On 12 September I gave an interview to Nexo Jornal about the anti-monarchy movement in the UK. Of course, the interest was sparked by the death of Queen Elizabeth II. There aren't any political scientists that I know of who specialise in this even after skimming ResearchRabbit for papers on the topic. So I went digging myself in order to help the reporter.
At least when it comes to Twitter (is there anything else?), the movement has gone mute again. Geographically tagged tweets in the month of September in the UK saw a sharp rise around the death of the Queen, but then a sharp drop in the following week and almost null at the end of the month. Total, there were 536 tweets.
However, most tweeters don't add their locations to Twitter, which can lead us to wonder - what about the total use of the hashtag during the month, regardless of being geotagged or not?
It's a similar enough curve, with lower peaks post day-of. Of course, many more tweets are found, a total of 183,720 during the same period. Looking into profile's descriptions and where they state they are, in addition to if they have added their locations could bring these numbers closer together.
Over the same period, the profile for the republican movement @RepublicStaff
tweeted 653 times, with 15 using the hashtag. The highest number of tweets was on 20 September, with 75; 10 used the hashtag. They did not use it at all during the 8th and 9th, only picking it back up on the 10th.
Increase in support for a republican UK is slow going and people seem more concerned with other issues that appear to more directly affect their lives than the monarchy. The biggest problem being the royal family's lavish lifestyle often has the counterpoints of many of their properties actually belonging to the state and the revenue their symbolism brings in. Big events might shake up those beliefs, but the Queen's death is just not sufficient.