Sous-titres (292)
0:00This is China, and this is China, yet the degree
of difference between the two sides of this line
0:06far surpasses that of many, perhaps even most
international borders. Growing from a fishing
0:12village into one of the world’s wealthiest
cities almost entirely within its 156 years
0:17of British Colonial rule, the 27 years since
Hong Kong’s return to China have done little
0:22to blunt the full totality of its anomalies from
the mainland, but Beijing’s now trying to change
0:27that—and fast. This is proving challenging.
Much of Hong Kong is quite literally as
0:34different to the mainland as it can be. North
of the border, vehicles drive on the right;
0:39in Hong Kong, they drive on the left. Hong
Kongers get their own passports—some of the
0:43strongest in the world, in fact, with visa-free
access to 172 countries. Mainlanders, meanwhile,
0:49only get relatively weak Chinese passports
granting the same rights to just 90 nations.
0:55Hong Kong has unrestricted access to the entire
internet, China’s is some of the most restricted
1:00and censored in the entire world. In fact, Hong
Kong is so isolated from the rest of China that
1:05mainland residents are not even allowed to
visit the territory without applying for
1:09and being granted a permit, whereas the
residents of the UK, US, and 168 other
1:14countries can visit without any visa or permit—it
is quite literally easier for most foreigners to
1:20visit the city than Chinese people.
But then there’s the less tangible
1:24side—the general, international flair to
the city borne out of Britain. For example,
1:30Hong Kong’s traditional tea is closer to
the British preparation since it relies
1:34on milk—uncommon in traditional Chinese cuisine
due to the lactose intolerance experienced by 90%
1:40of ethnic Chinese. There’s also the ever-present
egg tarts—a direct lineage of the British custard
1:45tart, ubiquitous across the city's bakeries and
restaurants, and even now in Hong Kong-style dim
1:50sum restaurants in the rest of the world. With
high levels of English proficiency, day-to-day
1:54exposure to Westerners, access to international
media, and more, Hong Kong, while in a category
2:00of one, is far more similar to places like
London or New York than any other Chinese city.
2:05But Hong Kong’s distinction goes deeper than that.
Perhaps the greatest source of difference is in
2:11the very core of its legal and political system.
China, after all, is a communist state—a political
2:18structure just about as fundamentally different
as possible to those used in the west. Hong Kong,
2:24meanwhile, is a free-market, capitalist economy
centered by a western, democratic system based
2:29on English law. With the handover of Hong Kong
to China in 1997, this system was adapted and
2:34enshrined into Hong Kong Basic Law—in broad
strokes, this guaranteed the maintenance of
2:40the status quo of democracy, capitalism, and
the English legal system until at least 2047.
2:46So in the era since the handover, you have a
strange, singular situation where a communist,
2:51autocratic country oversees a capitalist,
democratic territory—a fundamental
2:56incompatibility that the pair have increasingly
and painstakingly attempted to rectify, such as
3:01in 2019 when the Hong Kong government proposed
an amendment to the territory’s Basic Law.
3:08It was called the Fugitive Offenders and Mutual
Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters Legislation.
3:13The law was born out of a murder, as a 19-year-old
Hong Konger killed his girlfriend in Taiwan,
3:19admitted to doing as much, but then couldn’t
be extradited back to Taiwan because there was
3:23no formal extradition agreement between Hong Kong
and Taiwan. To close what they called a loophole,
3:29the pro-Beijing party, the Democratic Alliance
for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong,
3:33presented some changes to the law: that special
surrender arrangements would be considered on a
3:37case-by-case basis to any jurisdiction, regardless
of their prior extradition relationship with Hong
3:43Kong. While this would only apply to 37 specific
schedule 1 offenses—which range from murder and
3:48piracy to offenses involving the unlawful use
of computers—it was received by the Hong Kong
3:53public as a serious concern. Now, it seemed,
any brush with the law could see Hong Kongers
3:58whisked away from their western-style courts and
legal system and thrown into those of mainland
4:04China’s. For people with such a cultural
distance from their next-door neighbor,
4:08it seemed like another slide toward Chinese
rule—and they wouldn't stand for it.
