Can Hong Kong Exceptionalism Last? Dilemmas of Governance and Public Administration over Five Decades, 1970s–2020

The purpose of this book is to help explain Hong Kong’s path of governance and public administration over the last five decades — a path which has seen many twists and turns, ups and downs, and pride and anxieties, as the city transformed from a British colony into a Special Administrative Region (SAR) of China in 1997 and grew under the principle of ‘One Country, Two Systems’. At a time when confidence in Hong Kong’s future seems to be ebbing away again, especially among the younger generation who bemoan the loss of autonomy under a strong yet non-democratic China, it is particularly critical that we do not lose sight of the evolving historical context by just lamenting the present problems and tensions. Nowadays, political jitters and pessimism abound, which could easily drive populist sentiments about the fall of the Hong Kong system. However, is this a fair assessment of Hong Kong’s accumulated institutional strength or its social and economic achievements both before and after 1997? What is meant by the ‘Hong Kong’ system and values over the decades, where exceptionalism and hybridity seemed to have symbolised the city’s potential as well as vulnerabilities?

I completed the first draft of this manuscript in mid-2019 when the anti-extradition protests against the Fugitive Offenders and Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters Legislation (Amendment) Bill 2019 were beginning to explode. Since then, Hong Kong has entered a tumultuous period of political unrest and violent confrontations causing the central government in Beijing to respond harshly. The final manuscript was revised in July last year just as the National People’s Congress Standing Committee (NPCSC) passed the National Security Law in Hong Kong. Then, in March 2021, Beijing announced major changes to Hong Kong’s electoral system to revamp the local political order and rid it of ‘unpatriotic’ elements. Such a highly volatile situation makes it challenging for any writer to comment on Hong Kong’s politics and governance because new developments continue to unfold. It is not yet the time to form any definitive observations on how Hong Kong will evolve into the future. However, the trajectory of the past five decades will inevitably be relevant to the next phase of transformation, for better or worse. The statistics and references cited here are those available up to mid-2020, but new statistics will have come out since then. A Postscript has been added just before publication to give readers a provisional assessment of Hong Kong’s latest overall governance situation.

The year 2019 marked not only the 70th anniversary of the establishment of the People’s Republic of China (PRC), to which Hong Kong reverted on 1 July 1997, but was also the centenary of the May Fourth Movement which had inspired generations of Chinese students and revolutionaries seeking to build a strong and modern China free from feudal baggage and foreign subjugation in pursuit of ‘democracy’ and ‘science’ (respectively symbolising participatory governance and social progress sustained by scientific development). China today is keen to embark on another era of Chinese renaissance — the ‘Chinese Dream’.1 However, despite achieving rapid economic growth, there exists wide concern whether its politics and society have been sufficiently liberalised in accordance with the ideals championed by the May Fourth pioneers, some of whom took part in the founding of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) that later won the civil war in 1949 and has governed the nation ever since. China’s future forms the larger set in which Hong Kong evolves and transforms.