The Dynamics of Peaceful and Violent Protests in Hong Kong

This chapter develops an analytical framework of understanding the politics of peaceful and violent protests by focusing on not only the relations between the central state and local state but also the role of civil society and external actors. This framework can help us comprehend the politics of peaceful and violent protests. Moreover, the chapter reviews 15 perspectives on the politics of protests, namely (1) legitimacy; (2) state violence and repression; (3) organized crime, vandalism and violence; (4) political violence; (5) democratization and violence; (6) citizenship and violence; (7) social movement and violence; (8) the art of peaceful protests; (9) the relevance of totalitarianism; (10) the psychology of public fear; (11) populism and violence; (12) political symbolism; (13) anarchism and “uncivil society”; (14) insurgency; and (15) the role of the failed state. All these perspectives can help us understand the origins, dynamics and interrelationships of peaceful and violent protests in the case of Hong Kong.

This chapter aims at examining the origins of the extradition bill that was initiated by the HKSAR government in early 2019 with special reference to the considerations of the PRC authorities. It will first review the historical evolution of the transfer of fugitives between Hong Kong and mainland China, and then explore the origins of the amendments to the Fugitive Offenders Ordinance. This chapter will discuss the reactions of the local business community and foreign countries, especially the United States, to the content of the bill. The role of Chinese officials in the process of supporting the extradition bill will also be examined.

This chapter examines the political events, including peaceful and violent protests, that led to the occupation of the Legislative Council on July 1, demonstrating a snowballing effect from a series of protests in June that eventually brought about the legislative capture by demonstrators. The protestors’ capture and vandalism of the legislature was unprecedented and delegitimizing to the entire HKSAR government. It angered the central government in Beijing. The violent protests on July 1 had deep repercussions on the political development of Hong Kong, for they raised an array of issues, ranging from the protestors’ strategies to the policing tactics, from the participation of radicals to their escape to overseas places like Taiwan and the United States and from the responses of Beijing to the following violent confrontations between protestors and police.

This chapter examines the events leading to the controversial ways in which the police handled triad members who went out to attack passengers of the Yuen Long Mass Transit Railway (MTR) on July 21. The July 21 incident had profound repercussions on how ordinary people saw the role of the police in dealing with triads. The triad attack on Yuen Long MTR passengers shocked many citizens, who believ ed that the Hong Kong police had a crisis of performance legitimacy. After the incident of July 21, the protests began to target at the police. As such, the anti-extradition movement in Hong Kong overlapped with the inception of an anti-police movement. The anti-police movement evolved on August 31, when the police entered the Prince Edward MTR station to pursue, beat up and arrest some protestors. The August 31 incident was another turning point that not only angered many protestors, who firmly believed that the police “abused” their power, but also plunged the police into a deeper crisis of legitimacy.

As the sovereign power of the HKSAR, the PRC’s responses to the anti-extradition, anti-police and anti-mainlandization movement in Hong Kong must be analyzed and understood. This chapter traces the deployment of the People’s Armed Police (PAP) to Shenzhen’s border with Hong Kong, examines the relevant laws and stipulations governing the PRC’s military intervention in the HKSAR and explores the remarks made by mainland officials and leaders on Hong Kong’s political development. From a security perspective, the Hong Kong protests did challenge Beijing’s national security. Nevertheless, Beijing did not wish to deploy the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to assist the Hong Kong police directly, because doing so would have undermined the image of “one country, two systems” and defeated the purposes of using the formula to appeal to Taiwan for reunification. Beijing had to strike a fine balance between its consideration of national security interest in Hong Kong and its good image of tolerating the rule of law in not just Hong Kong but also the international world.

This chapter is going to argue that the protestors in the HKSAR from June to December 2019 could be understood from the perspective of populism, that the October 1 confrontation between protestors and police revealed a new pattern of peaceful and violent protests and that the opposition to the anti-mask law on October 4 and 5 was a continuation of the populist struggles against not only the police but also the mainlandization of Hong Kong. In other words, the anti-mask law’s promulgation and implementation was regarded by protestors as a crucial step of making the HKSAR more akin to the mainland’s authoritarian political system. As such, the pro-democracy populist protestors were determined to oppose the anti-mask law by both peaceful and violent means.

This chapter examines the two final and critical battles in the anti-extradition, anti-police and anti-mainlandization protests, namely the battles at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and the Polytechnic University of Hong Kong (PolyU). These two battles marked a final stage of the showdown between protestors and police. The confrontations at the PolyU led to the defeat of many radical protestors, who were arrested, surrendered to the police or escaped. After the battle at the PolyU, the protest movement has died down although it has been lingering on since early 2020. The outbreak of Covid-19 in China in February 2020 and then in Hong Kong from late February onward have become the dampers minimizing the quantity of protests. The whole protest movement became far more moderate than ever before when District Council elections were held on November 25, when the democrats won many of the directly elected seats. The elections were functional as they provided safety-valves for the disgruntled citizens to vent their anger through the exercise of their ballots. On the other hand, the US Congress passed the US Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act, which was then signed into law by President Trump. Finally, the role of the Republic of China (ROC) on Taiwan in the Hong Kong protests will be examined.

The case study of the HKSAR under the PRC’s sovereignty shows that the dynamics of peaceful and violent protests are shaped by several factors. The persistence of civil liberties in the HKSAR did contribute to the proliferation of peaceful protests. However, the main catalyst for a series of combined peaceful and violent protests in Hong Kong from June to December 2019 was the introduction of the extradition bill, which to many Hong Kong people constituted a real threat to their existing civil liberties and the rule of law. The extradition bill was attributable to not only the Taiwan murder case, but also the desire of Beijing to pursue corrupt mainland businesspeople and officials who were laundering money, hiding and staying in Hong Kong. The decision of the Hong Kong government to push the bill through the LegCo propelled the HKSAR along the path of combined peaceful and violent protests from June to December 2019. The involvement of external actors, such as the United States and Taiwan, complicated the entire protest.