Letters | Hong Kong courts, common law yet to adapt to life under ‘one country, two systems’

Recent developments clearly show Beijing leaning towards strengthening the ‘one country, two systems’ principle as applied to Hong Kong. The central government has never deviated from this path – an obvious truth which the courts seem not to grasp

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The Court of Final Appeal in Hong Kong’s Central district. Photo: Dickson Lee

Published: 6:15am, 25 Nov 2020Updated: 6:15am, 25 Nov 2020

It is an inexorable rule of nature that any organism that cannot adapt to change will perish, and so it is with human institutions. The common law is one such institution.

When Hong Kong was a British Crown colony, English was the language of government, and the common law as practised in Hong Kong sat comfortably within the governing system, even though the bulk of the population was Chinese-speaking.

Determinations by courts tended to be, at that time, brief and focused. They were easily translated into Chinese. Hence, common law became accepted as a workable system generally for the community. This gave the colony many advantages. It enabled Hong Kong to transform itself successfully from an industrial hub to a global financial centre.

A radical change occurred on July 1, 1997, when Hong Kong became a region of China, operating under the principle of “one country two systems”, and Chinese became an official language of the region. Within a few years, Chinese became predominantly the language of government.

How has the common law adapted to such change? The short answer is: hardly at all.