Just umbrellas

Beijing has forced apolitical Hong Kong into a corner

Hong Kong, normally the most commercially minded of cities, has been the setting of a remarkable political protest over the past couple of days. What has drawn tens of thousands of students and middle-class people into the streets is a broken promise by China, which regained sovereignty over the territory of seven million in 1997. Under the terms of the handover, fashioned by the late Deng Xiaoping, China would rule Hong Kong — but its local government, judiciary and capitalist way of life would continue much as it did under the British, till 2047. By then, everyone assumed China would be similarly liberal, so the “one country, two systems” formula devised by Deng Xiaoping was thought to be an insurance policy in perpetuity.

Trouble is, under the terms of the Basic Law, the mini-constitution Hong Kong is ruled by, it was expected that Hong Kong would choose its chief executive, or de facto mayor, by universal suffrage in 2007. Betting that Hong Kong’s people would accept the Communist Party’s version of an election – one in which it controls the choice of candidates and usually the winner – China came up with a “selection committee”, packed with pro-Beijing loyalists, mostly businessmen. The committee of 1,200 members was to ensure that no one too independent was ever elected. And, until recently, the city seemed collectively determined to make the best of a bad deal.

What has galvanised the mild-mannered Occupy Central campaign – intended to slow down the city’s business district – has been a series of spirited protests led by Hong Kong’s students. In an utterly disproportionate response, Hong Kong’s police, hitherto among the most disciplined and restrained in the world, have indiscriminately used tear gas and pepper spray on peaceful protesters. Hong Kong’s citizens are known for their adaptability; they have taken to arriving at protests hoisting umbrellas and wearing plastic sports goggles to ward off the tear gas. In sympathy, the ranks of the protestors have swollen to include many of the city’s middle class, who business tycoons in the city have long presumed cared little for politics. A completely unnecessary showdown of Tiananmen Square proportions is increasingly likely.

China’s leaders ought to have allowed Hong Kong to elect its own leader. The position at stake amounts to little more that of a mayor. A city whose protesters are civic-minded to clear up their litter after a protest, as the Financial Times observed on Monday, is certainly mature enough to carry out a free election. The likelihood of Hong Kong people electing someone who would demand “independence” from China was always remote. “One Country, Two Systems” was intended also as a template for eventually coaxing Taiwan to accept Chinese sovereignty without the use of force. Instead, what the unrest in Hong Kong is an advertisement of is that Communist China remains unable to stomach protests of any kind, even if those assembled are armed with little more than umbrellas.