《Wall Street Journal》社評,一句講晒!
"More Trouble Looms for Hong Kong"
(香港嘅麻煩只會更加多)
前因後果近期發展嗰啲唔重複喇,不過社評嘅結論就講晒問題嘅癥結。
//Beijing continues to blame Hong Kongers for the political instability and economic damage. But China’s unrelenting assault on Hong Kong’s freedom and legal autonomy guarantees that the resistance will continue.//
「繼續埋怨香港人令香港政治唔穩定,損害經濟咁樣。但係同時又「堅定不移」咁衝擊香港嘅自由法治同自治嘅承諾,咪只會令抗爭持續囉。」
#TheWorldIStillWatching
原文:
《Wall Street Journal》
https://www.wsj.com/articles/more-trouble-looms-for-hong-kong-11589148219
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🇩🇰 這是一篇深度報導,來自歐洲現存最古老的報紙:丹麥Weekendavisen,題目是從香港抗爭運動、香港聯繫加泰羅尼亞的集會,前瞻全球大城市的「永久革命」。一篇報導訪問了世界各地大量學者,我也在其中,雖然只是每人一句,加在一起,卻有了很完整的圖像。
以下為英譯:
Protest! The demonstrations in Hong Kong were just the beginning. Now there are unrest in big cities from Baghdad to Barcelona. Perhaps the stage is set for something that could look like a permanent revolution in the world's big cities.
A world on the barricades
At the end of October, an hour after dark, a group of young protesters gathered at the Chater Garden Park in Hong Kong. Some of them wore large red and yellow flags. The talk began and the applause filled the warm evening air. There were slogans of independence, and demands of self-determination - from Spain. For the protest was in sympathy with the Catalan independence movement.
At the same time, a group of Catalan protesters staged a protest in front of the Chinese Consulate in Barcelona in favor of Hong Kong's hope for more democracy. The message was not to be mistaken: We are in the same boat. Or, as Joshua Wong, one of the leading members of the Hong Kong protest movement, told the Catalan news agency: "The people of Hong Kong and Catalonia both deserve the right to decide their own destiny."
For much of 2019, Hong Kong's streets have been ravaged by fierce protests and a growing desperation on both sides, with escalating violence and vandalism ensuing. But what, do observers ask, if Hong Kong is not just a Chinese crisis, but a warning of anger that is about to break out globally?
Each week brings new turmoil from an unexpected edge. In recent days, attention has focused on Chile. Here, more than 20 people have lost their lives in unrest, which has mainly been about unequal distribution of economic goods. Before then, the unrest has hit places as diverse as Lebanon and the Czech Republic, Bolivia and Algeria, Russia and Sudan.
With such a geographical spread, it is difficult to bring the protests to any sort of common denominator, but they all reflect a form of powerlessness so acute that traditional ways of speaking do not seem adequate.
Hardy Merriman, head of research at the International Center for Nonviolent Conflict in Washington, is not in doubt that it is a real wave of protest and that we have not seen the ending yet.
"I have been researching non-violent resistance for 17 years, and to me it is obvious that there are far more popular protest movements now than before. Often the protests have roots in the way political systems work. Elsewhere, it is about welfare and economic inequality or both. The two sets of factors are often related, ”he says.
Economic powerlessness
Hong Kong is a good example of this. The desire among the majority of Hong Kong's seven million residents to maintain an independent political identity vis-à-vis the People's Republic of China is well known, but the resentment of the streets is also fueled by a sense of economic powerlessness. Hong Kong is one of the most unequal communities in the world, and especially the uneven access to the real estate market is causing a stir.
According to Lee Chun-wing, a sociologist at Hong Kong Polytechnic University, the turmoil in the city is not just facing Beijing, but also expressing a daunting showdown with the neoliberal economy, which should diminish the state's role and give the market more influence, but in its real form often ends with the brutal arbitrariness of jungle law.
'The many protests show that neoliberalism is unable to instill hope in many. And as one of the world's most neoliberal cities, Hong Kong is no exception. While the protests here are, of course, primarily political, there is no doubt that social polarization and economic inequality make many young people not afraid to participate in more radical protests and do not care whether they are accused of damage economic growth, 'he says.
