King Juan Carlos of Spain once insisted "kings don't give up the throne , they die in their sleep." But embarrassing scandals and the popularity of the republican left in the recent Euro-elections have forced him to eat his words and stand down. So does the Spanish crisis suggest that monarchy  is seeing its last days? Does that mean the writing is on the wall for all European royals, with their magnificent uniforms and majestic lifestyles? The Spanish case provides arguments both for and against monarchy. When public opinion is particularly polarized, as it was following the end of the Franco regime, monarchs can rise above mere politics and symbolize a spirit of national unity. It is this apparent transcendence  of politics that explains monarchs continuing popularity as heads of state. And so, the Middle East excepted, Europe is the most monarch- filled region in the world, with 10 kingdoms (not counting Vatican City and Andorra). Most royal families have survived because they allow voters to avoid the difficult search for a non-controversial but respected public figure. Even so, kings and queens undoubtedly have a downside. Symbolic of national unity as they claim to be, their very history and sometimes the way they behave today symbolizes outdated and indefensible privileges and inequalities. At a time when Thomas Piketty and other economists are warning of rising inequality and the increasing power of inherited wealth, it is strange that wealthy noble families should still be the symbolic heart of modern democratic states. The most successful monarchies try their best to abandon or hide their old noble ways. Princes and princesses have day-jobs and ride bicycles, not horses (or helicopters). Even so, these are wealthy families who party with the international 1%, and media interference makes it increasingly difficult to maintain the right image. Monarchs are kept as heads of state in Europe mostly
owing to their undoubted and respectable status to achieve a balance between tradition and reality to give voters more public figures to look up to due to their everlasting political symbolizing