The Future of Hong Kong
What does the future have in store for Hong Kong? Last week, I discussed why winning over the Hong Kong police was integral for democracy in China. Will Hong Kong protesters succeed in this before the 2017 elections? What are the implications of success or failure?
The 2017 Chief Executive elections are just around the corner, and things are not looking so good for Hong Kong protesters. Recent protests have once again pitted democratic activists with the city’s own police force. In the January fishball protests, protesters and authorities clashed over several weeks over the city’s sea-food districts, resulting in 90 injured police officers and over a hundred injured protesters. As order further breaks down in the city, many have begun to support the police in keeping protesters off the streets, even if, in doing so, they’re executing the will of the Chinese Communist Party. As the elections approach, it seems likely that the Communist Party will control the results, despite significant protest from Hong Kong students. Isolated protests may still occur around the year of every fake election, but Hong Kong’s democracy will slowly but surely disappear and the Chinese Communist Party tighten its control. After hard, it’s hard to see how Hong Kong can resist when the Chinese Communist Party have
such tight control over the 1.4 billion people living in China.
In 1997, when Hong Kong first rejoined China, Hong Kong was promised autonomy and democratic integrity. Now, with the promises slipping away, other East Asian nations have a stark remainder what a union with China may bring. Taiwan’s KMT party, which favors a union with China, lost a landslide election in 2016, getting only 31% of the vote (when they took 51% of the vote in the last election). The Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, and Japan, all of whom have potential economic and military benefits from siding with China, have strengthened ties with the United States in recent years.
Although Hong Kong’s democracy looks to be on its last embers at this point, East Asia’s strategic balance has shifted as a result. In the same way annexing Crimea turned the rest of Ukraine and Europe against Putin, the Chinese Communist Party won the battle in Hong Kong but lost the war. Their allies are losing support across East Asia because of the CCP’s actions: something that will hurt them more than Hong Kong democracy ever can.