The turmoil is now so extensive that it can no longer be dismissed as a coincidence. Something special and significant is happening. As UN Secretary General António Guterres put it last week, it would be wrong to stare blindly at the superficial differences between the factors that get people on the streets.
“There are also common features that are recurring across the continents and should force us to reflect and respond. It is clear that there is growing distrust between the people and the political elites and growing threats to the social contract. The world is struggling with the negative consequences of globalization and the new technologies that have led to growing inequality in individual societies, "he told reporters in New York.
Triggered by trifles
In many cases, the riots have been triggered by questions that may appear almost trivial on the surface. In Chile, there was an increase in the price of the capital's subway equivalent to 30 Danish cents, while in Lebanon there were reports of a tax on certain services on the Internet. In both places, it was just the reason why the people have been able to express a far more fundamental dissatisfaction.
In a broad sense, there are two situations where a population is rebelling, says Paul Almeida, who teaches sociology at the University of California, Merced. The first is when more opportunities suddenly open up and conditions get better. People are getting hungry for more and trying to pressure their politicians to give even more concessions.
“But then there is also the mobilization that takes place when people get worse. That seems to be the overall theme of the current protests, even in Hong Kong. People are concerned about various kinds of threats they face. It may be the threat of inferior economic conditions, or it may be a more political threat of erosion of rights. But the question is why it is happening right now. That's the 10,000-kroner issue, ”says Almeida.
Almeida, who has just published the book Social Movements: The Structure of Social Mobilization, even gives a possible answer. A growing authoritarian, anti-democratic flow has spread across the continents and united rulers in all countries, and among others it is the one that has now triggered a reaction in the peoples.
“There is a tendency for more use of force by the state power. If we look at the death toll in Latin America, they are high considering that the countries are democracies. This kind of violence is not usually expected in democratic regimes in connection with protests. It is an interesting trend and may be related to the authoritarian flow that is underway worldwide. It's worth watching, 'he says.
The authoritarian wave
Politologists Anna Lürhmann and Staffan Lindberg from the University of Gothenburg describe in a paper published earlier this year a "third autocratic wave." Unlike previous waves, for example, in the years before World War II, when democracy was beaten under great external drama , the new wave is characterized by creeping. It happens little by little - in countries like Turkey, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Hungary and Russia - at such a slow pace that you barely notice it.
Even old-fashioned autocrats nowadays understand the language of democracy - the only acceptable lingua franca in politics - and so the popular reaction does not happen very often when it becomes clear at once that the electoral process itself is not sufficient to secure democratic conditions. Against this backdrop, Kenneth Chan, a politician at Hong Kong Baptist University, sees the recent worldwide wave of unrest as an expression of the legitimacy crisis of the democratic regimes.
“People have become more likely to take the initiative and take part in direct actions because they feel that they have not made the changes they had hoped for through the elections. In fact, the leaders elected by the peoples are perceived as undermining the institutional guarantees of citizens' security, freedom, welfare and rights. As a result, over the past decade, we have seen more democracies reduced to semi-democracies, hybrid regimes and authoritarian regimes, ”he says.
"Therefore, we should also not be surprised by the new wave of resistance from the people. On the surface, the spark may be a relatively innocent or inconsiderate decision by the leadership, but people's anger quickly turns to what they see as the cause of the democratic deroute, that is, an arrogant and selfish leadership, a weakened democratic control, a dysfunctional civil society. who are no longer able to speak on behalf of the people. ”The world is changing. Anthony Ince, a cardiff at Cardiff University who has researched urban urban unrest, sees the uprisings as the culmination of long-term nagging discontent and an almost revolutionary situation where new can arise.
"The wider context is that the dominant world order - the global neoliberalism that has dominated since the 1980s - is under pressure from a number of sides, creating both uncertainty and at the same time the possibility of change. People may feel that we are in a period of uncertainty, confusion, anxiety, but perhaps also hope, ”he says.
Learning from each other.
Apart from mutual assurances of solidarity the protest movements in between, there does not appear to be any kind of coordination. But it may not be necessary either. In a time of social media, learning from each other's practices is easy, says Simon Shen, a University of Hong Kong political scientist.
“They learn from each other at the tactical level. Protesters in Hong Kong have seen what happened in Ukraine through YouTube, and now protesters in Catalonia and Lebanon are taking lessons from Hong Kong. It's reminiscent of 1968, when baby boomers around the globe were inspired by an alternative ideology to break down rigid hierarchies, 'he says.
