People avoid interdependent relationships and situations that might entail long-term obligations.
Task versus relationship orientation
Relationship oriented: Maintaining a harmonious relationship has priority over accomplishing tasks.
Task oriented: Relationships are less important than getting the work done.
Harmony versus ��Truth��
Avoid direct confrontation, open criticism and controversial topics. Concern maintaining harmony and with ��face��.
Willing to confront directly, criticise, discuss controversial topics and press personal opinions about what they consider the truth. Little concern with ��face��.
Role of laws, rules and regulations
More faith in personal relationships than in written rules and procedures for structuring interactions.
Written rules presumably apply to everyone and are assumed to produce fair, reasonable procedures and decisions.
Time consciousness
Relatively more attention to the past and to the longer-term future.
Less interested in the past; an eye on the near-term future.
Ascribed versus achieved status
Traditionally, a person��s status in the society was based importantly on inherited characteristics such as age, gender and family. This is changing.
People��s status is based mainly on their own achievements, including education obtained and level of success realised in their line of work.
Table 3.2.Merton Modes of Adaption when Strained
Typology of Modes of Individual Adaptation
Modes of Adaptation
Culturally Defined Goals (Values)
Structurally Defined Means
Explanation
Conformity
+
+
Conformity occurs when individuals accept the culturally defined goals and the socially legitimate means of achieving them. Merton suggests that most individuals, even those who do not have easy access to the means and goals, remain conformists.
Innovation
+
.
Innovation occurs when an individual accepts the goals of society, but rejects or lacks the socially legitimate means of achieving them. Innovation, the mode of adaptation most associated with criminal behaviour, explains the high rate of crime committed by uneducated and poor individuals who do not have access to legitimate means of achieving the social goals of wealth and power.
Ritualism
.
+
The ritualist accepts a lifestyle of hard work, but rejects the cultural goal of monetary rewards. This individual goes through the motions of getting an education and working hard, yet is not committed to the goal of accumulating wealth or power.
Retreatism
.
.
Retreatism involves rejecting both the cultural goal of success and the socially legitimate means of achieving it. The retreatist withdraws or retreats from society and may become an alcoholic, drug addict or vagrant.
Rebellion
+/.
+/.
Rebellion occurs when an individual rejects both culturally defined goals and means and substitutes new goals and means. For example, rebels may use social or political activism to replace the goal of personal wealth with the goal of social justice and equality.
Source: Robert K. Merton, Social Theory and Social Structure (New York: The Free Press, 1968).
Note: Key.+.=.acceptance of/access to, �V.=.rejection of/lack of access to and ./+.=.rejection of culturally defined goals and structurally defined means and replacement with new goals and means.
138
Policing in Hong Kong
139
Policing with Hong Kong Characteristics
137
4
Policing with Hong Kong Characteristics
Existence precedes essence.
Jean-Paul Sartre (1905�V1980)1
A superimposed government was the mark of the colonial status. But there must have been a society on which it was superimposed.2
D. Faure (1997)
Introduction
This chapter explores the defining features of colonial policing in Hong Kong: addressing the question of what made colonial policing in Hong Kong unique. The supposition is that policing of whatever persuasions�Xcolonial, communist or democratic�Xtook on local colour when applied3 and was cus-tomised to be effective.4 That is to say, in doing and understanding colonial policing, local context mattered.5 People might differ on the relative contri-bution of specific contextual factors�Xsocial, political, economics, cultural�Xin shaping policing, but few can deny that they were all important in their own way.6
It is argued in this chapter that colonial policing in Hong Kong exhibited a number of characteristics, otherwise not shared by other colonial police forces as a result of geography, history and culture. These characteristics defined the HKP in the 1840s as it is now, albeit in different mix and shifting significance. For example, over the years, Hong Kong people��s core identity has changed from more China oriented to now Hong Kong disposed7:
A June 2013 poll, the latest in a series released every six months, shows that identification with Hong Kong has even increased since the handover: today, 62 percent of the population identify primarily with Hong Kong and 38 per-cent exclusively. More surprisingly, the proportion is 84.3 percent among the 18 to 29 group (of which 55.8 percent identify exclusively with Hong Kong).8
Hong Kong people, starting with the young, are more in love with Hong Kong9 than being patriotic towards China. This shift in allegiance has caught the HKP in-between, when called upon to secure Hong Kong��s democratic rights versus defend China��s national interests.10
Looking further back, in the 1840s, Hong Kong people were predomi-nantly Chinese in culture, with nationalism and anti-foreignism orientation on display. In the 1950s, while the basic character of Hong Kong people�Xpatriotism and anti-foreignism�Xhas not changed, the basic constitution of Hong Kong people has changed, as a result of WWII. With the change in Hong Kong demographics and political orientation�XKMT versus PRC�Xthe HKP has to stand ready to deal with political unrests, like the 1956 Double Ten Riots.
The above brief discussion is to highlight the fact that there is much con-tinuity amidst drastic changes with the HKP and policing in Hong Kong, before and after 1997. It follows that the conventional wisdom that policing in Hong Kong has fundamentally and completely changed after 1997 is a myth. In fact, as observed, there is more continuity than change with the HKP throughout the years, for example, HKP reform in the 1990s is built upon the foundation of HKP reform in the 1950s, which radically trans-formed the HKP under colonial rule.11 This is so because conditions in Hong Kong that inform upon or set conditions for policing, such as social structure, communal culture, organisational ethos, collective identity and racial disposition rarely change. Long before 1997, Hong Kong people were integrated with mainland China, in culture, custom and habits. Otherwise, British policing culture and style has become embedded in and is part of the HKP��s genetic code.
This chapter is organised into six sections. Section I, ��Colonial Policing as Policing the Chinese��, discusses how the Hong Kong colonial officials faced difficulties in policing Chinese communities, who were long estab-lished and well disciplined before the British, making colonial rule superflu-ous, as applied to them. Section II, ��Colonial Policing as ��Chinese�� Policing��, investigates how Chinese policing works in philosophical, theoretical and practical terms. It observes that in policing and social control, the Chinese adopt an internal cultivation�Xdiscipline model, and the West pursues an external�Xpunitive strategy. The challenge to the British was in reconciling these two kinds of control system under one roof, which they did with mod-erate success with dual track justice and indirect rule. Section III, ��Colonial Policing as ��Self-Help�� Policing�� advances a ��theory of Chinese policing�� (formally, ��State Police Powers as a Social Resource Theory�� [STR]) that looks at policing from the people and not the state��s perspective. It argues that from the Hong Kong�VChinese people��s perspective, crime is less a legal violation than it is a personal problem (with expectations denied), requiring appropriate resources to address or redress. One of the fundamental propo-sitions to STR is that: ��The person who is closest to the problem, by impact and with resource, is the person to take care of the problem��. The mismatch of Chinese expectations and resources offered by the HKP precludes Hong Kong people from resorting to the HKP for help in solving their problems. Section IV, ��Colonial Policing as Policing Migrants��, looks into the effect of residency status on control by policing strategy and tactics. This gives rise to the issue of relationship policing, from intimate to stranger. Recounting Mao Tse-tung��s theory of contradiction, Section V, ��Colonial Policing as Relationship Policing��, postulates that the more intimate the relationship between individuals, the less necessary coercive policing is. Section VI is a ��Conclusion�� to this chapter and an overview to ��Part I�� of the book in theo-ries proposed, methods suggested, findings discovered, lessons learned and contributions made.
I: Colonial Policing as Policing Chinese12
The Hong Kong population, then (1841) and now (2014), is predominantly Chinese,13 and Cantonese at that (Table 4.1). Before the British arrived to take over Hong Kong as a ��barren rock��, Chinese people of different eth-nicities and clans had lived there for centuries.14 When Commodore James Bremer, Commander-in-Chief of the British Forces in China took possession of Hong Kong on 26 January 1841, the population in Hong Kong Island was: ��In the Villages and hamlets: 4,360; In the Bazaar: 800; In the Boats: 2,000; Labourers from Kowloong: 300��.15 In April 1843, there were about 19,000 people (12,561 people in March 1842) of which no more than 500 were for-eigners. By 1862, there were 123,511 residents in Hong Kong and Kowloon, of which about 1640 were European and American. The distribution of Hong Kong population has not changed much (c. 2011), while it has become more diverse, Chinese still dominate (93.6%). How alien (British) colonial officials in the minority came to rule an indigenous people (Chinese) in the majority effectively is the challenge of study and analysis.
The challenge in policing the Chinese was prominently on the mind of the colonists. In 1858, China Mail has this to say about HK governance:
With about 50 officials to govern five hundred merchants and not to govern 60,000 Chinese, who can wonder at disputes, which all our English, American, French, Germans, motormen, parsers, merchants, storekeepers, opium-sellers, gamblers and pirates, each under the supervision and control of his own control or commander, Secretary or Protector, who in their term and are under the control of a Governor, who is under the control of a Secretary of a State? All these are crowded together in a place about half as big as Hyde Park, and people at home wonder that they fall out and fight, slander, and go to law perpetually.16
The above China Mail is reported here to put into perspective the chal-lenge faced by a British minority (500) in ruling over a Chinese majority (60,000), of different ethnicities, stations in life and intentions.
In understanding the British philosophy of governance towards Hong Kong, it is best to understand Britain��s perception of China�VHong Kong. For this, it is best to consult James William Norton-Kyshe��s seminal work History of the Laws and Courts of Hongkong (1898) (HKLXHK).17 The preface of HKLCHK refers to Hong Kong as the last frontier (��Ultima Thule��), liter-ally and figuratively beyond the boundary and reach of human civilisation, to which the British empire courageously, tenaciously and determinatively reach out ��for the benefit of all mankind��:
Placed on the borders of an Empire so full of contradictions and prejudiced is China, with its uncontrolled millions, conservative and prejudiced to the backbone, a people totally ignorant and indifferent as to Western idea or modes of government, it seems as if Hongkong by its position had been destined to become the starting point from whence a civilizing power by its beneficent rule and humane laws was to endeavor to effect those reform which an uncivilized power China was ever in need of.18
As described, Hong Kong was a desolate and uncivilised place from nowhere, waiting for the British people to dominate, domesticate and civilise. Naturally, this would not turn out to be an easy task.
That said, policing in Hong Kong, then as now, is the policing of the Chinese, as distasteful a thought it was in the eyes of the coloniser. The only difference between then and now is that under British colonial rule, Hong Kong was to be governed by ��indirect rule�� coupled with ��social isolation�� and ��dual track�� justice.19 Nevertheless, whether it was ��indirect rule��, ��social isola-tion�� or ��dual track��, the task on hand was to tame the Chinese, failing that, to put them in their rightful place with draconian punishment.20
The ��indirect rule�� governance model is justified as follows:
Indirect rule reduced the costs of colonial administration, gradually incorpo-rated indigenous authorities into the colonial bureaucracy and enlisted them as agents to implement two essential aspects of colonial rule: the collection of revenue and the maintenance of law and order.�K.the gradualist polices of running Empire at minimal costs and with minimal force was a cause of self--congratulation by many colonial powers, who saw their systems of trusteeship as fulfilling the main criteria of good, if somewhat authoritarian governance.�K21
According to G.B. Endecott, during the first two 100 years of colonial rule (up until 1960s), the colony practised indirect rule. (He further opined that after the 1960s, there was equal administration under the law). Thus, Chinese communities co-existed with European communities in an autono-mous and self-sustaining way. (This was the same with other Western com-munities at the same time.)22 In fact ��the colonial authorities did indeed leave much of the work of government to the Chinese communities and made little effort to assimilate the Chinese to British rule��.23 In 1844, Governor David, himself an achieved sinologist, has this to say about regulating Chinese:
The attempt to regulate and restrain the Chinese population by European police is attended with difficulties. The ignorant of their language, their cus-toms and their persons give an insuperable advantage to the vicious part of the population and it becomes moreover a sort of patriotic combination against the rule of the foreigner. I was accordingly led to the conclusion that the Chinese in towns and villages would be best locally governed by their own system.�K.self government will be most efficient in its results and at the same time entails no charge on the colonial funds.�K24
As to ��social isolation�� (de facto) in time ��legal separation�� (de jure), in 1858, the fourth governor of Hong Kong, Sir John Bowring made this forth-right observation:
The separation of the native population from the European is nearly abso-lute. Social intercourse between the races is wholly unknown.25 A few Chinese speak a strange ��jargon�� by which they are enabled to convey their ideas to foreigners. I do not believe there is a single merchant or Tradesman in Hong Kong who speaks or understands the naive dialect, who has seen a Chinaman at his table, or admitted him to the slightest confidential intimacy. The influ-ence of the European settler upon the native mind may be said to be nil�KThere is an absolute abyss between the governors and the governed. We rule them in ignorance, and they submit in blindness.26
As to ��dual track�� justice, according to Munn, for the most part during the early colonial period (1841�V1880), the relationship between the rulers, political (British) and commercial (European), and the ruled (local Hong Kong�VChinese, migrant Chinese), was a rocky and contentious one. There was no love lost between the two. The relationship was made more difficult by the separation of race, class, language and culture made apparent by hab-its, custom and lifestyle, often reified in good versus evil terms. This led to suspicion and discrimination from the coloniser and misunderstanding and resistance from the colonised. Still, the differences between the British and Chinese�Xsocial, cultural, economic and political�Xhad to be reconciled.
The colonists were afflicted by this sense. In the end, instead of leaving the Chinese alone, as envisioned by ��indirect�� rule, the British sought to regu-late and control the Chinese in multifarious ways.
Rather than simply dismiss the ��maintenance of law and order�� as the simple and unremarkable qualification to a general policy of non-intervention, as many historians do, it focuses on the issues of criminal justice by a govern-ment that sought legitimacy in ��equal law�� an ��impartial justice�� yet believed that the solutions to the colony��s many problems lay in special forms of polic-ing and punishment for the Chinese population.27
Thus, racial isolation and political submission had to be secured by -separate legal regimes, with the barrel of the gun if needed.
Still, the British government hung on to their belief that it was their pro-fessed destiny as a superior race and advanced culture to pacify and, in time, civilise the Chinese population through British high ideology, magnanimous rule, benevolent governance and effective administration. In this regard, Hong Kong was not only to be a free trading port par excellence, but also a shining example of the best colonial rule the British had to offer in China.
However, many Hong Kong residents, including the foreign communi-ties, resented direct British rule from the White Hall. They considered it a bad idea to apply English law to Hong Kong. They wanted to be left alone. Failing that, they wanted to have a say over what and how British law was applied to Hong Kong28:
We are far from London where government is uncertain of local conditions. It should welcome information from Hong Kong officials and local residents about our needs. The Plenipotentiary is active and zealous but he is only one man and may not be able to think of everything. The administration of jus-tice in cases of serious crime must be considered. We need laws adapted for enforcement here rather than a precise copy of English law. We do not need the whole English statute book�Xjust those laws that relate to our specific prob-lems like property crime ashore and afloat. (Letter to the Editor from Observer dated 2.5.43) (Italics supplied)
The major problem with policing Chinese then was how to adapt British law to Chinese culture and Hong Kong conditions. When in doubt and frus-tration, the British colonial high officials and HKP street officers often turned a blind eye and took a could-not-care-less attitude, unless something hap-pened that required their attention or where the community sought help.29 This was the case with street hawking in the 1950s at Yau-ma-tei, one of Hong Kong��s principal urban areas. The HKP refused to do anything, so the responsibility of regulating the hawkers fell on the shoulders of the Chinese community leaders30:
In the pre-war period there used to be fewer hawkers on Temple Street than today. The street was deserted. Ng Kong lived in Mau Lam Street and Nathan Road. He seldom strolled around Public Square Street and Yung Shu Tau. As soon as the war was over, many outdoor singing stands were erected on Market Street (present site of the Public Library). Performances were staged every night and $10 was charged. Now the stands have moved into shopping premises and there are performances throughout the day. When Ng Kong joined the Yaumatei Kai Fong Welfare Advancement Association, he started to patrol around Temple Street and Yung Shu Tau frequently in order to fulfill his responsibility in the Association. When Tang Kai took the post of chief director, Temple Street became prosperous. Hawkers sometimes fought and quarreled with one another, fighting for more booth space. The police took a blind eye on this. The Association worked on reconciliation and delineated booths of 3��.��.6�� all along Temple Street. Hawkers were invited to register in the Association. Hawker numbers were allocated by lucky draw. Everyone was satisfied at this arrangement. Yet, the cooked food stalls on Temple Street were not managed by the Association. Now the task of booth delineation is done by the police. The area under control is similar to the one managed by the Association in the past. Yung Shu Tau was close to Yau Ma Tei Police Station. The police handle all the vice there. In the past, Tau Hau Temple was not enclosed by walls. People did not care about public order when worshipping. When Guan Yin opened the repository, worshippers crowded the Temple. Some of them worshipped and burned incense outside the Temple. Now the Temple was enclosed by shorter walls. And the police will set up barrack to maintain order at various festivals.
This is community policing at its best�Xcommunity self-regulation, with the HKP in the wing. To this age-old theory and practice of Chinese com-munity policing, this chapter turns.
II: Colonial Policing as Chinese Policing
From the earliest time, the Hong Kong Chinese residents were left to their own accord, in fighting crime and policing community. This was especially the case in the Kowloon, New Territories and water region.
Thus, colonial policing was also Chinese policing, that is, Chinese polic-ing Chinese, such as the District Watch Force. One of the least explored sub-ject in HKP research is how Chinese police the Chinese, then (in different colonial era: before 1900, before 1945, before 1997) and now (SAR era), com-paratively. In the following, the principles and practices of Chinese policing are explored.
Social Control Organisation and Philosophy
Historically, social control in China is decentralised and organised around natural communal and intimate groups, for example, family and clan,31 with governmental endorsement and support.32 Local social control is institution-alisation. The emperor rules the state by and through his officials who in turn govern the people by and through the family head and community lead-ers.33 Such decentralised, grassroot, social control practice was informed by Confucian teachings34:
Wishing to govern well in their states, they would first regulate their fami-lies. Wishing to regulate their families, they would first cultivate their per-sons. Wishing to cultivate their persons, they would first rectify their minds. Wishing to rectify their minds, they would first seek sincerity in their knowl-edge. Wishing for sincerity in their thoughts, they would first extend their knowledge.35
When asked, ��What is meant by ��in order rightly to govern the state, it is necessary first to regulate the family��.��, Confucius answered:
It is not possible for one to teach others, while he cannot teach his own family. Therefore, the ruler, without going beyond his family, completes the lessons for the state. There is filial piety:�Xtherewith the sovereign should be served. There is fraternal submission:�Xtherewith elders and superiors should be served. There is kindness�Xtherewith the multitude should be safe. 36
Thus, functional social control in China was supplied informally and extra-judicially. This resulted from deliberate state policy,37 building upon existing natural communal structure,38 established cultural habits39 and entrenched customary practices.40 Hence, while in theory, the local magistrates (��yamen��) were supposed to be in total control on all matters in rural China, in practice, broad police powers were conceded to the local community and exercised by the family.41
The authority of the Chinese pater familias was much stronger than intra-familial leadership required; and he owed his extraordinary power essentially to the backing of the despotic state. Disobedience to his orders was punished by the government. On the other hand, the local officials could have him beaten and imprisoned, if he was unable to keep the members of his family from vio-lating the law. Acting as a liturgical (semi-official) policeman of his kin group, he can scarcely be considered the autonomous leader of an autonomous unit.42
James Hayes described in detail how customary law and informal social control in China worked in China at the turn of the century, which was maintained in New Territories until it was eroded due to industrialisation and urbanisation after WWII and with the creation of new towns:
Overall, the customary law catered for most situations arising in the family, the village and the market. It provided a highly effective means of carrying out local administration without the presence of imperial officers in the vil-lage, or even in the sub-districts. Up to a point, one could even say that com-munities ran themselves. So long as they kept the peace and paid the land-tax, enabling the District Magistrate and his superiors in the provincial adminis-tration to fulfil their prime obligations to the central government in Beijing, they were generally left alone. Application of the customary law rested upon public opinion. The consensus view was a powerful force in each place. People were usually acquainted with each other, and everyone was presumed to know the rules. Deviations from accepted practice were soon known and usually condemned. Social and economic sanctions of different degree were applied to offenders, including the ultimate deterrent of expulsion from the lineage or village, or even execution. They were administered by the elders and local gen-try, with public consent and official support, and carried much weight within what was virtually a closed society. Behind the elders stood the more fearful figure of the county magistrate, to whom serious offenders could be referred, or in some cases even conveyed bodily.43
James Hayes�� observations as a Hong Kong district officer working in New Territories echoed those of Professor Mark Anton Allee, a sinologist conducting research on state and society relationship in Taiwan:
A significant dynamic in late imperial Chinese history is the escalating ten-sion between private and public at the local level. The proliferation of guilds, temple associations, and sectarian assemblies, and poetry and literary societ-ies, secret societies, militia and self-defense organizations and the like were manifestations of a trend toward the creation of interest groups whose opera-tion was largely outside local government. �K.In response, during the nine-teenth century some local governments made strenuous efforts to increase the articulation and sophistication of their administrative control by utilizing town and village leaders a step below the gentry elite in status.44
What then are the philosophical principles, theoretical postulates, and cultural parameters informing such practices. More significantly, how do they justify and explain colonial policing in Hong Kong, from inception to 1997.
Social Control Principles
Chinese traditional thoughts on social regulation and crime control were informed by the following premises (Table 4.2):
1. Crime control is a local, indigenous and above all a family affair.45
2. Crime control starts with prevention. Prevention addresses early symptoms.46
3. To be effective, crime prevention must be a multi-faceted, compre-hensive and integrated enterprise, involving the individual, family, clan, neighbour, community and the state.47
4. To be effective in controlling people and fighting crime, a variety of measures have to be used. Thus it was said by a Confucians that the best way to regulate people was to ��inspire them with justice, correct them with administration, guide them with rites, keep them straight with honesty, appeal to them with benevolence, reward them with benefits, persuade them to follow��.48 More specifically, crime control can be best achieved through moral education and supplemented by fast, severe and speedy punishment.49
5. Crime control will not be successful without also addressing the root causes of crime, such as the moral degeneration of the individual50 and criminogenic conditions of the environment.51
Consistent with the above Confucius ideas and ideals, crime preven-tion and social control in traditional China was realised through indigenous groups�Xstarting with the family that provided the education and discipline for character building, the neighbours who provided the supervision and sanction against deviance, and the community that set the moral tone and customary norms to guide conduct. Finally, the state acted as the social con-trol agency of a last resort in providing punishment against crimes, and eco-nomic maintenance and social welfare to anticipate civil disorder.52
Chinese Jurisprudential Ideas and Ideal: ��Qing Li Fa��
The British rule of law and concept of justice was not accepted by the Hong Kong people because they laboured under different jurisprudential principles and ideas of justice. To the Chinese, rule of law (fa) is not a supreme conduct norm, but the particularity of human circumstances (qing) is.
The legal concepts and jurisprudential principles of ��Qing�� ��Li�� ��Fa�� (<<���z�k>>) (hereinafter QLF) or ��ren qing�� (��human nature/relation/com-passion��)70 versus ��tian li�� (��heavenly principles��)71 or ��qing li�� (��accepted code of conduct��)72 or ��lun li�� (ethical principles)73 versus ��guo fa�� (��state law��) domi-nated ideals and ideas behind Chinese legal qua general culture.74
QLF are embedded and inter-related75 cultural tenets, espoused and dynamic76 ethical percepts in imperial China.77 Together, they informed social practices and guided personal conduct. As jurisprudential principles, QLF considered independently and as a whole is central to the formulation of legislation, implementation of law and dispensation of justice, and indeed all life choices, in imperial China.
