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Hong Kong's government is not Hong Kong's own, its chief executive has been appointed by the central Chinese government since China regained sovereignty over Hong Kong in 1997. However, residents of Hong Kong have enjoyed more civil liberty than the residents of mainland China, for example the freedom of speech and it's own separate judiciary system. With residents of Hong Kong fed up with current pro-Beijing chief executive, Leung Chun-ying, and mainland China's current president, Xi Jiping, who are limiting the democratic liberties of the territory. Though mainland China has sovereignty over the domain of offshore Hong Kong, the levels of democracy in mainland China and Hong Kong are very dissimilar. In China, the internet, education systems, communities, and society as a whole are controlled by the central government, allowing the residents few civil liberties. For a while, Hong Kong, has utilized its own judiciary system and maintained its own chief executive to deal with governance, allowing Hong Kong to keep some of its Western democratic roots, from Hong Kong's time as a British colony; more recently the central government has appointed pro-Beijing (mainland) chief executives who have slowly taken more and more democratic liberties from the people. The people have taken to the streets of Hong Kong in protest asking for more democratic power in the appointment of their chief executive, but the iron-fisted Xi Jiping refuses to allow for any compromises. Xi Jiping is a strongly believes previous communist regimes fell apart because they were lax; as a result, Xi Jiping refuses to let these protests flourish or compromise with protestors because he doesn't want this to spark any freedom protests in the mainland. Yet, Xi Jiping can't use the force he would like to, because the level of force necessary to take down protests with such fervor at this scale who be reminiscent to the force used in the Tiananmen Square massacre of 1989. Any significant bloodshed would j

Just by looking at pictures, you can see what 800,000 people mobilizing together looks like. It feels like every time I look at news, something new has happened with the protests. It was interesting to hear how adamant Hong-Kong residents are about not becoming like China.

It is crazy to see just how many people are willing to demonstrate even with the risk of government retaliation. This also hints at the fact that the number of people who supports these ideas must be many times larger.

This article addresses China's view of education and how it should be implemented. The main political party, the Chinese Communist Party, is attempting to implement a mandatory teachers manual by 2015. The manual gives specific instruction on how and what to teach Chinese students. However, the manual did not experience the same support it did in the Communist party. Heavy criticism of the manual arose from the education Bureau and the students themselves. A hunger strike arose on Friday and a march of 32-90 thousand protesting the manual. The article is important because is it address a nation's view of education and how education should be controlled by politics. The Article also shows how a major political party can not always be the most popular with the people.

Interesting. Of course, China is a communist country, so it is also interesting that citizens feel empowered to protest. Among democratic regimes, France also has a very scripted education program: my understanding is that the daily curriculum for the whole country is set by the Education ministry, so no matter where you are in France on September 4, you will be doing the same thing as all students in your grade everywhere else in the country. Why does this fly there? Why is it much less likely to fly here in the US?

I found this topic fascinating because it addresses the internal Chinese conflict of democracy and communism. The general public (those not in the communist party and not in control) is not happy with the governments plan to initiate a national education system. With the national education system teachers and schools will no longer have the choice on how to teach their students. This article questions Communism, Democracy, Nationalism, and Patriotism, all of which are important to China.

A quick update: So, it looks like Hong Kong is going the way of Occupy. In less than 24 hours, negotiations between the HK government and students will be held. Most people, protestors and others, predict very little change will take place. They seem to agree any sort of meaningful change has to come from the issuer of the controversial voting amendment itself -- the Chinese government. There seems to be an increasing sentiment among residents that the show for Beijing needs to reach an end, because of all of the economic and mobility issue it currently presents.

'"If there are sinners and saints, I'm much more a sinner, that's for sure," he said with a gentle laugh.'

I'm curious to know how the discussion of positivity for prisoners in Hong Kong with the radio station contributes to the discussion of restorative justice in criminal justice reform.

Fascinating article, Akira. Also ironic that the biggest support system is from outside the criminal justice system. Thanks for posting.

Carrie Lam, Extradition Bill, protests

Hong Kong protesters are seeking refuge in Taiwan, but they are in a weird legal middle ground that doesn't quite prevent the Chinese government from reaching them. China has begun suspending passports of those suspected to be involved in protests to prevent them from fleeing.