But just as the protest movements can learn from each other, the same goes for their opponents. According to Harvard political scientist Erica Chenoweth, Russia has been particularly active in trying to establish cooperation with other authoritarian regimes, which feel threatened by riots in the style of the "color revolutions" on the periphery of the old Soviet empire at the turn of the century.
"It has resulted in joint efforts between Russian, Chinese, Iranian, Venezuelan, Belarusian, Syrian and other national authorities to develop, systematize and report on techniques and practices that have proved useful in trying to contain such threats," writes Chenoweth in an article in the journal Global Responsibility to Protect.
Max Fisher and Amanda Taub, commentators at the New York Times, point to the social media as a double-edged sword. Not only are Twitter and Facebook powerful weapons in the hands of tech-savvy autocrats. They are also of questionable value to the protesting grass roots. With WhatsApp and other new technologies, it is possible to mobilize large numbers of interested and almost-interested participants in collective action. But they quickly fall apart again.
The volatile affiliation is one of the reasons why, according to a recent survey, politically motivated protests today only succeed in reaching their targets in 30 percent of cases. A generation ago, the success rate was 70 percent. Therefore, unrest often recurs every few years, and they last longer, as Hong Kong is an example of. Perhaps the scene is set for something that might resemble a permanent revolution in the world's big cities - a kind of background noise that other residents will eventually just get used to.
"Since there is still no obvious alternative to neoliberalism, the polarization that led to the protests initially will probably continue to apply," says Lee of Hong Kong Polytechnic University. "At the same time, this means that the anger and frustration will continue to rumble in society."
hong kong economic journal 在 黃之鋒 Joshua Wong Facebook 八卦
【美國國會「香港主權移交二十週年」聽證會發言全文】
(Scroll down for Joshua Wong’s testimony at U.S. Congressional hearing)
你可能知道香港的政治方針為「一國兩制」,但它現時已倒退為「一國1.5制」,未來更可能惡化成「一國一制」。我在97年回歸前不足一年出生,現時20歲,香港政府正準備慶祝香港回歸20周年,7月1日會是國家主席習近平首次訪港。
近日政府已進行大規模政治拘捕,同時亦繼續試圖取消多名民主派立法會議員資格,包括在去年以23歲之齡,在立法會選舉當選成最年輕立法會議員的傘運學生領袖羅冠聰。我對香港在雨傘運動後仍距離落實民主很遠感到不幸,這亦是我希望爭取更多國際層面支持的原因。
我很高興看到美國共和民參議員魯比奧(Marco Rubio)重提香港人權與民主法案(Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act of 2017),美國跨黨派都支持該法案,反映保障香港自由和自治,應該是不同政治光譜的共識。法案保障香港參加非暴力集會的人士,不應因有判罪紀錄而遭美國拒發簽證。
另一位傘運學生領袖周永康在去年7月因被判參與非法集會,被判監三星期和緩刑一年後,由於其案底,他在準備赴倫敦修讀碩士學位,申請英國學生簽證時遭到明顯困難。他近日已獲美國加州大學柏克萊分校(UC Berkeley)接受為研究生,意味他將會申請美國學生簽證,認為法案對周永康這類學生十分重要,能減少他們申請進入其他自由國家時的困難。
我早前應邀到泰國一大學交流時,曾被拒入境及拘留12小時,我當時要求聯絡律師及香港家人,但均遭拒絕,我擔心成下一個桂民海,幸好最好我獲釋放,但泰國當局稱在中國要求下,我將永久被禁止踏足泰國。
法案一旦通過,將能將人權和自由放在美國對港政策的中心,亦會向北京政府發出強大訊息,美國相信保障香港的政治自由,與保障香港的經濟自由同樣重要,這亦符合現有85000公民和1400間公司在香港的美國利益。大部分美國傳媒包括CNN、華爾街日報及時代雜誌都將他們的亞洲辦公室設在香港,顯示香港仍是中國中最自由的地區。
我希望美國共和、民主兩黨能合作去保障他們都認同的基本人權價值,香港人亦會繼續向中共政權爭取民主,並行使自決的權利。我6年前開始爭取民主,我當時14歲,香港民主之父李柱銘經歷40年的爭取,今年將已79歲,我好奇當我79歲時,是否已看到民主的來臨?
