not so special SAR
Hong Kong 26 years later
AMB James Smith will discuss the changing U.S.-Saudi relationship, the internal dynamics in the Kingdom, and the overall dimensions of the new environment on Wednesday, 19 July from 5 pm Eastern. It ought be absolutely fascinating. The link for the session is below. Please feel free to invite anyone you think would enjoy this webinar.
This past Saturday marked the 26th anniversary of Hong Kong’s return to Chinese control after being a British Crown Colony for much of its 155 years under London’s government. The world changed greatly after 1997 with the death of Queen Elizabeth last year, elevating the Prince of Wales from the representative attending these sorts of sad events to head of state; the thousands of business folks who fled the Crown Colony before the transfer have somewhat returned but many never did for (appropriate, as it turned out) fear of Chinese heavy-handedness; Macau reverted from even longer Portuguese control to Beijing’s sphere in 1999 with far less turmoil; Sino-U.S. relations began turning poorly with the Tian’anmen Square massacre of 1989, followed a decade later by the Belgrade Embassy bombing, the E-P3 incident, and downward spiral as China asserted itself and the United States sought to turnback the clock on that capability; and China finally confronts a frustrating reality of non-stratospheric economic expansion closer to (but still better than) the numbers boasted by other industrialised societies.
In that vein, recent stories in the western press highlight the anxiety and exhaustion of the 11+ million recent higher education graduates on the mainland who are finding it impossible to find jobs. Calling themselves ‘lying flat’, they offer rebuttal to harsh competition they experienced to secure slots in the hierarchy of universities, stressing the expected success of relatively well-paying jobs upon graduation. Instead, the cohort who struggled through the COVID years are entering a labour force still not churning at production levels of prior decades.
Hong Kong, however, is a different place than the mainland, perhaps so close yet so far away. Hong Kong, when the reversion occurred in 1997, would receive a fifty year transition from the wild west of capitalism to the more state-centric rule by the CCP. The Special Administrative Region (SAR) would both have autonomy in its laws and the Legco (Legislative Council) support multi-party participatory politics through 2047 to ease the shock of this change.
Implied, of course, was the hope that half a century after the reversion, the CCP China of Mao would be far more distant than even in the 1980s under Jiang Zemin when Margaret Thatcher’s government agreed, with no real option, to transferring Hong Kong back. Perhaps half a century after reversion, the CCP would not even govern the nation. Since the Communists have never subscribed to any interpretation of anything that would endorse diminishing the CCP’s authoritarian control, the hopes for 2047 were always gussied up in some other form. The hopes were all on the non-CCP side of the discussions, of course.
The SAR seemed to work well for about a decade, coincident with Zhu Rongji’s negotiations on the World Trade Organisation and the lead up to the cherished international recognition of Beijing’s ‘return to the world stage’ with the 2008 Olympics. Following those two sequences of events, Beijing became more heavy-handed on laws in the SAR, elections for the Legco, and challenges overall to Beijing’s preemptive rights as they defined them.
Yet Hong Kongers took the promised rights seriously, always holding the world’s most prominent 4 June protests with candles to commemorate the death of young (and so many hopes) in 1989. The SAR had People’s Liberation Army troops assigned there but they remained garrisoned with virtually no presence on the streets. Through the first generation after revision, Hong Kong seemed only to face relatively tame problems with Beijing, although certainly some individuals of note would reject that characterisation. My point is that the the tensions seemed stable and managable.
The Umbrella Revolution over the final quarter of 2014 erased any doubt that Beijing saw its prerogatives as in force immediately, regardless of the remaining 33 years of the transition agreement’s duration. Thousands of Hong Kong students protested the CCP’s interference and changes to the electoral laws of the SAR. They took positions on the Hong Kong island harbour-side and across on Kowloon as well. The students demanded the CCP respect legitimate universal suffrage and election of the top administrator who was not a Beijing flunkie.
Five years later, students again wielded the umbrellas against teargas to protest further pressure from Beijing by charging Hong Kongers at home for their behaviour on the mainland. The second round of unrest, knowing the CCP’s unflinching use of violence to quell dissent, was shorter lived.