4:13The protest began in earnest here, well before it
became global news, with a student-led sit-in at
4:18the Central Government Complex. Then, the movement
grew: 10,000 marched in protest two weeks later,
4:25then, a month after that, a crowd that organizers
claimed to be around 130,000 marched in protest
4:31against case-by-case extradition toward the
legislative council. Still, while the largest
4:36protest in five years, the bill, and its most
prominent proponent in Chief Executive Carrie Lam,
4:41maintained that the extradition rules were
to become law. But over the weeks and months
4:46that followed, the protests continued to
snowball into the massive demonstrations
4:50that reached global headlines and ranked as the
largest in the city’s history, and eventually
4:55Carrie Lam gave in and withdrew the legislation.
So in the short-term, the protests won the battle,
5:01effectively striking down Hong Kong legislation
that felt like it empowered the mainland. But it
5:06also served as justification for another legal
maneuver that may have forever displaced the
5:11balance between eastern and western influence in
the city. This was a new national security law,
5:17and it was annexed, in its entirety—all
6 chapters and 66 articles—by a vote of
5:23162 to zero. This criminalized acts that
could be considered subversion from China,
5:29or efforts of secession from China, or terrorism
toward China. As Lam saw it, such an act had been
5:35justified by the protests, but critically,
unlike the extradition legislation, this new
5:40law didn’t have to clear Hong Kong legislation,
as it was introduced then passed by the National
5:46People’s Congress, then signed by Xi Jinping—an
almost unheard of instance of Beijing imposing
5:52laws on the supposedly autonomous Hong Kong.
This was a massive break from the norm. While
5:59similar security legislation had been presented
in 2003, it was brought to the fore by Hong Kong
6:04officials, and it was subsequently dismantled
by protestors. But now, in the grips of a global
6:09pandemic that had Hong Kongers assembling in
no larger than groups of eight, and in the
6:13wake of what China viewed as a secessionist
and terrorism upswell in the year prior,
6:17the nation took legal reform into its own hands.
The legal case to do so was dubious. The Hong Kong
6:25bar association protested, the western world
strongly denounced the move. But strangely,
6:31the streets were quiet. Unlike during
previous perceived oversteps by China,
6:35Hong Kongers didn’t take to the streets, they
didn’t organize in the thousands around the
6:40universities. Rather, when reporters asked about
the new laws, they stayed suspiciously mum. And,
6:47one by one, organizers and activists focused their
energy not on saving Hong Kong’s special status,
6:52but getting themselves and their families out of
Hong Kong as quick as possible. As the UK opened
6:58up a path to citizenship for Hong Kongers
who lived in the city during British rule,
7:01well over a hundred thousand opted to move
to the former colonizer, while hundreds of
7:06thousands more opted to move elsewhere. For
many, confidence was lost that the territory
7:11could ever return to what it was before.
But it is worth noting: Hong Kong has never been a
7:17true, full democracy with universal suffrage. For
much of the colonial period, like most colonies,
7:23Hong Kong was essentially ruled outright by the
Governor, who themselves was the representative
7:27of the British monarchy. But in the 1980s,
the system started to evolve into something
7:31closer and closer to universal suffrage—where
everyone gets to vote. In the 1990s and 2000s,
7:37the territory experienced its most representative
form of democracy ever, yet from the 2010s to
7:43today, that has started to regress as Beijing
institutes a series of so-called, “reforms.”
7:49Now, Hong Kong’s elections system quite literally
may be one of the most complex in the entire
7:54world. But much of it stems from what’s called
the Election Committee. This is a 1,500 member
8:00body who votes for the Chief Executive—the head
of the government. How this body is formed is
8:05convoluted and has changed with each of the last
three elections. In the 2016 election, though, 106
8:12of the positions were just directly appointed—the
President of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University,
8:17Chairperson of the Drinking Water Safety Advisory
Committee, and Chairman of the Antiquities
8:21Advisory Board, for example, each automatically
gained a seat in the Election Committee.
8:25But the vast majority of seats were themselves
voted upon by so-called functional constituencies.
