From Liberty to Authoritarianism

Professor Johannes Chan was the former Chair of Public Law and Dean of the Faculty of Law, The University of Hong Kong (2002-2014), and, since his retirement in 2021, an Adjunct Professor of HKU and an Honorary Professor at University College London. He specializes in human rights, constitutional and administrative law, and has published widely in these fields, including Law of the Hong Kong Constitution (Sweet & Maxwell, 3^rd ed, 2021), which is the leading work on the Basic Law of Hong Kong. In 2019, he received the Hong Kong Research Grants Council’s Prestigious Fellowship in Humanities and Social Sciences, which is awarded to outstanding scholars for sustained research achievements and contribution to the field.  He has held visiting appointments at many other universities, including University of Pennsylvania Law School, Cambridge University, University College London, and University of New South Wales.  

 

As the first (and still the only) Honorary Senior Counsel in Hong Kong, he has appeared as leading counsel in many constitutional law cases, and has acted as a trial observer on behalf of international NGOs in political trials.  He has extensive experience in public services, including being the Chairman of the Hong Kong Bar’s Committee on Constitutional Affairs and Human Rights (1996-1999 and 2019-2021).

A former British Dependent Territory, Hong Kong became a Special Administrative Region of China on 1 July 1997 under the constitutional model of One Country, Two Systems, under which Hong Kong retains its previous social, economic, political and legal systems.  A major international financial centre and once a stronghold of liberalism and common law values, the lack of progress in democratic development in Hong Kong in the last two decades led to an increasing level of public frustration and revealed an increasingly wide ideological gap between the socialist sovereign and the liberal common law regime in Hong Kong.  The Extradition Bill in 2019, which would have allowed extradition of suspects from Hong Kong to Mainland China for trial, intensified the conflicts and led to the worst period of confrontation in the history of Hong Kong.  While the Bill was eventually withdrawn, over 10,000 people were arrested.  Archaic criminal offences were invoked, and heavy penalties were imposed even on those engaged only in entirely peaceful activities.  In 2021, the National People’s Congress enacted the National Security Law (“NSL’) for Hong Kong, which introduced sweeping national security offences and conferred wide police powers.  In 2024, the Hong Kong Government enacted the Protection of National Security Ordinance.  What is the impact of these laws on Hong Kong?  Do they bring Hong Kong back from chaos to stability and from stability to prosperity, or do they take Hong Kong from liberalism to semi-authoritarianism or authoritarianism?  What are the implications for the constitutional model of One Country, Two Systems, and the future of Hong Kong?