CPC steers healthy development of democracy in SAR

Lau Lan-cheong says anti-China forces in HK and their foreign allies don’t care about democracy in the city unless it brings political gain

On July 1, we will be celebrating the centennial of the Communist Party of China and the 24th birthday of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. Looking back at the past 24 years, one can see that, aside from socioeconomic development, Hong Kong has significantly increased the democratic elements in its governance system. Contrary to what China-bashers claim, from a macro perspective, the CPC is not only the creator, designer and leader of “one country, two systems” but also the captain that has steered Hong Kong’s democratic development in the right direction, which takes tremendous wisdom, confidence and patience.

At the International Symposium on the Communist Party of China’s History of 100 Years, held in Hong Kong on Wednesday, scholars and researchers drew attention to the CPC’s leadership in relation to the democratic development in the HKSAR. Meanwhile, Leung Chun-ying — a vicechairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference and former chief executive of the HKSAR — noted in his speech at a forum on June 12 that the nation’s Constitution and the Basic Law of the HKSAR provide the statutory basis for the Central People’s Government of the People’s Republic of China, under the leadership of the CPC, to authorize the HKSAR to implement “Hong Kong people administrating Hong Kong”. He referred to his personal experience working on the Basic Law Consultative Committee, which undertook more than four years of public consultation in the 1980s when the Basic Law was being drafted, which remains the longest, most expansive and most broadly representative consultation in Hong Kong history to this day, stating “the attitude with which the CPC treated the drafting of the Basic Law is the ultimate embodiment of democracy”.

The CPC has been practicing democracy since it was born a century ago and upholds democracy as a core value, uniting its members as well as the nation. The CPC’s democratic philosophy is based on the interest of the people as a whole and its vision of the world. Democracy is both the goal and a means to achieve it, thus the democratic system it maintains is designed to serve the collective interest. That is why the CPC built up a “system of democratic centralism” over decades of struggle and consolidated it throughout years of peaceful development since the founding of the PRC. The system of democratic centralism fully reflects upon popular opinions and formulates national policies as well as strategies based on consensus. The democratic centralism system is essentially different from Western-style democracy, which is designed to serve capitalist interests and therefore constantly exudes greed and hypocrisy to the detriment of the general public, particularly the working class. Moreover, the CPC emphasizes “immersive democracy”, whose process spans all aspects and stages of life and work, whereas Western-style democracy is all about elections, hence the mantra of “one man, one vote”. Consequently, a lot of resources are invested in securing votes during election campaigns, but there’s no guarantee the elected official will be fit for the job, or represent the interests of all people.

The CPC has never stopped learning and studying, which is why it knows Western-style democracy inside out and has chosen a different path for democratic development, not just on the Chinese mainland but in the Hong Kong SAR as well. And it has adopted a cautiously progressive approach to ensure Hong Kong’s democratic development proceeds steadily and surely but never hastily.

As a matter of fact, Hong Kong’s democratic progression began only after the 1985 Sino-British Joint Declaration

The CPC has been practicing democracy since it was born a century ago and upholds democracy as a core value, uniting its members as well as the nation. The CPC’s democratic philosophy is based on the interest of the people as a whole and its vision of the world. Democracy is both the goal and a means to achieve it, thus the democratic system it maintains is designed to serve the collective interest. That is why the CPC built up a “system of democratic centralism” over decades of struggle and consolidated it throughout years of peaceful development since the founding of the PRC.

heralded the transition period. The UK deployed its game plan, described by some as “countering the CPC with democracy”, by hastily introducing a crude form of “representative democracy”, with the intention of planting loyalists in the governance system to continue serving the UK’s interest after the handover. All points to the need for the CPC to carefully plan and execute its strategy for Hong Kong’s democratic progress to remain stable and healthy in the best interest of Hong Kong people as well as that of the nation.

Specifically, the central authorities have established the following principles regarding democratic development in the HKSAR to ensure a smooth process: First, stay firmly on course of the executive-led governance model and maintain a healthy relationship of cooperation between the executive branch and legislative branch of the SAR government; second, keep in mind that Hong Kong’s democratic development cannot be completed with one big leap and therefore must proceed steadily one step at a time; third, maintain “balanced public participation” in elections, including those for the Election Committee, the Legislative Council and the District Councils. Representative democracy is a complex undertaking of political system engineering that emphasizes broadly representative participation, rather than pursuing the “one man, one vote” format without realizing its limitations.

Hong Kong has experienced treacherous political struggles in the past 24 years, particularly in recent years, and all of them taught us that anti-China forces in Hong Kong and their overseas allies are only interested in using Hong Kong as a geopolitical pawn against the CPC-led central government in Beijing to serve their own interests. They don’t care about democratic development in Hong Kong unless it brings them real political gain. In absolute contrast, the CPC is committed to advancing healthy democracy in Hong Kong by clearing away obstacles that lead to “mutual destruction”.