While Chinese President Xi Jinping states that the One Country, Two Systems model [must be implemented] “exactly as it was originally agreed upon without any distortion,” One Country, Two Systems has actually deviated from the original and already become distorted.

Every step along the way from negotiating the Sino-British Joint Declaration to amending the Basic Law foreshadowed the calamity that Hong Kong’s democratic movement would face in the future.

Annie Zhang Jie-ping, founder of the blockchain-based, decentralized content platform Matters Lab, will write a regular column for CommonWealth Magazine in which she will comb through history to help readers understand the present by examining the past.

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Following 22 rounds of bilateral negotiations that spanned two years, Chinese Premier Zhao Ziyang and British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher signed the Sino-British Joint Declaration on December 19, 1984 in Beijing, sealing Hong Kong’s future. Chinese artist Ma Baozhong created this huge oil painting to record the historic event for posterity. (Source: AP)

One early morning in late July, a friend and I gingerly walked the streets of Hong Kong. Right before our eyes, strewn across the ground, were broken, shattered umbrellas, discarded gas masks, scratched helmets, crushed water bottles, scattered tear gas cartridges and a large amount of toilet paper rolled into a ball as well as several face masks with faint blood smears.

The dramatic clashes witnessed by the live broadcasts had just ended. Since I did not have any protective gear, I had not been able to go to the scene. I had no choice but to wait until the thick clouds of tear gas had dispersed, the protesters had been pinned against the ground, handcuffed and taken away, and the riot police in full body armor had withdrawn before I could visit the battleground the streets had become.

“Are we witnessing the demise of Hong Kong?” someone asked after a long moment of silence - I don’t remember who it was.

During the past four weeks, the neon lights on the high-rises were still glaring, the sturdy flyovers and expressways still stretched for miles, the lights in the convenience stores were still on, and the traffic lights at pedestrian crossings were making their clicking sound, as loyal as ever. Yet one couldn’t help but feel desolate.

A line from a song by Cantopop duo Tat Ming Pair came to mind: “I’m afraid that the splendor of this dazzling city is at its end.” This song dates back to 1987, more than three decades ago, when Hong Kong was counting down the days to the fateful handover of sovereignty, plagued by persistent apocalyptic visions. Now, when the masses say: “If we burn, you burn with us,” it seems that they won’t call it quits unless their concerted efforts have turned this fateful parable into reality.

Isn’t “If we burn, you burn with us” a dead end? Suddenly it dawned on me: “One Country, Two Systems will die, but Hong Kong probably won’t.”

What are the internal and external pressures that prompt many Hong Kong people to fight for their goals at all costs? (Source: Reuters)

The ’97 Handover Deadline, Floating City Sentiment

Five years ago, I had a conversation with political scientist Kuan Hsin-chi during which he said: “The most far-reaching impact of 1997 on Hong Kong did not occur in politics but with regard to [people’s] mental state.”

Kuan, who taught at the Department of Government and Public Administration at the Chinese University of Hong Kong for 38 years and also singlehandedly founded the Hong Kong Civic Party, said: “What is at the core of the 1997 problem? It is a question mark: Is One Country, Two Systems an interim measure or a permanent arrangement for ages to come? And what role is Hong Kong supposed to play during this “interim” period? The broader ’97 problem has existed the whole time. Before ’97 there was uncertainty; after ’97 there was “unchanged for 50 years”, which perpetuated the uncertainty. When people live in uncertain circumstances, their thinking and behavior will change; they will live without aim, make quick money, take risks and emigrate.” 

                       

“In the Floating City, May to September was the windy season; in the windy season the people dreamed, they dreamed the same dream; they dreamed they were floating in the air, none of them had wings, they didn’t speak to one another, they floated in absolute, solemn silence,” wrote Hong Kong novelist Xi Xi in her Marvels of a Floating City , [a collection of short stories, penned in 1986, about the mood in Hong Kong during the 1980s.]

Since then, the term “floating city” has become a classic image for how Hong Kong views itself.