8:31In 2016 there were 38 of these each representing
a variety of interests—there was one for the
8:36financial sector with 18 seats, another
representing Chinese Medicine with 30,
8:41even one representing religious interests with
60 seats. Now, each functional constituency
8:46itself has a different way of determining
who fills its election committee seats. Some,
8:51like the education constituency, allow for
widespread voting—every registered teacher
8:56and many higher-level administrative staff
in educational institutions are allowed to
9:00vote on who they send to the committee, and
therefore have an indirect say in who gets
9:04appointed as Chief Executive of Hong Kong.
But bizarrely, about 42.5% of total election
9:10committee seats were voted upon by organizations
and corporations. In the finance constituency,
9:16any registered bank that has been operating
for at least three years votes—not individuals
9:20working at the banks, the banks themselves. Yet
for other constituencies, like that of transport,
9:27the eligibility criteria is simply just a list
of companies. There are 229 that can register to
9:32vote in this constituency, and that’s how Gate
Gourmet, for example, the Swiss-Owned airline
9:37catering company, ends up with the right to vote
for the individuals who then go on to vote for
9:41the most powerful politician in the territory.
Clearly, this system had its critics. The very
9:48fact that the head of the government was voted on
by 246,440 voters, rather than all seven million
9:53residents of the territory, would be enough to
elicit controversy, but then there’s the question
9:58of the composition of this voter-base to begin
with. Politics in Hong Kong typically are split
10:03into the so-called pro-Beijing and pro-Democracy
camps. There’s the group that supports increased
10:08control by the central government, then there’s
the group that supports increased autonomy and
10:12democracy for Hong Kong. These functional
constituencies, and therefore the election
10:17committee, consistently skew more towards the
pro-Beijing camp than the general public.
10:22For example, in the 2012 legislative council
elections, some seats were voted upon by the
10:27general public in geographic constituencies, while
others were voted upon by the same functional
10:31constituencies. The pro-Democracy camp actually
beat the pro-Beijing camp in the directly elected
10:37seats—winning 18 to their 17. But considering
pro-Beijing won the vast majority of functional
10:43constituency seats, 26 to pro-Democracy’s 9, the
pro-Beijing politicians won a strong majority in
10:50the legislative council—as they have in
every single election in the Chinese era.
10:55But something changed in late 2019. In the midst
of the wide scale anti-extradition protests,
11:01the territory held its District Council
elections—essentially, the local elections.
11:06Unlike the territory-wide legislative council or
Chief Executive elections, the vast majority of
11:10District Council seats were directly elected
by the general public. And the pro-democracy
11:15camp showed up in force. For the first time ever,
they won in the popular vote—a full 57%—and won a
11:24colossal 388 of 452 seats—an absolutely massive
jump from their previous total of 126. With
11:32legislative council and Chief Executive elections
on the horizon in 2021 and 2022 respectively,
11:38Beijing decided it needed to make some changes if
it were to ensure its supporters stayed in power.
11:43China’s National People’s Congress—which itself
is a body whose members are technically elected
11:47but in a process almost entirely controlled
by the Chinese Communist Party—voted in
11:512021 to reform the composition of Hong
Kong’s legislative council. Previously,
11:56half of the seventy seats were directly elected
by the general public, while the other half were
12:00elected by the functional constituencies. But
now, there’d be ninety total seats with just
12:05twenty directly elected by the public, thirty
elected by the functional constituencies,
12:10then another forty elected by the election
committee—which itself, of course, was made up of
12:15members voted in by the functional constituencies.
Overall, this massively tilted power away from
12:21the people and towards the historically
pro-Beijing functional constituencies.
12:25But that was far from the full extent of the
reforms. The election committee, despite its
12:30perfect history in voting in a pro-Beijing chief
executive, was itself reformed too. Typically,
12:36the strongest block of support for pro-democracy
politicians comes from the functional
12:40constituencies made up of people, rather
than institutions. For example, the education
12:45constituency, made up of 85,000 teachers,
academics, and administrative staff, was always
12:50one of the few pro-democracy constituencies.
But with the 2021 reforms, the number of seats
12:55filled by these functional constituencies made
up of real people was slashed—many by half,
13:00some by four times. Meanwhile, the number of seats
voted in by companies and organizations stayed
13:06about the same, while they also added more than
three hundred new ex-officio seats—those filled
13:11by someone already in another position, in this
case almost all inherently pro-Beijing positions.
