Class/Group: Group C
Module Title: Comparative Politics
Assessment: Final Essay
Assignment Title: Choose a country and discuss the classification of its political system
Tutor Name: Stephen Ashe Student ID Number: 2089619
Date of Submission: April 8th , 2013
Hong Kong, claimed herself the ‘Asia’s world city’, has been a colony of the Great Britain since 1842 and a Special Administrative Region of China after the handover in 1997. The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, hereafter referred to as HKSAR, is under the People's Republic of China’s (“PRC”) governance but with a more independent political system which is different from the system of the state itself. The institutional framework is defined in The Basic Law, a constitutional document announced by the Seventh National People's Congress of PRC on 4th April 1990. The Basic Law ensures HKSAR remains a capitalist society and maintains a high degree of autonomy. However, some politicians consider that HKSAR only has a less-than-full democracy which still cannot be clearly defined under the control of the state (Ku, 2009). This essay will state that HKSAR is more likely a liberal democracy but with some issues restricting it of being a complete democracy.
The core value of The Basic Law is ‘One country, two systems’, an idea announced by Deng Xiaoping, a politician of the Communist Party of China. Its purpose is to mitigate Hong Kong people’s agitation and fear of the handover after over a hundred and fifty years’ governance by the Great Britain, especially under the rule of the Great Britain, Hong Kong became a well-developed and financial thriving city. Most people in Hong Kong worried about the changes which may bring by the handover. The Basic Law tries to guarantee, according to article five from The Basic Law (2013), ‘The socialist system and policies shall not be practised in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, and the previous capitalist system and way of