The Sleeping Giant

The modern Commonwealth is a voluntary association of nations which had its origin in the London Agreement of 1949. The ‘new conception’ gave the existing member states the freedom to acknowledge the British monarch as head of the Commonwealth without paying allegiance to the Crown as their head of state. In 1947, India became the first Commonwealth country to win independence and declare itself a republic. This sparked the compromise between the monarchy and the new emerging republics but the Commonwealth’s survival was not assured. African nations followed India. Ghana, under Kwame Nkrumah, was first in 1957. It was Nkrumah who, in 1964, led independence leaders in a popular revolution to create the new Commonwealth — with an independent secretariat and secretary-general — freed from British dominance. As such, the recent independence movement in the Caribbean is no different, nor are Caribbean countries leaving the Commonwealth. Such radical roots give the lie to media misconceptions that the Commonwealth is Empire 2.0 or an anachronism from the imperial past. Whilst the British monarch may be its head, the independent secretary-general running the organisation is elected by member state heads of government at a Commonwealth Summit for a term of four years.

Today, the Commonwealth is a free global association of 56 equal and independent sovereign states including developed and emerging economies that bridge the north-south divide. New nations are lining up to join. With a combined population of 2.5 billion, the Commonwealth represents almost a third of the planet’s population, of which 70 per cent are under 30. With its members’ common language, common law and similar government and civic institutions, its soft-power record is exemplified in brokering the political solution which ended apartheid in South Africa. The combined GDP of Commonwealth countries is expected to exceed $20tn by 2030 and is set to overtake the Eurozone. Half of the top-20 global emerging cities are in the Commonwealth, providing an unprecedented opportunity to raise living standards and multiply free, fair and open trade between member states. Yet, successive UK governments over the last 50 years have neglected the Commonwealth, dismissing it as a costly, antiquated relic. When people ask what’s the point of the Commonwealth, a simple answer is, “ask China”. If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then China’s $1tn investment in its Belt and Road ‘Commonwealth clone’ is telling. And yet when you compare this to the UK’s paltry £40m annual underwrite of the ALAMY Commonwealth Secretariat, the level of strategic neglect becomes apparent.

Whilst the UK has been tip-toeing around its history, other countries like China and Russia have been busy empire building and copying the worst whilst their ‘internet armies’ spread disinformation to undermine the best. It is time to shed the fake imperial guilt and realise our shared history is also our shared future. Fortunately, and contrary to the media doomsayers, the UK has done a great job assimilating and integrating skilled Commonwealth residents, and this is reflected across all the great cities of the UK. We share a common way of life and living, laugh at the same jokes and enjoy the sheer diversity of 56 cuisines which all have a home in the UK. This is the great British joy of eating other people’s food.

The Notting Hill Carnival has showcased Caribbean Commonwealth culture for many years. Now, plans are in the making for a London-wide Festival of the Commonwealth. To replace the UK’s lost Commonwealth infrastructure and provide a centre for the Commonwealth diaspora, a new ‘Out of Africa’ and ‘Out of Asia’ initiative is working with the Royal Borough of Greenwich to establish the World’s first New Commonwealth Quarter (NCQ) in Woolwich. The Greenwich Meridian Line is taken as the geographical central axis of the Commonwealth and a twinning with Ghana ‘down the line’ was launched by the late Prince Philip at the millennium. This project came of age at the Commonwealth Summit in 2018 in London with the inauguration of the first undermine the best. It is time to shed the fake imperial guilt and realise our shared history is also our shared future. Fortunately, and contrary to the media doomsayers, the UK has done a great job assimilating and integrating skilled Commonwealth residents, and this is reflected across all the great cities of the UK. We share a common way of life and living, laugh at the same jokes and enjoy the sheer diversity of 56 cuisines which all have a home in the UK.

This is the great British joy of eating other people’s food. The Notting Hill Carnival has showcased Caribbean Commonwealth culture for many years. Now, plans are in the making for a London-wide Festival of the Commonwealth. To replace the UK’s lost Commonwealth infrastructure and provide a centre for the Commonwealth diaspora, a new ‘Out of Africa’ and ‘Out of Asia’ initiative is working with the Royal Borough of Greenwich to establish the World’s first New Commonwealth Quarter (NCQ) in Woolwich. The Greenwich Meridian Line is taken as the geographical central axis of the Commonwealth and a twinning with Ghana ‘down the line’ was launched by the late Prince Philip at the millennium. This project came of age at Commonwealth Capital City Link between London and Accra. In October 2024, the small island state of Samoa will host the Commonwealth Heads of Government Summit from the ‘Big Blue Continent’ as the culmination of celebrations for this 75th anniversary year. Rwanda, an ex-French colony and new member state, the current Chair-in-Office, will hand over the baton of Commonwealth leadership to Samoa. Famed for celestial navigation heritage, the Pacific Island Way is collaborative and will bring a fresh new Oceanic perspective to Commonwealth relations over the next two years. An evolving global network on the scale of the Commonwealth — linking some of the World’s fastest-growing economies — needs a properly resourced and empowered secretariat to manage the network and provide connective capacity. Queen Elizabeth II championed the Commonwealth as “the most effective and progressive association of peoples history has yet seen”. To live up to such promise, a Commonwealth renaissance is needed to awaken the sleeping giant.