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THE DEMOCRACY MOVEMENT IN HONG KONG
and so on. Somewhat belatedly, the movement urged the British and Chinese governments to cooperate in working out the technicalities for a referendum in the territory on the various Basic Law proposals, to be held before the adoption of the final draft by the Chinese National People's Congress in 1990.21
But the Chinese authorities' response was predictable. Support for Louis Cha's proposal was mobilized among community leaders and traditionally pro-Beijing groups. The 'united front' strategy succeeded in prompting a number of supposedly neutral groups with no strong political stand to come out and endorse Cha's proposals; many of these
groups voiced minor reservations, but these suited Beijing's game plan just as well. The business and professional group of members of the Basic Law Consultative Committee also agreed to Cha's proposals. With the exception of Martin Lee and Szeto Wah, all the Hong Kong members of the Basic Law Drafting Committee Sub-group adopted Cha's version. The democratic movement was isolated, and it was significant that the New Hong Kong Society, a group of former student activists from the two universities, broke ranks with the movement and joined the neutral camp in endorsing Cha's proposals.
The elections of 1988
The democracy movement did, however, command support throughout this period, as was shown by the results of the elections of 1985 and 1988.
In the March 1988 District Board elections the voter turnout was 30.3 per cent of the 1.4 million registered voters (a drop of 7.2 per cent compared to the previous elections in March 1985).22 Meeting Point, the Hong Kong Affairs Society and the Association for Democracy and People's Livelihood all did well (see Table 1). Many of the successful candidates were also endorsed by the Hong Kong People's Council on Public Housing Policy and the Hong Kong Professional Teachers' Union. 23 The democracy movement gained between 30 and 40 per cent of the elected seats. The rest mainly went to the conservative political groups (backed by establishment political figures), the traditional kaifong (neighbourhood) groups and the pro-China groups. There were some independents too.
But a very large segment of the conservative business community did not take part in the elections, and the pro-Beijing forces were apparently far from being fully mobilized. Direct elections to the Legislative Council in 1991 will be a very different game. The democracy movement was concerned that many of its candidates, though re-elected, saw their previous large winning margins considerably eroded. They blamed the drop in voter turnout rate; they had to admit, though, that their opponents had become much more sophisticated in election strategy and tactics. The conserva- tives' patient yet inconspicuous work in cultural and recreational activities had begun
21. South China Morning Post, 12 Dec. 1988.
22. On the 1988 District Board elections, see Emily Lau, 'One Point for Democracy', Far Eastern Economic Review, Vol. 139., No. 12, 24 Mar. 1988, pp. 25-6. See also Joseph Cheng, 'The 1988 District Board elections-a study of political participation in the transitional period', to be published in Cheek-Milby and Mushkat, eds., Hong Kong. Most commentators considered that the release of the Feb. 1988 White Paper on 'The development of representative government: the way forward', which rejected direct elections to the Legislative Council in 1988, adversely affected the turnout. It should be pointed out that the District Board elections are direct elections based on universal suffrage, so their results provide a better indication than those of the Legislative Council elections of the democracy movement's likely performance in future direct elections to the Legislative Council. (The present elections to the Legislative Council are indirect elections, involving 'functional constituencies', in which the democracy movement is severely handicapped.)
23. Ming Pao, 12 Mar. 1988 and South China Morning Post. 16 Mar. 1988; also based on the author's interviews of the candidates and survey of their campaign pamphlets.