The importance and impact of QLF in Chinese culture and social inter-course can be gauged by looking at popular culture practices.78 Chinese people then as now make and evaluate social, economic, political or legal judgement of all kinds as ��he qing he li�� (compatible with human nature and reason)79 or ��bu he qing li fa�� (not being compatible with ��QLF��).80
The ultimate objective of lawmakers and judicial officials was to actualise QLF as a way of life, that is, to establish a harmonious81 and peaceful world wherein the ideas and ideals of Confucius hold sway.82 Everything should be found in its proper place and intercourse with each other should be conducted in a harmonious and well-balanced83 manner without conflicts or disputes.84
However, notwithstanding the importance of QLF, there are very few Occidental legal or jurisprudential publications on this subject matter. This lack of Western literature hampers existing understanding and scholarship of Chinese (Hong Kong) law in theory and practice.
Supremacy of ��Qing�� over ��Li��
In imperial China, human conduct was judged by and regulated with ��li�� (rites), which were inculcated through ��jiao�� (education) and not with ��fa�� (law) enforced by means of ��xing�� (punishment). Law is established to supple-ment the rites, and brought into play as a last resort. Doctrinally, this is called the Confucianisation of the law.85
Confucianisation preached that rites provide the law with content and spirit. Law is used to promote Confucian ideas and ideals. In judicial practice, law is based on Confucius teachings and Confucius teachings are resorted to in interpreting and applying the law. This is called ��jing yi jue yu�� (deciding cases based on Confucius teachings).86
How Judges Apply ��Qing-Li-Fa��87
What was being called for in order to be a QLF judge in imperial China?
When resolving disputes or rendering judgement,88 Chinese imperial officials started with a search for the truth before exercising discretion, as guided by law. Song Emperor Gao Zhong called for ��yuan qing ding zui�� (determining guilt based on true facts): ��Once a law is promulgated, it will never change. However, facts and circumstances are always different. Since law is to forestall evil, (judges need to) ascertain all the facts before positing guilty. They need to get to the truth of the matter��.89
��Yuan qing ding zui�� (deciding guilt based on true facts) required the officials to discover the cause of the incident and motive of people, before passing judgement.
First, by understanding others (motives), there comes an understanding of their action, and with that, naturally, more identification with and com-passion for their plight. This is the doctrine of ��yuan qing shi you ke men��. In essence, the more one knows, the more one understands, and the more one understands, the more one can identify�Xempathise and sympathise�Xwith the offender.
Second, the more knowledge there is, the more one can see the person��s act as normal than abnormal. People have their own reasons, inaccessible to others and incomprehensible to society, in doing things the way they do. Epistemologically, understanding requires knowing more, judging less.
Third, a person��s liability and punishment should be determined with reference to motive or what comes from the heart (��xin��).90 Well-intended action should not be punished, or at least punished less. Evil intentions are punished with or without being manifested in action.
Fourth, in passing judgement, the yardstick is ��ren qing�� and ��tienli��. The issue here is did the defendant do something a normal person would do in a similar situation,91 or what comes naturally to a person of similar status and under similar circumstances?
Fifth, officials were required to apply law on the books to facts in the street, finding concrete individual justice with abstract general justice prin-ciples. This required the fitting of sterile, monolithic and inflexible laws to divergent contexts, moving events and dynamic situations. This required officials to differentiate between people and determine the existence of miti-gating and aggravating circumstances that ultimately bore upon moral cul-pability, social accountability and criminal liability. Specifically, officials should treat offenders lightly when circumstance dictated, that is, ��qing qing fa zhong�� (literally ��facts light and law serious��). In ��qing zhong fa qing�� cases (literally ��facts serious and law light��), the officials were supposed to levy more punishment.92
Finally, officials followed the principle of compassion, that is, ��zui yi cong qing�� (treat doubtful cases lightly). In essence, if in doubt, offenders should be spared heavy punishment.93
Given different social control philosophies, structures and practices and divergent jurisprudence principles and justice percepts detailed herein, it should come as no surprise that the Chinese resented colonial rule. They avoided British justice, rather seeking out self-help to solve their problems. Lest people misconstrued Chinese resentment and avoidance as signs of challenge to colonial government��s political legitimacy and acts of defiance, it is straightforward to show they were not. Chinese resentment and avoid-ance were acts of (negative) self-help. Why pile up more problems (expecta-tion denied) by wasting time and getting frustrated in teaching old British dogs new tricks? Visiting with British officials on their best of days was an identity-denying and culture-bruising experience. Interfacing with the British at any level and in all occasions disturbed one��s authenticity, sense and sensitivity.94
III: Colonial Policing as Self-Help Policing95
Self-Help Policing in Chinese Philosophy
What is meant by ��self-help policing�� in a Chinese context? Historically, the Chinese sage scholars adopted a governing philosophy and offered a system of moral principles that aimed at creating an orderly world by developing a wholesome person and promoting harmonious relationship, not by impos-ing rules, sanctioning conduct and punishing people. More specifically, people are to be internally driven, not externally regulated, starting with self-cultivation96:
The ancients who wished to illuminate ��illuminating virtue�� all under Heaven first governed their states. Wishing to govern their states, they first regu-lated their families. Wishing to regulate their families, they first cultivated their personal lives. Wishing to cultivate their personal lives, they first recti-fied their hearts and minds. Wishing to rectify their hearts and minds, they first authenticated their intentions. Wishing to authenticate their intentions, they first refined their knowledge. The refinement of knowledge lay in the study of things. For only when things are studied is knowledge refined; only when knowledge is refined are intentions authentic; only when intentions are authentic are hearts and minds rectified; only when hearts and minds are rec-tified are personal lives cultivated; only when personal lives are cultivated are families regulated; only when families are regulated are states governed; only when states are governed is there peace all under Heaven. Therefore, from the Son of Heaven to the common people, all, without exception, must take self-cultivation as the root.97
Thus observed, self-cultivation (self-policing) holds the key to the better-ment of mankind and personal discipline leads to an orderly society.98 The most famous of all of Confucius�� admonitions in this regard is perhaps the following: ��Direct the people with moral force and regulate them with ritual, and they will possess shame, and moreover, they will be righteous�� (Analect: 2.3). As a result, Confucian ideas of ��self-cultivation, discipline the family, govern the country and pacify the world�� (xiushen qijia zhiguo pingtianxia) are well integrated into China��s cultural beliefs, social practices99 and politi-cal programme.100
There were five reasons why the people in China shunned the involve-ment with the ��police��, socially and intellectually.
First, the police were considered as not necessary in an intimately related, tightly bonded and closely watched community that was China��s past.101 Self-discipline, family surveillance and social pressure were considered sufficient to induce conformity and regulate conduct.
Second, officials/police were considered to be outside the community one is born into. Community disputes and personal problems are to be resolved within the tight-knitt in-group.102
Third, culturally, the Chinese were taught to avoid confrontation and absorb affronts.103 They were expected to seek accommodation through toler-ance and resolve disputes through mediation,104 at all costs.105
Fourth, involvement with the officials and association with the police spelled trouble for all concerned, that is, punishment and loss of ��face�� or ��reputation��.106 The saying ��not entering officials�� doorstep while alive, not going to hell when dead�� (��shen buru guan men, si buru diyu��) was widely shared and strictly abided; hell and government were considered similarly horrendous, unfathomable experiences!
Fifth, petty law enforcement agents (xuli) enjoyed low socioeconomic status in Chinese society. They were uneducated and came from usually the underclass, if not the underworld. They were mostly corrupt,107 exploitative and oppressive.108 Their work was considered as dirty or profane, that is, associated with law breakers and involved with disputes.109 Thus, policing was best left to the police, not to be heard from.110 There was no need to record their activities much less study them. This attitude still prevails today, for example, young people are discouraged from joining the police.111
Self-Help Policing as Imperial Rule
Long before the police came to China, the emperor relegated social control responsibility to the locals, namely, family and clans. When the Chinese are away from home, as sojourns or migrants, they look towards multi-aid organisation for support and security, and are bonded therewith. This was done in deference to ideology (Confucianism) and out of necessity (small government). Groves observed:
Even at times of optimal efficiency, the ability of the imperial government was limited only because officials and military forces were thinly spread over China��s large land mass. Routine police functions were largely rested in mutual responsibility systems, the heads of which were answerable to the dis-trict magistrate.112
The Chinese self-help approach to local policing�Vsocial control anticipated the Western mode by thousands of years. This is what is said of the need for and the advantage of ��self-policing society�� in the 1990s; basically, institution-alised and professionalised policing, however efficient and effective, is not able to deal with crime and disorder problems, living among the people 24/7 and with every social transaction and human encounter. Conversely, as the Chinese Emperor realised, he was not omnipotent and omnipresent and thus was likely not to be of much help when things happened tens of thousands of miles away:
The principles that lie behind this self-policing approach are simple. Society needs to change its relationship with the police. Rather than relying on the police to solve our crime problems society must take more responsibility itself. But that means creating effective intermediate institutions within civil society as well as links with the police which would allow more effective self-policing. One of the police��s main roles should be to strengthen sources of authority within society, to strengthen society��s ability to police itself.113
Self-Help Policing before the British
Long before the arrival of the Chinese magistrate and British colonialists to Hong Kong, the indigenous Chinese population learned to look after them-selves, that is, self-help.114 Traditional Chinese society yearned for harmony (�w��) and abhorred chaos (��).115 They relished personal relationships (���Y) and loathed disputes.
The family held disorderly conducts in check and disputes were resolved through mediation, self-help in action.
In colonial Hong Kong, the operative unit of self-help was not the indi-vidual or community, but the family.116
The elemental organization unit of the Chinese society in Hong Kong is the familial group, which constitutes the primary focus of identification of the Chinese people. It is also the core of a primary resource network within which resources and services are exchanged, and through which many of the salient needs of the Hong Kong Chinese are met.117
Indeed, it is said, every person (household) tends to his own snow, and not worry about the frost on other��s roof (�U�H�۱����e��, ���ޥL�a�ˤW��). More to the point, each family had its own rule, just as the country had its own law (�a���a�W, �꦳��k).
The repair of broken relationships brought about by disputes rested with insiders (the head of household), not the outsiders (magistrate).118 The justi-fications were threefold. First, the family head has the interest, knowledge, status, capacity and authority to intervene. Second, the family is closest to the manifestation (impact test) and roots (solution test) of a family problem. Third, the magistrate, as an outsider (�a�ण�y�~��119), has little legitimacy or competency to meddle with family affairs, a small kingdom unto itself.120 The conventional wisdom was that even a good judge cannot resolve a family dispute (�M�x���f�a�x��). In theoretical terms, the magistrate is furthest from the problem to be resolved. The rationale was that the father being the head of the family (�@�a���D) is responsible for the well-being of the family because he knows best, cares more and has the personal capacity and moral obligation to keep the house in order; failing that, the father is held person-ally responsible. The saying here is ��harmonious families are prosperous families�� (�a�M�U�ƿ�). Lastly, visiting the magistrate was the last and worst option. Visiting the magistrate brings shame on the family and punishment to the individual. The conventional refrain is never enter official door when alive, nor hell after death (�ͤ��J�x��121 �����J�a��). Visiting the ��yamen�� would end up being punished, as the Chinese saying goes: ��One is spanked before ever seeing an official�� (��.�x�����K�Q�j�O).
When the head of the family intervened in a dispute, he assumed an all-purpose problem-solving role (family-oriented problem solving [FOPS]122: determining facts, pacifying parties, articulating rules, finding responsibil-ity, settling grievances, anticipating future, imposing discipline, resolving differences, mediating arguments, rehabilitating relationship, or generally mending expectation gaps of all kinds and shape wherever it can be found. FOPS is Q�VL�VF in action.
FOPS is a restorative and integrative project, what we now call ��restorative justice��123 and ��reintegration shame��.124 Much like problem-oriented policing (POP) (Goldstein), in modern-day community policing, problem solving in a Chinese family is directed at finding a solution to a multifaceted problem, in a comprehensive and integrated manner. Unlike POP, it is not about solving other��s problem (community oriented), but only one of self (family anchored). Whatever it is, family problem solving is not about rule enforcement or pun-ishment. It is about restoring order, starting with rebuilding relationships.
The head of the household is the best person to solve problem because he has all the resources�Xpersonal, intellectual, moral, social, economic and legal�Xat his disposal to solve the problem on hand (see ��State Police Power as a Social Resource Theory�� below). If the head of the family cannot solve the problem, for example, lack of legal resource, the magistrate (in the modern day, a police officer) can be called upon to help as a last resort, and reluctantly so. This is what is meant by self-help policing.125
Chinese Theory of Self-Help
Self-help policing is also called expectation policing. It is so called because at the end of the day, what everyone wants is to solve his or her problem by hav-ing his or her expectations met. The theory behind self-help policing is ��State Police Power as a Social Resource Theory�� (SRT).
SRT is a people��s theory of policing. It looks at disputes, crime and prob-lem solving of all kinds from the people��s, not the state��s perspective. The central thesis of SRT is that people are given to self-help problem solving, naturally and instinctively, since birth. When people fall, they instinctively try to break their fall. Collaterally, the person who is closest to a problem is the best person to solve the problem. We are the first and only one who know our own problem best. When we fall, we and only we know where it hurts and how to alleviate the pain.
SRT addresses three main questions: What is the role and function of the police? What is the relationship of the police with the people? Why do people call the police? SRT (re)conceptualises crime and police from the per-spective of the people, not that of the state. From the people��s perspective crimes are personal problems. Problems are unmet expectations resulting from resource deficiencies. Police are a social resource made available to the people by the state in solving their own problems. In terms of foundation, SRT is a theory of the people, a theory of democratic governance, a theory of empowerment and a theory of self-help.
SRT Theoretical Statements
Proposition #1: Police are born with and tend to problems.126 People confront problems routinely; some of them are called crime.
Proposition #2: To the people, problems of everyday life are unmet expectations, resulting from the existence of expectations and a lack of resources to fulfill them.
Proposition #3: All problems can be solved by redefining expect actions and/or acquiring necessary resources.
Proposition #4: When people have unmet expectations, they will take affirmative action to solve problems; this is called self-help.
Proposition #5: People experience crime as a personal problem not as a legal violation.
Proposition #6: People call the police because they do not have (or unwilling to spare) the necessary resources to deal with their prob-lems, crime and non-crime.
Proposition #7: People call the police because they are resources of legit-imacy and coercion.
Proposition #8: Police power is a kind of emergency (social) resources made available to the people to solve their problems.
Proposition # 9: The more the resources at the disposal of the people, the less the problems the people will be confronted with.
Proposition#10: The more the resources at the disposal of the people, the less they have to call on the police when the problem (crime) happened.
Proposition #11: The more (adequate and appropriate) the resources at the disposal of the police, the more effective they are in solving peo-ple��s problem.
Proposition #12: The less (adequate and appropriate) the resources at the disposal of the police, the more likely they will resort to illegal or extra-legal means in solving people��s problem.
Proposition #13: The person who is closest (impact, information, knowl-edge) to a problem is and should be the person to solve the problem.
Definitions
��Police�� is defined as follows: ��Police is a depository and coordinator of social resources. Police is an all-purpose emergency problem solver who is autho-rised to use ��legitimacy�� and ��coercive�� resources to solve people��s problems in a domestic situation and during peaceful time��.
��Expectation�� is defined as ��human wants and needs, materially, mentally or psychologically��.
��Problem�� is defined as ��Unrealised expectation(s) of wants or needs due to resource deprivation��.
��Resource�� is defined as ��things of all kinds, including power, time, mate-rials, skills, culture, ideas, and knowledge that can satisfy ones expectations of want and needs��.
��Legitimacy�� is defined as ��that which is endorsed, supported and pro-moted by duly constituted political authority, which illicit intuitive respect and demand habitual obedience��.
��Self-help�� is defined as ��action taken by individual or groups to solve a problem, that is, meeting expectations with resources��.
Radical Theory of Policing
SRT starts with a basic observation that in a state run by the people we must understand how the people conceive of the nature of crime (as expectations) and role of the police (as a resource).127
From the perspective of the state, crime is a legal violation. From the perspective of the people, crime is a set of life experience, and a multifaceted personal problem.
From the perspective of the state, police power is a political resource to secure control, maintain order128 and command obedience.129 It is defined coercively, structured legally, organised bureaucratically and imposed unilaterally.
From the people��s perspective, police power is a social resource made available by the state and drawn upon by the citizens to handle personal emergencies or crisis situations. More significantly, in the eyes of the peo-ple, police power is not reconstructed in political image, structured by law, organised with reference to police needs130 but dictated by the people and negotiated to fit the personal circumstances and situational needs the prob-lem calls to mind.
Policing from People��s Perspective
Looking at the police��s role and functions from the public��s perspective, they can be justified on a number of grounds.
First, SRT calls for looking at life course problems from the people��s perspective, as a matter of birthright and process of maturation. In Kant��s words, ��Enlightenment is man��s emergence from his self-imposed immatu-rity. Immaturity is the inability to use one��s understanding without guidance from another��.131
This means empowering the people to meet their own personal needs,.supplying them with the necessary resources, on demand and as required.
Second, SRT corrects the lopsided relationship between police and the people by returning the people to the centre stage, and putting them in con-trol, thus achieving the communalisation, socialisation or personalisation of crime.
Third, SRT marks a shift of focus from a state-centred community-ori-ented policing to a people-driven policing.132
Fourth, SRT gives ��social�� meaning and lends ��emotional�� content to police�Vpeople activities, which is what policing is all about, that is, dealing with personal issues, human problems and relationship diffi-culties of one form or another.133 In so doing, it socialises and human-ises the police�Vpeople interface, making police business a truly peoples�� business.134
Fifth, SRT liberates the police from the sterile confinement of the law and stifling restrains of the bureaucracy. It gets away from the one-size-fits-all ��McDonaldisation�� of police (burger, cheese burger and double cheeseburger are still a burger) strategy and practices.
Sixth, SRT recognises that police work should be as diverse and complex as people��s problems, that is, policing changes with time, place, people, con-text, circumstances and situations.
Seventh, and most importantly, SRT allows the people to be heard. For all too long, the public is an object of policing when in fact they are, and should be, the subject of policing. Instead of being policed, police and people are engaging in problem solving.
The legal anthropologist has contributed much, through the study of ��trouble cases��, to our understanding of how indigenous people of other cul-tures settle disputes and deal with problems. Such research informs that the problems of everyday life look and feel very differently from the inside rather than the outside point of view.135
SRT as proposed�Xpeople solving their own problem with state resource�Xis consistent with the civil society movement,136 privatisation of police trend137 and alternative dispute resolution initiative.138 The theory, if ever fully realised, allows people to be masters of their own affair. They have the right to dictate and control the extent and manner of the state��s involve-ment in their life choices.
Legalisation of People��s Problems
When police powers are exercised by state officials to enforce the law, for example, criminal arrest, or invoked by the public to deal with a problem, for example, call for police assistance, it automatically transforms the nature and handling of the ��situation��139 on hand.
When the public calls the police, it gives the state the opportunity to transform a private/personal matter into a public/legal one. This amounts to the bureaucratisation/legalisation/professionalisation of a private or per-sonal problem, transforming/converting it into one that is recognisable by the police and actionable in court.
In being captured by law, a personal problem loses much of its attributes and meaning derived from the social milieu, communal setting, interper-sonal relationship, historical context and situational dynamics of which it is an integral part, or what the ��situation�� in situ is all about.
The process and effect of transformation of a private affair into a public matter on the event and people involved is best described by Manning:
As the message moves the system, it loses the implicit, connotative mean-ings associated with the polysemic nature of what was reported to have happened and becomes more denotative, represented in police classifica-tion, and is treated by the organization more as something to sort out and deal with and less as a reflection of a complex, emotional, sensate event. I shall refer to this as bureaucratization of social and personal problems. (Manning 1983:176)
Legalisation of a problem also shifted the ownership and arena of dealing with the problem from the public to the state.
Discussion
In scientific theory, building conceptual building blocks that are existen-tially authentic and beyond dispute are necessary. The concept for theory of self-help is personal and individual expectation. People all over have expec-tations and unmet expectations give rise to problems requiring resource supplement.
What the SRT describes, at a theoretical level, is that people are born with expectations of all kinds, for example, Maslow hierarchy of needs, from security needs to actualisation needs.140 Expectation is the motiva-tor and driver for personal action. People react to expectations in different and unique ways. This is ��self-help�� in action. When we are hungry, we seek food. When we are exposed to cold, we seek shelter. Each life encounter and personal experience, reducible to stimulus, generates multiple unmet expectations. Each unmet expectation results in untold number of self-help action to fulfill. Expectations dissipate when met by appropriate and adequate resources. Since a problem is constituted of multiple expectations denied, no one person has all the appropriate or adequate resource to meet with all the expectations.
Self-help entails gathering of resources. Self-help resource gathering pro-cess moves in three directions for different reasons.
First, it moves from the most impacted to the least�Xfrom victims, to family to society. Impact gives rise to self-help. People are differentially moti-vated, depending on impact factor, more or less.
Second, it moves from the most intimate to the least intimate�Xfamily, clan, community and strangers. Intimacy predicts impact, and with it moti-vation to act. Intimacy is itself a valuable resource.
Third, it moves from one with most, and most appropriate resource to the least�Xfrom expert to novice.
The most versatile and powerful resources, in ascending order, are infor-mation, knowledge and wisdom. A wise person as a resourceful person can define problems through reflection and understanding. To the wise, all problem as expectations denied is a figment of imagination.141 On the other extreme, the person who lacks information or knowledge can also avoid problem through ignorance (ignorance is bliss thesis).
Finally, a person can remove expectation at its source, that is, cognition, by suicide. Suicide is ultimate self-help.
SRT is a scientific theory of policing. It postulates that, when people are confronted with crime, they will conduct self-help policing. The first step is an expectation versus resource audit. After the audit, people will seek resources, wherever they can be found, to reduce expectation deficits, start-ing with the closet to the furthest, for example, putting hands over a wound to stop bleeding, calling family for emotional support and summoning police for legal remedy.
Application
In the early years of Hong Kong, that is, before 1900, the expectations of the Chinese, indigenous and migrants, were many, and resources were few. They had to rely on self-help or resourcefulness in tending to their expectations and needs. This was so for a number of reasons.
First, the Chinese (locals�Xresidents [Hong Kong�XChinese]; transient workers [Chinese�XHong Kong]; economic migrants [Chinese�XChinese]) lived in a different�Xsocial, cultural, economic, geographic�Xworld than the British. For analysis purposes, expectations are real in consequences, however derived. The Chinese had different expectations in life and about life than the British. The Chinese also differed among themselves, depending on where they came from, what they did and with whom they were associated. These are commonly called cultural differences, but they might have been due to any number of causes and conditions, such as ethnic rivalry or economic compe-titions, that had little to do with culture. The differences of Chinese within Chinese and British were real, and did not go unnoticed in overseas Chinese community and scholarship: ��Rather, it is to foreground the fact that, in the insistent invocation of a Chinese tradition�Xand with it Chinese readers with Chinese habits, sensibilities, perspectives, points of views, and so forth�Xsel-dom, if ever, has the question been asked; what exactly is meant by Chinese?��142 The above hints at the fact that Chinese were not all alike in their sense and sensitivity, perspective and points of view. Of necessity, their expectations of matters are different in kind and degree. This creates expectation problems that cannot be easily solved, adequately by self or family.
