Letters | China and Hong Kong: why ‘one country, two systems’ matters to the world

Your editor, in the City Beat column on April 20, poses the question: “Can two systems coexist in a world divided?” As attitudes harden on all sides and trust becomes brittle, the realistic answer is “probably not”.

The West has long viewed Hong Kong as the “canary in the coal mine” in relation to collaboration with China. It is obvious that the recent changes in personnel at the Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office and the central government’s Liaison Office are intended to bring Hongkongers to heel, as a reaction to the massive pro-democracy protests since June last year.

The recent arrest of 15 long-time government critics is in line with mainland methods of dealing with opposition (“Opposition veterans arrested”, April 19). In reality, many of those “veterans” now have little influence over the young protesters, or even the general population. This seems to be retribution for yesterday’s war, and Hong Kong officials should know better.

The Covid-19 pandemic has contributed to nationalism around the world, and there is a growing general awareness in Western countries that China plays by different rules. If the canary that is Hong Kong falls from its “two systems” perch, many American and European politicians will advocate that their own pluralistic systems disengage from China, in an attempt to take the moral high ground.