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FORBES ASIASIDELINES
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
Steve ForbesT
his summer brought
a couple of significant
20-year anniversaries
in Asia. Neither was what
you’d call a celebration.
It was July 1997 when
Hong Kong was handed
over to the People’s Repub-
lic of China. I was visiting
Moscow at the time, seeing
the aftereffects of Soviet
times, and felt more than a little trepidation. I had fond days in the crown
colony—fonder I’m sure than some native Hong Kongers did. But ambiva-
lence about this switch wasn’t limited to the expats.
Today there is ambivalence in spades. Yes, Hong Kong is richer still,
more gleaming. It still has formal rule of law and a separate status from
the rest of China—is in fact of use to Beijing for that reason. Beneath the
surface, however, the ground is moving, and many long-timers sense it.
Still, although the economic border with the mainland is increasingly
porous, Hong Kong remains an outpost. This is most obvious regarding
free speech—so evident again in the outpourings there in memory of Liu
Xiaobo, the Chinese dissident and Nobelist who died while a prisoner of
the state and whose work was officially hidden from his people.
For all that, Hong Kong’s return to China likely was inevitable. Like-
wise, the Asian Financial Crisis that began in summer 1997 was long in the
making. Debt and currency manipulation to service an entrenched elite,
plus the overreach of many who wanted to join in the good life, brought
a comeuppance. Western financial poohbahs didn’t alleviate the situa-
tion, and ordinary strivers suffered years of consequences. Yet from that
collapse came a sounder order. Asia today has fewer booms but is more
widely prosperous and, ideally, has less likelihood of an awful bust.
There are still shortcomings in much of “tiger” Asia’s practices, includ-
ing crony capitalism and undemocratic processes. Popular sovereignty
is, of course, still part of the Hong Kong rub. Twenty years on from that
eventful summer, what’s transpired calls for neither cheers nor tears but
for reflection and resolve.Uneasy Anniversaries
Tim Ferguson
Editor, forbes asia
[email protected] KYODO/NEWSCOM6 | FORBES ASIA AUGUST 2017
Not exactly party time in Hong Kong.