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Opinion | As Hong Kong protests cross 100 days, 10 ways to ensure an end to youth anger
- Without unpacking the protests’ complex dynamics, dialogue and remedial action risk missing their mark
- Apart from policies targeting youth empowerment, assurances on ‘one country, two systems’, as seen before 1997, would go a long way towards easing the unrest
Reading Time:4 minutes
Why you can trust SCMP
With protests in Hong Kong crossing 100 days, “one country, two systems” has undergone a trial by fire. Youth passion and idealism have been aroused for freedom and democracy. A protest theme song, Glory to Hong Kong, is gaining wide popularity.
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An ill-fated extradition bill has ignited a prairie fire, fuelled by housing unaffordability, lack of upward mobility, widening inequalities, and social injustice. Looking deeper, the anger has much to do with a perceived erosion of identity, lack of youth empowerment, and hopelessness about the future.
Without unpacking the protests’ complex dynamics, dialogue and remedial action may risk barking up the wrong tree.
Shortly before the “umbrella movement”, a Democratic Party leader was surrounded by over 100 university students on campus who berated her for her party’s ineffectiveness in not daring to take to the streets. I later asked some of the students if they wanted a revolution. Shocked to hear them reply in the affirmative, I asked how it would succeed. They said they didn’t care: that was the spirit that overthrew the Qing dynasty.
With a lack of national education, we have a whole generation of “Hongkongers” whose sense of nationhood has become extremely extenuated. Their thoughts and ideas have been fashioned at schools and universities with a predominantly negative view of the People’s Republic of China. Many are from middle-class families.
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