Ming Sing

The Legitimacy Problem and Democratic Reform in Hong Kong

On 1 July 2003, over half a million Hong Kong people staged a mass protest against the poor governance of the post-handover Hong Kong government. The grievances of the marchers quickly snowballed into a widely backed movement for democracy. The subsequent record-breaking support for pro-democratic candidates during the local elections held on 23 November 2003 unnerved Beijing over its possible loss of control over Hong Kong. Beijing swiftly shifted to a hard-line approach, attempting to dampen the local democracy movement. This paper will expound the five fundamental causes of Hong Kongs broad-based demand for full democracy, analyse its type of democratic transition to illuminate its political dynamics, and highlight the parameters impacting its democratic development.

Explaining Democratic Survival Globally (1946–2002)

Do parliamentary regimes outperform presidential ones in reducing democratic breakdown? Given the relatively higher breakdown rate of presidential regimes as compared to that of parliamentary regimes, which factors can explain the breakdown of presidential democracies? Using an original global dataset covering 85 countries from 1946 to 2002, this study shows presidential democracies are not intrinsically more likely to collapse than parliamentary ones. The study also reveals the oft-cited “military legacy” cannot explain breakdowns of presidential democracies. Instead, a less effective legislature and unfavorable U.S. foreign policy, two neglected factors in the extant literature, can robustly explain the breakdown of presidential democracies. This research confirms more effective legislatures are more likely to achieve oversight of the military and reduce the latters threats to democratic survival than less effective legislatures. A test for simultaneity bias indicates the type of political regime does not exert a causal effect on legislative effectiveness.

Public support for democracy in hong kong

Hong Kong witnessed a large-scale public rally and extensive support for democracy in mid-2003. This article explains the support by means of variables extracted from cultural, instrumental and sociological approaches. Drawn from the cultural approach, ‘post-materialistic activism’ and low levels of ‘respect for authority’ are found to be most powerful in explaining mass support, among all explanatory variables. Since culture seldom changes overnight, popular support for democracy may be sustained in the short and medium term. The calculation of the economic consequences for democracy, a variable drawn from the instrumental approach, has no effect on mass support. Thus, any attempt to suppress popular demand for democracy by offering economic sweeteners alone may prove futile. The most important instrumental factor among the public is ‘their confidence in political parties’. Whether pan-democratic parties can elevate such confidence becomes pivotal to boosting and sustaining this support. The lack of relatively stronger support among the younger and more educated stratum of people in Hong Kong does not bode well for prospects of increased mass support in the future. Finally, the article offers a small footnote on the implications for the ‘Asian values’ debate.

Weak Labor Movements and Opposition Parties: Hong Kong and Singapore

Abstract This research aims to unravel the causes of why Hong Kong and Singapore have failed to achieve high degrees of democracy amid recession. It focuses on how their labor movements and opposition parties have failed to capitalize on the current economic crises to act as key mobilizing agents to mobilize the public support for democratic breakthroughs. The weaknesses in labor unions and fragility of opposition parties account, in part, for their failure to key as major mobilizing agent. In Singapore the internal division among opposition parties, and lack of resources among them, have blocked them from becoming credible political alternatives to the ruling party. In Hong Kong, the tension between pro-democratic parties and labor federations has further curtailed their leadership in pro-democratic mobilisation. Finally, the short durations of their economic crises have also left the two authoritarian states still resourceful enough to implement policies that have wooed public support.

