The heads of government of five members of the Commonwealth of Nations at the 1944 Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference (L-R: King, Smuts, Churchill, Fraser, Curtin)Queen Elizabeth II and Commonwealth leaders, at the 1960 conference, Windsor Castle.
Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conferences were biennial meetings of Prime Ministers of the United Kingdom and the Dominion members of the British Commonwealth of Nations. Seventeen Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conferences were held between 1944 and 1969. As well, the prime ministers met for a Commonwealth Economic Conference in 1952. These series of conferences were a continuation and regularisation of the earlier Imperial Conferences which had been held periodically from 1887 to 1937. Since 1971, Commonwealth Heads of Government Meetings have been held.
Of the seventeen meetings, sixteen were held in London, reflecting then-prevailing views of the Commonwealth as the continuation of the British Empire and the centralisation of power in the British Commonwealth Office (the one meeting outside London, in Lagos, was an extraordinary meeting held in January 1966 to coordinate policies towards Rhodesia). Two supplementary meetings were also held during this period: a Commonwealth Statesmen's meeting to discuss peace terms in April 1945, and a Commonwealth Economic Conference in 1952.
The British Commonwealth leaders agreed to support the Moscow Declaration and reached agreement regarding their respective roles in the overall Allied war effort.
Conferences consisted of the prime ministers or presidents of independent states as well as the premiers of some senior colonies. This policy changed with the 1964 Prime Ministers' Conference which was confined to independent states and thus excluded Southern Rhodesia whose prime ministers had attended Imperial and Commonwealth conferences since the 1930s. While the growing number of Commonwealth states was given as the reason for this change, it coincided with the emergence of white minority rule in Rhodesia as a major issue.
The 1960s saw an overhaul of the Commonwealth. The swift expansion of the Commonwealth after decolonisation saw the newly independent countries demand the creation of the Commonwealth Secretariat, and the United Kingdom, in response, successfully founding the Commonwealth Foundation. This decentralisation of power demanded a reformulation of the meetings. Instead of the meetings always being held in London, they would rotate across the membership, subject to countries' ability to host the meetings: beginning with Singapore in 1971. They were also renamed the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meetings to reflect the growing diversity of the constitutional structures in the Commonwealth.
The Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting is a biennial summit meeting of the governmental leaders from all Commonwealth nations. Despite the name, the head of state may be present in the meeting instead of the head of government, especially among semi-presidential states. Every two years the meeting is held in a different member state and is chaired by that nation's respective prime minister or president, who becomes the Commonwealth Chair-in-Office until the next meeting. Queen Elizabeth II, who was the Head of the Commonwealth, attended every CHOGM beginning with Ottawa in 1973 until Perth in 2011, although her formal participation only began in 1997. She was represented by the Prince of Wales at the 2013 meeting as the 87-year-old monarch was curtailing long-distance travel. The Queen attended the 2015 summit in Malta and the 2018 summit in London, but was represented again by the Prince of Wales at the 2022 meeting in Rwanda.
Imperial Conferences were periodic gatherings of government leaders from the self-governing colonies and dominions of the British Empire between 1887 and 1937, before the establishment of regular Meetings of Commonwealth Prime Ministers in 1944. They were held in 1887, 1894, 1897, 1902, 1907, 1911, 1921, 1923, 1926, 1930, 1932 and 1937.
Stanley Melbourne Bruce, 1st Viscount Bruce of Melbourne, was an Australian politician who served as the eighth prime minister of Australia from 1923 to 1929, as leader of the Nationalist Party.
A Commonwealth realm is a sovereign state in the Commonwealth of Nations whose monarch and head of state is shared among the other realms. Each realm functions as an independent state, equal with the other realms and nations of the Commonwealth. King Charles III succeeded his mother, Queen Elizabeth II, as monarch of each Commonwealth realm following her death on 8 September 2022. He simultaneously became Head of the Commonwealth.
Rhodesia's Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI) was a statement adopted by the Cabinet of Rhodesia on 11 November 1965, announcing that Southern Rhodesia or simply Rhodesia, a British territory in southern Africa that had governed itself since 1923, now regarded itself as an independent sovereign state. The culmination of a protracted dispute between the British and Rhodesian governments regarding the terms under which the latter could become fully independent, it was the first unilateral break from the United Kingdom by one of its colonies since the United States Declaration of Independence in 1776. The UK, the Commonwealth and the United Nations all deemed Rhodesia's UDI illegal, and economic sanctions, the first in the UN's history, were imposed on the breakaway colony. Amid near-complete international isolation, Rhodesia continued as an unrecognised state with the assistance of South Africa and Portugal.
