ABSTRACT
This chapter will explore the contextual, cultural and regional background underlying the student-led protests against delays to democratic reforms in Hong Kong in 2014 as part of a wider civil disobedience movement. The protests culminated in a class boycott at universities across the territory and subsequently led to the occupation of downtown areas of the city in alliance with other democratic reform groups. The demands for universal suffrage and calls for an open selection process of candidates for the territory’s leader need to be understood by reference to Hong Kong’s status as a former British colony until 1997 and, subsequently, its status as a special administrative region (SAR) of the People’s Republic of China (PRC). The protests are also important to understand in the context of social, demo-
graphic and linguistic changes, increasing economic inequality in Hong Kong, and as part of a process of so-called ‘mainlandization’ whereby a subtle convergence is believed to be taking place between Hong Kong and mainland China (the PRC) (Lo, 2008: 42). This is the source of more widespread civil unrest and resistance in Hong Kong which has a long history of separate development and cultural identity as a result of its colonization by the British. Worries about the rapid pace of mainlandization underlie the sense of urgency and desperation to which student protests have given voice.
