Hong Kong: British Past, Chinese Future

Katherine Anne Porter, one of the most distinguished writers of America between the nineteen-thirties and nineteen-fifties, said that the past is never where you think you left it. The past, quite sometimes does not stay in the past, especially the past of a place - be it a remote rural province, a city, or a country. However, attempts to move forward by residents of Hong Kong, a former colony of Britain, have often unfailingly brought back memories of the past, even imagined ones.

Hong Kong was occupied by Britain in 1841, which established a colony there, obtaining a 99-year lease there in 1898. The city returned to Chinese rule in 1997, and has since been governed under a ‘one country, two systems’ policy that allows it to have independent judiciary and freedom for residents to protest - independences not cherished on the Chinese mainland.    

However, fears have grown in recent years of Chinese erosion of ‘one country, two systems’ policy on the island. This has been underlined by a string of troubles that has affected the relationship between Hong Kong and mainland China, with the latest being the extradition bill, which, if passed, would have allowed China to extradite citizens of Hong Kong.          

A Go-Go Girl, Maggie Li Lin-Lin (Yau Yat Tsuen Park, 1965) by Yau Leung

Hong Kong residents have been increasingly upset by a range of issues – including an inflow of Chinese immigrants and excessive property prices, in part, due to investment by business groups from mainland China. Many locals accuse China of extensive meddling in Hong Kong affairs, including interference with elections and obstruction of reforms related to self-governing.  

Speaking to Reuters about China’s impingement on Hong Kong’s civil liberties, Chan, a thirty-something man, recently said, ‘It’s like there’s a burglar in my house and I’m the one who’s forced to leave because I couldn’t defeat him.’ He is one of thousands of Hong Kong’s residents who have left the city and moved to proudly democratic Taiwan in recent years to start a new life.

A city’s greatness is not determined by its vastness, but by the breadth of its vision and the tallness of its dreams. While Hong Kong stands tall as admirably vivid representation of a city’s changing culture and how the past shapes present of a place, it vacillates between a British past and a Chinese future, trying to discover and, at the same time, uphold its self-identity by fighting for democracy. 

Slow Thought

We live in highly opinionated times, and between an unrelenting news cycle and bottomless ideological divides, we feel pressure to take sides hastily, often on situations and issues that are still developing, or on subjects we have little knowledge about.  

Le Penseur (The Thinker) at the Musée Rodin in Paris

While the ability to think and act swiftly is regarded as a necessary skill in many situations, research suggests that slow thinking requires more orderly thought and pay out more productive decision-making than quick reactions, which are often less accurate or useful. Lao Tzu was one of the foremost philosophers who spoke fervently in favour of cognitive patience. To him, simplicity, patience, and compassion were three greatest treasures of a person. He also believed that a person who knows does not speak, and one who speaks does not know.

Daniel Kahneman, an Israeli-American psychologist and one of the most prominent advocates of slow thinking research, in his book Thinking, Fast and Slow (2011), says that people mostly rely on speediness, but it's actually the slowness that assists better decisions to be made.      

When we’re not quickly jumping to conclusions or expeditiously taking actions, we’re free to weigh ideas and adjust our minds, or just be intentionally undecided. Having no fixed position is sometimes a liberating way to navigate the situation.         

As, in an Aeon article, Vincenzo Di Nicola, a professor of psychiatry at the University of Montreal, says, slow thought is playful, and it ‘appeals to reflection before conviction, clarity before a call to action.’

Wired for Bias

The human brain may be a natural wonder, but it is often an irrational snarl of biases. With around 100,000 chemical reactions every second and over 50,000 thoughts every day hitting our brain, our judgements are often wrong because our brain trusts cognitive biases more than strong evidence.

An article published recently by the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania explains how racial and gender biases are hurting our economy. It mentions a survey by the American Economic Association which acknowledges an alarmingly high level of gender bias in the field of economics, with around 50 per cent of the female respondents alleging they experienced discrimination. A staggering number of the female participants in the survey - around two-thirds - said their work isn’t taken as seriously as that of their male colleagues.

Additionally, around a third of non-white participants, from both sexes, admitted they had experienced racial discrimination, compared to barely four per cent of white respondents.                         

Corporate organisations and universities have procedures through their HR departments to address issues emanating from biases and discrimination, but measures taken to counter the problems are often toothless. Biases are so hardwired, appearing to be beyond any change, that most attention is paid not to counter them, but to avoid them.      

Our brain is wired for biases, but is it really possible for us to overcome our in-built biases or significantly mitigate them? Its answer cannot be precise or sharply defined. Corporate organisations, schools and universities, and government institutions have been only partially successful in their approach to a diverse and inclusive culture. Cognitive and implicit biases are natural, but the key is to understand that they have damaging consequences.