Political Events and Cultural Othering: Impact of Protests and Elections on Identities in Post-Handover Hong Kong, 1997–2021

ABSTRACT

Much academic research has examined the transformation of Hong Kong people’s national and local identification after 1997. This article further develops the literature by focusing on the notion of cultural othering and adopting the perspective of eventful sociology. It contends that, up to year 2020, an important aspect of Hong Kong people’s identity change was the increasing tendency, especially among the younger generation, to see Hong Kong and Chinese identities as separable from—or even contrasting with—each other. This cultural othering was an ongoing trend augmented by both routinized and unpredicted political events. Analysis of longitudinal and individual-level survey data shows that Legislative Council elections and major social protests strengthened this tendency of othering. This article adds to the understanding of the post-handover development of Hong Kong people’s political identities. Theoretically, the article illustrates the role of political events in the process of cultural othering and identity evolution.

KEYWORDS:

• Political events
• cultural othering
• Hong Kong and Chinese identities
• elections
• social protests

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

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²⁷ The results are available at https://www.pori.hk/pop-poll/ethnic-identity-en/q001.html?lang=en.

²⁸ Siu Lun Chow, King Wa Fu and Yu Leung Ng, ‘Development of the Hong Kong identity scale: differentiation between Hong Kong “locals” and mainland Chinese in cultural and civic domains’; H. Christoph Steinhardt, Linda Chelan Li, and Yihong Jiang, ‘The identity shift in Hong Kong since 1997: measurement and explanation’; Kevin Tze Wai Wong, Victor Zheng and Po San Wan, ‘Local versus national identity in Hong Kong, 1998–2017’.

²⁹ Siu Lun Chow, King Wa Fu and Yu Leung Ng, ‘Development of the Hong Kong identity scale: differentiation between Hong Kong “locals” and mainland Chinese in cultural and civic domains’; Francis Lap Fung Lee and Joseph Man Chan, ‘Political attitudes, political participation, and Hong Kong identities after 1997’, Issues and Studies 41(2), (2005), pp. 1–35.

³⁰ H. Christoph Steinhardt, Linda Chelan Li, and Yihong Jiang, ‘The identity shift in Hong Kong since 1997: measurement and explanation’.

³¹ Ibid.

³² William Hamilton Sewell Jr., ‘Historical events as transformations of structures: inventing revolution at the Bastille’.

³³ Suzanne Staggenborg, ‘Critical events and the mobilization of the pro-choice movement’, Research in Political Sociology 6, (1993), pp. 319–345.

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³⁶ Francis Lap Fung Lee and Joseph Man Chan, Media, Social Mobilization, and Mass Protests in Postcolonial Hong Kong.

³⁷ Richard A. Pride, ‘How activists and media frame social problems: critical events versus performance trends for schools’, Political Communication 12, (1995), pp. 5–26.

³⁸ Karlo Basta, ‘The social construction of transformative political events’, Comparative Political Studies 51(10), (2018), pp. 1243–1278.

³⁹ Daniel Dayan, and Elihu Katz, Media Events: The Live Broadcasting of History. (Cambridge, Massachusetts, London: Harvard University Press, 1992).

⁴⁰ Richard A. Pride, ‘How activists and media frame social problems: critical events versus performance trends for schools’, p.7.

⁴¹ Francis Lap Fung Lee and Joseph Man Chan, Media, Social Mobilization, and Mass Protests in Postcolonial Hong Kong.

⁴² Edward Vickers and Paul Morris, ‘Accelerating Hong Kong’s reeducation: “mainlandisation” securitisaion and the 2020 National Security Law’, Comparative Education 58(2), (2022), pp. 187–205; Klavier Jie Ying Wang, ‘Mobilizing resources to the square: Hong Kong’s anti-moral and national education movement as precursor to the Umbrella Movement’, International Journal of Cultural Studies 20(2), (2017), pp. 127–145.

⁴³ Edmund Wai Cheng and Wai Yin Chan, ‘Explaining spontaneous occupation: antecedents, contingencies and spaces in the Umbrella Movement’, Social Movement Studies 16(2), (2017), pp. 222–239; Francis Lap Fung Lee and Joseph Man Chan, Media and Protest Logics in the Digital Era. (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018).

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⁴⁵ Ngok Ma. ‘The rise of “anti-China” sentiments in Hong Kong and the 2012 Legislative Council elections’.

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⁴⁷ Karlo Basta, ‘The social construction of transformative political events’.

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⁵² District Councils are bodies giving advice to the government on local community issues and using public funding for organizing community services and activities. See Jermain T. M. Lam, ‘District Councils, Advisory Bodies, and Statutory Bodies’, In Wai Man Lam, Percy Luen Tim Lui, and Wilson Wong (eds.). Contemporary Hong Kong Government and Politics (expended 2^nd ed.), Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, (2012), pp. 111–132.

⁵³ Shiu Hing Lo, ‘Democratization without decentralization: local government in Hong Kong’, Journal of Contemporary China 8(21), (1999), pp. 297–318; Jermain T. M. Lam, ‘District Councils, Advisory Bodies, and Statutory Bodies’.

⁵⁴ Joseph Y. S. Cheng, ‘The 2003 District council elections in Hong Kong’, Asian Survey 44(5), (2004), pp. 734–754; Maggie Shum, ‘When voting turnout becomes contentious repertoire: how anti-ELAB protests overtook the District Council election in Hong Kong 2019’, Japanese Journal of Political Science 22, (2021), pp. 248–267.

⁵⁵ H. Christoph Steinhardt, Linda Chelan Li and Yihong Jiang, ‘The identity shift in Hong Kong since 1997: measurement and explanation’.

⁵⁶ Kevin Tze Wai Wong, Victor Zheng and Po San Wan, ‘Local versus national identity in Hong Kong, 1998–2017’.

⁵⁷ Francis Lap Fung Lee. ‘The role of perceived social reality in the adoption of postmaterial value: the case of Hong Kong’, Social Science Journal 55(2), (2018), pp. 139–148; Ma, Ngok. ‘Value change and legitimacy crisis in post-industrial Hong Kong’, Asian Survey 51(4), (2011), pp. 683–712.

⁵⁸ https://www.pori.hk/pop-poll-dataset/ethnic-identity-datasets.html?lang=en.

⁵⁹ The series asked respondents to rate the ‘strength’ of their identification. From 2008 onwards, the series added items asking respondents about the importance of their identification. For consistency, our analysis only used the ‘strength’ variables.

⁶⁰ The autoregressive term was needed because the data constitute a time series.

⁶¹ The interaction terms were all centred around the mean values of the involved variables to reduce the problem of multicollinearity.

⁶² H. Christoph Steinhardt, Linda Chelan Li and Yihong Jiang, ‘The identity shift in Hong Kong since 1997: measurement and explanation’; Kevin Tze Wai Wong, Victor Zheng, and Po San Wan, ‘Local versus national identity in Hong Kong, 1998–2017’.

⁶³ Gordon Matthew, ‘Hèunggóngyàhn: on the past, present, and future of Hong Kong identity’.

⁶⁴ Sebastian Veg, ‘The rise of “localism” and civic identity in post-handover Hong Kong: questioning the Chinese nation-state’.

⁶⁵ Ching Kwan Lee, ‘Take back our future: an eventful sociology of the Hong Kong Umbrella Movement’; Francis Lap Fung Lee and Joseph Man Chan, Media, Social Mobilization, and Mass Protests in Postcolonial Hong Kong.

⁶⁶ Ngok Ma, ‘The rise of “anti-China” sentiments in Hong Kong and the 2012 Legislative Council elections’.