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Nations, a free association of sovereign states comprising Great Britain and a number of its former dependencies who have chosen to maintain ties of friendship and practical cooperation and who acknowledge the British monarch as symbolic head of their association. Historically, the Commonwealth was an evolutionary outgrowth of the British Empire. The traditional British policy of allowing considerable self-government in its colonies led to the existence by the 19th century of several dependent states, which were populated to a significant degree by Europeans accustomed to the forms of parliamentary rule and which possessed large degrees of sovereignty. By 1931 they were recognized as having special status within the empire by the Statute of Westminster, which referred specifically to a ¡§British Commonwealth of Nations.¡¨ The adjective British was dropped from official use in 1946. (source: "Commonwealth" Encyclopedia Britannica <http://www.britannica.com/eb/article?eu=25386> [Accessed September 8, 2002]. ) |
Commonwealth