In Hong Kong, localism is a political movement centred on the preservation of the city's autonomy and local culture. The Hong Kong localist movement encompasses a variety of groups with different goals, but all of them oppose the perceived growing encroachment of the Chinese central government on the city's management of its own political, economic, and social affairs. While the movement's milder elements advocate for greater autonomy while remaining as part of China, the more radical elements call for a return to British rule or full independence as a sovereign state. Some also advocate for a more aggressive and militant stance against the mainland government in defending local interests. For that reason, they are labelled as "radicals" and "separatists" by the Chinese government. Issues of concern to the localist camp include land use and development, cultural and heritage conservation, parallel trading, and the increasing number of mainland immigrants and mainland tourists. Although grouped together with liberals, they have a distinct view as they advocate for Hongkongers' right to self-determination. In the aftermath of the 2019–2020 Hong Kong protests, localists were largely absorbed into the pro-democracy camp.
Though localist camps with different agendas and ideologies have existed since the territory's transfer of sovereignty in 1997, today's movement as a whole emerged in the early 2010s and gained significant traction following widespread protests in 2014 against the Chinese government's decision to pre-screen Chief Executive candidates before allowing them to be chosen by the general public for the 2017 election. Following these protests, a number of localist political parties were formed, organising protests and participating in Legislative Council elections. In the 2016 Legislative Council election, localist candidates won 6 of the 35 seats allocated for geographical constituencies, earning a 19 per cent share of total votes. After the election, the government took legal actions against the localist and the radical democrat legislators over the oath-taking controversy, which resulted in the disqualifications of six legislators, and furthermore, the disqualification of the candidacies of the accused "pro-independence" localist candidates.
Terminology Localism in the western context constitutes libertarian ideas of a decentralised local government as opposed to the central government, and stresses on self-sufficiency, agriculture, and communalism. Although Hong Kong localism also stresses the city's economic self-sufficiency and local democracy, it also emphasises the mainland Chinese's cultural and political threat to the city, and attempts to reinforce a Hong Kong identity as opposed to the Chinese national identity. It often includes an anti-immigration stance, and it has been said that "nativism" is synonymous with localism. Some localists call themselves "autonomists", while the Beijing government brands them as "secessionists".
History of local consciousness in Hong Kong
Hong Kong was established in 1841 as a free port. The colonial government encouraged the free movement of capital and labour and there was not a strict sense of "Hong Kong residents" or "Hong Kong people". Residents were not registered by the government until 1949, a response to the influx of refugees fleeing from the Communists' takeover in mainland China.
Sociologist Lui Tai-lok in his book Four Generations of Hong Kong People, divided Hong Kong people into four generations. The first generation, he states, was the ones who were born before 1945 and had experienced the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong; while the baby boomers, the second generation born after the war, were the first wave of local consciousness.
First wave The baby boomers were children of the refugees, but were born and raised in Hong Kong and have a strong sense of belonging. They sought to break through the Cold War rivalry between the Communists and the Nationalists which dominated the political scene at the time.
There were few advocates for decolonisation of Hong Kong from the British rule during the post-war period, notably Ma Man-fai and the Democratic Self-Government Party of Hong Kong in the 1960s. The 1970s saw unprecedented waves of student movements, such as the Chinese Language Movement and the anti-corruption movement, the defend the Diaoyu Islands movement, and so on, which were independent of the left-right spectrum and became the first wave of local consciousness. The Chinese Language Movement succeeded in having Chinese join English as an official language of Hong Kong. The student movements at the time consisted of some liberal, Chinese nationalist, and anti-colonialist elements.
In the 1960s and 70s, the colonial government also attempted to create an apolitical local consciousness in order to boost the legitimacy of the colonial rule. Under Governor Murray MacLehose's administration, Hong Kong underwent a massive decolonisation reform. The aim of creating a local identity was to raise the bid for the British side in the upcoming negotiation over Hong Kong sovereignty after 1997. The British government also carefully avoided increasing the Hong Kong people's sense of Britishness as it had already decided to prevent massive migration from Hong Kong to Britain.
Second wave
The second wave of local consciousness emerged in the 1990s as colonial rule was coming to an end. The 1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre sparked massive local protest and fear about the looming Chinese rule. The local cultural scene responded by consolidating enthusiasm about distinctive features and the diversity of Hong Kong culture and identity. It cited post-colonial theory, rejecting a Sinocentric form of chauvinism, and promoting the cosmopolitanism of Hong Kong as an international city, together with liberal ideals of inclusiveness, diversity, and trans-nationality. It also emphasised the importance of universal values, a diverse civil society, civic education, press and academic freedoms after 1997. In the late 1980s, established politicians, most notably Anson Chan, Chung Sze-yuen, and the Office of the Unofficial Members of the Executive and Legislative Councils (UMELCO), sought to voice the concerns on the behalf of the Hong Kong people in discussions between the Chinese and British governments. This, however, was unfruitful and saw Hong Kong's sovereignty transferred to the People's Republic of China (PRC) in 1997.