民主是普世價值,應在任何地方都被維護及推廣,我們這一代的宏願,是確保香港繼續作為中國及世界的人權及自由指標。
專制政權今日主導我們的未來,但那一天終會有民主到來,讓我們決定香港未來。無論民主運動如何發展,我們會使民主屬於我們的,因為這是我們的時代。
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Joshua Wong’s testimony at U.S. Congressional hearing
You may have known about Hong Kong’s political arrangement as “One Country, Two Systems.” But it has now become “One Country, One-and-a-Half Systems,” and potentially “One Country, One System” in the future if conditions continue to worsen.
I was born less than a year before the handover of Hong Kong from the U.K. to China in 1997. I am 20 years old now. At the same time, the Hong Kong government is preparing its 20th handover anniversary celebration. July 1 will be the first time Xi Jinping visits Hong Kong as the Chinese President.
To pave the way for that, we now face massive political prosecution, while the government intends to disqualify democratically-elected lawmakers in the opposition camp, including the core Umbrella Movement student leader Nathan Law, who was elected last year as the youngest ever legislator at age 23. Unfortunately, Hong Kong remains far from a democracy after the Umbrella Movement.
Some people may think it is failure because we can’t achieve the goal of universal suffrage but I am here to tell you today that we the spirit of the movement is in the heart of Hong Kong people. That’s why I have been trying to gather more support at the international level by strengthening our collaboration around the world.
I am glad to see the reintroduction of the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act by Senators Rubio, Cotton and Cardin. Bipartisan support for the bill proves that protecting Hong Kong’s freedoms and autonomy can be—and ought to be—a consensus across the political spectrum. The legislation ensures those who have participated in non-violent assembly in Hong Kong would not be denied American visas on the basis of their criminal records.
Alex Chow, who is in the audience this morning, is another core Umbrella Movement student leader. He was found guilty last July for participating in unlawful assembly, sentenced to three weeks of imprisonment with one year of suspension. Because of Alex’s criminal record, he has faced significant barrier in obtaining a British student visa last year for his master’s studies in London. He was recently accepted for Ph.D. studies at U.C. Berkeley this coming August, which means he will soon apply for a U.S. student visa. I cannot stress the importance of this legislation for many of those like Alex, who may potentially face difficulties entering free countries.
China’s suppression against us is helped by its growing regional domination. Last year, I was invited by top Thai universities, but was not allowed to enter the country and locked up for 12 hours in a detentoin cell. My requests to contact a lawyer or at least notify my family in Hong Kong were both rejected. I was very worried to be the next Gui Min Hai, one of the five booksellers abducted from Thailand to China. Luckily I was finally released, but the Thai government later said that I would be forever banned to enter the country, as requested by China.
If passed, the proposed legislation will place human rights and democracy at the center of future American policy toward Hong Kong. It will send a strong signal to Beijing that as a world leader, the U.S. believes it is just as important to protect political freedom in Hong Kong as it is to protect economic freedom.
The support of the proposed legislation is also in the American interests. Hong Kong is home to around 85,000 U.S. citizens and 1,400 U.S. companies. Two-way U.S.-Hong Kong trade was around $42 billion last year. Most American media outlets, including CNN, the Wall Street Journal, and TIME Magazine establish their Asian offices in Hong Kong. These are all evidence that despite all the difficulties it is facing, Hong Kong remains the freest city under Chinese administration.
In conclusion, I hope democrats and republicans alike can work together to defend the fundamental human rights values they share, which Hong Kongers will continue to fight hard against Communist Regime for the day will come for us with democracy and exercise our right of self-determination.
I started my fight for democracy six years ago when I was 14. The Father of Hong Kong’s Democracy, Martin Lee, is turning 79 years old this year, after four decades of struggle. I wonder, if I come to the age of 79, will I be able to see democracy?
My aspiration, and our generation’s challenge is to ensure that Hong Kong continues as a beacon of human right and freedom for China and the world. To sum up, today the authoritarian regime are dominating our future, but the day will come when we decide the future of Hong Kong.
No matter what happens to the protest movement, we will reclaim the democracy that belongs to us, because time is on our side.
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