For example, in real life, a migrant working in Victoria and away from home in Stanley, without taking care of his parent violated a num-ber of self-imposed expectations, requiring corrective action, of which four comes to mind: (1) A disrespectful son is a son without filial piety (����). This brought disrepute to the family name and loss of ��face�� for the father.143 (2) A son who was without filial piety was a disloyal person (����). A disloyal person was an unreliable and untrustworthy person at home or in society. (3) A son without filial piety was a person who also failed to reciprocate (����) (or reciprocity) what the parents had done; a failure of foundational ethical obligation in China. (4) A son without filial piety was not a virtuous person. This shows that there was either a failure in discipline or a lapse of leadership. In both cases, it reflected poorly on the parents�� own character and conduct. In common terms, the migrant was guilt ridden.
In most instances, whatever the source, such expectations, when denied, could not be easily resolved, internally within Chinese diaspora and exter-nally under colonial rule. The impacted person thus had to find self-help per-sonally or by and through other sources. If he was an overseas Chinese, he needed to form or find mutual aid organisations, such as clan association, and failing that, seek help from outlawed brotherhood, such as mutual aid organisations144 or Triad society145 or Tong.146
Second, an examination of police history in Hong Kong observed that the colonial HKP failed to provide police coverage for the Chinese, leaving them to their own accord, due to policy (indirect rule), economic (funding) and capacity (language) reasons. The aggrieved Chinese were then required to resort to self-help measures.
Coming to self-help, in urban Hong Kong, the Chinese could depend on the District Watch Force for protection or the Tung Wah Hospital in pro-viding welfare support. In rural Kowloon (1871), they had to rely on family discipline and communal mediation:
Two of my informants recall that stealing crops in their villages was a matter for the village elders. If the offender were an outsider the elders would take him back to his own village and expect his own leaders to deal with him. Failing an agreeable settlement the offender would be taken to the nearest police station. For a long time, it seems, the realities of local power lay with the elders.�K.. The same degree of local autonomy existed above the village level where the village organisation was augmented by small regional groupings which were usually based on a temple.147
This rendition of colonial policing in Hong Kong in its formative years fails to note the real reason for self-help policing under colonial rule. The real reason for the Chinese to seek self-help was because their expectations (guanxi and harmony) were not met with the right kind of resources made available by the HKP (law and gun). Specifically, the British philosophy and style of polic-ing did not address the needs and expectations of the Chinese, who were not interested in rule of law or independent judiciary or blind justice.
The strength of resentment against British policing style is best illus-trated by Chinese prostitutes refusing to expose their body to European doc-tors for health-related inspections in 1878:
Chinese prostitutes catering for Chinese clients objected vigorously to being examined internally by a European doctor, and would prefer to suffer any pun-ishment rather than submit to such an indignity.�K.. The Registrar General has the legal power to compel other prostitutes to be medically examined, but if they became deceased they normally made their own arrangements with Chinese doctors or herbalists or were sent back to Canton by the brothel keepers.148
The Chinese wanted their grievances resolved in Chinese ways; with restorative justice as the goal, QLF as the adjudicating principles, and the head of family and clan as mediator. Chinese dispute�Vcrime resolution needed an apology by the offender, compensation for the victims and repair of social relationship. Closer to home, the Hong Kong Triad dispute resolution pro-cess, notwithstanding its illegality, best exemplified and approximated what victim-driven problem-solving process would look like.149 In observing the Triad society dispensing justice, one would notice the following: it was fast, resolute, retributive, restorative and compensatory. For example, a violating gang member was expected to kneel before ��Guandi�� and fess up their wrong-doing, in a personally remorseful and publicly humiliating way. The offender was also required to apologise to the injured, begging for their forgiveness, and promise not to do it again. Then, and only then, would the offender be re-integrated within the gang.
In colonial Hong Kong and currently, when Hong Kong people have a (crime) problem with various expectations denied, they will turn to self-help, first from the family, and then clan and communal groups. Failing that, they still would not call the HKP because the resource the HKP possesses�Xlegitimacy, gun and law�Xis not effective in meeting their expectations, in restoring justice and repairing relationship. The Chinese under British colonial rule preferred to consult the Triad than go to the HKP to solve their problem because the Triad, unhindered by law and unencumbered by bureaucracy, was better able to meet the expectations of the Chinese,150 who yearned for brotherhood and the honor-able way of doing things.151 The Triad society in China, with Hung Mun, Tien Tei Wei or San Hwo Hui in the lead, was a patriotic and mutual aid organisa-tion in the twentieth century, committed to overturning the Qing (anti-foreign) and coming to the assistance of their brothers in arms (mutual).152 In time, it mutated, transformed and to some degree degenerated into hired guns, offering protection for a fee and illegitimate services as a business.153
The Triads were appealing to the Hong Kong�XChinese under colonial rule because they espoused traditional Chinese moral principles, for example, reject alien rule and uphold integrity, and embrace contemporary customary practices, for example, respect to parents and loyalty to friends, under colo-nial rule. The Charter�XOath of Heaven and Earth Society included154
1. After having entered the Hung gates I must treat the parents and relatives of my sworn brothers as my own kin. I shall suffer death by five thunderbolts if I do not keep this oath.
2. I shall assist my sworn brothers to bury their parents and brothers by offering financial or physical assistance. I shall be killed by five thunderbolts if I pretend to have no knowledge of their troubles.
3. When Hung brothers visit my house, I shall provide them with boarding and lodging. I shall be killed by myriads of knives if I treat them as strangers.
4. I will always acknowledge my Hung brothers when they identify themselves. If I ignore them I will be killed by myriads of swords.
5. I shall not disclose the secrets of the Hung family, not even to my parents, brothers, or wife. I shall never disclose the secrets for money. I will be killed by myriads of swords if I do so.
6. I shall never betray my sworn brothers. If, through a misunderstand-ing, I have caused the arrest of one of my brothers I must release him immediately. If I break this oath I will be killed by five thunderbolts.
7. I will offer financial assistance to sworn brothers who are in trouble in order that they may pay their passage fee, etc. If I break this oath I will be killed by five thunderbolts.
8. I must never cause harm or bring trouble to my sworn brothers or Incense Master. If I do so I will be killed by myriads of swords.
9. I must never commit any indecent assaults on the wives, sisters, or daughters, of my sworn brothers. I shall be killed by five thunder-bolts if I break this oath.
10. I shall never embezzle cash or property from my sworn brothers. If I break this oath I will be killed by myriads of swords.
11. I will take good care of the wives or children of sworn brothers entrusted to my keeping. If I do not I will be killed by five thunderbolts.
12. If I have supplied false particulars about myself for the purpose of joining the Hung family I shall be killed by five thunderbolts.
13. If I should change my mind and deny my membership of the Hung family I will be killed by myriads of swords.
14. If I rob a sworn brother or assist an outsider to do so I will be killed by five thunderbolts.
15. If I should take advantage of a sworn brother or force unfair business deals upon him I will be killed by myriads of swords.
16. If I knowingly convert my sworn brother��s cash or property to my own use I shall be killed by five thunderbolts.
17. If I have wrongly taken a sworn brother��s cash or property during a robbery I must return them to him. If I do not I will be killed by five thunderbolts.
18. If I am arrested after committing an offence I must accept my pun-ishment and not try to place blame on my sworn brothers. If I do so I will be killed by five thunderbolts.
19. If any of my sworn brothers are killed, or arrested, or have departed to some other place, I will assist their wives and children who may be in need. If I pretend to have no knowledge of their difficulties I will be killed by five thunderbolts.
20. When any of my sworn brothers have been assaulted or blamed by oth-ers, I must come forward and help him if he is in the right or advise him to desist if he is wrong. If he has been repeatedly insulted by others I shall inform our other brothers and arrange to help him physically or financially. If I do not keep this oath I will be killed by five thunderbolts.
21. If it comes to my knowledge that the Government is seeking any of my sworn brothers who has come from other provinces or from overseas, I shall immediately inform him in order that he may make his escape. If I break this oath I will be killed by five thunderbolts.
22. I must not conspire with outsiders to cheat my sworn brothers at gambling. If I do so I will be killed by myriads of swords.
23. I shall not cause discord among my sworn brothers by spreading false reports about any of them. If I do so I will be killed by myriads of swords.
24. I shall not appoint myself as Incense Master without authority. After entering the Hung gates for three years the loyal and faithful ones may be promoted by the Incense Master with the support of his sworn brothers. I shall be killed by five thunderbolts if I make any unauthorised promotions myself.
25. If my natural brothers are involved in a dispute or lawsuit with my sworn brothers I must not help either party against the other but must attempt to have the matter settled amicably. If I break this oath I will be killed by five thunderbolts.
26. After entering the Hung gates I must forget any previous grudges I may have borne against my sworn brothers. If I do not do so I will be killed by five thunderbolts.
27. I must not trespass upon the territory occupied by my sworn broth-ers. I shall be killed by five thunderbolts if I pretend to have no knowledge of my brothers�� rights in such matters.
28. I must not covet or seek to share any property or cash obtained by my sworn brothers. If I have such ideas I will be killed.
29. I must not disclose any address where my sworn brothers keep their wealth nor must I conspire to make wrong use of such knowledge. If I do so I will be killed by myriads of swords.
30. I must not give support to outsiders if so doing is against the interests of any of my sworn brothers. If I do not keep this oath I will be killed by myriads of swords.
31. I must not take advantage of the Hung brotherhood in order to oppress or take violent or unreasonable advantage of others. I must be content and honest. If I break this oath I will be killed by five thunderbolts.
32. I shall be killed by five thunderbolts if I behave indecently towards small children of my sworn brothers�� families.
33. If any of my sworn brothers have committed a big offence I must not inform upon them to the Government for the purposes of obtaining a reward. I shall be killed by five thunderbolts if I break this oath.
34. I must not take to myself the wives and concubines of my sworn brothers nor commit adultery with them. If I do so I will be killed by myriads of swords.
35. I must never reveal Hung secrets or signs when speaking to outsid-ers. If I do so I will be killed by myriads of swords.
36. After entering the Hung gates I shall be loyal and faithful and shall endeavour to overthrow Ch��ing and restore Ming by co-ordinating my efforts with those of my sworn brethren even though my breth-ren and I may not be in the same professions. Our common aim is to avenge our Five Ancestors��.155
In short, the Triads offered unavailable cultural goods for a colonised people and inaccessible legal services for illegal immigrants.
Theoretically speaking, in the first situation, when legal supply does not meet natural cultural demands, there is a black market for desired goods, for example, illegal gambling, prostitutes, drugs, debt collection and revenge. This falls under ��illegal market�� study in the field of economic sociology, which observed that when market supply does not meet natural demand for goods, a private sector black market emerges and public sector rent-seeking activities in the form of corruption appears, creating market distortions affecting valuation and distribution.156 The disjuncture between goals and means is otherwise studied by criminologists, such as Merton��s anomie�Vstrain theory.157 Here Merton postulated that when culturally promoted goals (American dream) cannot be achieved with institutional approved means (hard work), anomie and strains set in, leading people to adjust in five ways: conformity (+goal, .mean), innovation (+goal, .mean), ritual-ism (.goal, +mean), retreatism (.goal, .mean) and rebellion (new goal, new means). To Merton, when a person buys into strong cultural goals but with little respect for institutional means, innovation or deviance results. This theory was applied in 1934 to explain outburst of crimes in America after the Great Depression of 1932. But it can be equally explored to explain colo-nial Hong Kong when sex, gambling and drugs (cultural goods), which were not otherwise deemed illegal in Chinese society, were prohibited by colonial laws (institutional means). In Merton��s articulation, there was a disjunc-ture between culturally desired goals and institutional normative means, resulting in anomie and causing strain. This new rendition of Merton strain theory can now be reconfigured as ��colonial criminology theory��, which postulates that when cultural desired goods are not met with colonial nor-mative means, deviance would occur, for example, indentured maids and foster children.
When the supply of legal services, such as legal protection and police services, was not meeting the legitimate needs of illegal immigrants, people sought illegitimate supply.
The above theoretical treatment is best demonstrated with a study of corruption in Hong Kong in the 1960s. Before the ICAC came into being in the 1970s, the Triad offered up their services for the people, from ille-gal enterprises, for example, gambling, to protective services, for example, blackmailers.
In those days, triads lived with the people. The public found it more con-venient and effective to befriend Triad members, and seek the help of Triad in settling disputes and offering protection, rather than seeking the HKP. The triad was doing no more, no less than what another family or community member would do for them; for these services, they would exact a fee, and at times extort payment. Still it was better to engage the triad than the HKP who were as demanding, coercive, costly, but less effective.
Yuen Gor, a lifelong Hong Kong resident, was born in 1950. He grew up in Yaumati. This is how he remembered the community��s relationship with police and triads in the 1950s:
Bullying from the police was inevitable, but Yuen Gor never yielded to the triad elements who extorted money from the stall. The triad gangs in Yau Ma Tei ran illegal business such as loan sharking, drug trafficking, territorial fights, brothels and gambling parlours. Yuen Gor believed that the triad gangs run profitable business. Sometimes, the residents might even ask the triad ele-ments to settle their disputes. It was common that the triad elements would make troubles on a pretext, evade bill or extort money. Having lived in Yau Ma Tei since childhood, Yuen Gor grew up with many of the triad elements and became their good friend. The Yeung family��s stalls were thus free from triad disturbance and exempted from regular payment of protection fees. But, Yuen Gor was glad to offer free meals to his triad friends and occasionally gave them a small payment. Sometimes, when drug addicts visited Lai Heung Yuen for a free meal, Yuen Gor would entertain them, although he emphasized that it shall be a one-off offer only.158
IV: Colonial Policing as Policing Migrant159
Hong Kong and China share a long and porous border. Through the years, people and materials have crossed the border routinely for economic, social, political and cultural reasons. The policing of Chinese migrants has been a major concern of the HKP, in the past as well as the present.
Policing is subject-sensitive, for example, policing the intimate160 is not the same as policing strangers, which is different kind of policing. Until very recently, Hong Kong people were rootless and restless people.161 There were very few Hong Kong permanent residents, still less with a homegrown iden-tity.162 Migrants, Chinese and Europeans were quick to come to Hong Kong for fame and fortune, leaving just as quickly to seek opportunities and avoid trouble. They had no intention of remaining; everyone harboured a desire to return home, to live, to retire, or just to die (��..��, leaves fall to roots).
Hong Kong is a prototypical transient community. For example, in the 1840s, most migrants to Hong Kong were young and single. There were few families. Males outnumbered females by 6�V7 to 1. In 1841, thousands of labourers and craftsmen came to the colony to serve the British colonists. In 1948, on the eve of Communist takeover, two million people left China for Hong Kong.163 Since then, Hong Kong has adopted an open-door pol-icy to refugees from other places, such as China and Vietnam. Many have entered illegally, and more than a few stay beyond their period and have to be deported. This means that Hong Kong has a difficult time in setting bound-ary and imposing control on who is coming and going.
In the early days of the colony, the Chinese from Kowloon would make a trip across the harbour with ease. Many of them who were dutiful and diligent workers in the day, turned ruthless and violent ruffians at night. It also means that except for the European elites there were few cohesive communities. In time, Hong Kong earned the right to be called ��Borrowed Time, Borrowed Place��.164
Social structure, organisation and relationship affected policing, purpose, method and style. Loosely knitted groups have little community spirit,165 incentives and capacity to police itself. 166 Intimate groups are cohesive, with common values, mutual interest and collective capacity to self-regulate. In policing an alien or migrant society, that is the Chinese, Hong Kong polic-ing was more about maintaining security, averting (natural) crisis, keeping order and controlling people, and less so about enforcing law, promoting justice and delivering service. Self-help was the norm. Private security was the rule.167 In-group sanctions,168 informal social ordering169 and extra-legal strong-arm control170 was accepted as a way of life.
V: Colonial Policing as Relationship (Guanxi) Policing171
Policing of migrants and dealing with cross-border crimes raises a whole host of issues, from appropriateness of norm applied to effectiveness of means deployed. The former recalls the juvenile versus adult justice debate. The later implicates terrorist versus criminal controversy. In theoretical terms, both the treatment of juvenile and terrorist raise issues with policing of relation-ship, from strangers to intimates, best played out in rural (family�Xintimate policing) vs. urban (bureaucracy�Xstranger policing) policing context and setting. Intimate policing calls for socialization and persuasion. Stranger policing requires rewards and punishment, failing that excommunication (intimates�Xjuveniles) and extermination (strangers�Xterrorists).
Juvenile versus Adult Debate
Juveniles have long been treated differently than adults in common law in England and at family court in Chicago, because of their mental capacity. In common law, children under seven cannot be charged with a crime because they are considered to be mentally incompetent. In 1899, in Chicago, a fam-ily court was introduced to protect the best interests of the child because they are considered to be less developed, cognitively, emotionally and behav-iourally. The rationality of both common law and Chicago family prac-tice is that a juvenile does not belong in adult courts, which presupposes a logical mind and mature personality. If the same reasoning was applied to Chinese migrants, it is not difficult to see that Chinese migrants had little understanding of British culture and identification with British rule. To that extent, and from the perspective of the British colonialists, Chinese behaved very much like juveniles. Measured against British civilisation, the Chinese were developmentally retarded, an atavistic throwback of a kind. They lived in a world of their own. As a result, they were treated differently, if paternalis-tically. They were to be lectured at and spoken down to, not treated as equals. Much like the juvenile law in Chicago or extra-territoriality in Shanghai, British law had little application to the foreign-born. They have a tenuous relationship with the British. To do otherwise would not be fair or effective.
Terrorist versus Criminal Controversy
The terrorist versus criminal controversy centres on the entitlement and effec-tiveness of state sanctions on terrorist and community control of criminals. President Bush drew a clear distinction between terrorist, an enemy of the state, and criminal, a deviance of community norm. Enemy has no rights, offenders do. Thus, it is acceptable, indeed necessary, to torture (��enhanced interroga-tion��) terrorists for information and not put pressure on criminals to confess.
Half way around the world, Mao anticipated Bush by 44 years.172 On 18 June 1957, Mao delivered ��On the Correct Handling of Contradictions among the People�� before the Supreme State Conference. In the speech, he made the case that contradictions (conflicts) between people should be treated differ-ently than contradictions between people and the enemies. Contradictions among the people should be treated to persuasion, education by the mass (criticism, self-criticism) and, if need be, remedial sanctions (criminal law). Contradictions between the people and the enemy should be treated with coercive means, including death (elimination) if need be:
Since they are different in nature, the contradictions between ourselves and the enemy and the contradictions among the people must be resolved by dif-ferent methods. �K. Our state is a people��s democratic dictatorship led by the working class �KWhat is this dictatorship for? Its first function is internal, namely, to suppress the reactionary classes and elements and those exploiters who resist the socialist revolution�KDictatorship does not apply within the ranks of the people. The people cannot exercise dictatorship over themselves, nor must one section of the people oppress another. �KThe people��s demo-cratic dictatorship uses two methods. Towards the enemy, it uses the method of dictatorship, that is, for as long a period of time as is necessary it does not permit them to take part in political activity and compels them to obey the law of the People��s Government, to engage in labour and, through such labour, be transformed into new men. Towards the people; on the contrary, it uses the method of democracy and not of compulsion, that is, it must necessarily let them take part in political activity and does not compel them to do this or that but uses the method of democracy to educate and persuade. Such edu-cation is self-education for the people, and its basic method is criticism and self-criticism.173
Driven by ��moral panic��, the imagery of Chinese migrants as ��terrorists�� was fair game. They were very much beyond the cultural boundary of soci-ety and effective range of existing law and process. They were both inacces-sible by moral reasoning and not amenable to rational law. Laws were for the civilised, not the barbarians. As in the case of an animal in a different uni-verse, when moral discourse and rational reasoning failed, violence would be the only common language of behavioural modification.
Policing Relationship: Strangers versus Intimates
The above discussion on debate (juvenile versus adult) and controversy (ter-rorists versus criminals) points to the need to develop a theory of policing based on the nature and strength of relationship between the police and the policed. Such a relationship moves from the more intimate (blood) to no rela-tionship (stranger), with the supposition that if there is no relationship, there is no crime or control. Viewed this way, crime is the alternation of relation-ship expectations for personal gain.
To the Chinese, the starting premise is that policing (more appropriately, social control) is not about punishing offensive person or harmful conduct. It is about maintaining predictable relationships. Crime happens when rela-tionships ruptures. The second premise is that without a relationship between the police and the policed, there are few ways to control, except by force. To investigate a crime is to presuppose a prior existing relationship between offender and victims, individual and society, with information freely avail-able. Without a relationship between the police and the policed, there is little meaning to norms and sanction for the policed.
Thus far, in policing studies, there has been more interest in policing of strangers (urban policing, professional policing) and not policing of inti-mates (rural policing, community policing); thus the focus on coercion and not persuasion.
Relationship Policing: Rural versus Urban
Rural policing is the policing of relationship. In a rural (close, or close-knit-ted) community (submarine, Seal Team, PTU), there is little mobility and high solidarity. Everyone is related to everyone; everyone knows each other. Everyone depends on each other for materials and social and emotional sup-port. The decisions and actions of each affect the other. Control is customary (moral), easy (by surveillance), effortless (social pressure), total (omnipres-ent), cheap (opinion) and democratic (everyone has a say). People��s action is judged less (only) on the quality of the act, and more on the character of the person and nature of the relationship (in its totality).
The stranger, a tourist or a gang member, is judged by his actions. A stranger who acts as an offender would be discriminated against (insider vs. outsider). As a result outsider�Vstrangers would be dealt with formally and harshly because outsider�Vstrangers share nothing in common with the locals, and can only be punished according to the law, retributively and as a deterrent. (Strangers have no prior or after relationship with the rural area, and cannot be properly supervised.)
If we were to develop a ��criminology�� of ��guaxi��, we can start with the fol-lowing testable principles applicable to social relationship policing:
1. Crime is a function of social relationship distance (intimacy) between people and society, from stranger to family. The more inti-mate the relationship, quantitatively and qualitatively, the lesser the crime (more supervision, guardianship, bonding).
2. Crime detection is a function of relationship distance (intimacy) between people and society. The more intimate the relationship, the more easier it is to detect a crime, as in time and resources.
3. Response to crime is a function of the relationship between people and society.
a. The more intimate the relationship, the less formal the response.
b. The more intimate the relationship, the more compensatory and less punitive the response.
c. The more intimate the relationship, the more integrative and less retributive the remedial measures.
d. The more intimate the relationship, the more future oriented and less past oriented the evaluation of harm.
e. The more intimate the relationship, the more the focus on repair-ing of relationship than punishment of act.
f. The more intimate the relationship, the more the focus on per-sonality than act-based assignment of liability.
g. The more intimate the relationship, the more the particularistic justice than rule-based justice.
VI: Conclusion
The single most important lesson offered by this book (Part I) is that the investigation into the HKP and policing in Hong Kong should be based on theory, informed by evidence, and anchored within Chinese history, culture and society.
