Then & Now | Imagining a far better Hong Kong, and rueing 20 years of misrule

Being able to review the past dispassionately and form honest judgments based on what we know, now, about actual circumstances and events, then, is the key challenge in the study of history.

While we enjoy hindsight’s benefit, those living in earlier times had, as an ancient Chinese saying maintains, “to cross the river by feeling the stones”; in other words, to put one’s best foot forward into unknown currents and hope for the best. Nevertheless, some historical decisions with obvious ramifica­tions for the future were clearly ill-considered at the time they were made. And so we arrive at contemporary Hong Kong ’s manifold travails.

Academic discussions about Hong Kong independence, to cite one example, would have passed unnoticed by the general public had they not been fired by the frantic attempts of interested parties to suppress all mention of it. Frenzied bedwetting right across the political spec­trum over discussion of Hong Kong independence in recent months has accorded serious official legitimacy to a nascent political movement that – in practical terms alone – is too ridiculous for words.

One inescapable fact remains. Had Hong Kong been significantly better governed since the 1997 handover, the “independence” con­ver­sation that now poisons public life would never have occurred. For why would it have done? Such debates only happen when discontent reaches critical levels.

Contrafactual analysis – by posing the question “What would have happened if…?” – is a useful intellectual tool when exploring history’s trajectory, and can indicate how an alternative course of action might have led to a different set of outcomes. Hong Kong ’s “nativist” lobby, and its clearly trackable rise over the past decade, is a prime example.