Forever Hong Kong: A Conversation with Ching Kwan Lee
Six years after the spectacular ‘Be Water’ rebellion that rippled across national borders, Forever Hong Kong asks: What historical conditions and precedents precipitated the citywide revolt in 2019? How can we understand Hongkongers’ political resistance as acts of decolonial defiance? Weaving cogent historical and political-economy analyses of Hong Kong’s colonial history with rich ethnographic data from 2019, C.K. Lee situates the protest cultures and tactics she observed amid geopolitical tension and the conditions created under the ‘double coloniality’ of the British and Chinese governments. Full of intimate details from Lee’s participant observations during the protest, Forever Hong Kong offers an incisive theory-driven analysis of Hongkongers’ struggle for self-determination.
Shui-yin Sharon Yam: As a Hongkonger and social movement researcher, I have read numerous books—some academic, some not—on the 2019 Anti-Extradition Movement and its aftermath. I found Forever Hong Kong to be one of the most thought-provoking because of your ambitious historical and political-economy analyses.
The first chapter on the colonial mythologies of Hong Kong, for example, incisively contextualises Hongkongers’ historical lack of political agency, which, in turn, deepens their emotional investment in ‘self-limiting survivalist ideology’ (p. 34)—a mentality that focuses on material interest and self-interest over the struggle for freedom and political self-determination. You return to this observation in subsequent chapters when you examine the 2019 protests and the challenges Hong Kong’s anti-authoritarian movement faces. Why is it important for you to articulate the emotional impact of colonial mythologies while situating them in the political economy?
Ching Kwan Lee: A major puzzle motivating the writing of this book was why and how Hongkongers transformed themselves from ‘colonised subjects’, complacent and acquiescent to the status quo, to ‘decolonial subjects’ willing to take action and make their own history. To analyse this as a historical process, I had to reconstruct a ‘before’ and an ‘after’. So, the first chapter contextualises the lived experience of Hongkongers in the material and ideological circumstances before 1997, while the second chapter turns to the ‘ruptures’ in those circumstances that compelled people to rethink taken-for-granted truths and realign their interests towards colonial rules.
By combining political economy with subjectivity and collective experience, I hoped to address two audiences. The first are scholars of social movement studies and decolonial theory who almost always presume and romanticise colonial subjects’ will to resistance. But the Hong Kong case before and after 1997 presents such a stark contrast that we must explain rather than assume their agency. The other audience is Hongkongers themselves. From the Umbrella Movement on, we heard young activists whom I call the ‘postcolonial generation’ accusing the older generation of apathy and inaction for not protesting against the transfer of sovereignty from the United Kingdom to the People’s Republic of China (PRC). I hope the first chapter of the book helps them understand the historical circumstances that shaped their predecessors’ (in)action and collective subjectivity.
‘Subjectivity’ in my writing includes emotion—as you highlight—but also cognition and interests. The four colonial myths co-produced by the United Kingdom and China since the 1970s about Hong Kong appealed to all three elements of people’s subjectivity and therefore were successful in cementing their consent, or at least acquiescence, to colonial rule. The myths were: that ‘prosperity and stability’ define Hong Kong as an ideal society; that Hong Kong has ‘rule of law’ and no need for democracy; that Hong Kong’s economy is a fair and ‘free capitalist utopia’; and that there is no alternative to ‘China as destiny’ because we are Chinese. These were mythologies because, while believable and with an element of truth, they fly in the face of historical data, as this chapter demonstrates.
With the first chapter as an abridged ‘revisionist’ narrative of Hong Kong’s colonial experience before 1997, I would like to correct a tunnel-vision view of British rule common among contemporary Hongkongers. There is a tendency to conflate memory with history. Many people have fond memories of the final two decades of British colonialism, when colonial rule took a benign turn, coinciding with an economic take-off resulting from global geopolitical dynamics not of Britain’s making. But many Hongkongers have come to ignore more than a century of British colonial repression of political dissent, the racial hierarchy that buttressed their rule, and their rampant neglect of social welfare. Such popular ahistoricism is an intentional product of colonialism.
SSY: Some social movement literature and journalism tends to glorify activists as heroes with no blemishes and grassroots movements as a liberating force for all. Forever Hong Kong—refreshingly—does not. Rather, you offer critical, unflinching analysis of movement culture, protest tactics, and ideologies. In the second chapter, titled ‘Practicing Postcoloniality’, you discuss how prodemocracy movements in Hong Kong ‘were plagued by internal dissension and acrimonious factionalism … and organizational cultures of sexism, authoritarianism, and elitism’ (p. 118). Later, when you examine the aftermath of the 2019 protests, you point to Hongkongers’ lack of experience in sustained political resistance (p. 228). Francis Lee and others have argued that the predominant sentiment of solidarity during the 2019 movement had foreclosed room for internal critique. When writing the book, did you struggle with discussing faults and failures within the movement? How did you navigate that?