Applying the above lesson, this study theorised that in practice, colonial policing in Hong Kong, as with policing generally, is not a one-size-fits-all proposition. It takes on different strategic goals and tactical means, organ-isational form and operational style, in different countries, at different times and with different tasks.174
In order to maximise its utilities, increase its efficiency or promote its effectiveness, colonial policing as an instrumentality of the state (colonial empire) must be able to adjust its goals and means to fit with local condi-tions. Specifically, as deployed, colonial policing, if it is to work, must be made dependent on the vision and mission, conviction and commitment, and capacity and resource of the coloniser, while tending to the idiosyn-cratic nature of an alien population, separated by distances of space and culture. For example, Cole made it clear that colonial policing changes the purpose of settlement (pacified vs. settlement) and area of control (rural vs. urban):
A clear distinction eventually emerged between the development of policing in colonies that were annexed for purpose of settlement and the development of policing in the ��pacified�� colonies annexed mainly for trade. Generally, civil-ian policing structures were pre-dominant in ��settlement�� colonies of North America, Canada and Australia whilst para-military policing was common in ��pacified�� colonies located mainly in Africa, Asia, Central and South America. In the latter, two-tier policing systems were operated whereby urban areas where European settlers, administrators and traders lived (usually designated ��colonies��) were policed differently compared with rural areas where the bulk of ��natives�� lived (usually designed ��protectorates��).175
Beyond the purpose of the ruler and the character of the ruled, histori-cal conditions and contemporary circumstances bearing upon law, order and security situations of the colony come into play. Generally, maintaining an orderly society calls for civilian policing, pacifying conflict-ridden states requires military rule and securing disturbance-prone communities needs para-military policing. For example, colonial policing of crime and disor-der in Hong Kong (1841�V1844) differs substantially from colonial policing of political unrests (civil disturbances) (1923�V1924, 1954, 1967) or social pro-tests (civil disobedience [the 1990s]) in Hong Kong.
Even under the rubric of colonial policing, different strategies and tactics are used to deal with different governance issues and control problems in a colony. In the 1950s, Hong Kong Communists sympathisers (political risks) were treated to secret surveillance policing and social activists (disorderly crowd) were exposed to public order management policing.
Colonial policing manifested itself in all of the above social control meth-ods and styles. If colonial policing means different things in different places, at different times, with different people, under different circumstances, then the central meaning of colonial police can only be particularised in use and contextualised when discussed. The traditional understanding of colonial policing as imposed and coercive serves only to obfuscate the multifaceted nature of colonial policing.
Endnotes
1. See generally J. P. Sartre, Existentialism Is a Humanism. Tr. C. Macomber. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007).
2. D. Faure (ed.), A Documentary History Hong Kong. (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 1997), p. 12.
3. C. M. Christensen and M. Raynor, Why hard-nosed executives should care about management theory, Harvard Business Review, 81 (9): 66�V74, 2003.
4. J. Z. Dai, On several problems in legal transplantation, Journal of Politics and Law, 2(3): 107�V109, September 2009.
5. G. Bickley, A Magistrate��s Court in 19th Century Hong Kong: Court in Time (Hong Kong: Proverse Hong Kong, 2005).
6. W. S. Law, Collaborative Colonial Power: The Making of the Hong Kong Chinese (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2009).
7. Categorical Ethnic Identity�XHalf-Yearly Average (23/12/2013) (�]���������{�P�P) People��s Ethnic Identity, HKU, Public Opinion Program. http://-hkupop.hku.hk/english/popexpress/ethnic/index.html
8. S. Veg, Hong Kong��s enduring identity crisis, The Atlantic, 16 October 2013. http://www.theatlantic.com/china/archive/2013/10/hong-kongs-enduring-
identity-crisis/280622/
9. The HKAM movement, started by Professor Chan Wan, called for more admin-istrative autonomy for Hong Kong and less political integration with China. Hong Kong City-State Autonomy Movement (HKAM) (���䫰���۪v�B��). http://hkam2011.blogspot.com/
10. Hong Kong fears ��mainlandization��, The China Post, Taiwan (ROC), 9 September 2011. Retrieved 30 October 2011.
11. See Chapter 9: ��Hong Kong Police Reform in 1950s��, infra.
12. S. Georgina (ed.), Globalising British Policing (Farnham, Surrey, UK: Ashgate Publishing Limited, 2011).
13. ��Chinese society is to be envied by much of the so-called developed world, in that not only is much of the old traditional way of life, still visible in people��s behavior but is also so deeply instilled from parent to child and it is difficult to see it totally disappearing�� (p. xi). M. Topley and J. DeBernardi, Cantonese Society in Hong Kong (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2000).
14. R. T. Sigler and D. J. King, Colonial policing and control of movements for inde-pendence, Policing and Society: An International Journal of Research and Policy, 3(1): 13�V22, 1992.
15. W. F. Mayers and C. King, The Treaty Ports of China and Japan: A Complete Guide to the Open Ports of Those Countries, Together with Peking, Yedo, Hongkong and Macao. Forming a Guide Book & Vade Mecum for Travellers, Merchants, and Residents in General (London: Trubner and Co., 1867), pp. vi, 17.
16. Ibid., Note 5.
17. J. W. Norton-Kyshe, History of the Laws and Courts of Hongkong, Vol. I (London: Noronha and Company, 1898). (HKLCHK). http://www.archive.org/details/historylawsandc00nortgoog
18. Ibid., VII.
19. C. Munn, Anglo-China: Chinese People and British Rule in Hong Kong, 1841�V1880 (Richmond, Surrey, UK: Curzon Press, 2001), Chapter One; K. C. Wong, Policing in Hong Kong (Farnham, Surrey, UK: Ashgate, 2012), Chapter One.
20. E. Marcks, English law in early Hong Kong: Colonial law as a means for control and liberation, Texas International Law Journal, 35: 265, 2000.
21. D. Killingray and D. Omissi (eds.), Guardians of Empire: The Armed Forces of the Colonial Powers c. 1700�V1964 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1999).
22. G. B. Endacott, Government and People in Hong Kong (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 1964), note 3, p. 3, p. 4.
23. Ibid., p. 3.
24. Davis to Stanley, 27 February 1844. CO 129/6, p. 131.
25. D. E. Evans, Chinatown in Hong Kong: The beginnings of Tai Ping Shan, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch, 10: 70�V77, 1970. (��But for a very long time, there was indeed an area thought of by the Europeans as a part of the city into which they would not normally go. This area has, right from its incep-tion, been known as ��Tai Ping Shan�� or Mountain of Peace, after the Chinese name for the mountain the Europeans called Victoria Peak��.)
26. C. Munn, Anglo-China: Chinese People and British Rule in Hong Kong, 1841�V1880 (Richmond, Surrey, UK: Curzon Press, 2001), p. 1.
27. Ibid., p. 4.
28. Friend of China, 18.5.43 edition.
29. ��The police never intervened the distribution of free food and money. However, in the last two years of his office as chief director, an old lady stumbled accidentally when she was collecting rice. The police then stepped up their actions in maintain-ing the order on the occasion��. Memories of being Chief Executive of Yau Ma Tei Kaifong Welfare Advancement Association. 11/03/2011. http://www.hkmemory.hk/collections/oral_history/All_Items_OH/oha_50/records/index.html#p46053
30. Ng Kong. Chairman, Yaumatei Kai Fong Welfare Association. Male. DOB. 1919. ��The role of Yau Ma Tei Kaifong Welfare Advancement Association in the regu-lation of hawkers along Temple Street and Public Square Street��. (11/03/2011). Hong Kong Memory. http://www.hkmemory.hk/collections/oral_history/All_Items_OH/oha_50/records/index.html#p46056
31. R. J. Troyer, Chinese social organization, In: R. J. Troyer, J. P. Clark, and D. G. Rojek (eds.), Social Control in the PRC (New York: Praeger, 1989), pp. 26�V24. For a more comprehensive treatment, see K. C. Hsiao, Rural China: Imperial Control in the Nineteenth Century (Seattle and London: University of Washington Press, 1960), pp. 261�V370.
32. Dutton observed that the state sponsored and supported the exercise of control by natural and indigenous communal groups, for example, family, clan, as an extension of state power. Dutton, Policing and Punishment in China (Cambridge, New York, Melbourne: Cambridge University Press, 1992), Chapter Three. Kam C. Wong, building upon the conceptual scheme of Black��s definition of law as ��governmental social control�� (Black, 1976), has argued that sponsorship and support of government transformed informal/private social control into formal/governmental ones. K. C. Wong, Black��s theory on the behavior of law revisited II: A restatement of Black��s concept of law, International Journal of the Sociology of Law, 26: 75�V119, 1998.
33. See the organisation and functions of ��baojia�� as a formal social control insti-tution in imperial China. J. T. Wen, Zhongguo baojia zhidu (Chinese Baiojia System) (Taibei: Shangwu Yinshuguan, 1971). For the role played by community leaders, see C. Chung-li, The Chinese Gentry: Studies on Their Role in Nineteenth Century Chinese Society (Washington: University of Washington Press, 1955).
34. ��The ideology of the really successful Chinese merchant in the harsh competi-tiveness of Hong Kong went beyond self-help; there was also a strong sense of comradeship and responsibility to his fellow men. Mr Fung Ping-shan, him-self an exemplar of this tradition, described it as lipin (laap-ban in Cantonese), which may be loosely translated as ��establishing one��s character��. Mr Fung was a philanthropist, not only in Hong Kong, which he made his home, but also to his home village and county in China where he was born. The character pin in Mr Fung��s term incorporates a hidden agenda which can be understood in the light of the Confucian classics: The Chinese gentleman subscribes to the principle that social harmony can be achieved only by putting one��s character and then one��s household in order, and putting them in order means behaving in propri-ety to one��s social station��. D. Faure, A Documentary History of Hong Kong Society (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 1997), p. 17.
35. Sources of Chinese Tradition, p. 115.
36. The Great Learning, Chapter IX: 4, James Legge (trans.) The Four Books (Hong Kong: Culture Book, 1981), p. 23.
37. H. Befu, The political relation of the village to the State, World Politics, 19(4): 601�V620, 1967.
38. For example, baojia was build upon the mutuality of economic and social dependency of families and clans. Dutton, 1992, pp. 84�V85.
39. S. W. Williams, The Middle Kingdom, Vol. 1 (New York: Scribner, 1883), p. 507. (In nineteenth century China, as was earlier, people did not want to come before the court.) The courts were observed to be oppressive, corrupt and unresponsive. Generally, the legal and judicial systems were deemed non-approachable by the people; to use a more modern jargon�Xnot ��user friendly��. They were thus not uti-lised by the people to address their needs and concerns, for example, crime and disputes. J. Cohen, Chinese mediation on the eve of modernization, California Law Review, 54(2), 1222�V1223, 1966. T. T. Chu, Local Government Under the C��hing (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1962). (Yamen was corrupted and ineffi-cient. To the people, the officials were described as ��tigers or wolves�� or ��rats under the altar��. ��Customary fees�� and bribes were ��as numerous as the hairs on an ox��.) The centrally dispatched local officials (e.g., magistrates) were not only socially and emotionally removed from the people, but they were also physically isolated. D. C. Buxbaum, Some aspects of civil procedure and practice at trial level in Tansui and Hsinchu from 1789�V1895, Journal of Asian Studies, 30(2):255�V279, 1971.
40. H. C. Wang Liu, The Traditional Chinese Clan Rules (Locust Valley, New York: J.J. Augustin Incorporated Publisher, 1959). (Clan rules admonished against settling disputes through court.), p. 56.
41. Chapter II: ��General Analyses of the Clan Rules��, In: H. C. Wang Liu, The Traditional Chinese Clan Rules (Locust Valley, New York: J.J. Augustin Incorporated Publisher, 1959). (State recognised that the clan had quasi-auton-omous authority to deal with minor cases and among its members.)
42. K. Wittfogel, Oriental Despotism: A Comparative Study of Total Power (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1957), p. 50.
43. J. W. Hayes and E. Sin, Colonial Administration in British Hong Kong and Chinese Customary Law (Hong Kong: Centre of Asian Studies, University of.Hong Kong,.2001), pp. 66�V67. https://archive.org/stream/colonialadminist00jame/colonial.administ00jame_djvu.txt
44. M. A. Allee, Late Imperial China: Northern Taiwan in the Nineteenth Century (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1994), p. 254.
45. Sources of Chinese Tradition, p. 115. (��Only when families are regulated are states regulated��. The family and to a lesser extent the clan were made the pri-mary mechanism of social control. The family social control system was sanc-tioned by law.) T. Z. Qu, Zhongguo falu yu zhongguo shehui (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1981), Chapter One: ��Family��. For an English translation, see T. T. Chu, Law and Society in Traditional China (Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes-Sorbonne, Sixieme Section: Sciences Economiques et Sociales, Le Monde d��outre-Mer, Passe et Present, Premiere Serie, Etudes IV, Mouton, Paris and The Hague, 1961). See also S. H. Wu, Zhongguo Zhuantong Wenhua (Traditional Chinese Legal Culture) (Beijing: Beijing Daixue Chubanshe, 1995), pp. 437�V510. The.theoretical foun-dation for using the family as the basic unit of social control is supplied by Sutherland��s differential association theory and Hirschi��s bonding theory. As to empirical evidence, it has been demonstrated that the family is an important social control site for imparting values and establishing bonds. See J..Q. Wilson and R. J. Herrnstein, Crime & Human Nature (New York: Touchstone Book, 1985.), Chapter 8: ��Families��, pp. 213�V244. (Constitutional factors and family factors are most important in explaining the behaviour of the most serious offenders.)
46. S. L. Feng, Zhongguo Yufang Fanzui Fanglue (Chinese Crime Prevention Strategy) (Beijing: Falu chubanshe, 1994), pp. 67�V76.
47. Sources of Chinese Tradition, p. 115. At its heart, POP is a divide-and-conquer strategy. After an analysis is done on a ��crime problem�� government agencies and community groups have to be engaged, either as guardian or as controller, to keep control of the multitude of factors contributing to problems. Collaboration, coordination and integration of community social control agents and forces is at the heart of a successful community crime control program. K. J. Peak and R. W. Glensor, Community Policing and Problem Solving (New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1996), pp. 88�V92.
48. J. F. Lee, Zhongguo Fazhi Shi (History of Chinese Legal System) (Liang-jin chu-banshiwu gongsi, 1988), p. 61. POP, as a crime problem-solving strategy, calls for early intervention in the crime causation chain of event by dealing with the root causes of the crime problem through multiple means. Take the case of ��drug traf-ficking among juveniles in low-income housing, Tulsa, Oklahoma��. K. J. Peak and R. W. Glensor, Community Policing and Problem Solving (New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1996), pp. 411�V414. (Upon analysis of the problem, the officers took the fol-lowing steps to remove the drug problem: by improving the youths�� self-esteem, by teaching them values, by imparting with decision-making skills, by providing with positive role model (Boy Scout), by sponsoring youth activities, by teach-ing them job skills, by improving their manners, by teaching them driving.) The Tulsa POP has components of modelling, education, character building, norm setting�Xall thought to be important by Confucius to control people.
49. The best way to control people is to use benevolence and punishment at the same time. The idea is captured by the phrase: ��Dezhu xingfu�� (Primarily use benev-olence as supplemented by punishment). See ��Kongyou de Falu Shixiang�� (The legal thoughts of Kongyou), H. N. Liu and Y. F. Yang, Zhongguo Gudai Falu-shi Zhishi (Knowledge in Chinese legal history) (Helungjian renmin chubanshe, 1984), pp. 56�V64. This is similar to the philosophy and approach adopted by the juvenile authorities during the ��child-savers�� era when the juvenile justice system was socialised. T. Platt, The Child Savers: The Invention of Delinquency (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1969), pp. 54�V55. (Platt articulated a nine-points state-ment of the ideal reformatory scheme for juvenile delinquent. The fifth point being, ��resort to punishment where it became necessary means to reform��.) More significantly, the delinquent child should be viewed individually. His criminal acts should be assessed comprehensively and within the totality of circumstances he finds himself in. A comprehensive treatment program is then tailored to address the needs of the juvenile: personally and environmentally, emotionally, -physically as well as spiritually, educationally as well as vocationally. Family, schools, social agencies, churches, courts and police are all involved in saving the troubled child.
50. Confucius said: ��From the emperor down to the common people, all without exception, must consider cultivation of the individual character as the root. If the root is disorder, it is impossible for the branches to be in order�K�� Sources of Chinese Tradition, p. 115.
51. Guanzhi observed: ��When people are rich, they will be contended at home and treasure their families. If they are contended at home and treasure their fami-lies, they will respect their superior and avoid crime. If they respect their supe-rior and avoid crime they will be easy to rule��. See S. L. Feng, Zhongguo Yufang Fanzui Fanglue (Chinese Crime Prevention Strategy) (Beijing: Falu chubanshe, 1994), p. 72.
52. In this regard, the Chinese have taken a broad notion of control that includes the internalisation of norms (by the individual) (Durkheim 1933; Freud; Mill 1953; Piaget 1949), socialisation and disciplinary regime (by the family) (Sutherland 1949), setting up custom and accountability system (in the com-munity) (Folkways 1906; Etzioni), removal of criminogenic conditions (by the administration) and defining the moral and social boundary (by the state) (Merton). See Notion of control, In: J. P. Gibbs (ed.), Social Control (Beverly Hills, CA: Sage, 1982), pp. 9�V11. (Control can be used at any level�Xmacro, micro or intermediate.) The Chinese approach comes close to Edward A. Ross�� definition of social control�X��the molding of the individual��s feelings and desires to suit the needs of the group���Xincluding supernatural, ceremonies, public opinion, morals, art, and education which formed the normative struc-ture of a society. Id., 13. In a very real sense, Chinese social control is of a totalitarian gem (Owen 1984; Wittogel 1957).
53. Confucians believe in the malleability of man. The Communists subscribed to the idea that ��All history is nothing but continuous transformation of human nature�� and ��central function of government will be treated as the transfor-mation of the social natures of the citizen��. See D. J. Munroe, The Concept of Man in Contemporary China (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 1977), pp..9�V13. Reformation started by admission of guilt and assumption of -responsibility. The PRC police preached: ��Leniency to those who confess; sever-ity to those who resist��. When Bao Ruo-Wang, a political prisoner of Mao, met with his captor, he was told: ��In front of you are two paths: the one of confessing everything and obeying the government, which will lead you to a new life.�K�� R. W. Bao and R. Chelminski, Prisoner of Mao (New York: Coward, McCann and Geoghegan, Inc., 1973), p. 73. See also D. Bayley, Forces of Order: Police Behavior in Japan and the United States (Berkeley, California: University of California Press, 1976). (Japanese believe that apology is the first step towards personal reform, repairing of relationship, and re-integration to communal life), p. 134, 140.
54. D. Bayley, Forces of Order (California: University of California Press, 1976). (Police promotes the mending of relations.) K. C. Wong, ��Legal Opinion�� China Trade Report (December 1984) (In dispute resolution, Chinese are more con-cerned about a reasonable solution which would keep the parties in a workable relationship.)
55. Erving Goffman provided a useful framework for the analysis of this ��refor-mative�Vrestorative�Vreintegration�� justice model. Goffman observed that when expectations and norms were broken in the public place, the rule breaker and victim engages in a series of highly ritualistic ��remedial exchanges�� for the pur-pose of reestablishing social relationship between the offender and victim. The process involves the offender providing an innocent excuse or sincere apology for the transgression to show personal remorse (reformation) in order to re-establish the broken relationship. E. Goffman, Relations in Public (New York: Harpers, 1971), Chapter 4, pp. 95�V187.
56. A. von Hirsch, Doing Justice (New York: Hill and Wang, 1976) (��We take seriously Kant��s view that a person should be punished because he deserves it��.), p. 6.
57. T. Honderich, Punishment (Middlesex, England: Penguin Books, 1984). (General prevention [citing Bentham] ought to be the end of punishment.)
58. N. Morris, The Future of Imprisonment (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1974) (Rehabilitative programs in prison must be expanded and improved.), p. xi.
59. ��The determined scholars and the man of virtue will not seek to live at the expense of injuring their virtue. They will even sacrifice their lives to preserve their virtue completely��. The Analects, Book XV, Chapter 7.
60. H. L. A. Hart, Positivism and the separation of law and moral, In: R. M. Dworkin (ed.), The Philosophy of Law (London: Oxford University Press, 1977), pp. 1�V17.
61. Confucianisation of the law calls for the penal sanction of Confucius ethics. See Zhonghua faxi tedian tanyuan (The research into the origin of the character-istics of the Chinese legal system) In: J. F. Zhang (ed.), Zhongguo falu shi lun (Discourse on Chinese legal history) (Beijing: Falu chubanshe, 1983), pp. 11�V25.
62. Devlins, The Enforcement of Morals (London: Oxford University Press, 1965). (Law should be used to enforce moral.); J. S. Mills, On Liberty, first published in 1859 (Chicago: Gateway Edition, 1955), p. 13 (��The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised �K is to prevent harm to others.�K�� Morality is not part of law��s regiment.)
63. D. J. Munroe, The Concept of Man in Contemporary China (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 1977), pp. 9�V13.
64. T. Honderich, Punishment (Middlesex, England: Penguin Books, 1984). (General prevention [citing Bentham] ought to be the end of punishment.)
65. H. E. Pepinsky, The people v. the principle of legality in the People��s Republic of China, Journal of Criminal Justice, 4: 51�V60, 1973; Reliance on formal writ-ten law, and freedom and social control in the United States and the People��s Republic of China, British Journal of Sociology, 26(3): 330�V342, 1975. (U.S. relies upon formal legal control because of weak community structure occasioned by social, geographical, and occupational mobility. China uses informal commu-nal social control because of relatively stable community structure.)
66. Id.
67. United States vs. Salerno, 481 U.S. 789, 107 S. Ct. 2095, 95.L. Ed. 2d 697 (1987). (The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the Bail Reform Act of 1984, 18 U.S.C. Section 3142 (e): ��the judicial officer finds that no condi-tion or combination of conditions will reasonably assure the appearance of the person as required and the safety of any other person and the community, he shall order the detention of the person prior to trial.�K�� against the challenge that it impermissibly detained a criminal defendant based on anticipated future actions. William v. United States, 95.L. Ed. 1379, 1382 (1950). (��Imprisonment to protect society from predicted but unconsummated offenses is �K unprec-edented in this county.�K��).
68. See K. C. Wong, Confucianization of Qing Law II, In: The Selected Works of K. C. Wong, 2004. Available at: http://works.bepress.com/kam_wong/33
69. J. Bentham, An introduction to the principles of morals and legislation (1789), In: The Utilitarians (New York: Anchor Books, 1973). (Mankind governed by utilitarian calculus.)
70. One of the major difficulties in comprehending, interpreting and applying QLF, as jurisprudential concepts is that ��qing�� and ��li��, like justice and fairness, means different things to different people. Furthermore, the weighting, prioritising and balancing of QLF in arriving at an optimal QLF decision is not something that everyone can agree upon. In fact, different mixes of QLF in various deci-sions can satisfy most people. Conversely, any imbalance of QLF, no matter how slight, might attract detractors and dissenters. It goes without saying that any change in findings or interpretation of facts might affect outcome..
71. What is deemed reasonable. Pinyin Chinese English Dictionary (Hong Kong: Commercial Press, 1990) (PYCED), p. 676R.
72. What is deemed reasonable. PYCED, p. 556L.
73. PYCED, p. 449L.
74. In the popular culture, QLF has often been routinely borrowed to justify one��s action; oftentimes contrary to or deviation from what QLF truly entails or actually requires. In other circumstances, people have failed to grasp the true meaning of QLF. For example, QLF has been equated with human emotion�Xreasoning�Xlaw.
