Cold War Monarchy: British state visits and royal soft power

British governments used the supposedly apolitical monarchy in the age of the Cold War and decolonization to push through their foreign policy goals. During this phase, state visits developed from European neighborly relations into a global instrument that also encompassed the lines of conflict of the bloc confrontation and former colonies. In this context, the trips of Queen Elizabeth II and other members of the royal family were used specifically for political maneuvering. This was an increase in the importance of the monarchy, as British governments responded to the British decline with an expansion of royal diplomacy. The lecture traces the perspectives of the Foreign Office, the palace and civil society on this development.

Falko Schnicke is a historian and studies the social, cultural and political transformation of Europe in its international interdependencies from the 18th to the 20th century. He has been a Senior Lecturer at the Johannes Kepler University Linz since 2020. He was previously a Research Fellow at the German Historical Institute London. His research interests include the history of foreign policy during the Cold War, critical monarchical history and the history of climate change as well as gender and body history. His recent book publications include Belonging across Borders: Transnational Practices in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries (with Levke Harders, 2022) and Global Royal Families: Cultures of Transnational Monarchy in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries (with Robert Aldrich and Cindy McCreery, 2024). In the winter semester 2024/25 Falko Schnicke is Junior Fellow at the Alfried Krupp Wissenschaftskolleg Greifswald.

Moderation: Professor Dr. Annelie Ramsbrock