Why did Britain hand over power to China in Hong-Kong in 1997?

Résumé du document

The question of the future of Hong Kong had remained an outstanding question in the relations between People's Republic of China and the United Kingdom during the second part of the 20th C. The territory became a British colony in 1898 with a lease of 99 years in the wake of the opium wars between both empires in 1842 and 1860. Under British sovereignty, the city developed into a major financial and economic capital of world capitalism; at the opposite of mainland China which became communist after the revolution of 1949. This contrary evolution has shaped the antagonism between both territories and it does question the legitimacy of the British handover of power in Hong Kong to Chinese sovereignty.

The answer to this issue lies partly in the study of the bargaining positions, namely the different economic, political and symbolic stakes and interests of both protagonists in the 1982-1984 bilateral negotiations over the fate of Hong-Kong. Then in the next half of this essay one's may interpret the evolution of Chinese and British talk strategies' and the extent to which it influenced British handover from Hong Kong.

Extraits

[...] A Sino-British conflict would undeniably destroy Hong Kong's economy at the expense of China, highly dependent on its economic prosperity. Moreover it would afraid Taiwanese people and complicate even more the hypothesis of a peaceful retrocession of the isle to mainland China in a near future. Ultimately it would tarnish the image of the communist regime and provoke international agitation toward China in the world, which would not benefit to the country at the same time as it starts to open its economy to foreign investors. [...]

[...] Why did Britain handover power to China in Hong-Kong in 1997? The question of the future of Hong Kong had remained an outstanding question in the relations between People's Republic of China and the United Kingdom during the second part of the 20th C. The territory became a British colony in 1898 with a lease of 99 years in the wake of the opium wars between both empires in 1842 and 1860. Under British sovereignty, the city developed into a major financial and economic capital of world capitalism; at the opposite of mainland China which became communist after the revolution of 1949. [...]

[...] Yet Chinese and British differ over who must be in control of this economy. It is during the 1982-1984 Sino-British negotiations over Hong Kong that the future of the territory took shape and paved the way for its handover from Great Britain to China. In September 1982 British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher met Deng Xiaoping in Beijing and asked for an extension of the lease of Hong Kong. Her initial idea was to relinquish to British sovereignty over Hong Kong but to keep on administrating the city so as to continue extracting benefits from the vigorous economic activity of the territory. [...]

[...] The port of Hong Kong became a crucial element for the re-exportation of Chinese goods on world market. Furthermore by investing in China, Hong Kong firms played a large responsibility in the economic development of Special Economic Zones in bringing with them their knowledge, capital and advanced technology. For the United Kingdom, the prosperity of Hong Kong's economy was the principal interest at stake in the negotiations with China; British reaped many benefits from the rapid economic development of the colony in the 1960s and 1970s. [...]

[...] To this point, it seems interesting to analyse to what extent the British handover of power to China in Hong Kong was influenced by those Sino- British negotiations. Indeed, as talks were in a deadlock between 1982 and 1983 over the question of the indivisibility of the sovereignty and administration of China on the territory of Hong Kong, uncertainties increased within Hong Kong population over the future and with them the risks of an economic crisis. In the same time, British had to find a rapid accord with Chinese to avoid the collapse of Hong Kong's property market. [...]