In reality, the persistent sense of uncertainty stems from One County, Two Systems, this unprecedented, bold system design: The vague setup that seems to give you all the room you could want on the one hand, but also seemingly fails to clarify anything.

China and Britain graced the ceremony marking the 1997 Hong Kong handover with a prominent presence, including Prince Charles, Britain’s crown prince, British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, Chinese President Jiang Zemin and Chinese Premier Li Peng:

Source of Uncertainty: One Country, Two Systems

What is One Country, Two Systems? Never has there been a clear-cut definition. In theory, everything within the spectrum of One Country, One System to Hong Kong independence can be considered to fall into the One Country, Two Systems category.

It is a brilliant means that prevented the political players from becoming entangled in disputes as it designed a framework to resolve them and then march forward together, which was exactly the role it played during the Sino-British negotiations.

But it also provided a highly difficult initial setup for Sino-Hong Kong relations. (Read: Hong Kong Violence Reveals True Face of One Country, Two Systems)

The unprecedented, bold design that is One Country, Two Systems has also created enormous challenges. (Source: CW)

In changing times and as a new generation emerges, we are inevitably forced to adjust to reality when putting this setup into practice by making concrete arrangements and iterations. If these iterations are carried out without a reliable, clear, methodological approach, the political climate, social environment and the style of the incumbent leader at the time will be affected. 

Xi Jinping says that One Country, Two Systems [must be implemented] “exactly as it was originally agreed upon without any distortion,” but in reality, One Country, Two Systems has actually deviated from the original and been distorted all along. That it keeps “deviating” and “becoming deformed” lies in the nature of its design.

The legally binding documents embodying this system design are the Sino-British Joint Declaration and the Basic Law. Regarding key issues, these two documents exactly reflect the ambiguity of One Country, Two Systems and room for the rule of man.

Twists and Turns in the Thinking of One Country, Two Systems Chief Architect Deng Xiaoping

On December 19, 1984, Zhao and Thatcher formally signed the Sino-British Joint Declaration in Beijing after 22 rounds of bilateral negotiations over the course of two years.

British diplomat David Wilson, a member of the British negotiation team at the time, offers an interesting insight regarding the two sides’ different approaches toward the Declaration, which is legally binding under international law and constitutes the most important document for deciding Hong Kong’s fate: “We had wanted to write a book – which would have rather looked like the Encyclopedia Britannica– while the Chinese wanted about two or three sides of A4 paper.” 

Eventually the Chinese text of the Joint Declaration, not counting its annexes, consisted of only 1,536 characters, which happened to cover two A4 pages.

It was vague and lacked detail, providing ample room for developing and amending the Basic Law. From the proclamation of the Joint Declaration to the finalization of the Basic Law in 1990 it took six years. It was exactly during these six years that China transitioned from the most progressive 1980s to a most conservative course. The Beijing student protests of 1986 and 1989 made Deng, the chief architect of the One Country, Two Systems arrangement, reorient his thinking several times. 

China’s paramount leader Deng Xiaoping, the chief architect of One Country, Two Systems, in a meeting with British Prime Minister in Beijing in September 1984 (Source: GettyImages)

Two Restrictions on Universal Suffrage

Drafting of the Basic Law began just as debate about political democratization raged like wildfire in the China of the early 1980s, so that “universal suffrage” and “separation of powers” were popular topics in academic circles. Annex 1 of the Joint Declaration stipulated that Hong Kong’s chief executive shall be selected “by election or through consultations” held locally, and that the legislature shall be constituted “by elections”. Amid this political climate, “universal suffrage” was clearly written into the draft of the Basic Law.

But then the student protests of 1986 gave Deng a reason to worry about China’s political future.

[In 1987] he told [the drafters of the Basic Law] that China could not allow Hong Kong to be converted “into a base of opposition to the Chinese mainland under the pretext of 'democracy'.” Subsequently, the draft Basic Law was modified by attaching two conditions to universal suffrage: The election method was to be specified “in light of the actual situation” in Hong Kong and “in accordance with the principle of gradual and orderly progress.”