China mocked the protests at the US Capitol yesterday, comparing them to the Hong Kong protests in 2019 which the US supported. They considered this an example of failing democracy and even equated twitter blocking Donald Trump to "having no freedom of speech."

I also agree with Maya as Twitter is a private company and no one is banning Trump from speaking to the press or any other form of public media.

This seems like such a poor argument by the CCP I'm not sure why they would even make it, seeing as Twitter is literally banned in China.

While not directly related to the freedom and equality paradox, I think this article is related. As freedom is going down with government restrictions on speech in Hong Kong, equality is too (as human rights abuses are more likely to continue). So maybe the freedom-equality inverse relationship is only the case in terms of economics.

yup, I think so.

I am always drawn to articles that highlight young people being involved in their local governments. They seem to be the most relevant to me and my peers' lives. This article is super interesting because it gave me a lot of information I didn't know regarding Chinese government. The main speaker/ activist at this riot was apparently a small 17 year old boy accompanied by hundreds of students fighting for a democratic election in 2017. You could tell from his words how passionate he was about the topic: "Hong Kong's future belongs to you, you and you..I want to tell C.Y. Leung and Xi Jinping that the mission of fighting for universal suffrage does not rest upon the young people, it is everyone's responsibility..I don't want the fight for democracy to be passed down to the next generation. This is our responsibility." This article was inspiring and reminded me how deeply current political decisions affect the youth; this is why I think it is important for us to at least be educated about all of the crazy world politics going on around us outside of this "American bubble" we continue to contently live in.

This article, paired with a video, gives a good on sight view of what is happening at the "Occupy Central" riots. The article does a good job of showing how there are two sides among the protestors, those who are willing to stay and possibly risk their lives so that there will be democratic reforms for the upcoming election, and those who do not believe that the issue is worth risking their lives for.

"Hong Kong (CNN)As world powers work to verify North Korea's claims that it has tested a hydrogen bomb, others are asking what the country's only real ally -- China -- will do. "

As occupy Wall Street protests spread across the globe, arrests rise in response to increased violence and disorderly conduct. In objection to the inequality of capitalism, protestors have taken to the streets in order to get their message across. The movement has spread to London, Rome, Hong Kong, Chicago, and more. Frustration at the current system has caused many protestors to seek more extreme ways to ge their message across, which in turn has led to more arrests.

Russia is hitting its highest daily cases of COVID since the beginning of the pandemic despite being the first to authorize a vaccine. They have plentiful supplies but like the U.S., they are suffering from vaccine hesitancy. Putin is ordering a one-week lockdown starting October 30th.

On second thought (in response to my initial comment on "Amnesty International to close Hong Kong offices this year"), I think that maybe a decrease in freedom can also lead to an increase in equality (in this case fewer virus cases) in a non-economic situation. Although, this lockdown in Russia is in a way economic because poorer people will suffer more and have a harder time making money.

I was surprised to hear that Russia had such low vaccination rates since they were the first to authorize the vaccine. The article says that public attitudes are "lax", especially with conflicting signals from authorities, and I wonder if these lax views on vaccination relate in any way to nationalism or to their views on freedom vs. equality.

As many take to the streets in China to protest covid restrictions, the people's dissatisfaction with freedom of expression and democracy resurface. While the effort is valiant and Chinese politicians have made certain promises to satisfy protesters, it remains unclear whether these protest will have any long-term difference. Protests in Hong Kong in 2019 were seemingly larger and had a large impact in the moment, but after the movement was suppressed, the communist party silenced those behind them. Given this past, will these protests create any real change?

I don't any change will come. The government has all the resources needed to prevent the protests and could simply slowly deploy vaccines and lessen the restrictions to stop the protests. The protests haven't been advocating for much change in the structure of Chinese society, so the government still maintains all the power.

And now the Chinese government has softened a bit to accommodate the protestors' demands for vaccines--maybe even fewer lockdowns; but not for free speech. Let's see how that goes with the protestors; will they be appeased? See https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/01/world/asia/china-covid-protests-restrictions.html