Royalism in SCA governance

Master Louis-Philippe Mitouard, OP, OL, Baron, twice a kingdom great officer of the Outlands.

Recently there was a discussion in the Outlands that the Kingdom Seneschal should be deferential to the crown, even to the point of treating the Crown, using a corporate model, like the "Chief executive" of the kingdom. Generally this article disagrees with that notion. However, packed into this are the notions of what sort of organization the SCA is and what the roles of the Crown and officers should be. Obviously these are eternal SCA campfire debates, but if we restrict ourselves to the realm of senior kingdom officers vis a vis the Crown I believe the answer, although it can be obscured by general SCA dogma, can be readily discerned.

First, we have to dispose of parsing Royalism as a word. This is truly a vain exercise. Even though there are always people who regard the idea as a touchstone, its meaning is quite slippery. The only consistent definition I have seen is in the negative. Those who are most vociferous about it cannot exactly define what Royalism means except when it comes time to out an `anti-Royalist'. To complete the thought I can do no better than to quote Count Richard Ironsteed, first King of Atenveldt:

In spite of its obviously political character, most Royalists deny that Royalism is a political movement. In fact for most of them "politics" is a pejorative.

While the existence of a political movement in a group without formal political process is somewhat difficult to define, there is no question that by most definitions, Royalism is a highly political stance. Certainly it is not a code of ethics, such as Chivalry, an aesthetic movement or even a style of fighting. In fact, outside of politics, there is little or nothing that can be called Royalist. Aside from their views on what are clearly political questions, many Royalists have nothing in common.

Examination of statements by Royalists shows that for them "politics" has two meanings. It refers either to the turmoil and unpleasantness produced by differences of opinion on major questions or to the very act of expressing some disagreement with the actions of the King or Prince.

For some of the more extreme Royalists, "politics" is simply a code word for any kind of dissent from their opinion, active or passive. In this sense, Royalism can indeed be said to be "non-political" and those who are not whole-hearted Royalists are in fact "playing politics." [1]

Let us next consider the second great slippery phrase `the Dream'. Even though this too is subject to myriad definitions we can dispose of it quickly. Without unpacking it too far, on its face, `dream' connotes unreality or escapism. Although many people have the luxury of playing SCA as they wish history was, would be or could be, officers of the SCA would be well advised for their own financial, legal if not mental, health to see their jobs as they are – agents of a modern world 501(c )3 non-profit corporation. This is the way the authorities will see them if it should come to a test.

In short, by the time you get to be an officer you should know this but, all the relevant laws and penalties you will have to deal with do not take into consideration any notion of what anyone means by `the Dream' or `the current middle ages'.

What, then, is the role of the Crown (King and Queen) and the kingdom officers in governing an SCA kingdom? I do not intend to entirely deconstruct the crown's role in the SCA. One must acknowledge even without knowing or agreeing why that the Crown has a strong mindshare role as a leader of the group. In a purely quantitative way this can be evident when one stages an SCA event. Many groups have experienced that the presence of the royals attracts enough patrons to an event to make an otherwise obscure SCA event quite lucrative.

However, governing the group is another matter.

The prevention of self-dealing is a strong need for any non-profit. Even if it is not enforced as perhaps it should be by the IRS, the threat of suit against a 501(c)(3) for self-dealing (also called private inurement) [2] [3] is always present. This stands to reason as there is no large source of remuneration for participating as a volunteer as one might have at a paying job. Therefore there will always be people who, if they need money from the group, or at all, redirect it from the biggest existing pool – one that is (by definition) not intended for them. This is not a suspicion of the Crown, or any member for that matter, but is simply a well-known feature of nonprofit corporations.

The reason to allow `the king's word [to be] law' was explained to me by a former Seneschal (paraphrasing) thus: In order to allow a crown to prove their virtue we have to allow them to make mistakes. If we regulate the crown too heavily we take away their ability to show greatness.

