'People's Will Trumps At Times, Despite HK System'

Pro-Beijing legal scholar Albert Chen says in his latest blog entry that Hong Kong's strong and vibrant society is able to get its way from time to time, despite the SAR having a system which is "semi-democratic ... practising soft authoritarianism".

"It has been fortunate that in this latest test of the challenging project of 'One Country, Two Systems', the HKSAR and Beijing governments ultimately chose to submit to the logic of reason rather than the logic of coercion," wrote Chen, who had raised concerns last month about the now-suspended bill, surprising many circles.

In the blog post published on Thursday, Chen noted that in authoritarian societies such mass protests wouldn't be allowed, while in democracies, governments couldn't ignore the demands of such a huge number of people. In Hong Kong, the government was unmoved after two mass protests that saw millions take part and only suspended the bill following further opposition.

Chen said the row illustrates the peculiar feature of Hong Kong "where civil liberties and civil society flourish, and yet the government is not democratically elected and accountable to the people".

But he said the pressure mounted by the people still worked, as it did in 2003 when the government was forced to withdraw a national security bill.

In the blog, Chen also touched on the matter of why Hong Kong ruled out extradition arrangements with the mainland when the relevant laws were passed in 1997.

"Apparently, at the time of enactment of these laws, it was considered that given the vast differences between Hong Kong’s common-law based legal system and the socialist legal system in mainland China, Hong Kong was not yet ready to enter into rendition arrangements with the mainland," he wrote.

Chen also said that many members of the public are still wary of the mainland system and "doubt whether it would provide a fair trial for the accused", he said.

He said the government had not only underestimated this sentiment, but apparently failed to appreciate that there is a fundamental practical difference between introducing a case-by-case extradition arrangement with the mainland and making such deals with other jurisdictions.