Identity of the In-Between in Contemporary Hong Kong Literary Writings

Abstract

The political, economic and cultural development of Hong Kong in the last quarter of the past century has presented a theoretical problem to critics and politicians. All existing discourses of colonialism and postcolonialism are concerned about a colony which faces the rise of nationalism after it gained independence. In Hong Kong, the problem is not a future of independence after its separation from the British colonial centre but a merger with China, an Asian power in experiment with the transition from planned to market economy, and to the culture of globalization that accompanies it. China’s plan has been to include Hong Kong in its practical politics of a greater China with “one country, two systems,” which is meant to put an end to the political split of the country but with the least concern about Hong Kong’s identity. In contrast to all other postcolonial societies, Hong Kong does not have a pre-colonial past, nor does it have a postcolonial future. The anomaly of colonial Hong Kong is marked by the double absence of a past and a future, and existing only in its present.