13:16If that wasn’t enough, all candidates for
essentially any political position in Hong
13:20Kong now had to be approved by a candidate
review committee—one that follows ambiguous
13:25criteria and has absolutely no mechanism
for appeal. The members of this committee,
13:30that decides among other things who can run for
the seats that vote for the Chief Executive,
13:34are directly appointed by the Chief Executive.
Democracy is dead in Hong Kong. The pro-Democracy
13:41camp, which just years ago was able to win
the popular vote, now has absolutely no viable
13:48path towards any position of power. China has
remade the city in its own image—a political
13:54system that claims to represent the will of the
people, but in actuality hands near-complete
13:59control over to the central government.
Beyond and because of the changing political
14:04system, there is now also a widespread trend of
Hong Kong becoming more integrated—literally,
14:08functionally, and culturally—with the mainland.
In 2018, a $20 billion bridge opened connecting
14:14the peninsula to both Macau, another autonomous
territory, and the mainland on the other side
14:18of the Estuary. This was considered by many a
symbolic project more than anything. After all,
14:23there was already a reliable and popular network
of fast ferries connecting Hong Kong to Macau,
14:28and road traffic between both territories and
the mainland is quite limited—the territories
14:32drive on the opposite side of the road
as the mainland, and even then, driving
14:36a vehicle across the border requires a separate
driving license, a permit, separate insurance,
14:41and approval by the neighboring Chinese
region, so very few even attempt it.
14:45But a far more practical connection
opened with the West Kowloon railway
14:48station in 2018. This connected Hong Kong
to the Chinese high speed rail network,
14:53meaning one can now travel non-stop well over a
thousand miles across the country to Beijing or
14:59Shanghai in about eight hours. This was also
controversial. After all, to make it nonstop,
15:05without a long wait at the border, mainland
Chinese immigration would have to happen at
15:09the station itself. This meant that mainland
officials would operate within Hong Kong and,
15:15most problematically to supporters of Hong
Kong’s autonomy, mainland law would be in
15:20force after the immigration checkpoint,
meaning there is now this small area in
15:24Hong Kong within West Kowloon Station and on the
tracks out from it where many believe Basic Law,
15:29stipulating the autonomy of Hong Kong’s legal
system, has been violated. After all, there
15:34have now been instances where individuals have
been arrested and prosecuted under mainland law
15:39while physically in Hong Kong, but after clearing
mainland immigration in West Kowloon station.
15:44Beyond the increasing physical connection with
the mainland, there’s simultaneously a mounting
15:48intangible alignment with China. This is not
necessarily wrong—after all the vast majority
15:53of Hong Kongers are ethnically Chinese—but
it is often controversial and many see it
15:58as coming at the expense of maintaining Hong
Kong’s unique, singular identity. For example,
16:03the newly opened half billion dollar Hong Kong
Palace Museum displays artifacts from the Beijing
16:07Palace Museum, and focuses on educating the
public about the history of imperial China.
16:12But they’ve been very careful to phrase it as
a partner, not a branch, of the Beijing museum,
16:17even if in function it could be either. Critics
suggest that its development could have been
16:21forced through by Beijing as a form of cultural
propaganda as Chief Executive Carrie Lam approved
16:26its construction without any consultation
from the legislative council or public—and
16:30critics say this is a violation of the rules
of the cultural district in which it’s built.
16:35COVID was another example of alignment with
China. Pragmatically, Hong Kong had no choice but
16:40to align its prevention measures with Beijing’s
severe and scientifically controversial zero-COVID
16:45policies. After all, not doing so would act as
public doubt in Xi Jinping’s decision-making,
16:50which is not a realistic option for Hong Kong’s
ruling pro-Beijing leadership. But especially in
16:55the later years of the pandemic, this served as a
stark display of just how Chinese this supposedly
17:00Westernized city had become. Throughout 2022,
the territory maintained strict policies like
17:0621-day quarantines for arriving passengers,
legally-enforced isolation for the sick,
17:10vaccine passports for access to
public places, and more. Meanwhile,
17:14most of the western world got back to normal in
early 2022 as the Omicron-fueled surge subsided.