75. LF is inter-related in the following senses: (1) ��qing�� versus ��li�� versus ��fa�� are not independent of each other, conceptually, theoretically and operationally. For example, conceptually ��qing�� or ��renqing�� (human nature) while born to human is shaped by law of nature (tian li) and conditioned by rules of culture (li). (2) The formulation and content of ��li�� is less an arm chair contemplative product as it is a grounded intuitive, experiential and empirical exercise. In this regard, ��li�� must cater to natural forces, social conditions, human nature, life circum-stances and situational factors. (3) In terms of application, what is proper ��li�� is never a stand alone ethical-principle derivative (as with categorical imperative of Kant) but very much a factual ethical product (much like determination of negligence).
76. QLF is dynamic in many ways. (1) QLF are not static concepts. The content and contour, meaning and feelings of QLF, individually and collectively, changes with time, people, place and issues. (2) QLF interacts with each others dialecti-cally and continuously in shaping content and defining practice. (3) Outcome of QLF is contingent on the totality of material context and all aspects of prevailing circumstances. (4) Process of QLF is as important as standard of QLF in shaping outcome. Change in process leads to change in outcome. (5) There is no one correct or best QLF disposition, but many acceptable QLF outcome.
77. A legitimate question is raised as to the content and viability, priority and mix, identification and subscription of QLF in modernised China, Westernised Hong Kong or globalised Taiwan. Like questions can, and should, be raised about how QLF fare within diverse population in Hong Kong, for example, Hong Kong belongers versus new immigrants, Western educated versus domestic breed, professionals versus blue collars.
78. A keyword search with �����z�k�� on yahoo.com turned up 23,600 items. A search on Google Scholar turned up 240 items.
79. ��Qing li fa in management�� (��Guanli zhong de ��qing li fa�� ���z���� �����z�k��) (Modern business management can improve with ��qing�� ��li�� ��fa��. Q is human sentiment and individual feelings. Li is reasoning. Fa is funda-mental principles adopted by the company. http://admin.asiaec.com/wen-zhang/11023763/20050513/130035.html; E. W. Yun, ��Qing li fa conflicts in maintenance disputes��) (....�����z�k.��), Law in Oriental Eyes, 26 April 2007. (In China there is a venerable tradition: ��old people are to be sup-ported�� (���Ѧ���.��). This is changing with time and with the breaking of old social and moral order. This sea change of culture, custom and attitude affects how old people should be taken care of. The law has to provide for the old people when they were not maintained by their child out of qing and li in the process. This raised a whole host of QLF issues the law has yet to satisfactorily resolve. For example, maintenance issues arose because one or more children do not want to assume responsibility due to lack of education, lack of ability, feeling being unfairly treated by parents over estate dispersal, unequal burden because only male has to pay maintenance, parents versus children discord.) http://www.dffy.com/fayanguancha/sh/200704/20070426194557.htm
80. Q. D. Wu, Revelation about traditional Chinese law which accommodates qing li fa (��Qing lif fa jian ron de zhonguo gudai falu ji qishi�� ��Accommodating QLF, revelation of Chinese imperial law��. http://www.legalhistory.com.cn/ (A newly wed couple refused to move into a house they bought in Shanghai because their painter committed suicide in the house.)
81. Y. M. Huang, Hexie shehui yujing xia de ��zhifa ru shui�� linian ji qi shijian (The concept and practice of ��implementation of law like water�� within the language of harmonious society) Jiangcha Fengyun (.��.��) 2007-03-05 12:04:15 (The vision of a socialist legal system is to achieve harmony. This lofty goal is made unat-tainable by litigation explosion. People are taught to fight for their legal rights at all costs. They also resort to court to resolve interpersonal problems as a first instead of last resort.). http://www.cnjccn.com/article/2007/0305/article_329.html
82. Gu Yuan (.��), Conflict and reconciliation between following and not follow-ing the law: Balancing qing and fa ��Xun fa yu beifa de maodun you tuoxie, zhuo yu fail zi ping��. http://www.legalhistory.com.cn/ 2007-2-16.
83. The Chinese character for ��law�� (��fa��) consists of two radicals. The radical to the left represents water and the radical to the right represents wash way. The func-tion of law is thus to wash away bad things with water and return to normal-ity, tranquil and peaceful. Thus, justice to Chinese is levelling of upheaval to a prior state of tranquility, much like the natural tendency of water. Water will return to flatness in due course. Y. M. Huang, Hexie shehui yujing xia de ��zhifa ru shui�� linian ji qi shijian��. The concept and practice of ��implementation of law like water�� within the language of harmonious society, Jiangcha Fengyun (.��.��) 2007-03-05 12:04:15 X. Zhongming, Precedents, Stories and Judicial Culture of Ming Qing Dynasties (Anli, Gushi yu Ming Qing shiqi de shifa wen-hua) (Beijing: Falu Chubanshe, 2006), pp. 336�V339.
84. Z. P. Liang, Seeking Harmony in Natural Order (��Xuzhao zhiran zhixu zhing de hexie��) (Zhongguo zhengfa daxue chubanshe, 1997).
85. K. C. Wong, Confucianization of the law: A study of speech crime prosecution in China, Murdoch University Electronic Journal of Law, 11(3): September 2004. See text to notes 6, 7.
86. ��Ling yi jue yu�� is also referred to as ��Chunqiu jue yu��. ��Chunqui�� (Autumn and Spring Annals) of course is one of the five classics (wujing) authored by Confucius to teach his followers. ��Chunqiu jue yu�� as with complete Confucianisation of law was achieved in the Han dynasty (206 BC�V24 AD). The basic principles of ��Chunqiu jue yu�� cases are decided upon with reference to the Confucius doctrine, starting with determining the ��heart�� and ��motive�� of people, not just intent, act or harm. Z. W. Ma, Chinese Traditional Legal Culture (Zhongguo gudai falu wenhua) (Jinan daixu chubanshje, 1998), pp. 136�V142.
87. X. J. Liu (�B���s), A discussion on the use of ��qing li fa�� in ��prison litigations�� (Lun Songdai ��yusong�� zhong ��qing li fa�� de yuyong) (���ק��N�u���^�v���u���z�k�v ���B�Ρ�). Professor Liu studied judicial opinions from Song dynasty to under-stand the principles and application of QLF, inductively.
88. Imperial Chinese officials closest to the people are likely to be the local mag-istrates. The magistrates were called ��fu wu guan�� (father and mother official). Like parents they take care of all the needs, wants and problems for the people. In deciding cases, the magistrate do not only apply the law and decide right or wrong. Instead they try to resolve the disputes between the parties with an eye towards solving the problems once and for all. They are responsible for educat-ing the people, making them better with higher moral standing, and also the society a better one in the process.
89. http://web.ncyu.edu.tw/~hsinchun/word/study/3.pdf, see text at note 22, at p. 5.
90. Id., 6.
91. There is an issue as to whether ��ren qing�� as a reasonable person standard is to be set empirically (custom) or prescriptively (Confucius). Id., p. 7.
92. Id., 9.
93. Id., p. 12.
94. To make Chinese pliable to collective demands, Chinese people are trained to be thin skinned, that is, face matter, and always mindful of others opinion about oneself. This together with a high cultural expectation of self to be perfect, in Confucius image, makes Chinese uncomfortable with alien culture. A. Bartz, Sense and sensitivity, Psychology Today, 5 July 2011, last reviewed on 20 May 2013. http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/201107/sense-and-sensitivity
95. C. Leadbeater, The Self-Policing Society (Demos, 1996); B. Godfrey, Law, factory discipline and theft, British Journal of Criminology, 38(1): 59�V71, 1999. The arti-cle examines textile factory organisation on workplace ��theft�� or ��appropriation�� in mid-Victoria (c. 1800�V1850) in Yorkshire; particularly the deterrent effect of criminal law on such illegalities. The articles made clear that (1) The fac-tory owners would take steps to deal with run-away misappropriation problems themselves without resorting to the police, for example, by building factory to centralised workforce in order to better facilitate the monitoring and disciplin-ing of workers.
96. There are to be differences between schools of thoughts, for example, Fa jia or the legalists certainly believe that punishment is necessary to deter people. Y..P..Liu, Origin of Chinese Law (Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 1998), pp. 173�V201.
97. ��The Great Learning��, see W. T. Chang, trans., A Source Book of Chinese Philosophy, p. 86, as translated and cited in footnote 11 to Tu Weiming, The Ecological Turn in New Confucian Humanism: Implication for China and the World, In: Daedalus (Journal of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (Fall, 2001).
98. P. J. Ivanhoe, Confucian Moral Self Cultivation (Hackett Pub Co; 2nd edition, 1 March 2000).
99. G. Fang, F. X. Fang, M. Keller, W. Edelstein, T. J. Kehle and M. A. Bray, Social moral reasoning in Chinese children: A developmental study, Psychology in School, 40(1): 125�V138, 2003.
100. F. Zakaria, Culture is destiny; A conversation with Lee Kuan Yew, Foreign Affairs, 73(2): 109�V126, March/April 1994.
101. J. H. Liu, L. Zhang and S. F. Messner, Crime and Social Control in a Changing China (Greenwood Press, 2001).
102. This tendency to keep problems at home and away from officials is best captured by the saying: ��family shame should not be spread outside��. It is also appropriate to have elders in the family to resolve any dispute. They are considered wiser and more knowledgeable, than any outside officials, to find out the truth and decide the punishment. C. K. Fei, The Family and Clan Rules in China (Zhongguo de jiafa zhugui) (Shanghai: Shanghai shehui kexue chubanshe, 1998), Chapter 4: ��Adjudication and Punishment�� (��Cheng Chu��), pp. 106�V129.
103. C. Chan, The cultural dilemmas in dispute resolution: The Chinese expe-rience, Conference of Enforcing Equal Opportunity in Hong Kong, Hong Kong University, 14 June 2003. http://www.hku.hk/ccpl/pub/conferences/documents/14062003a-CeciliaChan.pdf
104. D. C. Clarke, Dispute resolution in China, Journal of Chinese Law, 5(2): 245�V296, 1991. See also; B. K. Y. Wong. Traditional Chinese philosophy and dispute resolution, Hong Kong Law Journal, 30(Part 2): 304�V319, 2000.
105. When dealing with external relationships, that is, clan and society, family rules (.jia gui) incorporated seven admonitions: (1) having good relationship with neighbours; (2) avoid litigation; (3) avoid hurting others; (4) avoid conflict; (5) defend the clan; (6) punish thieves and robbers; (7) protect the environment. Four of the seven, that is, (1) to (4), consisted of avoiding conflicts. C. K. Fei, The Family and Clan Rules in China (Zhongguo de jiafa zhugui) (Shanghai: Shanghai shehui kexue chubanshe, 1998).
106. J. R. Watt, The District Magistrate in Late Imperial China (New York: Columbia University Press, 1972).
107. B. W. Reed, Money and justice: Clerks, runners, and the magistrate��s court in late imperial sichuan, Modern China, 21:3: 345�V83, 1995.
108. C. Yu and M. Wei, The three social stratum and legal practice in Chinese char-acters, (��<<Ruulin waishi>> zhong de sange jieceng yu falu shijian��) Journal of Jiangsu Police Officer College, 17(2): 109�V119, 116R, 2000. (Petty officials were all corrupt. They were hated by the people and avoided by the public.) [Author note: The title of the article in the original was wrongly translated. It should be ��The three classes in the <> and legal practices��.]
109. M. Macauley, Social Power and Legal Culture: Litigation Masters in Late Imperial China (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1999). Chapter 1: ��The Evolution of a Crime and Its Punishment�� describes how songshi or litigation masters were being considered as ��habitual litigation hooligan�� in stirring up disputes, pp..19�V46, at 19.
110. This is not unlike policing in America when we leave the dirty work of polic-ing to the police, only holding them accountable when we are forced to be exposed to them, for example, scandal. P. K. Manning, Police Work: The Social Organization of Policing (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1997).
111. The common admonition in Hong Kong is ��Good boy does not become a police��. While such an attitude is fast disappearing because of increased salary, oppor-tunity, professionalism, and status a police career, it still strong felt and artic-ulated in some quarters of the community, for example, well-to-do families. K..C..Wong, Police Power: Misconduct and Accountability, In: Unit 4 to Police and Society (Hong Kong: Open University, 2000), p. 120.
112. R. G. Gove, Militia, market and lineage: Chinese militia, market and lineage: Chinese resistance to the occupation of HK��s new territories in 1899, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch, 9: 31�V65, 32, 1969.
113. C. Leadbeater, The Self-Policing Society (London: Demos, 1996), p. 28. http://charlesleadbeater.net/wp-content/uploads/1996/01/theselfpolicingsociety1.pdf
114. J. Hayes, Hong Kong Region 1850�V1911, The: Institutions and Leadership in Town and Countryside (New York: Columbia University Press, 2012) (Neither China imperial bureaucracy nor the British colonial administration reached into the running of local village affairs.)
115. A traditional Chinese idiom states ���r.�ӥ���, ����.�@�H (traditional, Pinyin ning wei taiping qua��n, bu zuo luanshi ren��) as: ��It��s better to be a dog in a peaceful time than be a man in a chaotic period��.
116. J. Salaff, Working Daughters of Hong Kong: Filial Piety or Power in the Family (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981).
117. S. K. Lau and Z. J. Liu, Society and Politics in Hong Kong (Hong Kong: Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1984), ��5: Linkages between the Bureaucratic Polity and the Chinese Society��. p. 121.
118. G. M. Chen and W. J. Starosta, Chinese conflict management and resolution: Overview and implications, Intercultural Communication Studies, 7(1): 1�V17, 1997�V1998. http://www.trinity.edu/org/ics/ics%20issues/ics%20vii/ics-vii-1-chen.pdf
119. Shameful things stay at home. Saving ��face�� is important in Chinese family, K. K. Hwang, Guanxi and Mientze: Conflict resolution in Chinese society, Intercultural Communication Studies, 7(1): 17�V38, 1997�V1998. http://www.uri.edu/iaics/content/1997v7n1/02%20Kwang-Kuo%20Hwang.pdf
120. Jurisprudentially speaking, positive law has little authority and still less legiti-macy in the home front, best left to family or community to order, naturally and customarily. Theoretically, law is to proscribe conduct with ��thou shall not��, social regulation is there to solve problem in line with expectations with ��thou shall��. Law is a closed-end command to cease and decease.. Social regulation is an open-ended invitation to participate. T. V. Svogun, The Jurisprudence of Police: Toward a General Unified Theory of Law (Palgrave Macmillan, 10 October 2013), p. 7.
121. Not entering official gate during one��s life time.
122. Not being legalised and bureaucratised, FOPS is an order maintenance task. The objective is to solve problem with a view to promote the best interest of the family. Policing (as in Problem Oriented Policing [POP] in the West) is act based (adult) or status oriented (juvenile), and rule specific. The question is how can we respond to or deal with people who violate rules? FOPS in China is family based and order specific. The issue is how to secure order that would contribute to the smooth functioning of the family as a whole. Rule enforce-ment is a negative activity. Order promotion is a positive venture. The former is punitive and backward looking. The later is remedial and forward looking.
123. Restorative Justice Online. http://www.restorativejustice.org/
124. J. Braithwaite, Crime, Shame and Reintegration (Cambridge: Cambridge. University Press, 1989).
125. There is an age-old Chinese saying: ��Not entering government door alive, and not entering hell in death��. There was also another saying: ��Receiving 300 lashes even before seeing the officials��. The later saying has some validity. In Imperial China, those who sought the Magistrate��s help in resolving disputes would be penalised whether their claim is legitimate or not. Thus, to the Hong People before the 1980s, visiting with government officials, especially police, is an unpleasant experience. ��In Hong Kong.�K.to avoid having contacts with bureaucrats as far as possible, either through ��self-help�� activities or to make do with shortage of services is the only way to relate oneself to the bureaucratic polity�� (p. 112). S. K. Lau and Z. Liu, Society and Politics in Hong Kong (Hong Kong: Chinese University of Hong Kong, 1984).
126. People are ��born with�� problems because they have expectations. People are ��born to�� problem because resources, personal or social, are always limited. When expectations are unlimited and material resources are limited, there are always problems. The only way out is to reduce expectations, that is, be contented.
127. Conflict theorists have long observed that it is impossible to have all the people agreed upon a uniform understanding of the social order. The radical theorists have challenged consensus theorists�� understanding of law and order from the perspective of the dominant class, while totally ignoring the contribution of the dominated class. This is a major oversight; people��s mentality and sensitiv-ity matters. The nature and distribution of police power take a different shape viewed from above, as it is from below.
128. C. D. Robinson and R. Scaglion, The origin and evolution of the police function in society: Notes toward a theory. Law & Society, 21(1): 109�V154, 1987.
129. J. Austin, Lectures on Jurisprudence; or, The Philosophy of Positive Law (London, J. Murray Year: 1885), pp. 226�V230 (habit of obedience).
130. P. K. Manning, Organizational constrains and semiotics. In: M. Punch (ed.), Control in the Police Organization (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1983), pp. 169�V194.
131. I. Kant, An Answer to the Question: What is Enlightenment? (1784). https://web.cn.edu/kwheeler/documents/What_is_Enlightenment.pdf
132. There is an urgent need to draw a clear distinction between the ��community�� and the ��people��. They are conceptually different categories for analytical and opera-tional purposes. Analytically, a community is a collectivity (group of people) sharing certain identifiable characteristics and relationship, that is, ��a group of people who share certain demographic and socio-economic traits and fellow-ship��. (Fessler, 1976). The people are an unbounded group of individuals shar-ing few things in common other than a universal social nature (humanity) and particularistic political character (nationality). Operationally, COP means that ��The police designate a community in which they will engage in problem solving, develop relationships (that hopefully become partnerships) with the population, collaborate with them to diagnose problems that have some generalised impact, prescribe and implement interventions to solve the problems, and continuously monitor the results�� (Flynn, 1998). In the case of people��s policing, it is the peo-ple��s problem, individually or as a group that should be of dominant concern.
133. Crime is never more than a breach of human trust, destruction of social relation-ship and infringement of personal rights. Breach of trust as failed expectation of predictability generates fear (of crime). Destruction of relationship as failed expec-tation of intimacy results in alienation (from others). Infringement of personal rights as failed expectation of entitlement causes loss (of property) or injury (to body). A reintegration strategy is much better than punishment strategy in renew-ing faith-building relationship and repairing harm. In this way, my theory echoes the concerns of Braithwaite with traditional punishment (cf. Braithwaite, 1989).
134. At its heart, all policing is a policing of relationship.
135. L. Nader, Law in Culture and Society (CA: University of California Press, 1969), pp. 337�V348.
136. R. Madsen, The public sphere, civil society and moral community: A research agenda for contemporary China studies, Modern China, 19 (2): 183�V198, 1993.
137. E. E. Joh, The paradox of private policing, Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, 95 (1): 49�V134, 2004. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=643184.
138. J. Gross, Introduction to alternative dispute resolution, Alberta Law Review 34.(1): 1�V33, 1995.
139. P. K. Manning, Organizational constrains and semiotics. In: M. Punch (ed.), Control in the Police Organization (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1983), pp. 169�V194. [Alternative, See Manning, supra, note 130.]
140. A. H. Maslow, A theory of human motivation, Psychological Review, 50(4): 370�V396, 194.
141. Letting go of expectation, Buddhist Blog, 23 December 2010. http://-thebuddhistblog.blogspot.com/2010/12/letting-go-of--expectations.html. J..Sherman, Ambigamy, Psychology Today, 5 October 2009. (��Expectation is what Buddha said is the source of suffering��.) http://www.psychologytoday.com/
blog/ambigamy/200910/ups-downs-expectations-and-attachements-what-the-buddha-missed
142. H. Liu, The Chinese Overseas, Vol 1. (London: Routledge, 2005), p. 307.
143. A. Chan, The Chinese concepts of Guanxi, Mianzi, Renqing and Bao: Their interrelationships and implications for international business. Conference Paper, Australian & New Zealand Marketing Academy (ANZMAC) Conference 2006, Brisbane, Australia. (2006). http://smib.vuw.ac.nz:8081/WWW/ANZMAC2006/documents/Chan_Alvin.pdf
144. E. Sinn, Power and Charity A Chinese Merchant Elite in Colonial Hong Kong (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2003).
145. Y. K. Chu, The Triads as Business (London: Routledge, 2000).
146. K. L. Chin. Chinese Subculture and Criminality: Non-traditional Crime Groups in America (New York: Greenwood Press, 1990), see ��Chinatowns and Tongs�� at p. 53.
147. J. Hayes, Old British Kowloon, Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society Hong Kong Branch, 6: 121�V137, 125, 1966.
148. R. J. Miners, State Regulation of Prostitution in Hong Kong, 1857�V1941, JRAS (HK), XXIV: 143�V161, 143�V144, 1984.
149. For political nature of mafia justice and order keeping, see L. M. McCartney, Democracy and the dangerous man: Mafia justice versus citizen virtue (January 1, 1997). Electronic Doctoral Dissertations for UMass Amherst. Paper AAI9809366. (��The study finds that the mafia variety of organised crime tends to substitute for the state as the recognized political authority when at least three basic conditions are met: (1) when the state fails to adequately protect its citizens, (2) when a climate of cultural mistrust of state authority exists, and (3) when there is an adequate supply of dangerous men who know how to employ force to obtain order in the manner described by Niccolo Machiavelli in The Prince��.) http://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations/AAI9809366
150. This rendition of Triad justice was captured in the first scene to Godfather I (15 March 1978), when people line up to see the Don Vito Corleone to ask for favour. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Godfather_%28film_series%29
151. R. Catanzaro, Men of Respect: A Social History of the Sicilian Mafia (Free Press, 1988). (��Two well-known codes of Sicilian and Mafia culture are crucial: honor and instrumental friendship. These cultural codes and the modern forces that shaped them gave the Mafia its essential competitive character which, in turn, imbued the organisation with its criminal dynamism��.)
152. Y. K. Chu, The Triads as Business (London: Routledge, 2000).
153. Ibid.
154. W. Stanton, Triad Society or Heaven and Erath Society (Hong Kong: Kelly and Walsh, 1900).
155. K. Bolton and C. Hutton, Triad Societies: Western Accounts of the History, Sociology and Linguistics of Chinese Secret Societies, Vol. 5 (London and New York: Taylor & Francis, 2000).
156. J. Beckert and F. Wehinger, In the shadow: Illegal markets and economic sociol-ogy, Socio-Economic Review, 1�V26, 2012. http://ser.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2012/09/26/ser.mws020.full.pdf?keytype.=.ref&ijkey.=.T5CNlKXvI3EBggc
157. R. K. Merton (1968-08-01). Social Theory and Social Structure (1968 enlarged ed.), (New York: Free Press, 1968); Robert K. Merton (October 1938). Social structure and anomie, American Sociological Review, 3(5): 672�V682, 1938.
158. ��Street-side business faced bullying from the police and triad elements�� (05/05/2011). (��Yeung Hon Yuen: Owner of Lai Heung Yuen Cafe, 61�� Hong Kong Memory.) http://www.hkmemory.hk/collections/oral_history/All_Items_OH/oha_74/highlight/index.html#p56936
159. There are many migrants travelling to and living in Hong Kong, as sojourns, and in time temporary permanent. But in the mind of Hong Kong people, migrant conjures up images of mainland Chinese invading Hong Kong, economically and culturally. For the purpose of policing in Hong Kong, the focus is on mainland migrants, legal or otherwise. C. Knowles and D. Harper, Hong Kong: Migrant Lives, Landscapes, and Journeys (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009).
