42 China The EconomistSeptember 28th 2019
O
ver thepast four months as many as 2m Hong Kongers—or
more than a quarter of the city’s residents—have marched to
demand the scrapping of a bill that would have exposed criminal
suspects to the mainland’s courts. Those protests were a stunning
vote of no confidence in China’s Communist-controlled legal sys-
tem. They worked: the extradition bill is being withdrawn.
It is hard to imagine a clearer rallying cry for the many main-
landers who distrust their own justice system. Their cousins in
Hong Kong, guaranteed access to independent courts and uncen-
sored news under the rubric of “one country, two systems”, could
not bear to live as mainlanders must every day. But dissent in Hong
Kong has not proved contagious.
Not all 1.4bn mainlanders think alike, but there are no reports
of any of them marching in sympathy. That may be in part because,
thanks to the unsleeping censors who guard the Great Firewall of
China, many know nothing of the extradition debate. But it is also
because an unknowable but significant number accept the narra-
tive of China’s media that treacherous radicals in Hong Kong, per-
haps funded by the cia, are trying to split the motherland. The
widespread acceptance of this narrative is a testament to the gov-
ernment’s success in shaping the way its citizens see the world.
Yet China’s propaganda machine, so effective at home, is mak-
ing a fool of itself in Hong Kong. When officials try to peddle the
idea that a silent majority in Hong Kong loves China, their efforts
strike many people in the territory as laughable. Communist-con-
trolled outfits in Hong Kong have often simply copied successful
stunts by protesters. In mid-September pro-democracy marchers
hiked up a local peak, Lion Rock, creating a chain of lights with
smartphones, torches and laser pointers as dusk fell. The next day
a smaller group of red-clad patriots puffed up the same hill to wave
a giant national flag, in images heavily promoted by the main-
land’s media. When youngsters in Hong Kong packed shopping
centres to sing a new protest anthem, small bands of the party
faithful were mobilised to belt out China’s national anthem in the
territory’s malls.
On the eve of a spectacular parade in Beijing on October 1st,
when tanks and nuclear missiles will trundle past President Xi
Jinping to mark 70 years of the People’s Republic, it is worth pon-deringthedomesticsuccessofChina’s propaganda apparatus, and
its external cluelessness. That machine is best understood as a
giant, state-directed monopoly. Within China, it has grown strong.
But in free markets fizzing with ideas and arguments from around
the world, China’s patriotic sloganeering falls flat.
In Hong Kong the city’s former colonial master, Britain, left be-
hind an awkward hybrid. The territory has the political culture and
education system of a liberal democracy. But its leaders are mostly
appointed, with only a minority of political offices opened to di-
rect election. Since Mr Xi became the Communist Party’s boss, Chi-
na has betrayed its impatience with even that limited accountabil-
ity, and the central government’s agents have worked to
marginalise competing voices.
In 2012, the year Mr Xi took over, the Hong Kong government
tried to impose “national education” on schools, but retreated in
the face of mass protests. Politicians seeking greater autonomy or
even independence (a minority view) have been barred from office
or from running for office. A national-anthem law demanded by
Beijing, if passed, would make criminals of Hong Kongers who boo
the tune at football games.
The results may be heard in Hong Kong’s shopping centres al-
most every night. Strolling this week through Kowloon, Chaguan
chanced upon a few dozen youngsters who had been summoned
by Telegram, an encrypted social-media app, to sing the protest an-
them in the atrium of a shopping complex.
Nic, a 25-year-old protester, described his mixed identity. He
does not imagine that Hong Kong can be independent, noting that
50 years after the handover from Britain the promise of one coun-
try, two systems will expire. “In 2047 we will return to China fully,
we understand that,” he says. “But we are trying to protect what we
have until the last day.” When he travels, his passport says “Hong
Kong, China”. But when asked who he is, he replies: a Hong Konger.
“China is not what we are proud of,” he explains. “The Chinese gov-
ernment sucks.”
Politics in Hong Kong is turning dangerously tribal. Rather
than a debate about policies, it is becoming an argument about
who is good and who is bad, who is bent on saving Hong Kong or on
destroying it. In that culture war politicians who sympathise with
the party conflate flag-waving patriotism with legitimacy. That has
led them to endorse “patriotic” thugs and alleged gang members,
including when they assaulted protesters in the far-northern dis-
trict of Yuen Long in July. That single incident changed the nature
of the demonstrations, says Cheng Chung-Tai, chairman of Civic
Passion, a party that wants more autonomy for Hong Kong. After
Yuen Long, showing resistance and defiance to authority became a
badge of belonging to the group that sees itself as defending the
territory. “Last Sunday Tseung Kwan O got tear-gas for the first
time. They celebrated,” notes Mr Cheng, referring to an operation
by police to quell protests in an eastern district.No room for a loyal opposition
Little in Mr Xi’s record suggests that he will respond generously
and imaginatively to Hong Kong’s identity crisis. In other periph-
eral territories, such as Tibet and Xinjiang, he has authorised brute
force backed by high-tech surveillance and a pounding drumbeat
of propaganda to crush hybrid identities. Hong Kong, a still-vi-
brant if troubled world city, will be harder to bring to heel. Alas, 70
years after its founding, China is hostile even to constrained forms
of pluralism. That is why, wherever people have choices, it inspires
fear or awe, but not love. 7Chaguan Hearts and minds
China’s rulers want the undivided loyalty of their subjects. That is causing a tragedy in Hong Kong