What’s the Cure for Ailing Nations? More Kings and Queens, Monarchists Say<br />Count Tolstoy took over in the mid-1980s, and says the current members are "sensible, run-of-the-mill<br />people." Count Tolstoy has written books on ancient and postwar British history.<br />that They think that modern forms of government are superior and have trouble accepting that monarchies have advantages.<br />Instead, his group advocates constitutional monarchies, in which a king or queen is head of state<br />and the real power rests with an elected Parliament — much like those in Belgium, Britain, Denmark, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway and Spain (although demonstrators in 2014 demanded a referendum on the Spanish royal family after King Juan Carlos abdicated).<br />But Sean L. Yom, a political-science professor at Temple University who studies Middle Eastern governments, said<br />that stability might be fleeting: With some of those monarchies propped up by oil money rather than a love of any royal family, "monarchies are on their way out," Mr. Yom said.<br />It is corrupt and secretive." The group has a clear mandate: "We want to see the monarchy abolished<br />and the queen replaced with an elected democratic head of state," it says.<br />" Count Tolstoy, 82, said as he sat in his lush garden behind an expansive stone house. that I love the monarchy,
