CONSTITUTIONAL MONARCHY IS BEST

As the scandal over the book published to coincide with Queen Sofia's 70th birthday died a media death last week, Royal Spanish Academy member Luis Maria Anson noted in his column in El Mundo last Friday that the author belongs to the controversial Catholic association, Opus Dei. Generally regarded as a very right wing organisation, Sr Anson suggested that in "The Queen from very close up", journalist Pilar Urbano was in fact putting typical Opus Dei sentiments into the Queen's mouth and contrasted it with another recent publication, "Doña Sofia, La Reina habla de su vida (The Queen talks about her life)". According to Sr Anson, its authors, Carmen Enriquez and Emilio Oliva, have produced a much more objective book, based on conversations with the Queen that lasted about 20 hours. In response to critics of the monarchy, Sr Anson pointed out that in a recent United Nations rating of the quality of life and development of the countries belonging to it, seven constitutional monarchies were among the top ten. This number grew to 11 in the top 15. Spain was rated at number 19.