25. The Principal Contradiction of Hong Kong is the "One Country Two Systems Principle": Conversations About the Book "Hong Kong Between 'One Country' and 'Two Systems': Chapter 24 (Saturday 23 May 2020) On Resolutely Resolving Contradiction 《全国人民代表大会关于建立健全香港特别行政区维护国家安全的法律制度和执行机制的决定（草案）》 ("Decision of the National People's Congress on Establishing and Improving the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region's Legal System and Implementation Mechanism for Maintaining National Security (Draft)").

 

 “言有尽而意无穷” [Words and meanings are endless]. 

In the run up to the book launch scheduled for 13 July 2021 (registration required but free HERE), the folks at Little Sir Press have organized a series of short conversations about my new book, "Hong Kong Between 'One Country' and 'Two Systems'." 

About the Book: Hong Kong Between “One Country” and “Two Systems” examines the battle of ideas that started with the June 2019 anti-extradition law protests and ended with the enactment of the National Security and National Anthem Laws a year later. At the center of these battles was the “One Country, Two Systems” principle. By June 2020, the meaning of that principle was highly contested, with Chinese authorities taking decisive steps to implement their own understanding of the principle and its normative foundations , and the international community taking countermeasures. All of this occurred well before the 2047 end of the 1985 Sino-British Joint Declaration (中英联合声明) that had been the blueprint for the return of Hong Kong to China. Between these events, global actors battled for control of the narrative and of the meaning of the governing principles that were meant to frame the scope and character of Hong Kong’s autonomy within China. The book critically examines the conflict of words between Hong Kong protesters, the Chinese central and local authorities, and important elements of the international community. This decisive discursive contest paralleled the fighting for control of the streets and that pitted protesters and the international community that supported them against the central authorities of China and Hong Kong local authorities. In the end the Chinese central authorities largely prevailed in the discursive realm as well as on the streets. Their victory was aided, in part by the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020. But their triumph also produced the seeds of a new and potentially stronger international constitutional discourse that may reduce the magnitude and scope of that success. These essays were written as the events unfolded. Together the essays analytically chronicle the discursive battles that were fought, won and lost, between June 2019 and June 2020. Without an underlying political or polemical agenda, the essays retain the freshness of the moment, reflecting the uncertainties of the time as events unfolded. What was won on the streets of Hong Kong from June to December 2019, the public and physical manifestation of a principled internationalist and liberal democratic narrative of self-determination, and of civil and political rights, was lost by June 2020 within a cage of authoritative legality legitimated through the resurgence of the normative authority of the state and the application of a strong and coherent expression of the principled narrative of its Marxist-Leninist constitutional order. Ironically enough, both political ideologies emerged stronger and more coherent from the conflict, each now better prepared for the next.

The book may be purchased through AMAZON (kindle and paperback), book information including free chapters and the access to all video conversations HERE.

I am delighted, then, to make available the next in the series of video recordings of conversations about the book with my former research assistant Matthew McQuilla (Penn State International Affairs MIA 2021). Today we discuss Chapter 24 (Saturday 23 May 2020) On Resolutely Resolving Contradiction《全国人民代表大会关于建立健全香港特别行政区维护国家安全的法律制度和执行机制的决定（草案）》 (""Decision of the National People's Congress on Establishing and Improving the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region's Legal System and Implementation Mechanism for Maintaining National Security (Draft)").

In this Chapter things are coming to a head. What started out in June 2019 as a fight over the “One Country-Two Systems” principle first effectively split the principle in two, and then devolved into a contest over which--One Country OR Two Systems principle--would serve as the primary constitutional basis for ordering Hong Kong’s political system. Either way, what appeared lost was the initial and once critical factor in the analysis. That factor--the scope, character, and consequences of the 2047 term end of the Sino-British Joint Declaration appears to have quietly become irrelevant in the calculus of every stakeholder. The "One Country" camp would necessarily see in international engagement a foreign interference. The "black hand" perspective remains strong among the "One Country" camp. For the "Two Systems" camp, on the other hand, foreign interference (at least before 2047) is turned around. Here the “black hand” of foreign interference is that of China

Indeed, by May 2020 it had become clear that both the One Country Two Systems" principle was the central contradiction of the relationship between Hong Kong, the Chinese central authorities and the international community. With the declaration of an intention to produce a National Security Law for Hong Kong, however, it also became clear that the central authorities were now bent on resolving that contradiction in line with New Era Chinese Marxist Leninist principles. and consistent with the vanguard's basic line. The Chapter, then, reflected an effort to consider the determination by the central authorities to enact a National Security Law for Hong Kong, and to justify that enactment, through the lens of Mao Zedong's 1937 essay "On Contradiction" (矛盾论).

The lens of contradiction provided a basis for more clearly understanding the arc of events from the start of the protests in June 2019. That, in turn, does much to shed light on the character of what had emerged as political culture--and the idealized aspirations of its fiercest adherents--of an autonomous Hong Kong under One Country Two Systems principles. This represents, in a way, the apotheosis of the "Two Systems" part of the international framework for the governance of Hong Kong. At the same time, the protests forced Chinese officials to confront the very same questions of the character of the political culture of Hong Kong, and its place within the greater Pearl River area and China generally from the idealized perspective of the Marxist-Leninist and national political-economic model of the Chinese state.

The two positions produced a contradiction that required resolution. This is contradiction  in the Maoist sense of the “law of the unity of opposites.” Within Chinese Marxist-Leninist theory, the vanguard is tasked with identifying the principal contradiction for each era of Chinese historical development. During the period of the leadership of Mao Zedong, the principal contradiction was class struggle. The development of productive forces assumed the role of principal contradiction from the leadership of Deng Xiaoping and his immediate successors. From the time of the leadership of Xi Jinping, the principal contradiction shifted to the balance between unbalanced and inadequate development and the people’s need for a better life. Within the historical context of Hong Kong, though, since 1998, the principal contradiction has been the “One Country-Two Systems” principle itself.

The dispute was academic until the protests began in 2019. Its use as the opening through which the contradiction between One Country and Two Systems can be resolved is the essence of 全国人民代表大会关于建立健全香港特别行政区维护国家安全的法律制度和执行机制的决定（草案）》("National People's Congress on the Establishment and Improvement of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region to Maintain National Security") and the anticipated actions of the National People’s Congress Standing Committee to come. It represents a quite robust action that is likely meant to change the entire landscape of the current impasse between local authorities and Hong Kong protesters. With the national security law for Hong Kong, the old contradiction at the heart of the post-World War Two global order--national diversity unified by the international order --is overcome by a triumph of a socialist basis for internationalism. For the protesters, and especially for the objectives that they have cultivated since the beginning of June 2019, this cannot be good news.

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 The video of the conversation about Chapter 24 may be accessed HERE.

All conversations are posted to the Coalition for Peace & Ethics YouTube page and may be found on its Playlist: Talking About the Book: "Hong Kong Between 'One Country' and 'Two Systems'." All conversation videos are hosted by Little Sir Press. I hope you find the conversation of some use. 

 

A pre-publication version of some of the book chapters may be accessed (free) on the Book's webpage (here). All videos may also be accessed through the Little Sir Press Book Website HERE.