CKL: I did not find it difficult to reveal and reflect on the internal fractures of the various movements, for several reasons. First, the activists themselves offered to discuss them. The rapid succession of collective mobilisations, the political expediency to maintain momentum and mass appeal, and activists’ action-driven strategy in the two decades leading up to 2019 had prevented open and good faith debates about the strengths and weaknesses of the movement. But after 2020, the political circumstances were so inhospitable to action that it was easier, even imperative, for the activists to switch to a reflective mode, to contemplate objectively what went wrong. I could detect a strong desire among them to leave a truthful record and a legacy of resistance. Second, as I say in the book, from the beginning, I did not see myself as a cheerleader or an ideologue for the movement. As a scholar, my contribution lies in analysing and explaining dispassionately Hongkongers’ decolonisation struggle, including their passion, cognition, and interests. It is up to the people to decide how to make use of the knowledge I produce.
Other than revisiting each of the major episodes of protest to rediscover their internal dynamics, which were swept under the carpet at the time, there is another aspect of Hong Kong’s decolonisation struggle that was often forgotten but is absolutely essential to recognise. While Beijing’s interventionist and authoritarian policies towards Hong Kong were the trigger and target of popular activism in the decade before the massive 2019 protests, people easily forgot that in the first decade after 1997, it was the crisis of neoliberal capitalism, in the form of the Asian Financial Crisis, and the economic distress experienced by the middle class, followed by mismanagement by the Hong Kong Government in response to this and other crises, that shook people out of their complacency. The nemesis of neoliberalism, the anti-globalisation movement, also arrived in Hong Kong in 2005 to inspire the vision of a just society and a confrontational protest culture that would have generational impacts for Hong Kong activists.
My account of ‘practising postcoloniality’, the title of the second chapter, is intended to be a reminder for Hongkongers of the scope of our struggle. It has been more than just demanding political freedom and self-determination from Beijing and encompasses demands for democratic city planning, preserving local memories and architecture, striving for a just economy and society, and a struggle against real estate hegemony and oligopoly—red or otherwise. All these themes recombined in 2019—think about the yellow economy, the new union movement, the neighbourhood concern groups, and community-based action. If we forget this broader agenda that emerged from our own struggle, we will betray our homegrown and hard-fought-for vision for genuine liberation from colonialism.
SSY: You argue that Hongkongers experienced ‘double coloniality coproduced and reproduced by the British and Chinese rule’ (p. 3). Amid the institutions and affective and political economies created by colonial powers, Hongkongers have therefore never enjoyed the right to self-determination. You demonstrate how the British and Chinese governments were complicit in denying Hongkongers’ right to freedom to protect their shared interest in ‘sustaining a colonial hegemony’ (p. 273).
Since Hongkongers had never enjoyed self-determination, the conditions of double coloniality prompted them to believe that there were no alternatives to the British Empire and the Chinese Communist Party. The result of such a sustained sense of powerlessness was ‘a survivalist culture of pragmatism’ (p. 273). The history and conditions of double coloniality, you also argue, are a key reason Hong Kong’s decolonial struggles have always been complicated and, at times, ambivalent.
I cannot stop thinking about this argument because it explains so much about parts of Hong Kong culture and structures of feeling that I have experienced but could never quite put my finger on. Are there other examples of double coloniality? How could researchers and activists make use of this concept to broaden our political imagination?
CKL: I used the term ‘double coloniality’ to make apparent China’s role as a ‘phantom coloniser’, haunting, ever-present, but unseen, when Hong Kong was formally ruled by British colonialists. This concept was based on Hong Kong historiography showing that Britain made major decisions about Hong Kong always with an eye towards China’s possible reaction and the two powers’ entrenched common interests in perpetuating a colonial structure and culture of rule. The more general applicability of this concept hinges on ‘coloniality’, to be distinguished from ‘colonisation’. ‘Coloniality’ points to power relations beyond the political realm or the state—encompassing education, law, mentality, religion, media, community, popular culture, economic order, etcetera—whereas ‘colonisation’ is typically a narrower concept referring to military conquest and political sovereignty. As such, any historical colony may have experienced double or triple coloniality if there was a second or third external power that held sway over how the colonial society, culture, or economy was governed or organised. The concept can also apply to conditions of ‘internal colonisation’ within a colonial state. When I gave a talk about this concept in Taiwan, some colleagues said ‘double coloniality’ applied to Taiwan’s colonial experience, too. I suppose they meant Japanese colonisation in the past and the phantom-like threat of the PRC now.
SSY: Forever Hong Kong draws on a wide range of intimate ethnographic data about the 2019 protests. You have interviewed prominent movement leaders, anonymous frontline protesters, union organisers, and diasporic Hong Kong activists, to name a few. You were also a participant-observer in the movement. Could you tell us one of the most memorable experiences you had while conducting ethnographic research for this book? Knowing what you know now, what advice would you give to ethnographers who study social movements and protests?
