Hong Kong's Democratic Reform-An Unexpected Path?

IMGXYZ641IMGZYXOn February 13, 2007 the Carnegie Endowment sponsored an event entitled “Hong Kong’s Democratic Reform-An Unexpected Path?” with Christine Loh, the leading voice in public policy in Hong Kong.  This discussion was moderated by Carnegie Senior Associate Minxin Pei.

Ms. Loh began her talk with an overview of the Handover history of Hong Kong. Many aspects of Hong Kong’s current political structure can be better understood from this transition period. Firstly, China’s design for the post-1997 structure in Hong Kong was based on a number of assumptions: that (a) the political structure should be executive-led and not legislative-led one; (b) China needed to co-opt Hong Kong capitalists, as the British did through out colonial rule, and to reassure them that Hong Kong would not practice socialism; (c) Britain could leave behind elements that would make governing Hong Kong difficult for the in-coming government; and (d) it was necessary to enable Britain could depart with “honor” and that a good show could be put on at the time of the transition. Beijing had a deep-seated fear that the people of Hong Kong were not going to be loyal to China and that the British were going to purposefully leave behind people determined to undermine Beijing. However, in reality, the British were more concerned about leaving with honor, and more democratization was a big part of this goal. 

Thus, Beijing’s strategy was to get the British to cooperate in the intervening years before 1997; ensure that its people and institution were in place in Hong Kong to assist with the Handover; draft the post-1997 constitution – the Basic Law; find a suitable first Chief Executive; and to boost prosperity in the final year prior to the Handover. Part of the draft Basic Law were revised as a result of 4 June 1989 – most prominently Article 23 was amended to provide for Hong Kong to pass its own laws to prohibit treason, secession, subversion, theft of state secrets etc; and to allow for more directly elected seats in 1991 to the Legislative Council.

In 1997, Hong Kong returned to China.  Beijing picked Tung Chee Hwa as the first Chief Executive. He appeared to be the ideal candidate – a loyal capitalist. The popular Chief Secretary, Anson Chan stayed on, and this was regarded as the ‘dream ticket’. However, the new administration immediately had to face the Asian Financial Crisis, which caused a severe downturn in the economy. A necessary consequence of the HK$ being pegged to the US$, Hong Kong could not devalue its currency but had to take the hit on asset prices. The major hit was in people’s main store of wealth – their homes. Property prices at one time dropped 60%.

Tung Chee Hwa faced many problems and became highly unpopular. Nevertheless, in 2002, Beijing leaders endorsed him to serve another term from 2002-2007. A series of mishandled crises, from the Asian financial crisis, to his housing policy, to SARS in 2003 coupled with the government’s mishandling of the Article 23 legislation, erupted into a massive protest on 1 July 2003, where over 500,000 people marched against the imminent passage of the controversial bill. In Loh’s view, the Tung administration fell that day but it would take another 18 months before Tung had to step down, as the new Hu/Wen leadership had to find another person to take over.

After the massive protest, Beijing had to reassess its Hong Kong policy. It sent a large number of foot-soldiers to Hong Kong to feel the pulse and mood of the city.The one thing that Beijing failed to grasp from the beginning was that there is no succession movement in Hong Kong; the people of Hong Kong want to be a part of China, so their loyalty need not be questioned.  However, people wanted to have more control over policy decisions that affected their lives.

Tung Chee Hwa resigned in March 2005. Donald Tsang was a surprise replacement. It was significant that Beijing was comfortable with Tsang, a former colonial civil servant, to take over. Beijing likely felt it had control of Hong Kong and need not worry about that and Tsang would not have the same problem Tung did being a much more experience administrator and also popular with Hong Kong people. Tsang is facing competition for the March 25 election although the result is known – he could win.

Today, the Hong Kong political system had certain characteristics:
1. Hong Kong had elections but not democracy. Loh raised the question of the sustainability of a system where the public was involved but they could only elect the opposition.
2. Without an electoral mandate, the Chief Executive knows he suffers a legitimacy deficit. The question is whether that can be made up by performance legitimacy. Loh pointed out that Tung failed to do so and it was debatable whether Tsang could be said to have done so in the past two years.
3. There is a generational change taking place in Hong Kong; the younger generation is questioning many of the characteristics of the system, for example the role of entrenched interests in the legislature and the election of the Chief Executive via functional constituencies.  Loh suggested the legislative election in 2008 can still be reformed to expand the voting base of the functional constituencies.
4. There is however a ‘new loyalty’ – Hong Kong people see themselves firmly as part of China but they still want democratic reform. The pressure has to be dealt with.

During the question and answer period, Ms. Loh discussed why some reporters may feel like self-censorship exists in the Hong Kong media.  Much the advertising money comes from companies controlled by a narrow group of tycoons. The media seldom wanted to upset them and little investigatory journalism was done. Moreover, rexporters are mostly young and inexperienced and don’t know how to go about digging stories.

In terms of Hong Kong’s relevance for democracy on the mainland, Ms. Loh commented that the position of Beijing business elites and Hong Kong’s business elites was quite similar; both would rather work with a government they know than promote democracy as this may mean the grassroots would run society.

On a question about the differences between Macao and Hong Kong, Ms, Loh noted that the situations in which they were handed back to China were quite different; Portugal wanted to give up Macao while China thought that Great Britain was scheming to hold on to Hong Kong. Therefore, Beijing was less suspicious of the Portuguese than the British.

Lastly, on elections in Hong Kong, Ms. Loh commented that the pro-democracy camp has not done well enough to show people they are ready for running Hong Kong. They had to work a lot harder.