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Long Term Policy.
(Appandex I
their subjects.
use of staff and
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The library, undamaged, will be open for the students.
21. At its first meeting the Committee became aware that any consideration of long term policy could not, even abstractly, be separated from proposals for an immediate revival of the University and that any consideration of a long term policy for the University of Hong Kong could fruitfully be undertaken only when it had considered the alternative proposal, of a worthy British University of the Far rast to serve both Malaya and Hong Kong situated either in Malaya or in Hong Kong, or having Colleges in both those places. The two schemes from the Hong Kong point of view were not true alternatives.
The one
was for an Institution to serve two Colonial areas, the other for a University conceived partly in terms of Colonial interest but dominated by considerations of British policy in the Far East. The Committee were authoritatively informed that it had been decided to proceed with the establishment of a University in Malaya and agreed that it was undesirable and inappropriate in their view to attempt to achieve a combined University.
22.
The Committee recognises that a University for Hong Kong and China should be planned on more generous lines than a University for Hong Kong alone for for Hong Kong and the Overseas Chinese Communities. It must be worthy to be the assembly place of two cultures and two types of learning. The Committee is of opinion that our quality in scholarship, the content of our culture, the organization of our way of life, the experience crystalieed in our social and political institutions have a value for China at this point in social evolution British civilisation has been enriched in recent generations by the impact of Chinese Art, Poetry and Thought, and there is still much for us to learn. Eminent Chinese have expressed the hope that our peoples may meet hereafter more on the ground of mutual respect for achievements in the spheres of the mind and spirit and less exclusively in the concerns of the market place. This, apparently, is the desire, too of those Members of the Committee who have recently lived in China,
A
23. Assuming that His Majesty's Government is concerned to maintain and develop the friendly relations that have existed between China and Britain over these past years, the Committee conclude that a really adequate British University in Hong Kong would be an excellent instrument of such a policy. The Committee's proposals are made on the further assumption that the Chinese will welcome the revival of the University and will co-operate in the efforts necessary if the University is to play its part in the post-war reconstruction of the Republic. Even if, after a relatively short-time, Hong Kong reverted to China the Committee believes that a University of Hong Kong revived on the generous lines proposed by the Founder would be justified as a continuing source of British influence in China.
24.
The Committee, convinced that the University is a good instrument of a friendly policy, and the need for it is not materially decreased by the work that is being done in China by the British Council, resolved to outline the type of University that it believes would be of value. It is assumed that ite beginnings might be modest but that provision should be made for growth in these parts of its work that experience shou approve. In making its 'blue print' which is appended to this note the Committee has had the aid of the recorded views and recommendations of Professor Perey Roxby and Dr. Joseph Needham, representatives of the British Council in China and of
Mr. Fitzgerald, the head of the Council's Far Nast Department
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