CKL: Even today, I often recall the image of a girl and her young brother whom I met during a peaceful and police-approved march in 2019. I was among tens of thousands of citizens marching on the edge of an enclosed lane on Harcourt Road, going from Victoria Park towards Central. Out of nowhere came two youngsters in black bloc, each sporting a sling bag, walking closely side by side next to me. They started moving trash bins from the sidewalk and lying them sideways to block the main road beside which we were marching. The girl was a pre-teen and her brother was even younger, but their actions seemed so professional and adroit, you would think they had been doing this all their lives. I looked around to see whether they belonged to a small team coming to prepare for a post-march confrontation with the police. There was no-one else; the pair acted alone.
Two middle-aged men marching next to me also saw them and understood what they were doing. One said to his friend: ‘How can your heart not feel the hurt? F*** this damned government, see what they are doing to our young ones!’ As we were proceeding at a similar pace, I asked the little boy, ‘How old are you, bro?’ He was smart enough to know that I was asking not for his age but why he was risking his young life to do this. His reply was heartbreakingly mature: ‘It is what it is’ (係咁㗎啦). He took it upon himself to fight, as though it was the most natural and normal thing to do for a nine-year-old. That moral certainty and spirit of sacrifice among the young in action were powerful catalysts drawing the pragmatic majority of Hongkongers into the 2019 protests. When the march ended in Central, the pair disappeared into a much larger crowd of black-bloc protesters—all gearing up for a clash with the riot police that evening. Losing sight of them was the saddest moment for me personally during the entire movement.
As to what advice I have for other ethnographers, I would emphasise the need to contextualise and historicise ethnographic data. If we pay attention to the microscopic, affective, interactional, and observable here and now, but ignore the invisible historical, structural, and institutional forces shaping them, we abrogate our scholarly responsibility as both participant and observer. Capturing the subjectivity and relational dynamics of social actors through ethnographic fieldwork is necessary but insufficient if our goal is to produce knowledge that is capable of both interpretation and explanation. I am methodologically committed to ethnography—the kind that is driven by concept and theory—because it is the singular research methodology that has the greatest potential of accessing simultaneously the hermeneutic and scientific moments of ‘knowing’. In my book, I offer a sociological analysis of the making of this postcolonial generation, explaining their political agency as a product of China’s contradictory interests and policies in Hong Kong and the legacy of previous waves of mobilisations. It did not emerge out of thin air, sheer bravery, or any mythical spirit of resistance.
SSY: You end Forever Hong Kong by reminding the reader that ‘Hong Kong’s decolonization struggle has only just begun. And this book has only covered its first chapter’ (p. 290). This ending echoes the book’s two epigraphs: ‘You must go on. I can’t go on. I will go on’, from Samuel Beckett’s The Unnamable; and ‘念念不忘 必有迴響’, from Wong Kar-Wai’s 2013 film The Grandmaster (一代宗師), which loosely translates as ‘hold onto what’s deep in your heart, and you shall hear its echo’. Taken together, these denote your preoccupation with temporality and determination—be it political or personal. Can you say more about the significance of these epigraphs and your decision to end the book by rearticulating the long arc of history?
CKL: Beckett was a literary master of courageous pessimism, and I hoped his simple but powerful words would encourage people to search for hope amid despair and to continue living with stoicism even though stoicism brings no guarantees. But to bring the same message closer to home, that famous line from a beloved movie made by a homegrown auteur about a Hong Kong martial arts legend would resonate more strongly with local readers.
On your point about historical consciousness: as scholars, we are trained to appreciate the weight and openness of history, even though human action is necessarily presentist in orientation. If we keep consciousness and temporality in the same frame, their balance will inform action most conducive to the outcomes we desire. In these dark times, it is particularly important to find wisdom and inspiration in history—not just our own but also others’. While Hongkongers are rightly proud of our city’s cosmopolitanism, we should also take an interest in the historical experiences of our neighbours, such as South Korea’s and Taiwan’s decades-long struggles against military and authoritarian rule. Or, further away but no less relevant, the popular uprisings in Eastern Europe, South Africa, and Northern Ireland. Their histories offer valuable lessons and inspiration for Hongkongers. All these societies have witnessed long periods of repression before mass mobilisations seized the opportunity of geopolitical shifts and international pressure to turn the tide and steer it towards democratisation, liberalisation, and even national independence. Along the way, many people made sacrifices without reaping immediate victory. Our colonial upbringing in Hong Kong is particularly corrosive to our sense of history. Colonial education intentionally omits local history and prohibits critical discussion of the history of the colonial masters. Reinstating our historical consciousness should be a core agenda of Hong Kong’s decolonial struggle.