Beijing argued for years that the Hong Kong model was ‘one country, two systems’ to reinforce that the SAR was China but that Zhongnanhai wasa allowing them to operate under a different system as promised. This catch phrase commonly appeared in CCP explanation of why Taiwan should peacefully reunite on Beijing’s terms as soon as possible since Hong Kong proved that the Taiwans could continue their style of government autonomy. A second catchphrase also become ‘One Country, Three Systems’ since Hong Kong had never been autonomous (a Britsh Crown Colony was hardly a model of democratic principles for most of the period between 1842 and the early 1980s when the agreement concluded for the reversion in 1997). Hong Kongers by 2014, and certainly with the protests in 2019, illustrated that China had never stood by its commitment of the fifty year transition.
The CCP victors in the Civil War similarly made—and broke—commitments to the economic entities in Shanghai in the late 1940s and early 1950s which contributed to Hong Kong’s anxiety in the leadup to 1997. But, China during the Jiang Zemin era (1992-2002) seemed a somewhat different, if not hopeful place than it had been under Mao.
Xi Jingping responded forcefully in 2014 and 2019 as he always does. Indeed, a month ago many observers noted the shocking end to the June 4th vigils that characterised the SAR for thirty plus years. Xi certainly never brooks that sort of public criticism.
On 1 July 2023, Hong Kong stands closer to the 2047 full reversion than to the initial ceremonies. I have not travelled for 11 years to this beloved place I went to so often as a kid. With the passage of the National Security Law on the mainland, among many others, I strongly and sadly doubt I will ever go to the island or Kowloon again. On the night before we celebrate Independence Day, I reflect on Hong Kong wistfully. On a clear day, there was no more beautiful place in the world than Victoria Peak and no more lively symbol of the entrepeneurship of the people than the alleys of Kowloon in the pre-reversion era.
Many people seem surprised China broke its commitments to Britain and the world. I suspect the Party saw those commitments, after the fact, as too dangerous to ever respect because they led to challenges at the heart of any ‘one country, two systems’ arrangement. This is not a Party at all good at nuance when it feels challenged. Challenge=threat to the CCP. It is a group of primarily men who fear their own citizens will end their rule as a result of public demands when the CCP cannot successfully justify its authoritarianism. They just don’t allow the queries to arise. The questions are not just about Hong Kong, of course, which is the whole concern.
Wishing you a safe, happy, and reflective 4th of July. FIN
—, Hong Kong’s Protests: What is the Umbrella Movement'?’, theGuardian.com, 28 September 2019, retrieved at https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/49862757
Vic Chiang, Lillian Yang, and Lily Kuo, ‘Chinese College Grads are ‘Zombie-style’ on campus. Here’s Why’, TheWashingtonpost.com, 2 July 2023, retrieved at https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/06/30/lying-flat-chinese-college-graduates/
Jonathan Kaiman, ‘Hong Kong’s Umbrella Revolution—the Guardian Briefing’, The Guardian, 30 September 2014, retrieved at https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/30/-sp-hong-kong-umbrella-revolution-pro-democracy-protests
Cynthia Watson is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.
Topic: Timely Topic: AMB James Smith on Saudi Arabia
Time: Jul 19, 2023 05:00 PM Eastern Time (US and Canada)
Join Zoom Meeting
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/87698281093?pwd=enptV2JPY1NaVjVpN292S1ptdkU5Zz09
Meeting ID: 876 9828 1093
Passcode: 301611
---
One tap mobile
+13017158592,,87698281093#,,,,*301611# US (Washington DC)
+13126266799,,87698281093#,,,,*301611# US (Chicago)
---
Dial by your location
• +1 301 715 8592 US (Washington DC)
• +1 312 626 6799 US (Chicago)
• +1 646 931 3860 US
• +1 929 436 2866 US (New York)
• +1 305 224 1968 US
• +1 309 205 3325 US
• +1 564 217 2000 US
• +1 669 444 9171 US
• +1 669 900 6833 US (San Jose)
• +1 689 278 1000 US
• +1 719 359 4580 US
• +1 253 205 0468 US
• +1 253 215 8782 US (Tacoma)
• +1 346 248 7799 US (Houston)
• +1 360 209 5623 US
• +1 386 347 5053 US
• +1 507 473 4847 US
Meeting ID: 876 9828 1093
Passcode: 301611
Find your local number: https://us06web.zoom.us/u/kD6hHfWuV