Enter the dragon: China's courtship of Hong Kong, 1982-1999

From 1982, when the Chinese government first signalled its intention to tak e back Hong Kong, to the actual transfer of sovereignty in 1997, the PRC en gaged in a long-term campaign to "win friends and influence people" in the British colony. Hoping to prevent a large-scale flight of capital and manpo wer, and wishing to cultivate a core group of sympathetic local notables as future political leaders, Beijing issued frequent pledges of non-interfere nce in Hong Kong's affairs and adopted classic "united front" tactics - fla ttering, cajoling, and otherwise wooing potential supporters while snubbing land sometimes smearing) outspoken critics. Despite intensely negative loc al reaction to the 1989 'Tiananmen Massacre", over the long haul Beijing la rgely succeeded in disarming public fears of a heavyhanded Chinese takeover . Consequently, the handover itself was an extremely calm, tranquil affair. And in the first 2 years of Hong Kong's new status as a "Special Administr ative Region" of China, the PRC earned generally high marks for honoring it s pledge to uphold the principle of "one country, two systems". (C) 1999 Th e Regents of the University of California. Published by Elsevier Science Lt d. All rights reserved.