Third wave
The 1 July 2003 march recorded an estimated 500,000 to 700,000 people demonstrating against the government's proposed anti-sedition legislation, the largest protest since the public response to the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests. Many post-80s (the generation who were born in the 1980s, millennials in western terminology) were inspired by the democracy movement and came out onto the streets. 7.1 People Pile was one of the groups which emerged after the protest. They were upset by the rapid urban development which was sweeping away old neighbourhoods and communities (gentrification). They were strongly opposed to the political and economic monopoly of vested interests, collusion between business and government, and questioned the nature of the capitalist system in Hong Kong.
They were also dissatisfied with the established opposition pro-democracy camp, which they considered ineffective in challenging the system. Several conservation movements led by young activists emerged, protesting against demolition of the Edinburgh Place Ferry Pier, the Queen's Pier, and the buildings on Lee Tung Street (known as "Wedding Card Street") in 2006 and 2007. Protests against the construction of the Hong Kong section of the high-speed rail link to Guangzhou (XRL) escalated in 2009 and 2010 and established a new high point of the localist movement.
Rise of contemporary localism
Chin Wan's city-statism The failure of the peaceful anti-XRL protests damaged the reputation of the left-leaning moderate activists. Some turned to a more radical approach. Scholar Chin Wan published the book On the Hong Kong City-State in 2011, which triggered fierce public debate and was popular among the young generation. In the book, Chin suggests abandoning the hope for a democratic China and positioning the democracy movement in a "localist" perspective, in order to counter Beijing's "neo-imperialist" policies toward Hong Kong. It analysed the potential threat of the influx of mainland tourists and mainland immigrants to the established institutions and social customs of Hong Kong, which he considered likely part of a colonisation scheme by Beijing, including the increasing use of Mandarin Chinese and simplified Chinese in daily use and in schools.
He advocates "Hong Kong First" and "Hong Kong–China separation" positions in order to protect Hong Kong from "cultural genocide", arguing that Hong Kong was already highly autonomous under Britain, and had formed its own identity with the preserved Chinese culture joining with British culture and more. He suggested consolidating Hong Kong into a fully autonomous city-state Chin's view was largely accepted by Hong Kong independence advocates and those who advocate for the restoration of British rule in Hong Kong.
Since then, it has created a diversification in Hong Kong's political discussion, from reinterpreting colonial history, nostalgia for British rule, to cherishing historical or current Hong Kong culture, and various forms of anti-Chinese sentiment through different ideologies like anti-communism, Confucianism, Taoism, constitutionalism, liberalism, socialism and more. He once joined the group Hong Kong Autonomy Movement, but later left and set up his own autonomist group called the Hong Kong Resurgence Order. Another group inspired by Chin's idea and called the Hong Kong Nativism Power was set up in 2011. They protested against the inclusion of non-Hong Kong permanent residents in the HK$6,000 cash handouts program demanded by new immigrants support groups, and called for a revision of the current immigration policy.
Hong Kong–Mainland conflict
Many conflicts between Mainlanders and Hongkongers also occurred due to the influx of the tourists and immigrants, such as the Dolce & Gabbana controversy, the Kong Qingdong incident, birth tourism, and parallel trading among mainland tourists, among others. These incidents and issues intensified the anti-Chinese sentiment among the Hong Kong public. Some of them published an advertisement in local newspapers, calling Mainlanders "locusts" who steal resources from Hongkongers.
At the same time, the localists are hostile toward the pan-democracy camp, as they believed the pan-democrats' cosmopolitanism as unrealistic and their wish for a democratic China will sacrifice Hong Kong's interests. They are also dissatisfied with the believed ineffectiveness of the pan-democrats as the opposition party for the past 20 years. On the other hand, the nativist tendency of the localist movements was condemned as "xenophobic" by mainstream activists and the Chinese government.
In the 2012 Legislative Council election, some pan-democrat candidates, including Claudia Mo of the Civic Party and Gary Fan of the Neo Democrats, both claiming to be moderates, expressed some localist ideas and raised concerns on tourist and immigration policies. For that, they set up a parliamentary group called HK First. Legislator Wong Yuk-man, a strong critic of the Chinese Communist Party and a former member of People Power; and his protégé Wong Yeung-tat, leader of the activist group Civic Passion; also switched to the localist cause soon after the election.