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The other inescapable fact of life governing Hong Kong's existence is the policy of the Chinese People's Government. 1972 has been China's year. The détente with the United States and normalisation of relations with Japan have been genuinely great events. So has the exchange of Ambassadors with Great Britain. Heads of Government and Foreign Ministers have flocked to Peking many via Hong Kong. Curiously enough in Hong Kong this has not created a foreboding of impending change, at least not to the extent that someone viewing the East Asian scene from London or Washington might expect. This is due to various factors. One is the conviction that maintenance of the status quo is the policy of the present leadership, and the fact that so much that has happened on the ground in Hong Kong in the last year supports this belief. Another is the experience of the cyclical pattern of progress under the Chinese People's Government, from destructive revolution to constructive pragmatism and back again which has marked the last 25 years. People wonder how long the present mood or present leaders will last and are wary of making judgments based on assumptions of permanency in present Chinese policies. Because long term views have so often proved valueless, they are accustomed to concentrate on the short term, and short term prospects are excellent. Thirdly, through their close contact with relations in China they know that present Chinese pre-occupations are domestically the unscrambling of the many-sided confusions of the cultural revolution and of the personal
economic and administrative problems involved and the related subject of the succession; and externally the threat from the Soviet Union. In comparison to such pre-occupations even the recovery of Taiwan lacks urgency at the present time. In so far as the relaxation of China's external relations affect Hong Kong at all, it is to underline the importance of the foreign exchange which China earns there. The possibility that her new international status may eventually make it more difficult for China to live with a colony in her backyard
however profitable has not yet impinged on the population. This may be because being Chinese they are able to discount more easily than a European the pressure of international logic on a Chinese government.
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