Junior Chamber International Lantau invited me to make an interpretative presentation at its press conference on Oct 3 on a comparative study of the well-being of Hong Kong people and Malaysians. Not surprisingly, Hong Kong was significantly behind Malaysia. Although the samples are small, the discrepancies are not unexpected. In Hong Kong, many commentators continue to be very critical of the special administrative region government, and considerable distrust continues, as suggested by the relative lack of support for the universal community testing program for COVID-19.

Evidently, one can be critical of various policies in Hong Kong. Our policymakers do make mistakes, as do those elsewhere. The greatest anger, however, stems from Beijing’s steadfast adherence to the Basic Law, which does not allow the “civic nomination” of candidates for the chief executive post. Many people had been misled into believing that Beijing had promised their “genuine” form of “universal suffrage” but broke its promise. The Western powers, led by the United States and the United Kingdom, as well as the Western press, followed the same narrative, telling the plain lie that Beijing broke its promise. The Western propaganda was very successful, helped by quite a few local newspapers and internet media that bombarded readers with the message that Beijing broke its promise and deviated from the Sino-British Joint Declaration. 

Because Beijing would not budge, some youngsters began to cherish secession from China, believing that this is the only way to achieve “democracy”, as Beijing does not follow the Western model of adversarial politics and does not subscribe to the “universal values” that are so dear to Hong Kong. Many people, led by fired University of Hong Kong associate professor Benny Tai Yiu-ting, also thought that they could launch a massive takeover of the Legislative Council as they had done with the District Council election, and then by paralyzing LegCo, force Beijing into submission. This, of course, did not work, either. Instead, all the agitations and stepping up of pressure only led to Beijing’s determination to stem the threat with the National Security Law. 

It is high time that all sides face the reality, and work together for a better future for Hong Kong and for China as a whole

It is high time that all sides face the reality, and work together for a better future for Hong Kong and for China as a whole. Only when we face the reality, understand the reality, and work realistically together can the well-being of all Hong Kong people be raised.

Actually, many of the tragic events in the years since 2012 were based on a crucial misunderstanding about Beijing. In 2012, when the SAR government was about to launch moral and national education in Hong Kong’s schools, many groups, led by the Hong Kong Professional Teachers’ Union, maintained that this was just Beijing’s attempt to “brainwash” our younger generations. Today, a Wikipedia entry under an entry “partiality of teaching materials” cited the “China Model National Conditions Teaching Manual”, to prove it was “biased towards the Communist Party of China”. The manual called the CPC an “advanced, selfless and united ruling group” but denounced the political process in the US as a “fierce inter-party rivalry (that) makes the people suffer”. The manual in question was indeed problematic in some aspects, as the then-secretary for education Eddie Ng Hak-kim acknowledged. While the CPC does cherish the ideal of serving the country selflessly, of course there are self-interested individuals in the Party looking for self-aggrandizement. Indeed, President Xi Jinping, since assuming the presidency of China, has been fighting to stem corruption within the Party.

Many Hong Kong people think that the CPC does not believe in the “universal values” that Hong Kong people cherish. The fact is, Beijing does cherish the same universal values like peace, freedom, prosperity, equality and democracy. When I traveled to Xitang, Zhejiang province, for sightseeing some years back, I saw exactly these words in big characters painted on the walls of a house on the waterfront. While China does not buy the multiparty model, that is just because there is no evidence that this model would work better than the Chinese model to achieve the values that we all share.

Here is the shortfall of the Chinese narrative: While Beijing does subscribe to the same core values like equality and democracy as Hong Kong, believing that people should have equal political rights, it does not follow that these must involve the right to elect leaders. The leadership of a country is too important to be subject to the whims of emotions and political maneuvers. In China, leadership at the top is always to be achieved through competition based on merit. Not many people realize that quite a few members of the Standing Committee of the Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee were grassroots-level workers. For example, Wang Yang, who is also a vice-premier, came from a poor family and had started working as a factory worker at 17. A person with similar background would be hard put to compete for important political positions in America. 

We all need to wake up to the fact that there are no differences between Beijing’s and Hong Kong’s values. Which works better: China’s meritocracy based on fair competition, or the US ballot-box democracy based on winning votes? This boils down to scientific scrutiny and evidence, and not beliefs.

The author is a senior research fellow at Pan Sutong Shanghai-Hong Kong Economic Policy Research Institute, Lingnan University.

The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.