“The Day After”: Hong Kong National Identity in 2015

Abstract

Nearly twenty years after the handover from a British colony to a PRC special administrative region (SAR)on July 1st 1997, Hong Kongers continue to fight for democracy, specifically seen in the election of the Chief Executive (CE) and the Legislative Council (LegCo) based on universal suffrage. This long-term fight reached its peak (the breaking out of the epic “Umbrella Movement”) in 2014 and made 2015 Hong Kong as the “day after”, full of dust and soil. In 2015, Hong Kong people from different social sectors and social classes dealt with the aftermath in their own ways.

The movement originated two years before. In 2013, an advocacy group called "Occupy Central with Love and Peace" (OCLP) was founded, holding a belief of demanding democratic election by engaging in non-violent civil disobedience. However, on 31 August 2014, China’s People's Congress announced a framework (the 831 framework) to govern Hong Kong's CE election from 2017 onwards. The framework suggesting that eligible CE candidates should be pre-screened by a committee of 1,200 members before going for popular voting was far beyond Hong Kong people’s acceptance. The Hong Kong Federation of Students (HKFS) regarded this 831 framework as “fake” universal suffrage and initiated a week-long class boycott beginning on 22 September 2014. This large-scale class boycott eventually turned into mass occupation of the Central district in a week, during which police fired tear gas to disperse the mass but failed. After seventy-nine days of occupation, all the occupation sites were cleared by police in December 2014. However, after the clearance of the road occupations, a small camp remained in Admiralty outside the legislative building complex, until the “831 framework” was officially voted down by the LegCo in June 2015.