'Our policy is to implement 'one country, two systems'. Specifically, that is to say, the one billion people in the People's Republic of China will practise socialism, Hong Kong and Taiwan will practise capitalism.
[The reason] we adopt the policy of 'one country, two systems' to settle the question of Hong Kong is not that we are driven by emotion, nor do we want to play tricks.
It's all based on practical needs and full consideration of the history and reality of Hong Kong.' SO SAID the late patriarch, Deng Xiaoping, architect of the formula under which Hong Kong will be administered for the next 50 years, when he met a local delegation of business leaders in June 1984.
A pragmatist known for his 'white cat, black cat' theory, Deng believed keeping Hong Kong's capitalist system and lifestyle unchanged for at least half a century was the only solution.
Simple as it sounds, putting the concept into practice is a different matter.
The process began with the drawing up of 12 basic policies by the Chinese Government after years of study and fact-finding trips to the territory in the late 1970s. The policies were spelled out in the Sino-British Joint Declaration in December 1984.
