Governance efficiency is one of the important sources of legitimacy for a government. In the post-National Security Law era, the Hong Kong SAR government must achieve “zero local infections” as soon as possible to defeat the COVID-19 pandemic. Meanwhile, safeguarding the region’s constitutional order is a more important duty in the long term. Nevertheless, if Hong Kong’s administrators do not extricate themselves from path dependence, there will be so small a chance to improve governance capability that the status quo cannot be changed.
With over 100 confirmed cases being reported almost every day, the public suspects that the fourth wave of the pandemic is out of control. However, it seems that our government is still focused on patchwork solutions, rather than overhauling the whole anti-pandemic regime. Why have universal compulsory testing and lockdown measures not been implemented? Probably, as our leaders said, because of the social operation mechanism and the value orientation of Hong Kong people, the government has shunned these two measures after weighing the costs and benefits. Nevertheless, repeated outbreaks of the pandemic have proved that rooting out the sources of infection and cutting off the chains of transmission have not been implemented consistently. As a result, the whole anti-pandemic campaign has fallen into a passive condition and is led by the pandemic.
Whether in coping with last year’s social unrest or the current pandemic situation, Hong Kong’s administrators have not demonstrated strong enough political courage and proactivity, especially in terms of contingency preparation and crisis management. For example, the central government has promised to reserve some COVID-19 vaccines for Hong Kong and the SAR government also declared that it had ordered some vaccines from overseas suppliers, but the SAR government should not feel at ease and must continue to tap other alternatives. In fact, the HKU medical team has been progressing smoothly and making breakthroughs in vaccine research development; yet there has not been much news about how the SAR government has cooperated with the local medical team. Besides, according to the WHO, the large-scale supply of COVID-19 vaccines is expected to be ready only next year. It is impossible to achieve the goal of universal vaccination in the short term due to limited supply. We are not even sure whether the vaccination will cause side effects. Under these circumstances, Hong Kong needs self-salvation consciousness and the capability to carry out other prophylactic measures to strengthen self-protection; and cutting off chains of infection is still the best way to contain the pandemic currently.
I believe that the central government will continue to help the SAR government to do “surgical operations” on the SAR’s political environment in the next few years, cutting and cleaning up some “cancers” in the political system to restore its constitutional order. But in the case of some deep-seated social problems, the Hong Kong SAR government can only tackle them on its own, especially on issues affecting people’s livelihoods and well-being, such as unaffordable housing, an aging population, middle-class anxiety and stagnant upward social mobility for young people. Governance efficiency is crucial to enhancing public trust and easing public grievances to ensure long-term social stability. Undoubtedly, under 150 years of colonial rule, path dependence had deeply influenced the Hong Kong government’s philosophy of governance and values. The post-1997 Hong Kong has retained many colonial legacies, but some political dilemmas of recent years have compelled the HKSAR government to make changes, especially in public management. But our administrators should change the old philosophy of governance first before implementing reforms in public management.
The myth of “civil servants effectively administering Hong Kong” is gradually fading away. Being conservative, rigid and hesitant to make a difference are the typical characteristics of the training model of transactional civil servants. For example, the Hong Kong SAR government still formulates and implements socioeconomic policies with the characteristics of the colonial era. When other regions with similar development levels proactively move toward building a welfare society to realize the self-salvation of capitalism, Hong Kong society still regards the extremely conservative laissez-faire approach as the gold standard; and the political and business elite generally agree to strictly implement the principle of “living within the means”, opposed to increase government expenditure on social services, and even advocate the notion that there is no welfare right in law. As the wealth gap continues to widen, there should be more of an effort to ensure the basic living requirements of vulnerable groups.
No society can keep prosperity and stability in a polarizing situation. Hong Kong should be more vigilant against falling into a K-type economic recovery trap when the pandemic recedes. It should strive to narrow the gap between the rich and the poor to stop social polarization from further deteriorating. In the coming years, with the central government continuing to help Hong Kong society to clean up its political obstacles, the focus of the next stage of the SAR government’s work should be to integrate the city’s development into the national development strategy, giving full play to its advantages in the process. Meanwhile, the SAR government should take more measures to build a welfare society, to curb housing prices and to improve living standards of vulnerable groups, etc. It should strive to make a difference by embracing “selective interventionism” rather than sticking to the laissez-faire philosophy, or positive non-interventionism.
The author is a member of the Hong Kong Association of Young Commentators.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.