160. J. A. Schafer and M. J. Giblin, Policing Intimate Partner Violence in Rural Areas and Small Towns, Women & Criminal Justice 20(4): 283�V301, 2010.
161. Cindy Chu, op. cit., Chapter One.
162. In 2010, only 17.3% identified themselves as Hong Kongese. The Identity and National Identification of Hong Kong People, Center for Communication Research, Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2010.
163. Annual Report, 1948, p. 9.
164. R. Hughes, Borrowed Place Borrowed Time (Singapore: Andre Deutach, 1968).
165. C. R. Shaw and H. D. McKay, Juvenile Delinquency in Urban Areas (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1942).
166. G. B. Endacott, Government and People in Hong Kong (HK: HKU, 1964), p. 4.
167. S. E. Hamilton, Watching over Hong Kong: Private Policing 1841�V1941 (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2008).
168. H. C. Wang Liu, The Traditional Chinese Clan Rules (New York: J.J. Augustin, 1959).
169. S. K. Lau, The Ethos of the Hong Kong Chinese (Hong Kong: The Chinese University Press, 1988) with S.K. Lau.
170. W. P. Morgan, Triad Societies in Hong Kong (Hong Kong: Government Press, 1960). (Reprinted 1982, 1989).
171. Professor Black is the first to observe that the behaviour of law as government control is a function of social and cultural distance. D. Black, The Behavior of Law (1976), K. C. Wong, Black��s theory on the behavior of law revisited III: Law as more or less governmental social control, International Journal of the Sociology of Law, 26(3): 365�V392, 1998. Available at: http://works.bepress.com/kam_wong/18
172. On the correct handling of contradictions among the people, Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung, 27 February 1957. (Speech at the Eleventh Session [Enlarged] of the Supreme State Conference. Comrade Mao Tse-tung went over the verbatim record and made certain additions before its publication in the People��s Daily on 19 June 1957.) http://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/mao/selected-works/volume-5/mswv5_58.htm
173. Ibid.
174. M. Deflem, R. Featherstone, S. Sutphin, and Y. Li. Policing the pearl: Historical transformations of law enforcement in Hong Kong, International Journal of Police Science and Management, 10: 349�V356, 2008.
175. B. Cole, Post-colonial systems, In: R. I. Mawby (ed.), Policing across the World. (London: UCL Press, 1999), pp. 88�V108, 89.
Table 4.1.Population of Hong Kong According to Ethnic Group: 2001�V2011
Ethnic Group
Census 2001
Census 2006
Census 2011
Number
%
Number
%
Number
%
Chinese
6,364,439
94.9
6,522,148
95.0
6,620,393
93.6
Indonesian
50,494
0.8
87,840
1.3
133,377
1.9
Filipino
142,556
2.1
112,453
1.6
133,018
1.9
White
46,585
0.7
36,384
0.5
17,342
0.2
Indian
18,543
0.3
20,444
0.3
28,616
0.4
Pakistani
11,017
0.2
11,111
0.2
18,042
0.3
Nepalese
12,564
0.2
15,950
0.2
16,518
0.2
Japanese
14,180
0.2
13,189
0.2
12,580
0.2
Thai
14,342
0.2
11,900
0.2
11,213
0.2
Other Asian
12,835
0.2
12,663
0.2
12,247
0.2
Others
20,835
0.3
20,264
0.3
30,336
0.4
Total
6,708,389
6,864,346
7,071,576
Table 4.2.Traditional Social Control Philosophy Compared: East (China) versus West (United States)
China
West
Justifications of control
Reformation (offender)53
Restoration (social relationship)54
Reintegration (communal harmony)55
Retribution (victim/society)56
Deterrence (individual/society)57
Rehabilitation (individual)58
Subject of control
Personal character59�Xinternal thought
Social conduct60�Xexternal behaviour
Basis of control
Moral wrong61
Legal wrong62
Method of control
Education�Xto reform63
Punishment�Xto deter64
Strategy of control
Root of the problem
Manifestation of the problem
Site of control
Collective
Individual
Sources of control
Multiple layers:
Individual�Vfamily�Vneighbour�Vclan�Vstate
Multiple focus:
Psychological�Vphysical�Vsocial�Veconomical�Vlegal�Vpolitical�Vcultural
Unitary system�V
Judicial�Vlegal�Vpenal
Nature of control
Informal�Vsocial65
Formal�Vlegal66
Time of control
Preventive�Vproactive
Remedial�Vreactive67
Assumption of the controlled
Affective�Vsocial68
Rational�Vautonomous69
II
Police Reform in 1950s
190
Policing in Hong Kong
191
Police Reform Literature
189
5
Police Reform Literature1
Introduction
Police reform is ubiquitous.2 It is all around us. Reform is necessary to keep up with change, political or social. Reform is inevitable to assure survival of the fittest, for example, with scandal comes reform. Reform is wholesome as it stands for improvement, for example, with President Lyndon Johnson��s war on crime in the United States (1968) and Governor Murray MacLehose��s war on corruption in Hong Kong (1974). Last but not the least, police reform is welcomed as it allays public concerns and promises future hope. In doing so, it serves the interests of some and fulfills the aspirations of many. Police reform is all of the above and more. According to Professor Savage, in concrete terms, police reform in the United Kingdom results from: ��public inquiries, miscar-riages of justice, legal changes, political agendas and cultural shifts�K��3
This chapter reviews literature on ��Police Reform��. It variously investigates into the nature, topologies, conduct, impact and assessment of police reform. Section II: ��HKP Reform Inquiries�� reports on a number of high-profile HKP Reform Inquires, from The Caldwell Commission (1858) to the Sir Alastair Blair-Kerr Commission (1973) to The Coopers & Lybrand Consultant Report (1993) to Lan Kwai Fang (LKF) Disaster Report (1993) to Hong Kong Audit Commission (1999). Section III is a brief ��Conclusion��.
I: Police Reform
Why Police Reform?
Why police reform? As the public faces a faceless and removed government, police agencies stand for all that is wrong with government and governance. As an all-purpose, 24/7-service agency, the police offers the public ample opportunities and the only readily available forum to air their grievances, with the police, in the name of transparency and accountability, which is actively encouraging. As the premier social control agency empowered to use coercive force to enforce law, impose order and deal with problems of all kinds, it attracts criticism and demands for accountability.
Why, then, are there recurring and persisting calls for police reform? The reason is simple. The police are set up to fail. The public is dissatisfied because the police can never meet all their legitimate demands. The first to observe is that police labour under a limited resource in the face of unlimited demands. For example, police cannot answer all service calls. Police also cannot hope to arrest all prostitutes or drug users when the public has demands for such illicit service and illegal commodities. The public is disillusioned because the police cannot meet all their (unrealistic) expectations, that is, deter or sup-press all crimes. The public expects customised and personalised service but is given bulk and routine services. The public expects final solutions to their problems but is only provided with partial and interim patch-up remedies, for example, when called police can drive rowdy juveniles away, only to have them return once the police are gone. The public is frustrated because the police are not able to resolve conflicting expectations, for example, domestic abuses. Frustrated citizens make good complaints. Police become the target of anger management.
To further complicate matters, different parts of the public have different expectations, which cannot be reasonably reconciled. For example, conser-vatives prefer substantive justice and liberals want procedural justice. For example, the public want full enforcement of the law, and protestors demand to be left alone. The public is jilted because the police over promise and under deliver. For example, the police claim to be able to suppress crime when many causes of crime are beyond the reach of the police, for example, family discipline, school education, peer influence, economic conditions and social discrimination. Viewed in this light, the call for and rendering of reform is natural and inevitable. For the misguided public, reform is a stopgap mea-sure to deal with recurring police transgressions. For the pragmatic police, reform is a survival strategy, to meet increasing demands and rising expecta-tions, of one reform at a time.
Typologies of Police Reform
The Police Reform Organizing Project (PROP) in its ��Mission�� statement, is instructive on why people seek police reform:
Through research and analysis, public education, policy advocacy, and coali-tion building, PROP aims: to stop the current wasteful, ineffective, unjust, illegal, bullying, homophobic, transphobic, and racially biased practices of the NYPD; to establish an outside independent agency that will investigate police priorities and punish abusive conduct; and to implement local problem solv-ing measures that strengthen communities while reducing crime.4
According to the ��Mission�� statement, PROP wants police to be less abu-sive, more accountable and totally responsive to the people.
The ��Mission�� statement also tells us another reason for reform. Police reform is driven by the public��s (or a part thereof) unhappiness with the sta-tus quo, from corruption to abuse of power to incompetence.
Depending on the context�Xpurpose, issue and people�Xinvolved, there are many types of police reform.
Nostalgic Reform
Some people look back, asking why their police are not performing what they used to be, in role and functions, ways and means, appearance and style. They complained that the police are not doing what they had been doing. These are the ��nostalgic�� reformers. Yesterday is always better than today, is the battle cry. To them, the best of policing lived in the past. Mark Doyle has this to say about Prime Minister Cameron as a ��romantic�� reform par excellence:5
Last month the Cameron government enacted perhaps the most sweeping police reform since the Second World War, a reform that is very much in line�Xon the surface, at least�Xwith the Victorian idea of community polic-ing�K What British policing really needs, it seems, are more men like Inspector Field, even if the literary Inspector Field was himself, as I suspect, largely a product of Dickens�� fecund imagination. The myth of the genial bobby-on-the-beat, feared but respected by criminals, fawned over by toothless hags, swimming like a fish through the criminal underworld, a veritable cocktail of honesty, integrity, and grit poured into a buttoned blue suit, may have been a Victorian fantasy, but it is a useful fantasy all the same. The Tories, not exactly immune to the odd fit of Victorian nostalgia, would do well to return to Robert Peel��s original blueprint for the Met (but not for the Irish Constabulary) and the model of engaged, cooperative community policing they were meant to embody. �K
Normative Reform
Others look at the present, lamenting why their police are not living up to their expectations, in ideology, morality, law or custom, more generally, expectations of all kinds: Can the police be more polite? Can the police be more efficient? Can the police be more competent? Ten thousands complain, one universal concern: the police are not doing what they should be doing. Why can��t the police meet all my reasonable expectations, and beyond? These are the ��normative�� reformers. To them, the best of policing is in keeping faith with the present, making police more accountable to the people and living up to the law.6 The various human rights organisations and international police assistant programmes are best known for their effort in holding the police accountable.
The United Nations Code of Conduct for Law Enforcement, adopted in 1997 General Assembly, recognizes the crucial role the police play in protecting human rights and ensuring equal treatment of citizens before the law. Subsequently UN documents, including Guidelines for the Effective Implementation of the Code, and the Basic Principles on the Use of Fore and Firearms by law Enforcement Officials, adopted in 1990, provide further guid-ance on the appropriate role of the law. Despite the existence and with formal endorsement of these international principles, police reform as an area of rule of law reform was largely ignored until the past 15 years and remains a sensi-tive topic.7
Take any expectations you might have with the police, the chances are the police would be most likely not be able to meet people��s ever-regressing expectations. Expectation begets expectation. Perfection knows no bound.
Progressive Reform
Still others look to the future, questioning why their police are not perform-ing as they could or should, in ideology,8 philosophy9 or theory terms. These are the ��idealistic�� or ��progressive�� reformers. To them, the best of policing rests with the future, not the past or the present. What they want to do is to change that status quo, by moving the performance bar. By far, the best known of all police ��progressive�� reformers are those who champion for pro-fessionalism in policing:10
The ideal of professionalism retains its allure in policing for some of the same reasons it retains its allure in other fields: it conjures up a body of practitioners who bring meaning and dignity to their work through dedica-tion, collective self-improvement, and ethical commitment, aligning their own interests with the interests of those they serve. If anything, that ideal has even greater appeal in law enforcement than in medicine or law, prob-ably the two most paradigmatic professions, because aligning the interests of police officers�Xthe personification of state violence�Xwith the interests of the public has for decades been thought a particularly pressing and particu-larly vexing problem throughout the Anglo-American world. �KFor police reformers, professionalism offers an antidote to corruption and underper-formance, and a way of emphasizing that the police have, or should have, special skills and knowledge that can be written down, taught, and continu-ally improved. It offers, too, an avenue of reform that promises to enlist the police themselves in the cause of reform, by offering them pride, respect, and status.
In the United States, progressive police reform11 was born out of progres-sive movement of the late nineteenth century (1890�V1920),12 with Theodore Roosevelt (1858�V1919), the Police Commissioner of New York City and later President of the United States, in the lead.13 Progressivism championed the dealing of social problems (poverty, inequality, racism and violence) of indus-trialisation in America in an enlightened and scientific way, for example, through education and with scientific research. They called for regulating cooperation, purging corruption and controlling the police.
Progressive police reform calls for the professionalisation of police, by way of removal of political patronage and in the reduction of corruption.
Critical Reform
Finally, more than a few are not happy with the police�Xpast, present or future, in whatever they do or do not do. They want change for change��s sake. ��Police can be done differently�� is made to stand for ��police can be done bet-ter��. These are the ��critical�� reformers. To them, the best of policing is an ever-changing policing, in meeting expectations, in ratifying mistakes, in seeking improvement, in keeping up with time or just experimenting with new ideas. Radical reformers are also known for shifting the paradigm of policing, away from the historical and conventional.
In the face of racial challenges, the police are either unwilling or unable to changes proposed by radicals.
Political Reform
The above reasoning for police reform pre-supposes the existence of an entrenched, if not functional, police agency. The need for political reform might result from doing away with the old altogether, for example, regime change, post-conflict societies and revolutionary change in political gov-ernance. These kinds of police reform have one thing in common; police reform is required not as a growth process but as a change in governance.14 This suggests an assertive change in political philosophy15 or the governing paradigm, such as the Europeanisation of Bosnia16 or commercialisation of China.17 Post-conflict police reform (PCPR) (a/k/a transitional society reform) is one such political reform.18
As the name of such kinds of reform denote, ��post conflict police reform�� or ��transitional society police reform�� (TSPR) is a kind of reform engaged by security�Xpolice or police�Vsecurity forces when the nation as a whole is mov-ing; thus, it is ��transitional��, from a conflict (war) stage to an order (peace) state, and is thus ��post-conflict��. The objective of the PCPR is in transform-ing the wartime military security forces (��demilitarization��) into a peacetime civilian police agency (��civilianization��) through re-defining the role and changing the relationship of the security versus police with respect to the society in transition. The other objective to be achieved is to ��democratize�� the security forces and police agency, making them more accountable to the public and working within the ��rule of law��. As such, nearly all PCPRs, especially those that are sponsored, assisted and funded by external donors (United Nations, United States, Canada, Japan and Spain) are also ��democ-ratization�� and ��rule of law�� reform programmes. The three major challenges to PCPR are:
First, how to ��demilitarize�� the functions of the security forces or ��civil-ianize�� the para-military role of the police. The former requires taking away powers of the security forces. The latter requires changing the culture of the police. In both cases, the values and interests of security forces versus civil police agency are at stake.
Second, how to maintain security of the nation and law and order of the society, when the war-torn nation is still in transition, with the real threat of war by political�Vmilitary leaders and fear of crime by the people.
Third, how to provide law, order and security in a war-torn nation, with-out violation of the rule of law or human rights.19
As intimated above, there are many kinds of police reform. The challenge is in how to classify and characterise them, in a systematic, coherent and meaningful manner.
Forces of Change
The initiation and conduct of police reform is very much affected by the media:20 The FBI has its own radio show�X��This is Your FBI�� on ABC from April 6, 1945 to January 30, 1953. LAPD was made famous by its own TV show�XDragnet.21 Without the glitz and over-the-top drama, this show brings ��the story of your police force in action���X��just the facts��.22 These shows and others ��make a rendering of what truly constitutes the good cop from the bad cop more difficult��.23
In the United Kingdom, it is not different. British press leads the call for police reform:
IT IS the hot new idea: local services ought to be accountable to local peo-ple. And everyone seems to agree that the police are a public service ripe for reform. Combine the two, and you get the government and both main opposition parties all pushing the same way, for local oversight of the men in blue. The Liberal Democrats aim, vaguely, to put them under regional control; the Conservatives want neighbourhood sheriffs. Labour proposes elected ��police boards�� and community advocates to keep chief constables on their toes.24
Most calls for police reforms, however, come from outside. The pub-lic.and interest groups variously complain about police scandals of one kind or another: abuse, corruption or incompetency. Reform initiative from within the police agency is extremely rare25 and from rank and files, is unheard of.
Globally, police reform moves along predictable and familiar lines: establishing legitimacy,26 recovering public trust,27 building integrity,28 promoting democracy, 29 building the rule of law,30 improving accountabil-ity,31 increasing cost-effectiveness32 and forging community engagement.33 They are often sold as ��best practice�� or ��universal model�� or ��progressive principles�� or ��modernization method��.34 In most cases, there is rarely any serious discussion over the need for utility of reform direction and method.
Traditionally, police reform is made synonymous with democratic polic-ing of the West, justified on the grounds of globalisation and trans-nation-alisation of policing35 and achieved through conditionality, socialisation and the impositions with agreement, funding or incentives, from abroad. It is always Western-developed nations dictating to the other lesser-developed countries. Bayley observed ��we are in a period of unprecedented effort to expand democratic institutions around the world, with the explicit recogni-tion that reform of the police, and of the larger criminal justice system, is a critical component��.36
Of late, police reform chases after crude improvements in managerial operations, made famous by the New Public Management with the transfer-ence of private sector productivity management techniques, management by objective (MBO), total quality management (TQM) to the public sector and police included.37
How to Conduct Police Reform?
There are many ways to conduct reform: administratively, legally, politically and socially.
Depending on history, nature, reason and issues for reform, how to con-duct reform differs between countries, and communities. That is to say that the reform process is invariably contingent and contextual. No two reforms are alike, though some similarities can be observed, such as obstacles pre-sented and lessons learned. Such obstacles and lessons have more to do with reform in general, than police reform in context.
Accountable to What, Whom and How?38
Reform is about changes to the organisation, people, process and action to enhance performance or achieve objectives. While there are many kinds of changes, reform is about meeting expectations, either reporting to a supe-rior or giving an account of one��s performance.39 In both instances, things should not have happened, happened with a performer. To many and in real terms, reform is accountability in action.40 As such, police reform cannot get far away from issues of what, whom and how police reform should be con-ducted. In this, Skogan��s remark is most apt and pertinent: ��Police reform is risky and hard, and efforts to innovate in policing often fall short of expec-tations��.41 This is to say that the police (especially in a democratic society) intersect with society at multiple points and are involved with people��s life in every way. As such, police actions and reform are bound to have a material and substantial impact on people��s value and interests; psychologically and physically, politically and socially, ideologically and materially. Simply put, police reform matters to people in multifarious and discernible ways, near or far, directly or indirectly, more or less, salient or obscured, dominant or marginal, real or imagined. The symbiotic relationship between police soci-ety recalls Hemingway��s book For Whom the Bell Tolls which draws upon John Dunn��s famous line: Devotions upon Emergent Occasions, specifically ��Meditation XVII��:
Olde English Version No man is an Iland, intire of itselfe; every man is a peece of the Continent, a part of the maine; if a Clod bee washed away by the Sea, Europe is the lesse, as well as if a Promontorie were, as well as if a Manor of thy friends or of thine owne were; any mans death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankinde; And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for thee.42
The study of and understanding about police reform regarding the ori-gin, process and impact of reform, requires looking at police reform from a variety of stakeholders�� perspectives, inside and outside of the police.
Impact of Police Reform
Without fundamental changes in the socio-political environment, police reform would only be superficial, local and temporal.43 The impact of police reform must be understood in a historical and cultural context, lest we draw the wrong conclusion that democratic governance or commu-nity policing would be embraced with open arms by local people, without considering their values and interests towards reform.44 Police reform is less like a lock step military march as it resembles a collaborative dance in Waltz.
How to Assess HKP Reform?
As previously implied, the assessment of HKP reform in a process and out-come is a long overdue. The question is how to get it done. Depending on the purpose and needs, accountability or debriefing, and parties calling for assessment, for example, internal versus external, there are many ways to conduct assessment audit.
In 2001, David Bayley published a defining study on the: ��Democratizing the Police Abroad: What to Do and How to Do It�� (2001).45 In it, Bayley pro-vides a checklist by which to conduct reform. Some of the most important ��generic��46 criteria of assessments are:
1. Objective-linked action: ��Any reform program must be based on a clearly articulated understanding of the connections between the objectives to be achieved and the actions proposed�� (p. 19).
2. Leadership commitment: ��Sustained and committed leadership by top management, especially the most senior executive, is required to produce any important organizational change�� (p. 20).
3. Organisational members responding and responsive: ��The key to changing any aspect of policing is management, that is, the way in which the members of a police organization are brought to do what policies call for�� (p. 20).
4. Changing the system�Vculture and not people: ��Organisational change does not occur through changing personnel; it requires changing the system and culture of an organisation�� (p. 21).
5. Formal organisation change cannot change behaviour: ��Police behav-ior cannot be changed by formal reorganization within the police or by restructuring on a national basis�� (p. 21).
6. Material resources are necessary but not sufficient for change: ��Material resources may support desired changes, but they are rarely essential and never sufficient to bring them about�� (p. 22).
7. Significant reform requires ��buy-in��: ��Significant reform requires widespread acceptance across ranks and assignments in a police department. �KTo obtain this necessary ��buy-in�� by all members of a police force, successful reform generally involves the following sequential activities: ��brainstorming�� by senior managers and care-fully chosen colleagues about operational problems, creation of task forces from all ranks to devise concrete plans, discussion of proposed plans in seminars in all units and among all managerial ranks, devel-opment of pilot projects to test feasibility in the field on the clear understanding that the objective is to determine how to carry out the program and not whether to undertake it, and implementation of the new program throughout the department�� (p. 22).
8. Pilot projects required committed leadership and dedicated person-nel: ��When pilot projects are undertaken, they must have committed leadership and personnel who are not continually pulled away for other purposes�� (p. 23).
9. Police officers change due to self-interests: ��Police officers will not change their behavior unless they perceive it to be in their personal interest to do so�� (p. 23).
10. Effective reform requires change performance criteria: ��Reform will not occur unless the criteria for evaluating individual performance encourage the sort of behavior that reform requires�� (p. 24).
11. Reformers should not denigrate established people with old behaviour: ��Reformers both inside and outside police organizations should be careful not to denigrate the motivation, knowledge, or skill of the people whose behavior they are trying to change�� (p. 24).
12. Evaluation should be based on outcome, and not output: ��Program evaluations that emphasize outputs rather than outcomes as a mea-sure of success inhibit organizational creativity�� (p. 24).
13. Reform should be monitored for change, not too burdensome: ��Reform requires that new programs be monitored so that midcourse changes can be made. At the same time, burdensome evaluation can discour-age reform�� (p. 25).
14. Change results from new resources and not redistribution: ��Change is more likely to occur when new resources are made available rather than when existing ones are redistributed�� (p. 25).
15. Reform sensitive to the rising crime: ��If the incidence of crime and disorder is thought to be unacceptable or increasing, police reform will be inhibited�� (p. 25).
16. Service oriented accountable policing results from an increased con-tact with respectable citizens: ��Increasing contacts between police personnel and respectable, noncriminal members of the public is an important way of encouraging the development of an accountable, service-oriented police organization�� (p. 25).
17. Changed behaviour depends on a clear policy and matched sanctions: ��Issuing clear statements of organizational policy accompanied by appropriate positive and negative sanctions is a powerful way to change the behavior of police officers, even in situations of high stress and urgency�� (p. 26).
