China’s Crackdown on Hong Kong Is About Intimidation

The goal is not to arrest people, but to silence them.

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As Americans prepare to celebrate our independence this weekend, citizens of Hong Kong are dangerously close to losing theirs. After a year of historic pro-democracy protests in response to Beijing’s 2019 extradition bill, Chinese President Xi Jinping officially enacted a national security law on Tuesday aimed at stamping out dissent in Hong Kong once and for all. 

The sweeping legislation was shrouded in secrecy for the 40 days between its introduction and passage, and its reveal confirmed the worst fears of Hong Kong leaders and activists. With more than 60 articles—which cover secession, subversion, terrorism, and collusion with foreign entities—it continues the worrisome trend of China’s constraint of civil liberties in the region. Mass demonstrations in response to the law erupted on Wednesday, July 1—the anniversary of Hong Kong’s independence from British colonial rule—in the city’s largest display of resistance this year.

As a stipulation of the territory’s return to China from British rule in 1997, Hong Kong had previously enjoyed a semi-autonomous state characterized by the maxim “one country, two systems.” As a special administrative region, Hong Kong managed its own courts, currency, and extradition. However, according to Margaret Lewis, an expert in Chinese law at Seton Hall, this system increasingly looks more like “one country, 1.5 systems.” Many view the national security law as another step toward the end of Hong Kong’s economic and legal sovereignty.

The law paves the way for Beijing’s intrusion into Hong Kong’s long history of judicial independence, allowing for the introduction of China’s repressive legal practices. It sets up extensive administrative networks to investigate and prosecute various vague offenses thought to undermine the Chinese government.

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  1. Avatar photo
    Tracie

    The theme of vagueness in the writing of the law is interesting.

    "It [the national security law] sets up extensive administrative networks to investigate and prosecute various vague offenses thought to undermine the Chinese government."

    "Vaguely defined offenses combined with harsh penalties enable the legislation to inspire maximum fear among protesters."

    “The idea here is to intimidate them. And that’s why you write the law in this very vague fashion so that everybody realizes it could apply to me.”

    Guess there's no chance of any part of this law getting challenged and working it's way up to the high court?

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    Paul Hoppenjans

    Excellent piece - thank you. I find the Hong Kong protests to be inspiring, and the frankly weak response of the world, including the United States, is as disheartening as, and in some way reflective of, the self-loathing that is being preached domestically about the supposed evils of the Founding, the Founders, and the Constitution.

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      Tracie

      Very good point. Happy Democracy Day.

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      Logical

      It is not the libs with the weak response....sorry, it's the Confederate POTUS who is too scared to say a peep about Xi and HK. You are conflating.

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        Paul Hoppenjans

        I don't think I am conflating. The lack of response on both sides and from people in general is "reflective of" the self-loathing. "Who are we to question them?" is what many are effectively saying via their apathy. Hence, the inspirational nature of it, which I feel, doesn't seem to be a consensus view in the USA...and that's a shame.

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        David Chen

        Nobody has taken a real stand on this issue IMO.

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    DougAz

    Personal Responsibility is...real ? Or a Joke? Do we sacrifice to help foil China?

    Then stop going to Wal-Mart....which for 20 years I call China-Mart.

    $350 Billion purchased by China-Mart... who supported closing American businesses and shipping good jobs to China.

    So you could buy a $15.00 blue jean instead of a $35 pair.

    Word are great but pale to actions taken..

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      Tracie

      Without Chinese made goods, the purchasing power of poor people in this country would really take a hit.

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        David Chen

        I'm not a macroeconomist but I've always wondered if this race to the bottom is just a self-perpetuating condition if the people put out of work now depend on their replacements to produce cheaper goods. But at the very least, we shouldn't outsource to countries that actively work to undermine our values and institutions. There are a lot of cheap countries that can make stuff and have a mutual interest. I'd much rather my dollar go to Mexico than China.

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          DougAz

          I agree with you about Mexico. I was poor enough in the 60s growing up. Food stamps. Working at 14. We got along for decades without making and buying anything in China.

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          Tracie

          I also am no macroeconomics expert. Hope we can still have a discussion.

          I have heard there are alternatives for a lot of goods, but maybe not on the scale that China can provide. American-based corporations have made enormous investments in China.

          It's far from a perfect analogy, but regarding placing expediency over values, the US welcomed a number of German scientists who'd worked for the Nazis to work on projects for the US military.

