Preparing for localism: a socioeconomic history of education and housing in Hong Kong between 1950 and 1981

Thesis

This thesis explores how the development of education and housing in Hong Kong (HK) between 1950 and 1981 helped to create a foundation that allowed HK localism to emerge from the 1970s onwards. Existing scholarship on HK localism has largely overlooked the years before the 1990s and mostly fallen into the fields of sociology, anthropology, cultural studies, and politics. This thesis, however, takes a historical perspective, focusing principally on socioeconomic factors. Moreover, while the existing literature has seldom dissected HK localism, this thesis identifies two preconditions for its emergence: i) a sense of belonging more to HK than to elsewhere; ii) a sense of responsibility towards HK. It proposes that a HK resident becomes a HK localist when both senses are strong enough to motivate them to take action, participating, for example, in public events, by supporting interest groups and joining demonstrations.

The thesis demonstrates, in six thematic chapters, how education and housing helped to create a foundation for localism through two mechanisms: i) locating most public-sector schools in and around public-housing estates; ii) cultivating core Christian, Confucian, and secular values, via formal and informal educational activities in the public sphere, including in both non-communist schools and public-housing estates. These two mechanisms helped to foster a sense of belonging to HK from the early-1950s, promoting a sense of community responsibility among the HK-Chinese from the late-1960s, and enabling HK localism to emerge in the early-1970s. The thesis highlights the crucial initiatives undertaken by David Trench, HK Governor 1964–71, which prepared the ground for his successor, Murray MacLehose, HK Governor 1971–82, to successfully promote a local HK identity from 1972. The thesis argues that the emergence of localism in HK from the early-1970s was largely inadvertent, although the colonial government deliberately encouraged HK localism from the mid-1980s.

Authors: Liu, Z

• DOI: 10.5287/ora-ovngredkq
• Type of award: DPhil
• Level of award: Doctoral
• Awarding institution: University of Oxford
• Language: English
• Keywords: social history; housing; Hong Kong; education; localism; economic history; identity
• Subjects: History; Civics, Hong Kong; Education; Housing policy; Identity politics; Colonial agents; localism