When Queen Elizabeth II came to the throne in 1952, Britain was just seven years out of the second world war. Rebuilding work was still ongoing, and rationing key products such as sugar, eggs, cheese and meat would continue for another year or so.
But the austerity and restraint of the 1940s was giving way to a more prosperous 1950s. It is perhaps no wonder, then, that the Queen’s succession was hailed as the “new Elizabethan age”. Society was changing, and here was a young, beautiful queen to sit at its helm.
Seventy years later, Britain looks very different. Elizabeth II ruled over perhaps the most rapid technological expansion and sociopolitical change of any monarch in recent history. Looking back on Elizabeth II’s life raises key questions about not just how the monarchy has changed, but also how Britain itself has transformed throughout the twentieth and twenty-first century.
