Opinion | Business sector’s opposition to Hong Kong’s extradition bill should have sounded the alarm

As the Hong Kong government attempts to justify the police force’s disproportionate use of tear gas, rubber bullets and pepper spray, it is helpful to remember the exceedingly moderate character of the corporate staff, small-business owners and students who were out on the streets protesting this week. 

Historically, it has been rare in Hong Kong’s politics for the international business lobby to find itself on the same side as the city’s democrats.

In 2014, when the city was readying for the Occupy Central pro-democracy protests, the “big four” accounting firms warned that investors could leave Hong Kong over the protests. Leading international chambers of commerce took out ads attacking the protests, saying that the demonstrations may “cripple commerce in the city’s central business district”.

But proposals to change the city’s extradition law united these diverse interest groups in an unprecedented way. On Wednesday, Ernst and Young and Deloitte, two of the “big four” firms, previously so publicly opposed to the Occupy protests, granted their employees “flexible working hours”, which allowed some to attend the protests. Around 100 businesses announced a general strike only days after 1 million people turned up to protest.

The International Chamber of Commerce, the American Chamber of Commerce and some European chambers queued up to protest against the bill on the basis that the erosion of the rule of law and fundamental freedoms implied by proposals to allow Hong Kong to extradite people to mainland China would reduce the attractiveness of the city as an international financial hub.