18. Reform is likely to occur if officers are connected to professional and progressive networks: ��Reform is more likely to occur if police offi-cials are connected to professional networks of progressive police leaders (regional, national, and international)�� (p. 26).
19. Labour organisation must be included in reform planning and devel-opment: ��Labor organizations within the police must be included in the development and planning of any reform program�� (p. 27).
Professor Bayley provides 19 items that police reform leadership or plan-ners must be made aware of and insisted on when conducting a successful police reform.
Coming at the beginning of Section II on Hong Kong Reform, this is hardly the venue to go through each and every one of them in evaluating HKP reform. Reform assessment has to wait its turn. Sufficed to say, the list passes the most stringent facial validity test. The road ahead is for external police researchers or internal policy makers to operationalise the audit items in order to measure them objectively.
For example, with item one: In determining in what way and to what extent reform objectives, one and all, are linked with reform actions (pro-gramme, policy, strategy, tactics, measures and actions), it is necessary to look at the intent, purpose, objective and desired outcome of the reform, before we turned plan execution and impact, both formally and informally. We then need to find a way to determine the degree of closeness of fit between the objective and action, before we can come to a judgement whether the action in kind and degree is best designed to reach the objectives. The closeness-of-fit index must also be evaluated in the context, that is, an action that might work in one setting (people, places, functions and circumstances) might not be appropriate in any other setting. This raises the issue of the least-best choice, after comparing the positives and negatives through cost-benefit analysis of matching means and goals.
Turning our attention to HKP reform in the 1990s, consider the case of item seven. In tying HKP reform (in Knowledge Management [KM]) with employees ��buy in��, evidence provided by the senior management suggests that KM has not been fully accepted by HKP members because of ��Resistance to change; Limited awareness of knowledge management leading to over expectation of its impact and results; A lack of ownership of the project; Misconception of ��knowledge is power��; Rank consciousness; The absence of a change management mechanism; and A lack of incentive to motivate members to adopt the changes��. It is clear from the above that the ��resistance to change�� resulted from ��a lack of ownership�� (internal motivation) due to ��limited awareness�� resulting in ��misconception��. A ��lack of incentive�� (exter-nal motivation) also plays a role (item nine, 10).47
II: HKP Reform Inquiries48
The Caldwell Commission (1858)
The first independent study of HKP was Governor John Bowring��s commis-sioned investigation49 into the Attorney General Anstey50 versus Registrar General Caldwell affair,51 in 1858. The former Attorney General Anstey charged the Superintendent of Police Caldwell with corruption in office. Specifically, Caldwell was charged with speculating on brothel licences and dereliction of duties, including associating with Mr Chow Wong, a pirate and informant, while acting as the Superintendent of Police. As a histori-cal backdrop, Caldwell was one of the very few British police officers who spoke fluent Chinese at the time and was well connected with the local com-munities, including the underground. He was very successful in keeping crime, vice and triads at bay through collaboration with unsavory Chinese, and infamous pirates included. As a result, Chinese middlemen enjoyed free rein of power to fight crime and maintain order in the Chinese community, with ways and means known but not sanctioned by their British handlers. In doing so, Caldwell��s agents were able to deviate from normal criminal jus-tice process, and compromised the purity of colonial rules, in search of self-serving ends of dubious legality and morality.52 Viewed in this context, the charges of Caldwell Commission that Caldwell associated with characters of disrepute, the like of Ma-chow Wong and operating of brothel, while true is besides the point. What Caldwell was really charged with was not acting like a British in treating Chinamen, the way they should.53 Mum observed:
In openly marrying a Chinese woman according to Christian form, and by raising what by all accounts was a happy family, Caldwell, uniquely, has over-stepped the tacitly agreed boundaries and provoked complex and unstable responses in the colonial community. �Kit was these questions abut racial bar-riers, as much as concerns about bribe-taking or piracy, that were at issue dur-ing the enquiry.54
In a more understanding language of the time: Conduct unbecoming of a British officer.
The Police Commission (1871)
The second was a self-study of HKP by ��The Police Commission�� in 1871. The precipitating cause for concern about worsening the crime situation and deteriorating police performances observed by the community:
The subject of the inefficiency of the Police continued to engross the attention of the authorizes. Secret societies and the elements composing them produced crimes a great deal faster than the Police could find the out; the Government seemed all engrossed with the gambling licenses; and the General administer-ing of the Government, naturally reluctant to interfere in the annexed of Sir. Richard MacDonnell has enough to do so to keep things quite in his absence. Mr. Deane, the Captain Superintendent of Police, in his last report stated ��rob-beries with violence, burglaries, and assaults with intent to rob had increased nearly fourfold��. The Chief Justice instanced the demoralization of the police, due to the debasing influences of the gambling houses, and has suggested that the ��hope of obtaining government rewards led to conspiracy to convict inno-cent men of murder��.55
Chief Justice Smale complained of disorganisation of the HKP and lack of control over the policing observed by the Chief Justice:
The Chief Justice expressed himself strongly on the organization, or rather disorganization, of the Police on the Legislative Council on the 18th August. He considered discipline could only be obtained by the whole Force being concentrated under one efficient head. At this period there were consta-bles under the orders of ten Harbor Mater and others under the Registrar-General, and all, more or less interfered with by Mr. D. R. Caldwell, who either in connection with the gambling farm of otherwise, now kept ��runners�� of his won, or a sort of private detective department employed occasionally by the Government no one knowing to what use these detectives may not be turned�Xthis ��questionable element�� in the local administration inducing the Chief Justice to state that Mr. Caldwell was ta this date ��virtually at the head of the Police��.56
There was also a disagreement over who�XChinese versus South or West India versus Sikhs�Xshould be employed as officers.57
The Police Commission was called forth by the Justices of Peace backed by a petition of 400 Hong Kong foreign residents complaining. The Commission was empanelled by Governor MacDonnell on 22 December 1871 but imple-mented by Sir Richard McDonald, the next governor. The charter of the Commission was to make: ��to consider whether under the circumstances of the alarming increase of crimes in the Colony, some steps might not be taken on behalf of the community at large to ascertain the cause of the existing state of matters and inaugurate some reform for the future��.58 Specifically, to conduct: ��inquiries into the efficiency and organization of the Police Force and the prevention of crime in the colony��.59
The Commission was one of the most extensive and comprehensive stud-ies of HKP by external parties at that point of time. The Police Commission was composed of: the Acting Attorney General T.C. Hayllar, Council Member William Keswick; Representatives of Gibb and Co. Messers F. W. Michell and Henry Lowcock; Merchant William Lemann; with Hayllar as the Chair, Leister as the Interpreter and Coroner as the Secretary. The scope of the inquiry included:
a. Crime during the past 6 years;
b. Increase or decrease, cause of: How far due to individual execution;
c. Reports and suggestions of Messrs. Deane and Rice, especially the later;
d. ��Divided Authority��;
e. Fusion of all classes of police;
f. Present organisation: Suggestion for reform;
g. Sikhs, East Indians and Negroes;
h. District watch;
i. Police force badge.60
In terms of process, the Police Commission was very professional and thorough. It interviewed witnesses, including Captain Superintendent of Police Dean and Chief Judge of the Supreme Court Hornby. It inspected key official documents, including reports on the police (1968�V1970), criminal sta-tistics and parliamentary papers. It called for public participation (though not the Chinese).
Overall, the Report of the Police Commission (July 1872) came to the following observations:
First, crime in Hong Kong was exceedingly high, with a large amount of crime unreported, that is, according to the Superintendent of Police May, it was upward of 50% in 1862. More than 60% of crimes were not detected.61
Second, the British criminal justice system, as applied to Hong Kong, was unsuitable to the Hong Kong native population. For example, criminal pun-ishment was not harsh enough. ��Except for the mere restrains of confinement, which to most Chinamen is not irksome, he finds himself surrounded with every comfort-roomy clean quarter, congenial society, the kindest of treatment, wholesome and plentiful food, work about sufficient to give him an appetite to enjoy it, medical attendance and comfort�K��62 In essence, British criminal jus-tice has no deterrent effect on the Chinese, individually and as a group.
Third, branding had little effect on Chinese who knew no shame, except to arouse sympathy from compatriots due to anti-foreign sentiments.63
Fourth, the Chinese people were not cut out for British criminal justice system.
The British justice system required ��fair play�� and ��honesty�� in order to pursue ��justice�� and attain ��truth��. Chinese people had no respect for oaths and were given to perjury, even in the face of punishment.64 Without brand-ing, there was no way of keeping track of the habitual offenders.
Fifth, the leadership of the police force should be promoted from within and not appointed from outside, that is, with Cadet officers, such as Deane, who were not trained to be or have experience with police officers.65
With respect to the Water Police, The Commission supported the recom-mendations of the Harbor Master, Captain H.H. Thomset, namely: Water Police should be commanded by an Assistant Superintendent whose ��duties being confined to Policing the Waters of Hong Kong��; that the areas cov-ered by policing rowing boats should be better planned and that a ��fast steam launch�� should be added.66
The Commission was not in agreement on most of the issues, such as reg-istering the complexity of the issues and diversity of views, especially on the ethnic composition of HKP, for example, Mr Lowcock�Xmostly Europeans, a few Sikhs and Chinese and no native detectives; Mr Lemana�Xagrees with Lowcock, and uses native detectives cautiously; Mr Steward�Xuses Europeans and Negroes, no native detectives and Major General Whitfield�Xsame as Steward. All Commissions unanimous: Minimum Europeans; command and control by Europeans; increase in pay and encourage studying the local dialect.67
The Commission did not achieve the purpose it was intended.
Sir Alastair Blair-Kerr Commission (1973)68
Since its inception (1844) and until recently (1974), the HKP has suffered cor-ruption that is endemic, open, rampant, accepted, and institutionalised in a syndicated form.69 According to the one-time ICAC chief:
Every part of public service was infected, especially the disciplined services, namely the police, the customs, and exercise service, the immigration depart-ment, the fire and ambulance services and prison service. Certain other government departments shared the notoriety of the disciplined services: housing, public words, education and health.70
To say that corruption within HKP is syndicated is to say that it is sys-temised, organised and rule bound. ��Neil Maloney, a British expatriate who joined the Hong Kong police force in 1969 before becoming an ICAC inves-tigator in 1974, recalled that each police station had a dedicated room for a ��collector��, whose sole job was to buy the bank drafts to send bribes to local and overseas accounts��.71
Officers who were on the take were protected and promoted,72 and those who were not, were sanctioned.73 Inspector Allen Ellis who served the HKP between the mid-1960s and mid-1970s and alleged his career was dam-aged because he refused to take bribes.74 Corruption was so pervasive and engrained within HKP that young recruits or honest cops were told on their first day of duty:
1. ��Get on the bus��, that is, if you wish to accept corruption, join us; or
2. ��Run alongside the bus���XIf you do not wish to accept corruption, it does not matter, but do not interfere;
3. ��Never stand in front of the bus���XIf you try to report corruption, the ��bus�� will knock you down and you will be injured or even killed or your business will be ruined. We will get you, somehow.75
In the days before ICAC, the public did not get service without paying lucky money,76 street hawkers could not ply their trade without paying a licence fee77 and gambling establishments could not operate without paying protection money.78
HKP corruption finally came to light with the landmark Godber cor-ruption case79 that called out for radical reform of corruption in Hong Kong, starting with the HKP.80
In 1971, the Chief Superintendent Peter Godber was investigated by the HKP Anti-Corruption Office for corruption as a result of suspicious bank-ing transmittals, in and out of Hong Kong. A bank audit of all 480 banks in Hong Kong showed that he amassed a fortune of $330,000. Further inquiry worldwide�XUnited States, Canada, Singapore, England and Hong Kong found that the total bank deposits were to the tune of $4,377,248, six times his career earnings as a HKP officer, since 1952. During the investigation, he asked for early retirement. He was instead suspended from duty and was asked to explain his ill-gotten gain under Section 10 of Prevention of Bribery Ordinance, within 7 days, that is, before 11 June 1973. Sensing trouble, he escaped using his police authority (special airport security per-mit) to bypass airport security and immigration on 8 June, arriving in England on 8 June 1973.
Godber was finally arrested in England on 29 April 1974 and extradited back to face justice in Hong Kong on 7 January 1975, after 8 months of legal rankle for accepting a bribe of $25,000 from a Chinese Superintendent81 to arrange for his appointment as the Division Superintendent of Wai Chai.82
Godber was tried in front of Judge Yang Ti-liang in Victoria District Court 7, Central, Hong Kong, for accepting a bribe of $20,000. He was convicted on 25 February 1975 and sentenced to 4 years in prison with HK$25,000 in res-titution, in the presence of 100 plus press officers and cheering public.
The Godber case is considered as a landmark case because of a number of distinctive characteristics:
First, it was for the first time a high ranking and decorated expatriate HKP officer was investigated by the HKP�XAnti-Corruption Office under the supervision of the Commissioner of Police, and later arrested by the ICAC after it was established.83
Second, it was for the first time Section 10 of Prevention of Bribery Ordinance was used to ask a senior HKP officer to explain his finan-cial holdings, beyond his earnings.
Third, it was the first case that shows that Hong Kong Government is committed to clean up corruption in Hong Kong. No one, not even high-ranking British officials, was above the law.84
Fourth, it was the first case that was able to generate a public outcry against HKP corruption, fostering an anti-corruption ethos in Hong Kong.85
Fifth, it resulted in the establishment of the ICAC, a recommendation of the Sir Alastair Blair-Kerr Commission appointed by then Sir Murray MacLehose.86
A report by the Blair-Kerr Commission in 1973, on its investigations into corruption in Hong Kong contained an analysis of factors affecting public attitudes towards corruption in Hong Kong.
1. Refugees with experience of China before 1949 brought expectations that officials would be corrupt. ��This belief in itself breeds corruption because it leads to voluntary bribery by people who consider it normal practice �K��
2. To such immigrants, the Hong Kong Government was alien and its language different, but while they would grumble among themselves they would not complain.
3. Overcrowding and fast development led to businesses not observ-ing regulations, willing to pay ��black money�� rather than lose their livelihood.
4. Time was valuable, bribes for faster service were found helpful.
5. Also, bribes were paid to jump the queue, for example for low cost housing.
6. Middlemen would make bribes appear as legal commission to the ignorant.
7. Junior civil servants claimed bribes had to be shared with senior officers.
8. People feared trouble, court appearance, etc., if they reported corruption.
9. Stringent controls and high standards were not accepted by the pub-lic, making them more willing to pay bribes.
10. Tea money was considered normal, tips for service not seen as bribes.
11. Public sympathised with needs of officials because their pay was too low.
12. Younger generation [then] were much more critical of government corruption and its links with crime.
13. Public concern was especially strong about police corruption.87
The Blair-Kerr Commission ushered in a new era of clean anti-corrup-tion government movement. Between 1974 and 1993, 9000 people were pros-ecuted for corruption with a claimed 84% conviction rate.
The rate of complaints has fluctuated over the years, with a downward trend. For example, a total of 3189 cases were reported in 1974, the first year of the ICAC. This was dropped to a low of 1234 or a decline of 62% in 1980. Since then, it rises again and stabilised at the 2000 plus range between 1981 (2344) and 1992. Beginning in 1993, it hits a 3000-cases range (3276), until it hits the 4000-cases range in 2000-cases range (4390) and remained for 4 years, with 2003 at 4310 cases. From 2004 (3746), it was again on the down-ward trend until 2013 when, for the first time since 1995 (2987), it reported 2514 cases (see Table 5.1). It is clear that the ICAC has been successful in keeping corruption down in Hong Kong, after 1997, in spite of the change of political sovereignty, leadership and culture, and with mass influx of Chinese into China.
Turning to the most recent 2 years 2012 versus 2013 (Table 5.2), one sees that the government sector has seen a decrease in corruption complaints of minus 32%, with the HKP close behind at minus 27%. While the total num-ber of corruption complaints might have been dropped by 33%, the people prosecuted for prosecution have increased. This suggests that there has been more focussed investigation on successful cases (Tables 5.2 and.5.3).
The LRC: Report on Arrest (1992)88
In August 1992, and in anticipation of the 1997 reversion of political sov-ereignty, the LRC investigated into police powers of stop, search, arrest and detention in Hong Kong leading to the publication of: ��Report on Arrest��. The Report recommended to the adoption of the U.K. PACE to rein in abuse of police powers. The implementation of the LRC report was left to ��An Inter-departmental Working Group�� chaired by SB consisting of all the disciplinary forces, ICAC and Legal Department which finally recommended for implementation of 30 of the 60 LRC��s recommendations and another 21 were accepted in principle. The Working Group report was first entertained by the Hong Kong Legislative Council in November 2006 to act on.89
The Coopers & Lybrand Consultant Report (1993)
The reform of HKP started before 1997. It began in 1992. In that year, then CP Hui announced the vision, mission and values underscoring the incipient reform. In the same year, the HKP formed a Police Study Group and enlisted private consultants from Coopers & Lybrand to conduct a study of ��The Command Structure and Manning Level Review of the Royal Hong Kong Police Force�� (a/k/a ��Police Management Review (PMR)��. According to the Secretary for Security:
The Police Management Review, begun in 1992 and completed in 1994, criti-cally examined ways to improve the command structure, the use of modern technology and the manning levels of the entire Police Force so that it will be properly prepared and equipped to meet future challenges.90
The independent review of HKP was conducted by the consulting firm Coopers & Lybrand on the eve of 1997 over the restructuring of HKP (October 1992 to March 1993). The purpose of the study was to conduct a sys-tematic and comprehensive review of the HKP management structure and make the necessary preparation for the transfer of power on 1 July 1997.91 The Report was completed in March 1993. It made 116 recommendations. It concluded that: ��The Force already has a powerful culture92 and the question is whether this culture is appropriate to support and under pin the changes that are needed in order to continue to provide a high quality service to the public��.93 On 1 April 1994, the HKP Quality Service Wing was established to reform the HKP.
The Consultant Report and recommendations serve as the blueprint of and building block for HKP management reform, with an oversight of the Hong Kong Legislative Council Panel on Security.
In time, 42 reports94 derived from PMR became the strategic plan.95 The PMR is one of the most comprehensive, systematic, far ranging and deep-reaching review conducted on the command, management and operations of HKP, ever.
The objective of the review is to determine the appropriate level of manning for the Police Force to carry out its functions efficiently. It also critically examines whether certain tasks should continue to be performed by the police; whether more modern technology can be used; and the maximum extent of civilian-ization. This is the most comprehensive study of the police establishment ever undertaken and obviously takes time to complete; we must get it right. Initial examination of the 42 reports has just recently been completed, and I am working at presenting the reports to the Security Panel of this Council for examination next month.96
The PMR was very much anticipated by the LegCo members.97 In November of 1994, frustration, the senior member of the Democratic Party in charge of security and policing was heard demanding for the early release of the PMR:
Mr President �K (a) when the details of the Report will be disclosed, so that the public and Members of this Council can have specific and accurate informa-tion for analysis and discussion and will thus be able to reflect their views to the Government; and (b) whether the Government is of the view that the appro-priate time to release details of the Report is when it applies to the Finance Committee for funds to implement the measures recommended in the Report; if so, what the reasons are and whether the Report will be released in full then?
The 42.PMR reports were finally shared with the LegCo Security Panel in May of 1995,98 with one being withheld as against public interest because it dealt with the Security Wing.99 With the release of the Reports, the LegCo Panel on Security formed a subcommittee to examine the Reports from May of 1995 to July of 1997.100 With the participation of the LegCo, the structural and organisational reform to HKP then began in earnest.
On 9 July 2006, HKP requested funding from the LegCo-Establishment Subcommittee of finance committee for a major reorganisation of HKP management structure to cope with changes in population growth and work-related changes in Hong Kong, since 1983, and finally, the current command and control administration structure was put in place. Specifically:
We need to streamline and update the management and control structure of the Police to take account of the changes in the demography and nature of crimes in Hong Kong that have taken place since the introduction of the existing directorate structure in 1983. The proposed re-organisation has taken into consideration the recommendations made by a management study on the Police command structure�K The organisational changes �Kare as follows
a. Strengthening the operational support role of the Support Wing;
b. Strengthening the Crime Wing��s capacity to combat organised crimes;
c. Following up on the consequential changes brought about by dis-bandment of the Special Branch;
d. Rationalising the command structure of police formation in the New Territories to take account of the population changes there;
e. Enhancing the human resource management capability of the Personnel Wing;
f. Replacing the Inspection Services Wing with a new Service Quality Wing to further promote the concept of accountability; and
g. Transforming and retitling the existing Management Services Wing to Information Systems Wing to take charge of the promotion of a wider use of information technology in the Force.101
The first to be observed is that the 1997.HKP reform involved real, sub-stantive and substantial changes instead of cosmetic, nominal and minor changes, involving the destruction of the entire branch/post, for example, disbanding Special Branch and Bangkok counsellor post, or establishing a new bureau/functions, for example, Criminal Intelligence Bureau (CIB) and In-Service Training (IST) Branch.
Second, it involved fundamental reorganisation to HKP command and control structure, for example, removing the Traffic Wing (renamed as Traffic Branch command by an ACP) to a Support Wing (command by a CSP), territorial jurisdiction and operational functions, for example, split-ting of N.T. into North and N.T. South Region in the face of added responsi-bilities and shifted priorities. The result was a more streamlined, efficient and cost-effective HKP.
Third, it involved changes to every aspects of HKP, from vision and mission, organisation and culture, structure and process, management and operations, staff and line.
Fourth, it involved facing up to new development, challenges and demands of the day.
Fifth, it involved doing more (productivity gain) and better (quality enhancement) policing with less resources, that is, achieving cost-effective policing, through re-defining of priority, integration of functions, alignment of services, leveraging of resources and introduction of technology.
Finally, it involved an expert-designed and evidence-based reform plat-form, process and outcome.
Lan Kwai Fong (LKF) Disaster Report (1993)102
In 1993, 20 people died and 71 odd were injured on New Year eve at LKF, one of Hong Kong��s primer nightspots, as a result of a stampede by a frantic crowd.103 An international crowd control scholar described the day��s event thusly:
1993 (Jan 1st) LKF, Hong Kong. 21 died in crowd crush incident. The LKF disaster that took place in Hong Kong in the early hours of 1 January 1993. It was a crush crowd incident, catching thousands of party-goers off-guard and resulted in 21 persons dying. The location (narrow streets and a sloped gradient), poor police planning and bad weather all played their part in this disaster. The crowd. In January 1993 at LKF, not far from the Happy Valley Racecourse a disaster occurred. More than 20 people died in a crowd crush on a busy street. From Mr. Justice Bokary��s Interim Report into that disas-ter. A number of persons, more or less in a row and more or less at the same time, lost or were deprived of their footing and fell. Because the press from behind was overwhelming, more and more people started falling. People piled upon those who had gone down before them. The pile grew until it reached such a height that the people immediately behind it were propped up by it and pinned against it by the press of people behind and upslope of them. Thus came about what some witnesses have called a ��human wall��. Tragically, men, women and children had the breath of life crushed out of them. 20 persons died very quickly, one more died in hospital some days later.104
The tragic incident, the first of its kind,105 was thoroughly investigated by Mr Justice Bokhary.106,107 Mr Justice Bokhary summarised the causes of the tragedy by isolating the main and contributing factors. He identified the main factor causing the incident as too many, densely packed, people in a small area. The other contributing factors were: gradient of the road, slippery road surface, pushing and jostling and drunkenness. The other unexpected factor was people from a cross road coming up against a downward crowd. The convergence of all these factors resulted in ��a massive, crushing human pile up��. The police officers on duty were not spared.108
The HKP was faulted for not doing its job in controlling the crowd, esti-mated to be 15�V20,000 strong. The nature, complexity, mood and behav-iour of the crowd was not explicitly considered, but implicitly suggested, for example, it distinguished LKF crowd from political crowd, and described them as ��milling�� around, instead of behaving passively. In the final analysis, Justice Bokhary recommended that: ��an effort should be made by the police and other bodies having responsibility for crowd control in Hong Kong to expand their knowledge of the problem and how to deal with it��.109
The LKF tragedy spawned a number of studies, and many academic and professional, domestic110 and foreign,111 were undertaken by a variety of disci-plines and with multiple perspectives.112 As a tragic incident, the LKF stam-pede ranked high on Hong Kong people��s awareness. According to a research conducted in March to September 2008,113 people of Hong Kong rated LKF as one of the top three most likely ��disasters�� to reoccur. LKF is a notewor-thy event notwithstanding its low test rate (compared to the first two: severe acute respiratory syndrome [SARS]: 299/1775; Garley fire: 41/80) and avert-able nature (namely crowd behaviour, not natural disaster (1) SARS or human error, (2) Garley Building fire). More significantly, it was one of the only three that makes the list before 1992 (landslide (1972), embankment collapse (1992)).
