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1,000 to 1,500 and a final five contain over 1,500 occupants.14 How large are the Mutual Aid Committees of this relatively small estate? Is there such a thing as an "average" committee? The following figures are computed for active members only; honorary members are excluded here, but will be discussed later in this paper. In my sample, four of the committees have a membership of ten or less, officers and committee members combined. Another seven operate with eleven to twenty members, and four more have between twenty-one and thirty. The three largest committees in this sample have thirty-seven, thirty-nine, and forty-five members. In all these examples, actual committee membership may vary from election to election, depending on the number of floor representatives serving at any one time. Nevertheless, these committees are still rather small when compared to those in other estates, where the total membership is generally much higher. In Tze Wan Shan Estate, for example, the committees regularly contained fifty members, and in 1978, one committee had a total of fifty-nine active members (Scott 1980:41).
Floor Representatives
Mutual Aid Committees are best understood as organizations formed in two stages: the first, and basic, level is made up of the floor representatives, who are the first members selected when a committee is established. Floor representatives (*), who in Lok Fu Estate MACs are synonymous with committee members (Δ), make up the group from which officers are elected and which provide the manpower for the sub-committees, if any. The Model Rules of 1982 states that, "Floor representatives shall be elected biennially either at floor meetings convened before the Annual General Meeting, or at the Annual General Meeting" (City and New Territories Administration 1982:2). Many committees do hold elections to choose their floor representatives, but in others, a number of floor representatives simply volunteer for the positions and are approved; for this reason, the floor representatives of some committees do not change every two years.
How many floor representatives are elected to a committee? Here the actual situation is somewhat at variance with the official
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1,000 to 1,500 and a final five contain over 1,500 occupants.14 How large are the Mutual Aid Committees of this relatively small estate? Is there such a thing as an "average" committee? The following figures are computed for active members only; honorary members are excluded here, but will be discussed later in this paper. In my sample, four of the committees have a membership of ten or less, officers and committee members combined. Another seven operate with eleven to twenty members, and four more have between twenty-one and thirty. The three largest committees in this sample have thirty-seven, thirty-nine, and forty-five members. In all these examples, actual committee membership may vary from election to election, depend- ing on the number of floor representatives serving at any one time. Nevertheless, these committees are still rather small when compared to those in other estates, where the total membership is generally much higher. In Tze Wan Shan Estate, for example, the committees regularly contained fifty members, and in 1978, one committee had a total of fifty-nine active members (Scott 1980:41).
Floor Representatives
Mutual Aid Committees are best understood as organizations formed in two stages: the first, and basic, level is made up of the floor representatives, who are the first members selected when a committee is established. Floor representatives (
* ), who in Lok Fu Estate MACs are synonymous with committee members ( A ), make up the group from which officers are elected and which provide the manpower for the sub- committees, if any. The Model Rules of 1982 states that, "Floor representatives shall be elected biennially either at floor meetings convened before the Annual General Meeting, or at the Annual General Meeting" (City and New Territories Administration 1982:2). Many committees do hold elections to choose their floor representatives, but in others, a number of floor representa- tives simply volunteer for the positions and are approved; for this reason, the floor representatives of some committees do not change every two years.
How many floor representatives are elected to a committee? Here the actual situation is somewhat at variance with the official
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