Allowing that this is the goal for some SCA players, still this runs headlong into problems of self-dealing, either in fact or in appearance. The SCA is a crown-centered game. Rather than denying or diminishing this, in fact it is the reason we must treat the crown as special. They indeed do have a unique ability to guide the group, either to the light or into darkness.

Is the Crown the chief executive officer (CEO) of the kingdom? In a legal sense, clearly no. They are officers of the corporation, but even within the kingdom, the Crown is given much greater informal power than a chief executive but less formal power. The formal powers of the crown are fairly strictly limited. It cannot solely hire or fire officers (it needs the agreement of the directly superior society officer). It has no staff that it directly can appoint or fire. It has only 1/3 of the votes in the kingdom financial committee controlling the kingdom's outlay of money. Any action taken by the Crown can be countermanded by the society or Board of Directors and any discipline imposed by the Crown (banishment) is automatically reviewed from above.

The crown can certainly take actions that while not touching money directly nonetheless will smell like pure self interest. Even leaving aside the actual threat from real world authorities (the scope of which I believe can only be properly assessed by an experienced non-profit attorney) appearance of impropriety itself proves likely to make a crown's life very unpleasant.

On a more general level, the role of the kingdom officer is to keep the ship of the SCA on a steady and peaceful course – to promote order and harmony in their area of focus.

Whether an officer sees his role as the crown's loyal advisor, or in simply wishing to be the steward of a smoothly running group, he cannot generally afford to let the `royals be royal'. The officer corps must steer the crown from temptation.

In matters unrelated to money, such as the general direction of the kingdom or more specifically in recent times, the scheduling or placement of events, especially kingdom events, the Crown has greater latitude, yet still the overhang of self interest is still a problem that is within the kingdom officer corps' power to prevent. For instance, given their druthers, who would not want events scheduled at a manner, time and location convenient to themselves? Some Crowns have proven incapable of resisting this temptation yet it has an undeniable impact on the satisfaction level (and therefore the mission) of our entire organization. I will not make too much of unfairness of royal caprice as a hurting the SCA quantitatively. In moderation, it is arguably a feature of the SCA that some patrons enjoy (although again, arguably, allowing royal caprice has precious little to do with the group's stated mission of studying and educating about the Middle Ages and Renaissance in Europe). Richard Ironsteed goes into this in great and convincing detail, but suffice to say the general unfairness of allowing a few to dictate to the many is a corrosive force that in excess will destroy a volunteer organization.

As stewards of the SCA, kingdom officers can do much to prevent the worst abuses of power without entirely removing the color of the SCA royalty game. Some chafe against terms like `theater' that frame the SCA as something they think of as lacking real world heft but, to be effective, officers must see the SCA as the world outside sees it, not as some `royalist' players might wish it. It is a term worth embracing. Part of the theater of the SCA is that the Crown, as some notions of royalism would have it, can only truly be `king' when they are in sole and unfettered charge. Where this is the goal, realistically we can only allow this to be an act, not reality. Using our analogy, then, the kingdom officers are the crew who make sure a stage is already set for the crown when they are ready to perform. The good crowns allow that this is a charade, and so for that matter do the good officers. However, they do readily break character when needed (when dealing with real world considerations). The bad ones don't.

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[1] ROYALISM: AN INFANTILE POLITICAL DISORDER by Count Richard Ironsteed, February 1983 (A.S. XVII) Runnymede Press, Copyright © 1983 Rick Cook.
[2] A general report on private inurement and excess benefit. http://www.nonprofitlawreport.com/guide/private-inurement/
[3]The IRS definition of a non-profit charitable organization: http://www.irs.gov/charities/charitable/article/0,,id=123297,00.html

Inurement/Private Benefit - Charitable Organizations
A section 501(c)(3) organization must not be organized or operated for the benefit of private interests, such as the creator or the creator's family, shareholders of the organization, other designated individuals, or persons controlled directly or indirectly by such private interests. No part of the net earnings of a section 501(c)(3) organization may inure to the benefit of any private shareholder or individual. A private shareholder or individual is a person having a personal and private interest in the activities of the organization.