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The purpose of this paper is to trace the changing pattern of identity politics in Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR). It shows that in response to the massive urban renewal projects in the 2000s, “civic localism” in the form of cultural preservation movement emerged to protect local community culture against the government-business hegemony. However, due to the deepening of social integration between Hong Kong and the mainland, a new “anti-mainland localism” emerged in the 2010s against the influx of mainlanders. In 2015–2016, as a result of Beijing’s active interference in Hong Kong affairs, localism is further transformed to Hong Kong “independence.”

This paper uses a historical methodology to trace the changing pattern of identity politics in Hong Kong after it becomes a special administrative region of China in 1997.

It shows how the interaction among the following three factors has shaped the pattern of localism in Hong Kong: macro historical-structural context, social movement dynamics and the response of Hong Kong and mainland government.

This paper argues that Beijing’s hardline policy toward Hong Kong localism may work in the short run to all push the pro-independence activities underground. However, unless the structural contradiction of the HKSAR is resolved, it seems likely that anti-mainland localism and Hong Kong independence sentiment and movement will come back with a vengeance at a later stage.

The literature tends to discuss Hong Kong localism in very general terms and fails to reveal its changing nature. This paper contributes by distinguishing three different forms of localism: civic localism in the mid-2000s, anti-mainland in the late 2000s and early 2010s, and independence after 2016. It shows how the macro historical-structural transformation, social movement dynamics and the responses of the Hong Kong SAR government and Beijing government have led to the changes of civic localism to anti-mainland localism, and finally to independence.

The purpose of this paper is to explain why many activists in Hong Kong have shifted from demanding democracy to independence while, at least for a short time, there have been more aggressive tactics which culminated in the Fishball Revolution of 2016.

Based on event analysis, participant observation in recent protests, as well as interviews with participants and non-participants in various pro-democracy protests, this paper traces the changes of the democracy movement from 1997 until 2018.

The paper demonstrates that the inability of the democracy movement to make progress has contributed to a change in the goals and tactics of some pro-democracy activists. The goals have shifted from moderate democratic reforms to much more revolutionary demands including calls for full autonomy or independence while the approach has shifted from an institutionalized approach toward more aggressive tactics such as illegal forms of resistance. During the Lunar New Year in 2016, the growing frustrations over perceived threats to the local culture have, for the first time since the handover, even led to the use of violence.

This paper views contentious politics in Hong Kong through McAdam’s distinction of reform-oriented and revolutionary goals as well as institutionalized and non-institutionalized tactics. This provides a new perspective for explaining the rise of localism and Hong Kong nationalism.

The purpose of this paper is to give a critical review of the City-State Theory by Wan Chin of Hong Kong. Chin is referred to as the “Father of Hong Kong Independence,” and his two books about the City-State Theory of Hong Kong are popular among the netizens in Hong Kong as a new model of Hong Kong-China (People’s Republic of China (PRC)), in which Hong Kong is considered a city-state and should be fully segregated from the PRC other than in seeking its help in military and diplomatic functions. This paper will aim to review his works with the view of nationalism and nativism theories.

This paper uses nationalism theories with particular focus on Benedict Anderson’s Imagined Communities and theories on American nativism. Then an effort is made to compare these theories against Chin’s arguments on his City-State Theory. This paper also compares his theories against China’s state-nationalism raised by Professors He and Guo.

This paper concludes that Chin advocates a “Hong Kong Nationalism,” a blend of traditional Chinese culture and moral values (he used the term Huaxia), but with a Western influence, into a typical Hong Kong culture. His theory fits into Anderson’s arguments of allowing Hong Kong citizens to imagine Hong Kong as a nation, through the “ramparts” of the city-state. His nativist advocacies also have shown strong nationalistic sentiments. He argues that China should be built in the Hong Kong model before the PRC intervention.

Despite his fame, this paper is the first comprehensive academic paper to review Chin’s theories. This paper introduced the notion of “ramparts” and how this has become the backbone of Chin’s nationalism advocacies.

The persistent growth of ‘nativists’ in Hong Kong not only highlighted people's consideration over mainlandization, it also stimulates Beijing's nerve on national security. This paper adopts a critical perspective to explore the development of ‘Hong Kong Nationalism’ that emerged in 2015. It will show the development of ‘Hong Kong nationalism’ is a phenomenon compounded by the creation of critical academics, government exaggeration, and pro-Beijing media labeling. In fact, this phenomenon leads to the suppression of political space for critical opposition.

The interaction between Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) government, central government, critical academics, and pro-Beijing media will be used to adopt a conceptual framework to show how their interrelationship would derive tremendous impacts to the development of ‘Hong Kong Nationalism.’ It will further investigate some implications for the further political development in Hong Kong.

The development of ‘Hong Kong Nationalism’ illustrates the triangular relations between critical academic, HKSAR and the Beijing government, and pro-Beijing media. The critical academics create and imagine such ‘Hong Kong Nationalism’ with Hong Kong's political destiny that stimulates the nerve of Beijing and HKSAR on territorial integrity. The ‘imagined nationalism’ advocated by critical and opposition academics and advanced by the activists not only opened the Pandora's box that derives a Trojan horse scenario for the development of pan-democratic camp which affects the democracy movement tremendously.

This paper is the first academic paper to explore ‘Hong Kong Nationalism’ through analyzing the discourse advocated by critical academics. This paper can also fill in the gap from existing literature about social movement in Hong Kong as most of them ignored the influence of radical nativist movement.

A new wave of anti-mainland protests has emerged in Hong Kong since 2012. The purpose of this paper is threefold: to delineate its unique characteristics; to trace its historical origins; and to speculate on the political implications of this new wave of anti-mainland protests.

A historical approach has been adopted to trace the origins of the anti-mainland protests. Since this new wave of anti-mainland protests only began in 2012, this paper is based mostly on documentary analysis of mass media reports.

This paper finds that this new wave of anti-mainland protests has been characterized by its targeting of mainland tourists/immigrants, its militancy, its concentration in the New Territories, its constituent membership of people from society’s grassroots, its dependence on e-mobilization and its poor image in Hong Kong’s mass media. In addition, this paper has identified the complex interplay between the influx of tourists/immigrants, the increase of social inequality, the emergence of a localist discourse, the formation of localist organizations and the setbacks to the democracy movement that are the underlying socio-political factors that have sparked this new wave of anti-mainland protests.

Anti-mainland protests have profound implications for Hong Kong politics since they deepen socio-political polarization, have transformed the mode of protesting in Hong Kong society and threaten the prospects for the national reunification of Greater China.

This paper may be one of the first academic papers to examine the anti-mainland protests. Instead of taking a pro-Beijing or anti-mainland approach, this paper takes a neutral position and offers an objective analysis of the anti-mainland protests.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the two decades since Hong Kong’s return to Chinese sovereignty, assessing developments against the 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration, the international agreement under which Hong Kong was transferred from British to Chinese sovereignty on July 1, 1997, and which first set out China’s “basic policies” toward Hong Kong.

The paper’s analysis of developments focuses particularly on areas of controversy, from the extent to which Hong Kong has enjoyed a “high degree of autonomy” to basic rights and freedoms and the legal and judicial systems.

It argues that on the whole, the policies set out in the Joint Declaration have been well implemented: Hong Kong has retained its separate systems since 1997, including rule of law and an independent judiciary, basic rights and freedoms, and separate government and social systems. However, especially since the “occupy” movement of 2014, questions about the sustainability of the “one country, two systems” arrangement have come to the surface.

The paper is distinctive in its assessment of developments against the 1984 Sino-British Joint Declaration.