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Hi

Can someone explain to me what the difference is between Commonwealth and Empire?

Also is there a list to differentiate between the two?

Thanks,
William

This question probably comes from a post I just made.

I use it to differentiate between the periods where the royal family of the United Kingdom was Head of State of the nations of the Empire (and I do believe it is call the Empire period, but I could be wrong as well) and the more modern Commonwealth which HM Queen Elizabeth is the Head of, but not necessarily the Head of State of the member nations.

i.e., HM the Queen is the Head of State for Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and of course the United Kingdom, as well as various other countries and territories.

However she is not Head of State for countries such as South Africa but they are a Commonwealth member, however at one time they were part of the British Empire and thus the monarch was Head of State at that time.

I collect Canada, the UK, and Commonwealth countries where HM is Head of State and British Empire period for the other Commonwealth countries.

Hope this wasn't too convoluted

This is a good chance to find out how accurate Wikipedia is:

"...The Commonwealth of Nations—formerly the "British Commonwealth"—is a voluntary association of 54 independent sovereign states, most of which are former British colonies, or dependencies of these colonies with three exceptions, Mozambique (which was a Portuguese possession), Rwanda (which was a Belgian mandate) and Cameroon (which is a union of a French mandate and a British mandate) plus the United Kingdom itself. The Commonwealth's membership includes both republics and monarchies. The head of the Commonwealth of Nations is Queen Elizabeth II. She also reigns as monarch directly in a number of states, known as Commonwealth realms, notably the United Kingdom, Australia, Barbados, Canada, Jamaica, and New Zealand."

Anyone have a problem with this definition? To continue:

"...The British Empire comprised the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom. It originated with the overseas colonies and trading posts established by England in the late 16th and early 17th centuries. At its height, it was the largest empire in history and, for over a century, was the foremost global power. By 1922 the British Empire held sway over about 458 million people, one-fifth of the world's population at the time, and covered more than 13,012,000 sq mi, almost a quarter of the Earth's total land area."

So, in effect, the Empire was a much larger entity than the Commonwealth, although sometimes subject to interpretation, and after World War II, constantly shrinking due to the ongoing independence of its members.

Now, the Commonwealth is much larger, and "defined" in absolute legal terms, i.e., its 54 sovereign states.

So Basically the Commonwealth is 54 member nations that have banded together for support but does this include Canada and Australia or are they in a class by themselves where they are ruled by the Queen?

Canada, Australia, New Zealand and any other country that is ruled by HM the Queen are members of the Commonwealth.

Strangely enough there is an order to the seniority to them as well. Canada is the senior commonwealth nation.

Bit of trivia, as the senior nation we had first choice of the Queen's Beasts that were placed in front of Westminister Abbey during her coronation. We have them all now (there are 10) in the Canadian Museum of Civilization.

Surprised Canada Post didn't use them in the Jubilee stamps.

"Commonwealth/Empire?"

Is a rather lazy and totally meaningless thread heading.

Please READ Rule 10 before starting future threads.

And Rule 9, as you used the wrong Forum to start it in.

I have spent my time adjusting both on THIS occasion.

Admin

I think most of the difference lies in political correctness. Why would the "British Commonwealth" be now called the "Commonwealth of Nations" unless it offended somebody ?

The big exception is that these days Republics are members of the Commonwealth of Nations. There were no republics in the old British Empire. You could roughly draw a line at around the end of WW2 for the changeover from Empire to Commonwealth.

Search for the definitions of Dominion, Protectorate, Crown Colony, Crown Agent and also research the Statute of Westminster for a better understanding.

Cheers,

Robert

I thought that I read, (must go check) that there member countries now in the Commonwealth that were never in the old Empire. I don't just mean a change of name, but a neighbouring country to ones that were have joined.

(Apart from the Wiki above)

Founded in 1949 with 8 members:
The London Declaration
The Governments of the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, India, Pakistan and Ceylon, whose countries are united as Members of the British Commonwealth of Nations and owe a common allegiance to the Crown, which is also the symbol of their free association, have considered the impending constitutional changes in India.


The Government of India have informed the other Governments of the Commonwealth of the intention of the Indian people that under the new constitution which is about to be adopted India shall become a sovereign independent republic. The Government of India have however declared and affirmed India’s desire to continue her full membership of the Commonwealth of Nations and her acceptance of The King as the symbol of the free association of its independent member nations and as such the Head of the Commonwealth.


The Governments of the other countries of the Commonwealth, the basis of whose membership of the Commonwealth is not hereby changed, accept and recognise India’s continuing membership in accordance with the terms of this declaration.


Accordingly the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, India, Pakistan and Ceylon hereby declare that they remain united as free and equal members of the Commonwealth of Nations, freely co-operating in the pursuit of peace, liberty and progress.

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Mozambique and Rwanda are now members of the
Commonwealth of Nations.

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Jay Carrigan
http://www.jaypex.com

Exactly. So....


No it's NOT political correctness as those two countries were not British colonies.

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As the Wikipedia article points out, the term "Commonwealth" was used before WWII, and in formal terms can be dated from the 1931 Statute of Westminster. Also, the "British" part of the name was dropped in 1949, long before the term "political correctness" became part of the common parlance. (A rather silly term, especially when applied to things we used to call "common courtesy" rather than a party line laid down by a dictatorship.)

Quite right, dropped in 1949 to appease the Indians.

Just because the term 'political correctness' wasn't in the common vernacular in 1949 doesn't mean it didn't exist.

That kind of assumes that "appeasing the Indians" (as you put it) was somehow an unreasonable thing to ask and only done to stop them whinging. A more practical way of looking at it would be to reflect that getting them to join an organisation that was basically "places the British took over at one time or another", at the time they were getting independent from them, was actually quite a diplomatic achievement.

In other words, you could (with equal or greater fairness) argue that the Indians were being "politically correct" by agreeing to join in the first place, just to make the Brits feel better about the whole losing-an-Empire thing. Dropping the "British" bit from the name seems like an obvious necessity to get the show on the road.

Easier if you just consider the now Commonwealth Games (the second rate Olympics if you prefer).

These were the British Empire Games till renamed the British Empire and Commonwealth Games in 1954, renamed the British Commonwealth Games in 1970 and finally the Commonwealth Games in 1978.

Seems easy and fair to me; the Empire had certainly died after Word War Two but it took a little while for the Games people to catch up. The 'British' dominant part really was a bit of an insult in a competition involving many countries, and where the Brits were not winning it. Commonwealth makes sense of a people with something of a shared heritage (now convinced that odd new countries who were never colonised by the Brits should be there, it sort of becomes a meaningless group of nations the more such countries join, but that's my political point...)

And British is an awkward point as it excludes Northern Ireland...

Dropped in 1949 to appease Australians (and others) after the Brits withdrew from Asia in the war, so we looked to the Americans. The 'mother country' made it quite clear that we were not important. At that point the Empire died according to many Oz historians.

Britain did not accord the Commonwealth countries the respect that they deserved after WWII. That is to our shame.

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With kind regards, Jim

Easy to answer:

British Empire: "The sun never set on the British Empire" *

British Commonwealth: The sun sets every day



* It has been said that " the sun never set on the British Empire because you could'nt trust the buggers in the dark"

Thank you all for the help. It is much appreciated.

This conversation has gone so far off topic, I don't think it will ever find its way home

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The off-topic posts referred to have been split from this thread. I will refer them to the Mod panel to decide if they have any place on this Board.

The original poster has answers and is happy with that so the thread can remain locked.

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