her proudest achievements, has a future when her reign is over.

The Commonwealth advanced out of the British empire, and Elizabeth grew to become its head in 1952 when she grew to become queen, three years after the London Declaration formally created the voluntary affiliation in its present type.

Now it’s one in every of world’s largest worldwide organisations, made up of 54 nations, virtually all of which have been former colonies of the UK, protecting some 2.5 billion folks or about one third of the world’s inhabitants.

The 96-year-old queen has at all times been at its coronary heart, however there are solutions it has already grow to be outdated and irrelevant.

“I feel maybe the Commonwealth has traditionally run its course,” mentioned Philip Murphy, professor of British and Commonwealth Historical past on the College of London. “And what you are actually seeing now’s the ghost of an organisation.”

Commonwealth members vary from rich nations comparable to Britain, Australia, New Zealand and Canada – who nonetheless all have the queen as their head of state – to populous India, in addition to tiny Pacific republics comparable to Nauru.

Supporters say it offers a community to foster worldwide cooperation and commerce hyperlinks, with a deal with selling democracy and growth, and addressing points comparable to local weather change.

So when Barbados lower its ties with the British monarchy final 12 months when the Caribbean nation grew to become a republic, it was eager to stay a part of the Commonwealth.

“The Commonwealth is helpful to many Caribbean nations in addition to many African nations and it hyperlinks us into nations like Australia and New Zealand and Canada,” mentioned Barbados-based David Denny, normal secretary for the Caribbean Motion for Peace and Integration, a non-government organisation.

The organisation was considered enjoying a major function in serving to to finish apartheid in South Africa, and Murphy says it has makes use of for smaller, much less highly effective members. However he stays unconvinced of its wider profit.

“The Commonwealth talks in regards to the significance of selling democracy, tackling local weather change, tackling gender inequality,” he instructed Reuters. “However the Commonwealth is not essentially a logical framework internationally wherein to cope with any of these issues.”

The place the organisation might have a job, Murphy says, is in coping with the legacy of the British empire and colonialism, with a brand new objective of coping with points comparable to reparation and restitution.

‘MASSACRED’

“We have been massacred and killed for the financial growth of Britain,” Denny mentioned.

“The nation states inside the Commonwealth ought to demand reparation for that sufferation from the royal household, from the British authorities, all the British firms that will have benefited from slavery and the exploitation of our African folks all through the Commonwealth nation states.”

One other query the organisation should handle is who will lead it, with Denny arguing it shouldn’t be the British royals, regardless of Commonwealth leaders agreeing in 2018 that Elizabeth’s son and inheritor Prince Charles needs to be her successor though the function isn’t hereditary.

Charles’s eldest son Prince William, after a tough tour of the Caribbean nations earlier this 12 months when he confronted protests, requires reparations and an apology for slavery, instructed he may not get the job.

“Who the Commonwealth chooses to guide its household sooner or later is not what’s on my thoughts,” mentioned William. “What issues to us is the potential the Commonwealth household has to create a greater future for the individuals who type it, and our dedication to serve and assist as finest we will.”

Nonetheless, within the meantime, there isn’t a query of the significance of the organisation to its present head.

“As we speak, it’s rewarding to watch a contemporary, vibrant and related Commonwealth that mixes a wealth of historical past and custom with the good social, cultural and technological advances of our time,” Queen Elizabeth mentioned in her annual message to the Commonwealth in March.

“That the Commonwealth stands ever taller is a credit score to all who’ve been concerned.”

Murphy mentioned he suspected it could survive, however with even much less consideration that it attracts now.

“I feel it is going to stagger on,” he mentioned. “I do not see the need to attract a line below it, and I do not see who would actually have the authority to do this. I feel the hazard is that it’ll simply regularly grow to be much less influential, much less vital and fewer attention-grabbing to its residents.”