In his article published in the public policy journal Pearls and Irritations, retired Court of Final Appeal judge Henry Litton indicated that “there are many models of democracy in the world; some are more successful than others. If democracy is to be defined as a community where government exercises power with the consent of the governed, then China is very much a democracy. An overwhelming majority of people in the mainland today supports the government under the leadership of the Communist Party. A ‘democracy’ is not made up simply of a government model. Partly it is a question of how power is exercised.”
His remarks give a concise account of the diverse nature of democracy, that it is not only about how the government is formed, but also about how power is exercised. At the end of the day, a government that carries a popular mandate while exercising its power is democratic.
Why is democracy diverse in nature? It is because the historical background, cultures, demographics, external environment, etc. vary across different countries and regions. The democratic systems of developed countries such as the United States, Britain, European Union countries and Japan are perfect examples of this reality.
That said, Western countries like the US, UK, Canada and Australia invariably refuse to recognize socialism with Chinese characteristics as a model of democracy. Out of the same arrogance, they also accused the HKSAR government of pushing democracy backward in compliance with the National People’s Congress decision to improve Hong Kong’s electoral system through local legislation. It is yet another display of their double-standard fetish.
The improved electoral system will ensure the implementation of “patriots administering Hong Kong” and prevent sabotage by the anti-China and anti-communist forces. It is a common practice adopted by sovereign states around the world. To better understand why Beijing has taken these measures in Hong Kong, we must recall why London ordered the introduction of a representative legislature in Hong Kong in a hurry before the 1997 handover.
In July 1984, two months before the Chinese and British governments approved the draft Sino-British Joint Declaration, the British Hong Kong government issued the “Green Paper: The Further Development of Representative Government in Hong Kong (July 1984)”, stating that the purpose of instating representative government in Hong Kong was to prepare for the transfer of power at the end of the British colonial rule. Preparation work was divided into two areas. The first one was to establish a new legal basis for the existing administration in Hong Kong, whose political system needed to gradually switch from a situation where its power was derived entirely from the colonial governorship to one where its power would come from the local people. The other area was to progressively cultivate political leaders for the new political system.
The attempt by London to “return power to the people” has a clear agenda: establish a pro-Western, especially a pro-British “Hong Kong people ruling Hong Kong” political system to offset the Chinese government’s resumption of the exercise of sovereignty over Hong Kong. In a book I published in 2000, titled Into the New Millennium — Hong Kong’s Early Experience under “One Country, Two Systems”, I describe London’s ploy as “leading Hong Kong toward Western-styled democracy instead of return to the motherland”.
After the July 1 rally in 2003, the above-mentioned contradiction degenerated into confrontation. Then the anti-China political forces launched the illegal campaign of “Occupy Central” in 2014 in an attempt to force Beijing to transplant Western democracy in Hong Kong, and they succeeded the following year in blocking the plan to achieve universal suffrage in the 2016 chief executive election. By then there was no more question that the detour to Western democracy designed by the UK in the 1980s was precisely aimed at derailing Hong Kong’s genuine return to the motherland. Again, in 2019, the same anti-China radicals let go of all their pretenses in launching the anti-extradition law amendment bill protests, which soon turned into violent riots known as the “black revolution”. Apparently, they were committed to exploiting Hong Kong’s flawed electoral system to seize the right of overall jurisdiction over Hong Kong from Beijing by all means imaginable, including street violence, the threat of “mutual destruction” and election manipulation.
Beijing, by refusing to compromise over the “one country” bottom line in the dispute over the method of electing the chief executive by universal suffrage, effectively put an end to London’s bid to lead Hong Kong away from its genuine return to China by introducing Western-styled democracy in a rush.
After quashing the “black revolution”, Beijing went on to improve Hong Kong’s electoral system, so as to maintain the HKSAR’s constitutional order and status as a special administrative region of China under the “one country, two systems” framework, instead of being turned into an independent political entity under so-called “true democracy”.
The design of the framework of democracy is intended to serve the people. Therefore, ensuring national security and territorial integrity should be the prerequisite of introducing a democratic system, and pursuing the maximum interests for the people should be served as its goal. Planting Western democracy in the soil of Hong Kong society is an equivalent to bestowing the city to the alien hands of foreign forces of the US and the UK, which will inevitably endanger China’s sovereignty and put national security and territorial integrity at risk. Treason is certainly intolerable for any country, including China. It has been nearly 24 years since the establishment of the HKSAR, yet the anti-China and anti-communist forces are bent on towing Hong Kong away from its motherland and subverting it. The city’s economic restructuring is impeded and its social-political development has stalled. It goes without saying that Beijing is duty-bound to rectify the chaotic situation in Hong Kong.
Many people believe that “one man, one vote” is the core of democracy, which, in nature, is closer to populism than democratization. The UK’s Brexit referendum in 2016 prompted many people in the West to have second thoughts on “one man, one vote”. Many elites have gone so far as advocating for heavier voting rights than those of the mobs.
The right to be elected, on the other hand, is also one of the assertions of many. However, nowadays the fierce political wrestling among different parties in the capitals of the Western world have torn their people apart. The existing flaws in the electoral system in the West have been acknowledged, but no solution has ever been hammered out. The same problems have also plagued Hong Kong, with LegCo, the Election Committee and the election of the chief executive at the center of the battlefields. The new electoral system will turn the three battlefields into constructive forces when the political landscape is dominated by patriots. It is certainly an ideal solution that Hong Kong deserves the most.
The author is a senior research fellow of China Everbright Holdings.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.