ABSTRACT
This study addresses the political participation of Protestant ministers in Hong Kong. It aims to describe and explain the pattern of political participation of these ministers.
The concept of political participation hinges on the meaning of the word “political”. The most common definition of “politics” is that it is about ‘who gets what, when, and how? ’ (Lasswell, 1936 as referred to in Parry, et.al.,1992, p.6); in other words, politics is to ‘manage everybody’s things’ (Shen, 1985, p.26).1 It follows that political has to do with the ability to control and decide the distribution of resources in society, including power itself (Chui, 1988, p.32). In the context of a modem pluralistic society, in which the government is the authority to control and make decision about the allocation of resources, political denotes something that is related to the decision-making of government; more precisely, political describes any activity that is directed to affecting the choices of government personnel or affecting the choices made by them (Verba, Nie & Kim, 1978, p.473). Political participation in the present study is therefore defined, according to Huntington and Nelson, as ‘activity that can affect governmental decision-making’ (Huntington & Nelson, 1977, p.4).2 This definition is broad enough to cover all behaviour through which people express their political opinions and requests, make their standpoints and give their approval.
