London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Tuesday, Jul 22, 2025

Unpacking the white paper on ‘Hong Kong democracy’

Unpacking the white paper on ‘Hong Kong democracy’

Analysts say official document and campaign marks part of a strategy to capture what Beijing sees as moral high ground on Hong Kong’s democracy.

More than a week before Hong Kong’s Legislative Council election under a Beijing-imposed overhaul was held on December 19, the State Council’s white paper on the city’s democratic development was completed and ready to be released at any time. The “publish” button was pressed 11 seconds past 10am the following day.

The official document, titled “Hong Kong Democratic Progress Under the Framework of One Country, Two Systems”, saw the light of day nine minutes before all election results were announced on December 20.

Mainland experts familiar with the central government’s thinking on Hong Kong affairs have noted that the publication of the official document and the ensuing high-profile publicity campaign to attack Western-style democracy is part of Beijing’s coherent strategy to capture what it sees as the moral high ground on Hong Kong’s democracy.

“It is part of Beijing’s grand strategy of governing Hong Kong in the new era, which highlights the need for theoretical justification on top of practice,” a mainland academic familiar with the drafting stage of the white paper told the Post.

In the days that followed the release of the white paper, officials and experts appeared in media briefings as part of an extensive publicity campaign.


Seasoned analysts said the document should be read in parallel with another white paper called “China: Democracy that Works”, also released by the State Council Information Office three weeks ago as part of a broader effort to promote the country’s system of governance as more effective than the model exemplified by the United States.

The timing of the first white paper was not coincidental, they said, coming just days before the US convened a “democracy summit” of friendly countries, an event seen by critics as an attempt to forge an alliance against China and Russia.

Seen together, the white papers were a consequence of the larger geopolitical tensions between China and the US, with Hong Kong caught up in it as a high-stakes ideological battleground, analysts said.

Tian Feilong, an associate professor at Beihang University’s law school who advises Beijing on Hong Kong affairs, said the Hong Kong white paper was not an “isolated document” but a carefully crafted move by the central government.

“It is a sequel to the white paper on China’s democracy,” he said.

“The white paper devotes a lot of coverage to the importance of promoting diversified forms of democracy in Hong Kong, a core message highlighted in the document on China’s democracy,” he said.

Lawmakers-elect for Hong Kong pose for a picture. The white paper was issued by Beijing the day after the legislative poll.


The white paper on Hong Kong’s democratic development stressed that democracy cannot be reduced to the “simplistic question of whether there are elections, and elections themselves cannot be defined exclusively as direct elections”.

“What matters is whether public representation is expanding and whether the fundamental interests and the common will of the people are faithfully represented. For democracy to develop in Hong Kong, measures should be taken to improve the electoral system, and more forms of democracy – consultation, inquiry, hearing and dialogue – should be tested, to open up more channels for democracy of quality and substance,” the document read.

Tian said he expected the central government to stress in the coming months the importance of delivering “substantive democracy” in Hong Kong. “Instead of the degree of competition in elections, good governance, the quality of those returned in elections and the performance of the government in resolving livelihood issues will become the major yardsticks of success or failure of democracy in Hong Kong,” he said.

Tian said, based on the experience of the central government’s drafting of crucial official documents, it usually took a long time to prepare and pen such a white paper, involving multiple rounds of consultations among experts.

The document, the second such white paper on Hong Kong affairs since 2014, highlighted China’s determination to ­develop democracy with “Hong Kong characteristics”. It also renewed the central government’s pledge to pursue the ultimate goal of electing the city’s leader and legislature by universal ­suffrage, as set out in the Basic Law.

It came as a surprise to critics who had questioned Beijing’s commitment to such a goal after the 2019 anti-government protests and the ensuing political shake-up.

However, a mainland expert familiar with the drafting process of the white paper said the central government would not avoid the issue of universal suffrage. “But Hongkongers should no longer look at the issue from a linear perspective, assuming that the number of directly elected seats must increase as time goes by,” the source added on the condition of anonymity.

The white paper laid out a detailed argument that there was no democracy in Hong Kong under British colonial rule, and that it was only the city’s return to Chinese sovereignty in 1997 that “ushered in a new era for democracy”.

“Britain exercised a typical colonial rule over Hong Kong … but [it] rushed through electoral reform in Hong Kong in the very short remaining period of the colonial rule,” it said.

Ray Yep, City University political scientist.


Ray Yep Kin-man, a political scientist at City University, said: “All governments need a narrative to convince their own people and foreign countries on controversial issues. China is no exception.”

He said Beijing intended to appeal to the international community and mainlanders for support on its stance on democratic development in Hong Kong.

“However, Beijing’s narrative on the history of democratic development in Hong Kong was quite different from the understanding of many Hong Kong people,” Yep said.

Yep, who has been studying Hong Kong’s history using declassified British files in the past decade, said according to declassified UK archives, the British government said it decided not to press ahead with democratic reform in Hong Kong after the second world war and the 1950s because of Beijing’s opposition.