17:20Ultimately, Hong Kong’s strictness, borne out of
Beijing’s influence, seemed to get it the worst of
17:26both worlds. The city had an extremely high COVID
death rate—higher than most Western countries,
17:32and far higher that most of the Asian continent.
And perhaps most notably, Singapore, perhaps Hong
17:37Kong’s closest equivalent, did not see the same.
2,024 people died of COVID in Singapore, or about
17:44one in 2,800 people. In Hong Kong, though, 13,516
died—that’s one in 550. But Singapore’s COVID
17:55policy was far less strict. It opened its borders
to the world about a year before Hong Kong,
18:00and was devoid of almost all visible restrictions
by late 2022 while Hong Kong was still in the
18:05midst of its strict zero-COVID policies.
This had an impact because the cities are
18:10direct competitors. They both portray themselves
as global business capitals—the perfect hub of
18:16east and west, with high English proficiency,
strong local talent, and easy access to financial
18:21services and other important institutions. And
they are each successful at this. Singapore
18:26is home to the Asian headquarters of Apple,
Google, Johnson & Johnson, Chevron, Barclays,
18:31Microsoft, Boeing, and plenty more while Hong
Kong acts as the headquarters of J.P. Morgan,
18:35Prudential, Estée Lauder, and more, but the
composition of these lists reflects the changing
18:40nature of multinational enterprise in Asia.
Singapore is winning. It is consistently being
18:47chosen as the best city for western companies
to base their Asia operations out of. This is
18:52reflected by the fact that Hong Kong barely has
any tech presence, as the new wave of businesses
18:57has consistently chosen the city-state to the
south. And they’re not losing out on new business,
19:02they’re also just simply losing business.
FedEx and the Wall Street Journal were two of
19:07the highest profile headquarters moves from Hong
Kong to Singapore in recent years, while others
19:10have selected elsewhere. The New York Times, for
example, moved its Asia headquarters to Seoul,
19:15while LVMH—the luxury goods conglomerate
including Louis Vuitton, Sephora, Tiffany,
19:20and dozens more brands—opted to move up to
Shanghai. In fact, the number of American
19:25businesses with regional headquarters in Hong Kong
is now declining, and at 214, it’s at its lowest
19:31count since the year 2000, and a similar trend
is seen for British and Australian firms as well.
19:37Since 2018, Hong Kong’s economy has been
effectively flat—it’s only grown a marginal
19:435.8% in five whole years. Over the same span,
Singapore’s has exploded a full 33.2%. Since 2021,
19:52Hong Kong’s historically red-hot property
market has been on a steady decline. And
19:57tourism figures have been terrible,
at numbers not seen since the early
20:012010s. Hong Kong is just not what it once was.
Its quagmire seems centered around the fact that
20:09it’s losing what made it unique. The destinations
of the businesses leaving the city reflect this.
20:14Shanghai is certainly the city best-suited to
international companies in mainland China, so
20:19it makes sense the companies that want to further
focus on the Chinese market, like LVMH, would move
20:23there. Singapore, meanwhile, has effectively
stepped in to be what Hong Kong once was.
20:29It is tremendously cosmopolitan—at times
it’s hard to categorize it into any one
20:33continent—and yet it still has high exposure and
proximity to China. Also a former British colony,
20:39Singapore also runs on a western legal system,
also has high English language proficiency,
20:44and also runs as a democracy—although also an
imperfect one. But perhaps most importantly,
20:50Singapore is, of course, its own country. It is
not subject to the same game of tug of war between
20:55the world and China as Hong Kong. It is therefore
perceived by many as a more stable environment.
21:02Hong Kong is changing fast, and when a company is
deciding where to invest hundreds of millions of
21:06dollars to build a headquarters, fast change is
not attractive. In 2021, the US Departments of
21:12State, Treasury, Commerce, and Homeland Security
jointly issued an advisory warning US companies
21:17about the growing risks in operating in Hong Kong.