When the respondents were asked: ��Events in Hong Kong that are con-sidered as disasters with likelihood of their occurrence according to parents with young children (N198)��.114 The responses were (N: percentage):
1. SARS outbreak (299 deaths, 1755 infected) in 2003 (187/94.4%);
2. Garley Building fire (41 dead, 80 injured) in 1996 (143/72.2);
3. LKF tragedy (20 dead, 71 injured in stampede) in 1992 (130/65.7);
4. Building demolished in a landslide (67 dead) in 1972 (113/57.1);
5. Embankment collapse on Sau Mau Ping (71 dead) in 1972 (108/54.5);
6. Avian flu (18 infected, 6 dead) in 1997 (94/47.5);
7. Landslides in Baguio Villas (2 dead, 1500 evacuated) in 1992 (65/32.8);
8. China Airlines crash in 1999 (3 deaths, 209 injuries) (58/29.3);
9. Petrol bomb in Top One Karaoke (17 dead) in 1998 (55/27.3);
10. Far East jet-foil wreck (1 death, 119 injuries) in 1998 (51/25.8);
11. Explosion caused by oil leak from the transformer in West-rail Kowloon�VCanton Railway Corporation (KCRC) (12 injuries) in 2007 (41/20.7);
12. Poisoning and food additives (frequently reported) imported from China (17/8.6);
13. Ministerial conference of World Trade Organization (5000 protest-ers, over 1000 arrested and nine injured) in 2005 (14/7.1).
Culturally, the iconic happenstance was seared into the (sub) conscious-ness115 of foreigners116 and the Hong Kong people alike:117 ��The LKF Tragedy shocked many of us habitual patrons �K is a mixed, hybrid space, a crowded and dangerous pace, carnival-like event in times of crisis, heavenly and not far from disasters�K��.118
At an operational level, for the HKP, LKF instantly became ingrained in institutional memory, with external-perceived organisational ineptitude and internal professional frustration in the mix. Long known for its outstanding performance in crowd management and control in the face of crisis (1967) and challenges, against all odds, LKF stood as an enigma. Learning from the incident, the HKP proposed the use of closed-circuit television (CCTV)119 as one of the many crowd control120 and emergency relief measures, in all later mass public gatherings.121 However, while most people, including more than a few tourism guides, warned people to stay away from LKF in holiday sea-sons and with festive occasions, the HKP�VCCTV proposal was rejected on privacy and related (business) grounds.122
Law makers�� objections notwithstanding, CCTV was widely used before the LKF incident, both in public (ICAC�Xinterview, HKP�Xborder and Transport Department�Xtunnel, housing�Xsecurity) and in private (banks, retail shops, train, bus and MTR) and was taken for granted by the major-ity of the Hong Kong people, with placid acceptance to many, and openly embraced for more than a few.123 It turned out that the HKP was the only agency that did not use CCTV aggressively or law enforcement purposes. In fact, the HKP had few administrative guidelines developed providing for their use. This is especially surprising given that the HK government had no law-regulating CCTV.
The HKP, as part of HKSAR post-1997 reform process, heavily leveraged technology, from a computer to CCTV, to keep Hong Kong safe and crime free. The latest bout over CCTV and privacy was fought over the installa-tion of eight CCTVs without prior notice and conspicuous disclosure in and around the Legislative Council meeting as authorised by the Legislative Council Commission. The CCTV units were employed for security reasons. ��The installation of CCTV is aimed at proper management of public order activities outside Legco�K The installation of CCTV is aimed at proper man-agement of public order activities outside Legco, and police have notified related government departments and organisations��.
The employment of CCTVs was roundly criticised by a LegCo member from intrusions of privacy (��Public who join protests outside Legco will be under a threat that they are all under surveillance��. Pan-democrat union-ist Lee Cheuk-yan) to lack of due notice (Privacy Commissioner��s ��guidance note�� requires: ��people should be explicitly informed that they are subject to CCTV surveillance��) to being unnecessary. LegCo and Legislative Council Commission member, Cyd Ho Sau-lan observed: ��Police already have a video team to record protests and I do not see a need to install those permanent surveillance cameras��.124
Hong Kong Audit Commission Audit of HKP
The Audit Department (Audit Commission after 1997) is one of the oldest departments of the Hong Kong Government. It was first established in 1841.
The Audit Commission is charged with conducting oversight, opera-tional (regulatory) or financial (value for money) audits. Its main mission being: ��To provide independent, professional and quality audit services to the Legislative Council and public sector organisations in order to help the Government enhance public sector performance and accountability in Hong Kong��. Its major objective is ��to enhancing the performance and accountabil-ity of the Government and other public sector organisations in Hong Kong��. The Audit Commission achieves its mission by:
1. Conducting regularity audits which provide the Legislative Council with an overall assurance that the government��s financial and.accounting transactions and those of funds of a public or quasi-public nature are proper and that they conform to accepted account-ing standards; and
2. Conducting value-for-money audits which provide the Legislative Council with independent information, advice and assurance about the economy, efficiency and effectiveness with which any bureau/department of the government, agency, other public bodies, public office, or audited organisation has discharged its functions.125
The authority to audit was granted to the Director of Audit Commission.
According to the Audit Ordinance (Cap. 122), the Director of Audit ��has wide powers of access to the records of departments��, ��can require any public officer to give an explanation and to furnish such information as he thinks fit to enable him to discharge his duties�� and ��is not subject to the direction or control of any other person or authority in performing his duties and when exercising his powers under the Ordinance��.
The Audit Commission carries out two kinds of audits, namely regular-ity audit and value-for-money audit.
Regularity audit is conducted to assure the Legislative Council that the government finances, accounts and funds (of public and quasi-public) the agency.126
Value for audit examines the economy, efficiency and effectiveness of gov-ernment organisations pursuant to established guidelines agreed between the Legislative Council�XPublic Accounts Committee and Director of Audit.127
In the year of February 2000 to October 2010, the Hong Kong Audition Commission completed a total of eight audits, with three of them in the first year, with a management of leave in the Hong Kong Police Force (October 2007, 2010); collection of fines imposed by Magistrate Courts (March 2006): road safety: accident investigation and law enforcement (March 2006); sta-tion improvement and amalgamation projects (March 2005); construction of the Government Flying Service Headquarters (March 2002); provision of staff recreation, catering and welfare services for the Hong Kong Police Force (October 2000); the provision of vehicle removal service and permanent vehicle pounds (February 2000).
Many of these audit reports were very critical to the HKP, especially when it came down to police administration in traffic law enforcement, plan-ning of station upgrade, working with external partners and leave adminis-tration. In the history of the HKP, this was for the first time that any external agency called into questions of the HKP��s operating capacity, efficiency and effectiveness, with the use of objective data obtained independently.
Station Improvement and Amalgamation Projects (April 2005)128
In 1999, the HKP started an ambitious station (physical and security) improvement, to appease the public, and amalgamation project, to facilitate effective deployment and save costs, for $649.2 million.129 The audit showed that the project suffers from time delay (21 months),130 space wastages (1686 square metres)131 and failure of purpose (hardware not in use).132 The prob-lems as identified by the audit resulted from mal-administration, from failure of internal communication�Xconsultation over needs133 to lack of external coordination with contractors,134 to delay in implementing feedbacks,135 to inadequate needs assessment136 and so on.
The audit uncovered the following (selected) shortcomings with the improvement and amalgamation project:
First, there was a substantial delay of station improvement project because there was inadequate internal communication between and within formations over the needs for and limitations to improvements to be made.137 There was a lack of coordination between builder works contractors and security system contractor, resulting in duplication of work.138
Second, the audit identified a utilisation of spare space problem with three police stations under improvement.139 Specifically, the audit noted that 1686 square metres of station space were not put to good use for 2 years, without the Government Property Agency (GPA) ever being consulted.140 Similarly, when New Territories South Regional Headquarters moved out of Tsing Yi Police Station to Tsuen Wan, the extra space at Tsing.Yi was not.uti-lised.141 Finally and more generally, the space savings�Xsurplus accommo-dation, changing room and night-duty room�Xfrom the overall station improvement programme was not reported to GPA for alternate disposal.142
Third, with the ��remodeled report room��,143 the audit found that after vis-iting 16 report rooms (July to September 2004), that in six out of nine of the reception areas, there was no one on duty.144 This reflected inadequate needs assessment and poor planning process.145
Fourth, the audit found that officers reported that the carpet at the ��back of house�� area was not easy to clean and asked for replacement in 2001. But such feedback was not heeded until January 2003. By that time, nearly all police report rooms (49 of them) had been carpeted. The replacement costs with synthetic tiles were $1.7 million. This was a costly mistake.146
Fifth, the audit found that the information kiosks located in 16 different report rooms were underutilised,147 in both hardware148 and by citizens.149 As a result, many of the information kiosks were used for different purposes, for example, officer briefing,150 or found to be dysfunctional.151
Sixth, the audit found that resource centres for police officers that have little resource materials, were rarely used152 and otherwise too close to each other.153
Seventh, the audit found that with the installation of ��automated sta-tion security system��, the stakeholders were not fully briefed, consulted or involved beforehand resulting in confusion and misunderstanding.154
Eighth, with the station amalgamation project, the audit found it to be a success, saving the HKP of $44.3 million through the deletion of 117 posts in the first 5 years.155 However, the amalgamation also caused temporary con-gestions in some merged stations, such as The Castle Peak Police Station and the Chai Wan Police Station.156
III: Conclusion
This review of police reform literature illustrates that police reform is natu-ral, necessary and continuous, as a by-product of social, political and cul-tural changes. In the case of Hong Kong, police reform was driven by events (reactionary change to scandals, such as Caldwell and Godber incidents) as by institutions (pro-active change as a result of audits, HKLR).
It is now necessary to turn to the final chapters to see how HKP reform was conducted in the 1950s, as a case study.
Endnotes
1. R. K. Yin, Case Study Research: Design and Method, 4th edition (Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage, 2009). (��A.case study is an empirical inquiry that investigates a contem-porary phenomenon in depth and within the real life context, especially when the boundaries between phenomenon and context are most clearly evident��. p..16).
2. S. Savage, Police Reform: Forces for Change (London: Oxford University Press,.2007). http://www.theguardian.com/books/2008/jan/12/crime.society
3. J. Grieve, A fair cop, The Guardian, Friday 11 January 2008. http://www.-theguardian.com/books/2008/jan/12/crime.society
4. Mission Statement Police Reform Organizing Project. http://www.-policereformorganizingproject.org/?page_id=2
5. M. Doyle, The police reform that wasn��t, The British Scholarly Society, December 2012. http://britishscholar.org/publications/2012/12/02/the-police-reform-that-
wasnt/.
6. M. J. Trebilcock and R. J. Daniels, Rule of Law Reform and Development: Charting the Fragile Path of Progress (Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar Publishing, 1 January 2009).
7. Ibid., 107�V108. Normative Benchmarks. A re-conceptualizing the role of the police in developing countries.
8. M. Trivunovic, Police reform�XIntroduction 1, Helsinki Monitor, 15 (3): 171 (1 January 2004). (��Police reform is widely recognized as a key process of demo-cratic transformation, particularly from the perspective of protecting human rights and democratic institutions. �Ktwo experiences from Southeast Europe�XMacedonia and Serbia�Xhave seen police reform launched precisely with this objective��.)
9. M. Kempa and L. Johnston, Challenges and prospects for the development of inclusive plural policing in Britain: Overcoming political and conceptual obsta-cles, Australian and New Zealand Journal of Criminology, 38 (2): 181�V191, 2005.
10. D. A. Sklansky, The promise and the peril of police professionalism, In: J. Brown (ed.), The Future of Policing (Oxon and New York: Routledge, 2013). http://www.law.berkeley.edu/php-programs/faculty/facultyPubsPDF.php?facID=4878&pubID=60
11. J. S. Berman, Police Administration and Progressive Reform: Theodore Roosevelt as Police Commissioner of New York (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1987); H. Toch, The democratization of police in the United States: 1895�V1974, The Police Forum: Academy of Criminal Justice Sciences, 7 (2): 1�V8 (April 1997).
12. The progressive era (1890�V1920). http://www.gwu.edu/~erpapers/teachinger/glossary/progressive-era.cfm.
13. T. Roosevelt (1858�V1919). An Autobiography 1913 (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1913).
14. P. Albrecht and L. Buur, An uneasy marriage: Non-state actors and police reform, Policing and Society, 19 (4): 390, 2009.
15. Ibid.
16. A. E. Juncos, Europeanization by decree? The case of police reform in Bosnia, Journal of Common Market Studies, 49 (2): 367�V389, 2011.
17. K. C. Wong, Police Reform in China (Boca Raton, FL: CRC Press, 2012).
18. W. O��Neill, Police reform in post conflict societies: What we know and what we still need to know, International Peace Institute, Policy Papers�X14.April 2005. http://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/AB276AF8A1C3261E852570B20077F20C-police%20reform%20post-conflict.pdf; Rama Mani, Policing in post-conflict situations, Concept Paper for Whitehall Policy Seminar, London. http://www.ssrnetwork.net/document_library/detail/.2978/policing-in-post-conflict-situations.
19. Ibid.
20. J. Sovell, Good Cop/Bad Cop: Mass Media and the Cycle of Police Reform (Monsey, NY: Willow Tree Press, 2003), p. 177 (��One of the central features of postmodernity . . . is the prominence of mediated experience in our daily lives. No longer do we encounter reality firsthand . . . worldly events are increasingly experienced only second-hand [which] has tremendous consequences�� (p. 45).)
21. Ibid., p. 103.
22. Ibid., p. 93.
23. Ibid., pp. 158�V160.
24. Britain: Hard to turn the coppers round; Police reform, The Economist, 369: 52 (15 November 2003). https://www.google.com/search?q=Britain%3A+Hard+to+turn+the+coppers+round%3B+Police+reform%2C%E2%80%9D+The+Economist+&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&aq=t&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a
25. G. Dean, Police reform: Rethinking operational policing, Journal of Criminal Justice, 23(4): 337�V247, 1995.
26. Reforming police: Legitimacy and effectiveness, ECPR Joint Sessions of Workshops 2014, Salamanca. European Consortium for Political Research. http://www.ecpr.eu/Events/PaperDetails.aspx?PaperID=15818&EventID=12.
27. A. Goldsmith, Police reform and the problem of trust, Theoretical Criminology, 9 (4): 443�V470, 2005.
28. T. Prenzler and J. Ransley (eds.), Police Reform: Building Integrity (Sydney: Hawkins Press, 2002), Chapter 1, 25 ways to fight corruption.
29. Police reform: Ah, democracy, Economist, 10 November 2012. http://www.economist.com/news/britain/21565996-elected-watchdogs-are-flawedidea-boycotting-polls-worse-one-ah-democracy
30. Ndung��u Wainaina, Kenya: Police Reforms Are Key to Rule of Law, 20 October 2011. http://allafrica.com/stories/201110210753.html.
31. S. Walker, Institutionalizing police accountability reforms: The problem of mak-ing police reforms endure, St. Louis University Public Law Review, 32(1): 57, 2012.
32. G. Heyer, New public management: A strategy for democratic police reform in transitioning and developing countries, Policing an International Journal of Police Strategies and Management, 34 (3): 419�V433, 2011.
33. A. S. Vitale, Police reform��s next step, The Indypendent, 194. 25 February 2014. http://www.indypendent.org/2014/02/25/police-reform%E2%80%99s-next-step
34. R. Ritsert and M. Pekar, New public management reforms in German police services, German Policy Study, 5 (2): 17�V47, 30, 2009.
35. B. Bowling, Transnational policing: The globalization thesis, a typology and research agenda, Policing, 3 (2): 149�V160, 2009. (Globalisation results in homogenisation of police system and practice, in Western mode).
36. D. Bayley, Changing the Guard: Developing Democratic Police Abroad (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2006), p. 6.
37. F. Leishman, S. Cope and P. Starie, Reforming the police in Britain: New pub-lic management, policy networks and a tough old bill, International Journal of Public Sector Management, 8 (4): 26�V37, 1995.
38. E. S. Fisher and S. M. Shortell, Accountable care organizations: Accountable for what, to whom, and how? Journal of the American Medical Association, 304 (15): 1715�V1716, 20 October 2010.
39. J. B. L. Chan, Governing police practice: Limits of the new accountability, British Journal of Sociology, 50 (2): 251�V270, 1999.
40. Police as a public institution is always accountable. The debate is over what, whom and how. M. Escotet Universities must be accountable, yes, but to whom? Guardian (Professional), 10 December 2012. (��Universities, whether public or private, cannot be exempt from internal and external control and there has been a clear move towards implementing institutional assessment and accountability processes since the end of the twentieth century. But this process of account-ability should not be influenced by the government in power or by political bias within universities��.) http://www.guardian.co.uk/higher-education-network/blog/.2012/dec/10/university-regulation-accountability-to-whom.
41. W. Skogan, Why reforms fail, Policing and Society, 18 (1): 23�V34, 2008.
42. J. Donne, From Devotions upon Emergent Occasions, 1623. Mediation XVII (http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Meditation_XVII; https://web.cs.dal.ca/~johnston/poetry/island.html).
43. A. Hill, The dialectics of police reform in Nigeria, The Journal of Modern African Studies, 46 (2): 215�V234, June 2008. (��Based on developments in the Nigeria Police since 2005, this article suggests that reform can make a normative and organisa-tional difference, but that in the absence of fundamental socio-political change, its effects tend to be superficial, localised and temporary. Reform��s dynamic is better understood as a classic dialectic than a serial succession of movement��.)
44. Ibid.
45. D. H. Bayley Democratizing the police abroad: What to do and how to do it. Issues in International Crime (U.S. Department of Justice: National Institute of Justice, 2001), NCJ 188472. www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/nij/188742.pdf.
46. Ibid., Chapter 2: Generic Lessons for Changing Police Organizations, p. 17.
47. Knowledge Management Symposium. 20 May 2005. Hong Kong. http://www.psdas.gov.hk/content/doc/2004-2-22/Sym%20Handbook%20-2004-2-22.pdf.
48. ��HKP Reform Inquires�� refers to major inquiries into HKP structure, process, policy or functions requiring changes. This is not a comprehensive list. Ad hoc and incidence-based inquiries, for example, charges of individual malfeasant, organisational cover up, operational problems or policy review, are not included. For the individual malfeasant, see Published under Section 48(2) of the Personal Data (Privacy) Ordinance (Cap. 486). Investigation Report: The Hong Kong Police Force leaked internal documents containing personal data via Foxy (English translation) Report Number: R13�V15218. Date issued: 24 October 2013. Office of the Privacy Commissioner for Personal Data, Hong Kong. For organ-isational cover up, see A summary of the report of the Commission of Inquiry into Inspector MacLennan��s case (Hong Kong Government Printer, 1981). For operational problems inquiry, see Legislative Council Panel on Security. Security arrangements for the Sixth Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organisation held in Hong Kong from 13 to 18 December 2005. LC Paper No. CB(2) 2362/05-06(01). 4 July 2006 and Legislative Council Panel on Security. Police Review of Policing Arrangements during Visits of Political Dignitaries to Hong Kong. LC Paper No. CB(2)921/11-12(07). 7 February 2012. For policy review, see LegCo Panel on Security. Subcommittee on Indebtedness of Police Officers. Minutes of meeting held on Tuesday, 16 November 1999 at 10:45 am in Conference Room A of the Legislative Council Building. LC Paper No. CB(2) 1050/99-00. http://www.pcpd.org.hk/english/publications/files/R13_15218_e.pdf
49. On 20 May 1858, Governor John Bowring appointed a Commission of Inquiry to investigate into Attorney General Anstey��s charges, sent directly to the Secretary of Colony. See ��Warrant of Commission��. J. W. Norton-Kyshe, The History of the Laws and Courts of Hongkong, Tracing Consular Jurisdiction in China and Japan and Including Parliamentary Debates, and the Rise, Progress and Successive Changes in the Various Public Institutions of the Colony from the Earliest Period to the Present Time, Vol. 1 (London: T. F. Unwin, 1898), p. 508.
50. T. C. Anstey, Crime and government at Hong Kong, a letter to the Times (1859) RareBooksClub.com (4 July 2012).
51. D. R. Caldwell, A vindication of the character of the undersigned from the asper-sions of Mr T. Chisholm Anstey, Ex-Attorney General of Hongkong as Contained in His Charges, His Pamphlet, and His Letter to the Secretary of State for the Colonies to the Secretary of State for the Colonies (Hongkong: Noronha��s Office, 1860).
52. C. Munn, Colonialism in a Chinese atmosphere: The Caldwell affair and the per-ils of collaboration in early colonial Hong Kong, In: R. Bickers and C. Henriot (eds.), New Frontiers: Imperialism��s New Communities in East Asia, 1842�V1953 (Manchester: Manchester Press, 2000), pp. 12�V38.
53. Ibid., 25.
54. C. Munn, Anglo-China: Chinese People and British Rule in Hong Kong, 1841�V1880 (Hong Kong: Routledge, 16 December 2013), p. 332.
55. J. W. Norton-Kyshe, History of the Laws and Courts of Hongkong, Vol. 2 (London, 1898), p. 180. Op cit. 49, 180, supra.
56. Ibid., 178.
57. Ibid., 180.
58. Ibid., 200.
59. The Report of the Police Commission, CO 129/158, Paragraph 1, See Chapter 6: The Police Commission in Austin Kerrigan, Policing a Colony: The case if Hong Kong: 1844�V1899. PhD dissertation. Cardiff Graduate Law School. University of Wales (January 2001).
60. Ibid., Austin Kerrigan, p. 203.
61. Ibid., 204.
62. J. W. Norton-Kyshe, History of the Laws and Courts of Hongkong, Vol. 2 (London, 1898), p. 189. Op cit. 49, 189, supra.
63. The Report of the Police Commission, CO 129/158, Paragraph 74.
64. Ibid.
65. Austin Kerrigan, op. cit., p. 207.
66. I. Ward, Sui Geng: The Hong Kong Marine Police 1841�V1950 (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 1991).
67. J. W. Norton-Kyshe, History of the Laws and Courts of Hongkong, Vol. 2 (London, 1898), p. 200. Op cit. 49, 200, supra.