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            David Chen

            Some industries like electronics have consolidated so heavily in places like Shenzhen that pretty much no alternatives exist if you want to get things done quickly. This is in large part because of short sighted international companies thinking it will never bite them in the butt to outsource to that degree. They deluded themselves into thinking that liberalism is the inevitable fruit of industrialization. Now they are at the mercy of the CCP and their domestic startups that grew from IP theft and mercantilism.

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    Show Jay Janney the 🚪!

    Is it effective? Look how silent the NBA is over it! Mission accomplished, even though there's no way in Hell that Trump would allow Daryl Morey to be extradited for sedition. The NBA players know how much BRI comes from China, and they are not cutting their own pay for millions of people they've never met.

    Advice: it is never in your best interest to assume others will not act in their own best interest.

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      Bradley Alpert

      Unfortunately, we seem to fail to realize that standing up to China sooner rather than later is in the best interest of all of us. Otherwise China will dismantle the West by dividing us, piece by piece.

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        Tracie

        Maybe, but do they really care about the "west" as much as they care about their own fortress?

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          David Chen

          "China has become a threat because its leaders are promoting a closed, authoritarian model as an alternative to democratic governance and free-market economics. The Chinese Communist Party is not only strengthening an internal system that stifles human freedom and extends its authoritarian control; it is also exporting that model and leading the development of new rules and a new international order that would make the world less free and less safe."

          https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/05/mcmaster-china-strategy/609088/

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            Tracie

            How aggressively though? Sure they want to sell everybody their surveillance-state technology. Sure they want trading partners who don't care how they treat their citizens. But how much of a threat to they regard other democracies?

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    Victor Clairmont

    So on the treason and sedition part, if a religion or ministry, lets say Baptist, Methodist, Catholic, were to have a mission in Hong Kong or an organization that was helped by getting tithe (or offering) from the US, the vagueness actually would allow China to drag those people off in Hong Kong and persecute them (those receiving the funding there. Or if you were some atheist organization funding people in Hong Kong before this law was ever passed, same thing.

    If the Trump administration doesn't get more serious about China, the Biden administration probably will not either. He has too many ties there himself and he has been wrong on every aspect of China. Doubt he will turn around on it. And too many people in congress have ties to China too, republican and democrat.

    It seems China is going to be left mostly unchecked. Not good, for one of the greatest evils of our day in the Communist Party of China.

    Never let evil go unchecked if you are in a position to do so. Sad we are too busy fighting the culture war to realize this. The more we don't get our act together, or the EU, the more leeway China gets to do wrong.

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      Tracie

      "Sad we are too busy fighting the culture war to realize this."

      Yes, note how many more comments discussions about abortion or the late CHAZ/CHOP garner. I'm as guilty as anybody. Who cares about Democratic ideals when you can laugh about your neighbor's moral depravity?

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        Victor Clairmont

        Great point Tracie. I feel sad when most comments and likes are for things that don't seem as necessary. I am big on foreign policy, as what happens outside America is almost as important as what happens within. No nation is isolated. Take Covid-19, without China's communist party, we would be in a different world right now.

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          Tracie

          I work in healthcare, and yet even some of my co-workers at the lunch table did not get why I was so obsessed w/ Wuhan shutting down in February (?January.)

          I didn't realize any more then them how fast or how hard it would hot the US, but it's cuz I care about what's happening in the world that I had any real concern about it. When people in my family started saying "Hoax!" I was able to ask: Well, why is northern Italy shutting down? Why are epidemiologists in Australia saying social distance?

          There are few things Trump has exploited better than our collective indifference to the rest of the planet.

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    Kaitlin Johnson

    Thank you for this piece! I was never able to find such specific detail about this law in other sources and was hoping TD would run a piece like this!

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    Logical

    Setting aside the authoritarian side of China, one country -- two systems is just not sustainable.

    Another example is India. Kashmir was given a special status in 1947 out of expediency. It should have been abolished by 1950. Instead, continual deception kept it going until now.

    Longer the wait, harder the means to unify.

    Israel is going the other way; on the verge of creating one nation, two systems. Mark this -- it will not end well.

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      DougCLE

      “Setting aside the authoritarian side of China...”
      Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how was the play?

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        Logical

        Not much different from licking Saudi derriere.

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          DougCLE

          Somehow, I feel that’s not quite how she would have responded. I mean, unless it was a really, really bad play. Or if she was into that sort of thing - no kink-shaming here.

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