Trained to be king from childhood, Charles III. the longest wait for the throne in British history.

But while his mother, Queen Elizabeth II, was crowned with great fanfare and national excitement in 1953 at the age of just 25, her aging eldest son will inspire less enthusiasm, royal commentators have said.

“It will be very difficult for him to follow the Queen,” Robert Hazell, who founded the Constitution Unit at University College London, told AFP.

“The monarchy will probably go through some difficult times, I think.”

Born in 1948, Charles married Diana Spencer in 1981 and they had two sons, William and Harry, before their marriage fell apart amid very public revelations of infidelity.

Diana died in a high-speed car crash in Paris in 1997 at the age of 36. In 2005, Charles married his long-time divorced lover Camilla Parker Bowles.

Long known for his outspoken comments on subjects ranging from agriculture to modernist architecture, the new king has often faced ridicule and accusations of meddling, even as his environmental concerns have now gone mainstream.

As king, he will have to change to be “embarrassingly neutral,” Hazell said.

In a 2018 BBC interview, Charles made it clear that he understood he had to stop campaigning publicly.

“I’m not that stupid,” he said.

But neutrality could prove difficult as Scottish nationalists push for another referendum on independence while saying it will keep the monarchy, Hazell said.

It would be “very difficult… for the monarch to remain scrupulously neutral throughout the referendum campaign”.

At the same time, Hazell praised Charles’ “very strong sense of public service and public duty”.

“I think that will serve him well when he becomes king.”

YouGov opinion polls show that the prospect of Charles as monarch divides British public opinion almost evenly.

In 2022, just under a third of respondents said it wouldn’t make a good king, while almost exactly the same proportion said it would.

“I don’t expect that to change much when he becomes king,” Hazell said.

In contrast, over 80 percent say the Queen did a fairly good or very good job.

Britain is a constitutional monarchy with the king or queen as head of state. Support for a republic has hovered around 15 percent over the past two years.

The interest group Republic sensed a change in mood and launched a poster campaign in mid-2021 calling for the abolition of the monarchy.

Republic Chief Executive Graham Smith said Charles’ accession was “an important turning point” as Barbados sacked the monarch as head of state in November 2021, raising the prospect others could follow suit.

“It won’t be 1952 again,” he added, referring to the Queen’s accession to the throne after the death of her father, King George VI.

“He is not protected by the nearly impenetrable shield of homage that surrounds the queen.”

In contrast, “Charles has faced a lifetime of criticism and ridicule,” he added.

Hazell suggested Charles could be pressured into abdicating in favor of his son William, who was born in 1982, and he could “conceivably” do so, unlike his mother.

Belgium’s King Albert resigned in 2013 at the age of 79 in favor of his son, as did Juan Carlos I of Spain the following year.

For Smith, however, Charles “will not give up.”

With increasing public scrutiny of royal finances, Charles is reportedly looking to reduce the number of royals with official duties – now around a dozen.

Several other European royal families have already done so.

However, the numbers have dropped recently as Prince Harry has moved to California and Charles’ brother Prince Andrew has resigned amid uproar over his friendship with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.

Limiting royal roles isn’t primarily about saving money, it’s about reducing the risk of “one of them going off the rails,” Hazell said.

However, this would reduce the number of participants available at public events, he acknowledged.

Harry’s wife Meghan complained in a sensational Oprah Winfrey interview that the couple’s son Archie was not given the title “Prince”.

She linked it to losing weight, but also said one or more royals made racist remarks before Archie’s birth.

“As far as I know there was no change in the rules, there was no discrimination against Harry,” said Hazell.

At the same time, Charles can choose titles, for example, including making William Prince of Wales — the title he has held since 1958, Hazell said.

“Ultimately, it is the monarch’s choice whether to confer a title.”

The Sun tabloid reported that Charles had no plans to make his youngest brother Edward Duke of Edinburgh, despite his late father’s wish.

But in one of her final crucial acts about the succession, the Queen settled what Charles’ wife Camilla will be called and gave her blessing to the “Queen-Consort”.