The document notes the risks to foreign nationals
21:22and businesses placed by the new National Security
Law, that data security is no longer a guarantee,
21:27and that there could be challenges with access
to information given growing constraints on
21:30the freedom of the press in the territory. And
beyond the direct implications of these threats,
21:35multinational companies rely on the ability to
convince key talent to move to their offices
21:40in Asia, and there’s a significant number of
westerners who are wary of moving to a place
21:44that is increasingly influenced by Beijing.
So to the decision-makers, it’s now hard to see
21:50what Hong Kong uniquely offers. There’s the option
of Shanghai if a business wants a cosmopolitan
21:56city with direct access to mainland China, and
then there’s Singapore if they just need proximity
22:00and familiarity. The city is just consistently
losing, and the trend-line is the scariest bit.
22:07It’s tough to know what Beijing’s end-game
is. Hong Kong is a useful tool for the
22:12central government as it’s difficult for western
companies to operate in China’s unique economic
22:16and legal system, so the city almost acts as
a connecting node between China’s socialist
22:21economy and the western capitalist one. This
almost certainly increases the flow of capital
22:26into the country while simultaneously
allowing the Chinese Communist Party
22:29to maintain their brand of socialism.
Perhaps it’s just instinct. Xi Jinping
22:36and the other autocratic leaders in China
just don’t know how to deal with dissent.
22:40This has been demonstrated by the Tiananmen
Square Massacre, by the lack of free press,
22:44by the censorship of media—the instinct is to
just prevent dissent from happening in public,
22:49rather than confronting its cause. But in
a democratic system, dissent is inherent.
22:55In a democratic Hong Kong, therefore, there will
always be an anti-China camp. So perhaps, in the
23:01long term, one country, two systems was never
going to work, but it’s also possible that in
23:06the future the world will look back on Hong Kong
as an example of Chinese short-sightedness—the
23:12destruction of a once-great city out of
fear of what democracy could do to Beijing.
23:20Rather than do a traditional ad-read here at
the end, I’m just going to play the trailer
23:23for the new show me and my team made called
the Getaway. Although I’ll say now: there is
23:29a bit of a twist in this trailer, so it’s worth
watching at least halfway through…
“Welcome to
23:34The Getaway where these six creators are taking a
road trip to transport a $10,000 prize across the
23:40great American West. The problem… there's a Snitch
among them! Sabotaging the group at every turn.
23:49The Gamer? Am I 1,000% sure I am not the Snitch?
Absolutely. The Zoologist? Is there nothing I can
23:56say to change your mind? The Therapist? You guys
trust-trust each other? Actually trust each other?
24:02The Card Counter? I'm not— I'm not throwing shade
at you. But the way that I think it would be smart
24:07to do it— Steven! The Finance Guy? This Snitch
thing is very stressful. I go to bed at night,
24:13and I worry. The Political Scientist? I
have this suspicion that... we did get the
24:18Snitch. You really never know. Sure. Okay.
This is a tense moment. Okay, here we go.
24:29What am I? Alright, nice. Ohh yeah. Snitch.
So here's what's actually going on. We really
24:35like shows that have, you know, a sabotage
element. But there's already so many that
24:40have a saboteur. Okay. Alright. I have this
special role. I'm really carrying this entire
24:48series. There's even the ones that have a couple
of saboteurs. Boston I don't believe in. Jersey
24:53I don't bel… It's Boston. Boston was never the
city. But as far as we know, there's none that
25:00have everyone as the saboteur. And we thought
that would be funny. In some way, I'm like,
25:11are there two Snitches here? We got— We gotta run!
Oh my (bleep) god! There's no script for this. So,
25:31you know… That's a great—Oh, that's gonna make
the trailer, dude. Yeah. Yeah. You mother—”
25:54You can watch the Getaway
exclusively on Nebula, so head over
25:58to Nebula.tv/Wendover to sign up and you’ll even
get 40% off an annual subscription, bringing the
26:00cost down to just $2.50 a month. With that you’ll
get access to the full catalog of top-notch Nebula
26:03Originals made by creators you probably already
watch and love, plus access to all of our normal
26:05videos early and ad-free, and you’ll be helping
support our work, so thank you in advance.
