How much money can we make

In The Guardian today Mark Lawson said that television coverage of this week's royal engagement was greater than coverage of the 1981 royal engagement. There was a disappointed air to the piece, as if Mark Lawson had been hoping that the coverage would prove to have been less (and thus indicate a decline of interest in the British monarchy). No doubt a percentage of the coverage has been sychophantic, with no doubt much more sychophancy to follow, but there are some interesting comparisons between now and the 1981 event.

In 1981 both Russia and China were closed societies, totalitarian states subscribing to communist ideologies. The 1981 Royal Wedding barely registered in the vast territories that comprise those countries. But today the position is different.

The ceremony next year is likely to be one of the world's biggest broadcast media events (perhaps the biggest yet seen) with various commentators equating it to the Olympics or the World Cup in terms of media attention and advertising opportunities.

How far will it penetrate into the national consciousness of both Russia and China, with their huge populations? Will they remain true to their communist heritage and be completely uninterested? Or is the event sufficiently exotic and strange to attract their attention?

Tristram Hunt (historian and now a Labour MP) on Newsnight condemned the 1981 event as "imperial". There are arguments in favour of a cheaper, more austere ceremony. But in terms of newly-consumerised world poulations, is there an appetite for imperial performances? (the Beijing Olympics can be put in this category).



Above: China Daily, an official publication of the Chinese government, covered the royal engagement on their website. Admittedly this is the English-language version, but the Chinese never do anything without a reason. The Chinese do not kow-tow to anyone, so why are they doing this?

It's not as if they need United Kingdom support for anything.



Above: Pravda On-line (Pravda!) is covering the royal engagement in a series of extremely sympathetic articles. Of course, Pravda On-line is not the same as the old communist Pravda, but it still has a big following. One article even described the British monarch as "the pinnacle of excellence".

The question is: how much of this media attention is going to translate into positive responses towards British manufactured goods and services (and how much money can we make from it).