Even as the 20th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party reinforces its narrative of liberation for Hing Hong and its more definitive process of reincorporation into China, liberal democratic states have (too late to do much good) sought to reinforce their counter-narratives of the special connection (at least through 2047) of the Hong Kong SAR. The problem, one that emerged quickly after the start of the 2019 protests, is that the counter narrative has never to gel around a single narrative discourse. One, a legalist approach, was based on guarantees in the Sino-UK Declaration which expires of its own terms in 2047. The others are built around the application of international human rights laws autonomously of the Sino-UK Declaration or in variation, that permits the people of Hong Kong a measure of self-determination. In both cases, territorial sovereignty is detached from sovereign governance rights, which in this case are constrained by the higher law of international law (discussed in my book, Hong Kong Between “One Country” and “Two Systems”).
Nonetheless, the elaboration of this counter narrative remains an important project And thus on October 4, 2022 the Congressional-Executive Commission on China released a special report, providing first-person accounts of the effects of the Hong Kong government’s efforts to dismantle civil society in Hong Kong since the 2019 demonstrations started against the draft extradition law.
This from the press release:
The report, entitled Hong Kong’s Civil Society: From an Open City to a City of Fear, draws on interviews with 42 current and former members of Hong Kong’s civil society and details how the draconian enforcement of the National Security Law crushed democratic institutions and a once vibrant civil society in Hong Kong. The interviews excerpted in the report document how the crackdown transformed Hong Kong, including measures the authorities have taken to silence dissent; the challenges faced by people detained for speaking out against political persecution; the condition of civil society after the forced closure of the most influential independent media outlets and the largest civic organizations; and the implications of this repression for Hong Kong people who have left and for those who have stayed.
“The National Security Law means the end of political space for civil society organizations,” said Patrick Poon, Visiting Researcher for Comparative Law at Meiji University. “The Chinese Communist Party thinks that it is in a life-and-death struggle with foreign forces in Hong Kong. It is determined to make the civil society collapse.”
“Hong Kong has changed from an open society to one in which people are gripped by fear,” said a professor in Hong Kong who requested anonymity. “And the fear is encompassing.”
Read the full report here and on the CECC’s website.
See also the CECC report Hong Kong Prosecutors Play a Key Role in Carrying Out Political Prosecution and the bipartisan letter from CECC Commissioners asking President Biden to sanction any prosecutor complicit in undermining Hong Kong’s once robust rule of law and the fundamental freedoms guaranteed to Hong Kong residents.
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