The conflictual church and state relations in post-handover Hong Kong Special Administrative Region under Tung Chee-Hwa's regime

: its causes and implications

Abstract

For more than one and a half centuries, the church and state relationship in Hong Kong had operated smoothly under British colonial rule. This cooperative relationship had contributed to the development and stability of Hong Kong. The Hong Kong Catholic Church has long been a prominent institution strenuously acting in the contractor role through providing essential services for society’s social, political, educational and religious functions, and it has enjoyed honourable status in society in this role. However, after the change of sovereignty in Hong Kong from Britain to China in July 1997, there occurred a change in the church and state relationship. The former cooperative relationship was replaced with a conflictual one. This puzzling change in church and state relations emerged in the administration of the first Chief Executive Mr. Tung Chee-hwa (July 1997 - March 2005) who was elected to be the first leader with the blessing of Beijing. This research study focuses on the conflictual church and state relations under the Tung Chee-hwa administration. It attempts to explain the conflictual church and state relations as well as explore what implications the conflictual relations have on the future development of civil society in Hong Kong. The evolution of church and state relations in Hong Kong will be delineated in the study by first examining the cooperative church and state relations under colonial rule. For the theoretical concerns, the study applies a model presenting the conflictual scenario on church and state relations. Theoretical frameworks are constructed by three causal factors to explain that the long China and Vatican diplomatic rift is an external factor that somehow subtly exerts a negative impact on the church and state relations in the HKSAR. Besides, the level of good governance under the first Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa’s administration was questionable. Tung’s misgoverning rule was evidenced by his failures in a series of external shocks, policy fiascos and mismanagement of crises which greatly spurred the public discontent. Furthermore, the top leaders of the Hong Kong Catholic Church adjusted their attitude from a cooperative one to one of the opposite stance towards Hong Kong’s political leaders. Since then, the local Catholic Church’s top leaders have emphasized the prophetic role in public life through challenging the injustice in society and the political leaders. Though changing into a less-privileged religious institution after the handover, the Hong Kong Catholic Church remains an active force joining civil society in propelling social changes through mass mobilizations as in the pre-handover period. Practically speaking, the confrontational tactics of the Catholic Church since the handover against the HKSAR government have advanced citizenship in the underdeveloped political society of Hong Kong. Theoretically speaking, the study has provided a theoretical framework for analyzing the conflictual church and state relational puzzle after the post-handover period.

Date of Award	2 Oct 2007
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	City University of Hong Kong
Supervisor	Ming Dixon SING (Supervisor)