A war cabinet is a committee formed by a government in a time of war to efficiently and effectively conduct that war. It is usually a subset of the full executive cabinet of ministers, although it is quite common for a war cabinet to have senior military officers and opposition politicians as members.
The Imperial War Cabinet (IWC) was the British Empire's wartime coordinating body. It met over three sessions, the first from 20 March to 2 May 1917, the second from 11 June to late July 1918, and the third from 20 or 25 November 1918 to early January 1919. Consisting of representatives from Canada, Australia, India, the Dominion of Newfoundland, New Zealand, South Africa and the United Kingdom, the Cabinet considered many aspects of waging the First World War. It led to the United Kingdom's Dominions being considered more equal to Great Britain. Held concurrently with the cabinet were the Imperial War Conferences of 1917 and 1918.
The Allies, formally referred to as the United Nations from 1942, were an international military coalition formed during the Second World War (1939–1945) to oppose the Axis powers, led by Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, and Fascist Italy. Its principal members by 1941 were the United Kingdom, United States, Soviet Union, and China.
Australia and Canada have a longstanding relationship that has been fostered by both countries' shared history and culture, and links between residents of both countries. The two countries are former British Dominions and have a common head of state in King Charles III. Both countries are members of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, Cairns Group, Commonwealth of Nations, Five Eyes, OECD and the United Nations.
The Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland, also known as the Central African Federation or CAF, was a colonial federation that consisted of three southern African territories: the self-governing British colony of Southern Rhodesia and the British protectorates of Northern Rhodesia and Nyasaland. It existed between 1953 and 1963.
Zimbabwe and the Commonwealth of Nations have had a controversial and stormy diplomatic relationship. Zimbabwe is a former member of the Commonwealth, having withdrawn in 2003, and the issue of Zimbabwe has repeatedly taken centre stage in the Commonwealth, both since Zimbabwe's independence and as part of the British Empire.
The Commonwealth of Nations, simply referred to as the Commonwealth, is a political association of 56 member states, the vast majority of which are former territories of the British Empire. The chief institutions of the organisation are the Commonwealth Secretariat, which focuses on intergovernmental aspects, and the Commonwealth Foundation, which focuses on non-governmental relations amongst member states. Numerous organisations are associated with and operate within the Commonwealth.
The 1923 Imperial Conference met in London in the autumn of 1923, the first attended by the new Irish Free State. While named the Imperial Economic Conference, the principal activity concerned the rights of the Dominions in regards to determining their own foreign policy.
The 1937 Imperial Conference was held in London from 14 May to 24 June 1937, following the coronation of King George VI on 12 May. It was the eighth and final Imperial Conference and the last meeting of British and dominion prime ministers held until World War II.
The 1973 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting, officially known as the II Commonwealth Heads Meeting, and commonly known as Ottawa 1973, was the second Meeting of the Heads of Government of the Commonwealth of Nations. It was held from 2 to 10 August 1973 in Ottawa, and hosted by Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau.
The Rhodesian mission in Lisbon, the capital of Portugal, operated from September 1965 to May 1975. It was a diplomatic mission representing Rhodesia, initially as a self-governing colony of Britain and, after the Unilateral Declaration of Independence in November 1965, as an unrecognised state. Rhodesia informed Britain of its intent to open a Lisbon mission headed by an accredited representative, independent from the British Embassy in the city, in June 1965. Whitehall refused to endorse the idea but Rhodesia continued nonetheless, and later that month appointed Harry Reedman to head the mission. The British government attempted unsuccessfully to block this unilateral act—Rhodesia's first—for some months afterwards.
The 1944 Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference was the first Meeting of the Heads of Government of the British Commonwealth. It was held in the United Kingdom, between 1–16 May 1944, and was hosted by that country's Prime Minister, Winston Churchill.
The 1961 Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference was the 11th Meeting of the Heads of Government of the Commonwealth of Nations. It was held in the United Kingdom in March 1961, and was hosted by that country's Prime Minister, Harold Macmillan.
The 1969 Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Conference was the 17th Meeting of the Heads of Government of the Commonwealth of Nations. It was held in the United Kingdom in January 1969, and was hosted by that country's Prime Minister, Harold Wilson.
The 1952 Commonwealth Prime Ministers' Economic Conference was an emergency Meeting of the Heads of Government of the British Commonwealth. It was called by the British government of Sir Winston Churchill and held in the United Kingdom in December 1952 as a follow-up to a Commonwealth Finance Minister's conference held in January 1952. The conference was held in the context of British economic and military decline and the United States' surging role in the world.
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