Abstract
PurposeThis paper provides an analytical account detailing the historical linkages between Chinese on both sides of the Sino-Hong Kong border from 1841 onwards and examining important incidents of collective actions in the colony and Canton.Design/methodology/approachUsing annual reports published by the colonial administration in Hong Kong, especially those focusing on years that witnessed major incidents of anti-colonial agitations, this paper analyzes how British policymakers were confronted by collective actions mounted by Chinese in Canton and Hong Kong. Building on the works of prominent historians and utilizing the theoretical frameworks of analysts such as Charles Tilly (1978), the author examines if a Cantonese regional solidarity served as the foundation for popular movements, which in turn consolidated a rising Chinese nationalism when Canton and Hong Kong were the focal points of mass actions against imperialism.FindingsHong Kong Chinese workers were vanguards of the modern Chinese revolutions that transformed not just their homeland, but their lives, allegiances, and aspirations as Chinese in a domain under foreign jurisdiction on Chinese soil, as their actions were emulated by their compatriots outside of South China, thus starting a chain reaction that culminated in the establishment of the Nanjing regime.Originality/valueThis paper reveals that popular movements of Hong Kong Chinese possessed national and international importance, especially when they were supported by their Cantonese compatriots and the two leading Chinese political parties, the Kuomintang (KMT) and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
Highlights
While they were often underappreciated and largely ignored in academic scholarship, ordinary men and women on the frontline of Hong Kong’s economic and political transformations were of immense strategic significance to both their colonizers and mainland regimes that attempted to combat perceived imperialist encroachments on Chinese sovereignty
Given that Guangdong was the native province of the majority of the colony’s Chinese workers, but was a site of confrontations between foreign powers and political organizations with aspirations to becoming the ruling regime of China, it was only natural for the KMT, when its political base was in Canton, to offer political and financial support to Hong Kong Chinese workers when they were mobilizing against the British
The solidarity, partnership, and even feudalistic, traditional, sociocultural ties that emerged in Guangdong but were carried to the British colony by Chinese workers were ready-made, convenient, and extremely powerful channel for revolutionary mass actions the purposes of which were the preservation of their collective interests, the defense of their ancestral province, and if harassed by a political organization that saw itself as the prime representative of an anti-imperialist Chinese nationalism, the creation of a new China
Summary
While they were often underappreciated and largely ignored in academic scholarship, ordinary men and women on the frontline of Hong Kong’s economic and political transformations were of immense strategic significance to both their colonizers and mainland regimes that attempted to combat perceived imperialist encroachments on Chinese sovereignty.
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