THE PROBLEM OF LEGITIMACY FOR THE POST-HANDOVER HONG KONG GOVERNMENT

The much-publicized reversion of Hong Kongs sovereignty to China on July 1, 1997, has been hailed as a success by many. Politically, it has been pointed out that Hong Kong has scarcely changed since the handover. Nevertheless, the alleged successful transition has also witnessed a number of economic, social, and political crises. Drawing on systematically collected longitudinal data of public opinion, this paper tries to answer two important questions: first, has the quasibureaucratic-authoritarian political structure of the post transition government experienced a “legitimation problem,” i.e., a rejection of the political structure as a whole. And second, does social discontent directed at incumbent government officials represent strong bottom-up pressure for faster democratization? The longitudinal data suggest that even when public confidence in the HKSAR government dropped to its lowest level in June 1998, there was no evidence to suggest the quasi-bureaucratic authoritarian system had a legitimation problem, nor was there strong public pressure demanding rapid democratization. The demand for changing the political system has seldom been treated as an important personal concern during the transitional period. While social and economic issues have been of great personal concern for most Hong Kong people, very few of them have demanded democratic changes as a way of restoring confidence. Pressure for bottom-up democratization remains low.

Explaining mass support for democracy in Hong Kong

This article aims to identify the main causal factors that underlie the overall levels of mass support for democracy in Hong Kong in the light of two approaches of comparative politics. Using a common questionnaire in 2003, 2005, and 2008, analyses of their results reveal a more or less stable level of support by Hongkongers for democracy. Viewed from the perspective of a mass values approach, post-materialism and respect for authority are found to be consistently statistically significant factors in explaining the support across the three years. The future prospects for Hong Kong will thus in part rest on the future trends of post-materialism and respect for authority. Viewed from the perspective of a perceived performance approach, both perceived economic and political performance are found to have consistently exerted a causal effect on mass support for democracy. Thus, any attempt to suppress the popular demand for democracy by offering only economic sweeteners will not, it is argued, be enough. Also, the democrats’ ability to shape the publics perception of the performance of democracy is pivotal to raising mass support. However, it is shown here that the lack of relatively strong support among younger and more educated people in Hong Kong casts a pall over the prospects for Hong Kongs democratic development. Finally, the theoretical implications of the theory of post-materialism and the Asian values debate are discussed.

POST-TRANSITION HONG KONG

On July 1, 1997, Hong Kong, a former British colony, reverted to Chinese sovereignty. Since then it has been run by a local administration under China’s ‘‘one country, two systems’’ and ‘‘Hong Kong people governing Hong Kong’’ policies, as a special administrative region (SAR). The whole world has been watching this major city to see if it could continue to thrive under Chinese rule. While China has promised not to interfere in any way with how Hong Kong is to be governed, so long as her sovereign interests are not affected, no one would imagine that this SAR would stay totally unchanged, whether politically, economically or socially. Indeed as it faces up to the challenges of self-administration and rides through the hurdles of economic turbulence following the 1997 Asian financial crisis, its capacity and efficacy in coping with such challenges have been very much tested. How well it can cope will attest to the resilience of the new SAR model of governance. This special issue brings together several articles examining the politics and administration of post-1997 Hong Kong. Four articles deal with Hong Kong politics and society and discuss respectively political legitimacy, the electoral system, political economy and the issue of corruption. Three articles focus on the public administration, discussing civil service reform, the culture of the administrative elite, and developments of the broader policy-making environment. They analyze the situation as at the end of the last decade.

Confucianism and Democratization in East Asia

Part I. Confucianism and Confucian East Asia: 1. The evolution of Confucian East Asia and its cultural legacies 2. The Confucian Asian values thesis Part II. Upholding Confucian Values: 3. Confucianism as a hierarchical way of life 4. Confucianism as a government of paternalistic meritocracy Part III. Engaging in Civic Life: 5. Communitarianism and civic activism 6. Familism and civic orientations Part IV. Embracing Democracy: 7. Conceptions of democracy 8. Support for democracy Part V. Final Thoughts: 9. Reassessing the Confucian Asian values debate.

Economic development, public support, and the endurance of Hong Kong's political institutions (1970s - 1980s)

* Dr. Sing is attached to the Department of Public & Social Administration, City University of Hong Kong. He would like to thank the Faculty of Humanity and Social Sciences, City University of Hong Kong, for the generous funding which enabled him to attend the conference held at Leiden University during the summer of 1996. He is also grateful to Dr. Tak-Wing Ngo and other scholars of Leiden University during and after the conference for