Hong Kong’s protesters should be wary of provoking Chinese oppression

Recent protests in Hong Kong have tended to run a familiar course. A restrained beginning; escalation into violence as the police move in with tear gas and rubber bullets, and then, sooner or later, nothing. The protests fizzle out. Thus it was five years ago with the pro-democracy “umbrella revolution” that called for free elections. Thus it may be again, with the protests this week against a bill that would formalise extradition to mainland China.

An exception was in 2003, when mass demonstrations led to a draft national security law being dropped. Whether this week’s protesters can replicate that success, however, is another matter. Hong Kong’s chief executive, Carrie Lam, seems intent on pushing the contentious bill through.

In several respects, though, the start of this protest struck a different tone from the largely youthful “umbrella” movement. In the numbers taking part in the initial march, in its solemnity, above all in the breadth of participation across ages and social groups, it was reminiscent of nothing more than the mass march of mourning on that June Sunday 30 years ago after the massacre at Tiananmen Square.

That was before the UK had handed the colony back to China, and the conflagration in Beijing served as a fateful warning of what Hong Kong could lose. All of Hong Kong – or so it seemed – turned out dressed in mourning white to make a stand. Contrary to some hopes at the time, however, neither Tiananmen Square nor the mass protest in Hong Kong prevented what was to come. On 1 July 1997, the Union flag was lowered and the erstwhile rulers sailed away, leaving the formula “One country, two systems” as the sole protection of the former colony’s special status for – it was formally set down – the next 50 years.

That formula is now facing a new test. Its opponents, who include many lawyers, insist that, however tightly the new law is drawn – to apply only to those who have committed crimes in mainland China – its effect will be to extend Beijing’s jurisdiction to Hong Kong. China, after all, remains under communist rule and its definition of a “crime” may well be more elastic than it is in the former British colony.

On the other hand, as its supporters would argue, a formal extradition provision could allow those who have sought refuge in Hong Kong resort to due process for the first time. As things stand, China is not above simply abducting its wanted individuals in complete disregard of the law. Then again, would a formal extradition provision stop this, or would it simply expose more people, including political dissenters, to a trial in a Chinese court?

“One country, two systems” does not solve this. A neat diplomatic formula, it has always pitted idealists against realists, with just a little space for ambiguity in between. During the UK-China negotiations, some of which I covered during the late 1980s, there was both an admirably vigorous human and civil rights lobby in Hong Kong and a quieter, more resigned “realist” strand that saw at least some accommodation with Beijing as the price of a quiet life, openness to the world and freedom to carry on doing business.

Needless to say, there was little love lost between the two sides. The realists worried that the idealists were endangering everyone’s future peace and prosperity; the idealists feared that freedom was being sacrificed to money. And both, in their own way, were right.

The extradition bill is the latest battleground. Carrie Lam for the executive says that it is not being foisted on Hong Kong by Beijing, and Beijing appears to confirm that. But it is legislation that would clearly suit the mainland and can therefore be seen, in a way, as pre-emptive. It is often wise to anticipate the demands of others.

The relative economic weight of China and Hong Kong is also very different from what it was. In 1997, Hong Kong accounted for 18 per cent of China’s GDP; it was more than 10 per cent in 2003, whereas it now accounts for less than 3 per cent. China attracts its own foreign investment and handles its own exports. The crucial middleman role once played by Hong Kong is no more.

How this might affect Beijing’s compliance with the “one country, two systems” undertaking, less than halfway through the 50-year guarantee period, can be argued both ways. On the one hand, Hong Kong’s economic significance to China is so diminished that it might be cheaper and simpler for Beijing just to leave Hong Kong to its own devices and let it languish on the margins.

It could also be argued that any overt intervention – from pressure exerted financially, through to cyber superiority or even crude military suppression – could risk not only killing the (now much smaller) goose that lays the golden egg, but drawing international opprobrium at a time when Beijing gives every sign of wanting to be accepted as a fully paid-up global player.

On the other hand, however, it may now be 30 years since Tiananmen Square, but some of the considerations that applied then, still apply. Civil disobedience and disorder that disrupts the functioning of even a small part of what Beijing would regard as the Chinese state could be seen as a security challenge or an affront to its dignity, or both. There is no sign that China’s rulers have become any more tolerant on either front in the intervening years.

Beijing might also see a danger from “contamination” – up to and including the spread of unrest of whatever sort to the mainland. The risk of leaving such a potential threat unattended could be judged by Beijing as greater than the international ostracism, or worse, that might follow any action it decided to take. Plus, its global economic clout is so much greater than it was, that it could afford to disregard any sanctions or similar measures. Remember how soon even China’s severest critics returned to normal relations after 1989.

At a time when China’s leader, Xi Jingping, apparently feels the need to crack down on dissent at home and stamp out potential resistance in the Uighur-populated region of Xinjiang, it seems doubtful that he would treat serious unrest in Hong Kong with much indulgence.

Which is why, though it seems ignoble and defeatist to say so, Hong Kong’s realists probably have an even greater advantage over its idealists now than they did in the run-up to the handover. Those protesting against the extradition bill may indeed be proved right – if not at once, then over time – that “Hong Kong will just become another Chinese city if this bill is passed”. But that is the relentless trajectory on which the former British colony is on, given China’s vastly superior, and increasing, power. Any action that makes Hong Kong ungovernable by its own authorities risks direct intervention of a most unwelcome kind.

The best hope might be that popular demands for political change successfully sweep the mainland before Beijing finds a pretext to impose its repressive will on Hong Kong. Whether a democratic China could come about in any orderly way, and without Hong Kong being destroyed in the maelstrom, however, calls for a lot more optimism than even my generally positive outlook on the world can muster.