Philip Bowring
The former editor of the Far Eastern Economic Review, journalist Philip Bowring has been based in Asia since 1973. He’s now a columnist for the International New York Times and South China Morning Post, as well as Consultant Editor at independent news site Asia Sentinel. He talks to Yannie Chan about covering one of the city’s most scandalous bankruptcies and his refusal to kowtow to anybody.
I grew up in England. I went to school in England. I went to university in England.
I never set out to be a journalist. I wanted to be an academic, and then I decided that I wouldn’t—I’d only be a second-rate academic and so there wouldn’t be much point to it.
The first journalism I did was when I was in Sudan. In fact, I think I wrote the first ever article about the rebellion in Southern Sudan.
I’m not a direct descendent of John Bowring [the 4th Governor of Hong Kong]. I’m a descendent of his first cousin. It’s entirely by chance that I came here.
There are issues I’ve been involved in that have made quite an impact. One of those was the biggest financial scandal and bankruptcy in Hong Kong’s history, about Carrian Group and the series of collapses in the early 1980s.
I suppose I’d look back on my writing then that predicted the bank collapses as the best journalism I ever did. But it’s not something that would’ve been seen by the outside world as particularly exciting.