In 1946, the post-war governor, Sir Mark Young, announced his plan to usher in an age of direct elections and “a municipal council constituted on a fully representational basis”.

Young retired in 1947, and left his “Young Plan” in the hands of his successor, Sir Alexander Grantham. But the idea never got off the ground as Grantham did not think Hong Kong needed elections and businesses could continue their ways with the British acting as benevolent dictators.

On how the white paper did not mention Beijing’s reservation about democratic reforms for Hong Kong after the second world war as cited in the British documents, Professor Anthony Cheung Bing-leung, former transport and housing minister, pointed to a disadvantage China faced.

Cheung, a political scientist by profession, noted that the British government had an established practice of releasing official archives regularly.

“But there is no such arrangement under mainland’s mechanism. Instead, Beijing relies on publishing memoirs of retired officials handling Hong Kong affairs, without a systematic or transparent mechanism to release archives,” Cheung said. “It means Beijing would be in a disadvantageous position in the debate on history of democratic development in Hong Kong.”

This and other mini-debates surrounding the white paper were likely to continue for awhile, analysts noted.

Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
US Treasury Secretary Calls for Institutional Review of Federal Reserve Amid AI‑Driven Growth Expectations
UK Government Considers Dropping Demand for Apple Encryption Backdoor
Severe Flooding in South Korea Claims Lives Amid Ongoing Rescue Operations
Japanese Man Discovers Family Connection Through DNA Testing After Decades of Separation
Russia Signals Openness to Ukraine Peace Talks Amid Escalating Drone Warfare
Switzerland Implements Ban on Mammography Screening
Japanese Prime Minister Vows to Stay After Coalition Loses Upper House Majority
Pogacar Extends Dominance with Stage Fifteen Triumph at Tour de France
CEO Resigns Amid Controversy Over Relationship with HR Executive
Man Dies After Being Pulled Into MRI Machine Due to Metal Chain in New York Clinic
NVIDIA Achieves $4 Trillion Valuation Amid AI Demand
US Revokes Visas of Brazilian Corrupted Judges Amid Fake Bolsonaro Investigation
U.S. Congress Approves Rescissions Act Cutting Federal Funding for NPR and PBS
North Korea Restricts Foreign Tourist Access to New Seaside Resort
Brazil's Supreme Court Imposes Radical Restrictions on Former President Bolsonaro
Centrist Criticism of von der Leyen Resurfaces as she Survives EU Confidence Vote
Judge Criticizes DOJ Over Secrecy in Dropping Charges Against Gang Leader
Apple Closes $16.5 Billion Tax Dispute With Ireland
Von der Leyen Faces Setback Over €2 Trillion EU Budget Proposal
UK and Germany Collaborate on Global Military Equipment Sales
Trump Plans Over 10% Tariffs on African and Caribbean Nations
Flying Taxi CEO Reclaims Billionaire Status After Stock Surge
Epstein Files Deepen Republican Party Divide
Zuckerberg Faces $8 Billion Privacy Lawsuit From Meta Shareholders
FIFA Pressured to Rethink World Cup Calendar Due to Climate Change
SpaceX Nears $400 Billion Valuation With New Share Sale
Microsoft, US Lab to Use AI for Faster Nuclear Plant Licensing
Trump Walks Back Talk of Firing Fed Chair Jerome Powell
Zelensky Reshuffles Cabinet to Win Support at Home and in Washington
"Can You Hit Moscow?" Trump Asked Zelensky To Make Putin "Feel The Pain"
Irish Tech Worker Detained 100 days by US Authorities for Overstaying Visa
Dimon Warns on Fed Independence as Trump Administration Eyes Powell’s Succession
Church of England Removes 1991 Sexuality Guidelines from Clergy Selection
Superman Franchise Achieves Success with Latest Release
Hungary's Viktor Orban Rejects Agreements on Illegal Migration
Jeff Bezos Considers Purchasing Condé Nast as a Wedding Gift
Ghislaine Maxwell Says She’s Ready to Testify Before Congress on Epstein’s Criminal Empire
Bal des Pompiers: A Celebration of Community and Firefighter Culture in France
FBI Chief Kash Patel Denies Resignation Speculations Amid Epstein List Controversy
Air India Pilot’s Mental Health Records Under Scrutiny
Google Secures Windsurf AI Coding Team in $2.4 Billion Licence Deal
Jamie Dimon Warns Europe Is Losing Global Competitiveness and Flags Market Complacency
South African Police Minister Suspended Amid Organised Crime Allegations
Nvidia CEO Claims Chinese Military Reluctance to Use US AI Technology
Hong Kong Advances Digital Asset Strategy to Address Economic Challenges
Australia Rules Out Pre‑commitment of Troops, Reinforces Defence Posture Amid US‑China Tensions
Martha Wells Says Humanity Still Far from True Artificial Intelligence
Nvidia Becomes World’s First Four‑Trillion‑Dollar Company Amid AI Boom
U.S. Resumes Deportations to Third Countries After Supreme Court Ruling
Excavation Begins at Site of Mass Grave for Children at Former Irish Institution
×