These restrictions told the Hong Kong people bluntly “I [China] have the say” when there will be universal suffrage and what it will look like. It was this modification that foreshadowed the subsequent democracy movement and its eventual escalation into the 2014 Umbrella Movement.

Planting the Seeds of Fear

It was the Tiananmen Incident in June 1989 that made Beijing take a hard line against public opinion, just as the [second draft of the] Basic Law was in the midst of the public consultation exercise, and insert a tougher Article 23:

The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region shall enact laws on its own to prohibit any act of treason, secession, sedition, subversion against the Central People’s Government, or theft of state secrets, to prohibit foreign political organizations or bodies from conducting political activities in the Region, and to prohibit political organizations or bodies of the Region from establishing ties with foreign political organizations or bodies. 

If the restrictions attached to universal suffrage are delineating the borders within which Two Systems functions, then Article 23 defines when One Country can subvert Two Systems. And it was exactly the modification of this article that planted the seeds of fear in Hong Kong. All the time, from the big protest march on July 1 in 2003 to 2019, when the fear that the “extradition bill” could become an Article 23 upgrade ignited the largest ever, still ongoing “Hong Kong Summer” protests, this was the case. (Note: To date the laws called for in Article 23 have not been adopted.)

The revision of Article 23 of the Basic Law triggered fear in Hong Kong society. Subsequently, Article 23 came to stand for the curbing of Hong Kong’s freedoms. Protest slogans used in the 2012 movement against the introduction of [patriotic] Chinese civic education in Hong Kong schools also referred to the controversial article, saying: “Reject Education Article 23, Oppose Brainwashing.” (Photo by Kuo-Tai Liu/CW)

Although Beijing has been reiterating over the past two decades that it “stands firm in supporting One Country, Two Systems,” we can see that the actual content of these four words has undergone several major changes since 1997.

In times of high mutual trust, the vagueness and indetermination of the One Country, Two Systems arrangement leave a political gray zone, whereas in times of low mutual trust, it triggers a downward cycle of fear, suspicion, protest and oppression. It constitutes a rule-of-man ceiling above Hong Kong’s rule of law. The SAR Government can manage Hong Kong’s rule of law, but the success or failure of the One Country, Two Systems ceiling depends on whether mutual trust or confrontation governs popular sentiment in Hong Kong and the will of the central government in Beijing.

Have you read? More on Hong Kong
♦ Annie Zhang: From 'Be Water' to 'Liberate Hong Kong'
♦ Anson Chan: ‘Electing a Leader Won’t Turn Hong Kong into Beijing’s Enemy’
♦ For Hong Kong, No Turning Back

Success of One Country, Two Systems Depends on Mutual Trust Between China and Hong Kong 

The University of Hong Kong has been conducting a survey on people’s confidence in One Country, Two Systems for many years – please note that this is not a survey on satisfaction with the government or the level of trust toward Beijing but on confidence in One Country, Two Systems, Hong Kong’s constitutional basis.

The surveys show that, between 1997 and 2013, confidence levels were sometimes up and sometimes down, but generally more than half of Hong Kong citizens were confident. However, after 2013 the share of those who had confidence in the framework fell to less than 50 percent, while those who had no confidence gradually became the majority. In the latest survey published this August, this trend continued, leading to an unprecedentedly high lack of confidence: Only 33.8 percent said they have confidence in One Country, Two Systems, while 61.5 percent said they don’t.

With mutual trust gone, One Country, Two Systems has de facto collapsed and exists in name only. The exposure of its collapse has brought the floating city back down to earth. Getting rid of this indeterminate interim measure hovering over Hong Kong’s fate has gradually become the latent but powerful internal motivation that drives the protests in Hong Kong today – – That’s what “If we burn, you burn with us” is about.

Have you read? More on Taiwan
♦ How the ‘1992 Consensus’ Colors Taiwan’s Fate
♦ From Constitutional Reform to Democracy
♦ Will Taiwan Go the Way of Hong Kong?

Translated by Susanne Ganz
Edited by TC Lin, Sharon Tseng