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Perhaps it is better to just let Carrie Lam resign, to start anew.
I don't think this would change anything. HK Governor has always been and will always be a puppet. Leung was extremely unpopular amongst HKers as well.
Hong Kong remains the most convenient and effective financial center for mainland China. As long as China doesn't provoke any reason for the protesters to become even more violent, Hong Kong will still remain an important financial hub.
Of course, having Hong Kong as the main financial city is the best option.
My point was that there exist alternatives to Hong Kong, such as mainland cities and other financial cities like Singapore. You pretty much agreed to that point. Some investors do not want to invest in China, then they can invest in cities like Singapore. They probably will not allow their own citizens to put lots of money in Singapore, but letting Chinese business raise capital from there should be okay.
Hence, the idea among protestors that China cannot let Hong Kong sink is unbelievably stupid. Hong Kong is useful, but not invaluable.
Quote:
Originally Posted by GoldenTiger
Would be better for both the HK (Chinese) government and the protesters to swallow some pride, and make some concessions. Both sides have so much pride and want to "save face"... don't know what face both of them are trying to save. The extradition bill should have been withdrawn long time ago before it came to this mess. Perhaps it is better to just let Carrie Lam resign, to start anew. It is just ridiculous how much worse the situation has become due to the bullheadedness on whether there's a difference between the bill being suspended or being withdrawn.
For China there is very little to gain to give any concessions. If China were to show that violent protests works, then they could expect violent protests in other parts of the country like Xinjiang and Tibet. In addition, it sets a bad precedent for Hong Kong. If you just protests hard and violent enough, eventually you will get what you want. That means any protest in the future will be violent. There is also no guarantee that the protests will calm down unless they give them everything, and China will be blamed that they did not concede earlier.
The only benefit China will get from giving concessions is that the protests will calm down now, instead of sometime in the future. Compared to the disadvantages it is not worth it. The best course of action for China is to concede nothing and wait it out. The protests has already lost momentum, they even say so themselves. When the economic crisis hit Hong Kong at full force, then the protests will become too small to outnumber the riot police and the remaining protestors can be arrested.
I don't think this would change anything. HK Governor has always been and will always be a puppet. Leung was extremely unpopular amongst HKers as well.
Unless they change the way that the Chief Executive is selected (e.g. by election), they will always lack legitimacy by a large segment of the public. It doesn't seem to matter whether they come from the private sector (Tung, Leung) or civil service (Tsang, Lam). I admit I had some high hopes for Tung (as the first one), but he ultimately was disappointing. As was Tsang. By the time Leung came along, the people had little patience - and he got off on the wrong foot from the start.
The last two times that Hong Kong experienced such large scale of demonstration were in 1927 and 1967. Both demonstrations lasted for two years. So I don't expect this time the demonstration will fade out soon.
Another reason that it will last for a while is because Hong Kong is neither democratic nor totalitarian. If Hong Kong were democratic, the extradition bill would probably be completely withdrawn after the first million people peaceful demonstration in early June. If Hong Kong were totalitarian, probably the government would have asked PLA to come in to quell the protest.
But the problem is Hong Kong government is semi-authoritarian.
And either side doesn't have much incentive to back down. The government officials keep their pay while the police get over US$10,000 per month with overtime pay. The demonstrators, mostly university students, teachers, high school students, social workers, public hospital medical workers,.....etc are also paid by the government.
Either side don't suffer financial loss.
Beijing also doesn't have any incentive to back down. CCP almost never made concession in domestic politics. The withdrawal is almost the most they would do. And they never do any independent investigation even though they keep telling Japan to do so on Nanking Massacre. So what actually happened during Great Leap Forward, Cultural Revolution, Tiananmen Massacre,....were still mystery.
And understandably if the demonstrators in HK win major concession, then most likely dozen cities in Mainland will follow suit. Beijing can tolerate the upheaval in HK, but likely not in Mainland.
In the meantime, after the reinforced version of Hong Kong Democracy and Human Right Act is passed in Congress, the HK government is expected to behave more properly. For example, probably no government officials dare to disqualify any candidate from running in the legislature, no matter his political background.
Hong Kong cannot be replaced by Singapore for three reasons.
First, Hong Kong serves as a window for China to import/search/steal foreign technology. And it also serves as a window for those Chinese companies to do dirty deals, i.r. Huawei dealing with Iran.
Second, Hong Kong also serves as a convenient base for those Red princelings to park their money.
Third, Hong Kong Stock Exchange is many times bigger than Singapore's. Under the threat of delisting from NYSE and NASDAQ, the only option for those Chinese stocks is relisting in HKSE.
If Shanghai and Shenzhen can replace Hong Kong as an international financial center, they would have done it many many years ago.
Unless they change the way that the Chief Executive is selected (e.g. by election), they will always lack legitimacy by a large segment of the public.
And that's one of the demands of the protest and the 2014 Umbrella Movement. If they would even begin to consider this the situation would never have exacerbated to this degree in the first place.
And that's one of the demands of the protest and the 2014 Umbrella Movement. If they would even begin to consider this the situation would never have exacerbated to this degree in the first place.
The greatest fear from Beijing is that the Mainland Chinese will also want to vote for their own government(s) via universal suffrage by learning from Hong Kong's example. That would spell the end of CCP supremacy. Strangely enough, back in 1984 and even in 1997, many Western political scientists actually believed China would learn from Hong Kong and become more democratic but in actual fact the opposite is happening. BTW private corporations are not democracies and so few if any would be willing to support a wholeheartedly democratic system. HK has too many private corporations who care only about their own profits which is why they tend to support Beijing and would be willing to snuff out any democratic ideas if they pose a risk to their profits.
Or just have everybody show up with a tee shirt in the home team colors. One side of the stadium can read FREE HONG KONG, the other side can read FREE TIBET. And then we can beam across the world our corporate security forces forcing people out of stadiums.
Surely Lebron James can live on $500 million, half wages from Nike along with the Lakers pay and the occasional acting role.
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