Recorded on January 27, 2021.

Making Hong Kong China

About the Event:
How can one of the world’s most free-wheeling cities transition from being a vibrant global center of culture and finance into a subject of authoritarian control? The “one country, two systems” model China promised Hong Kong has slowly drained away in the years since the British colony was returned to Chinese rule in 1997. The people of Hong Kong riveted the world’s attention in 2019 by pouring into the streets to demand the autonomy, rule of law, and basic freedoms they were promised. Beijing responded on June 30, 2020 by imposing a new National Security Law aimed to snuff out protests. We will hear from Michael Davis, who has taught human rights and constitutional law in Hong Kong for over three decades and is author of the recently published book, Making Hong Kong China: The Rollback of Human Rights and the Rule of Law.

About the Speaker:
Michael C. Davis is a visiting professor in the Faculty of Law at the University of Hong Kong, where he teaches core courses on international human rights. He is also a global fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington DC, a senior research scholar at the Weatherhead East Asia Institute at Columbia University, and a professor of law and international affairs at O.P. Jindal Global University in India. He was a professor in the Law Faculty at the University of Hong Kong until late 2016. His scholarship engages a range of issues relating to human rights, the rule of law, and constitutionalism in emerging states, with frequent publication in such widely read public affairs journals as Foreign Affairs and the Journal of Democracy, as well as academic journals. Amnesty International, the Hong Kong Journalists Association, and the Hong Kong FCC awarded him a 2014 Human Rights Press Award for his frequent commentary in the South China Morning Post.