The Myth of Political Apathy in Hong Kong

While Hong Kong people are often characterized as politically apathetic, closer study indicates that such descriptions need to be reconsidered in light of Hong Kong's particular, and peculiar, history and future. The restraints of proximity to a soon-to-be-sovereign China and its position as a listening post, capitalist enclave, and refuge imposed psychological (internalized) and security-based (external) limits on formal democratic political development. Although there have been, and remain, vigorous structures of Chinese political influence and activity, with Chinese Communist Party and Nationalist China partisans estimated at some 60,000 in the early 1980s, political participation in colonial politics remained limited except for the village-based politics of Heung Yee Kuk. In a process beginning in the early 1970s, however, territorywide political structures were erected that encouraged the grassroots activities that laid a foundation for rapid political development in the 1980s and 1990s.