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Policing

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Hong Kong History

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Abstract

This chapter aims to introduce the key features and development of the policing system in Hong Kong. London set up the Hong Kong Police Force in 1844 to maintain the social order and safeguard the British interest in the territories. The Hong Kong Police was established under the colonial policing model of Royal Irish Constabulary, which featured its highly centralized command, non-local leadership, and segregation with the indigenous population. The Hong Kong Police took up most of the internal security duties in its early years of establishment, ranging from policing to immigration control, fire services, and prison management. Apparently, the Hong Kong Police is a civil force, but it is equipped with the paramilitary capacity to suppress social disturbances after quick mobilization, under the colonial Governor’s command. After the territory-wide disturbances that lasted for six months in 1967, the Hong Kong Police was bestowed with the title ‘Royal’ by Queen Elizabeth of the United Kingdom. It was thus renamed the ‘Royal Hong Kong Police’ (RHIP) until the handover in 1997.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Ho Ka-ki Lawrence, Chu Yiu Kong, Policing Hong Kong 1842–1969: Insiders’ Stories (Hong Kong: City University of Hong Kong Press, 2012), pp. 122–123.

  2. 2.

    In 1879, the police chief, Henry May, investigated corruption of the police personally. He seized a record of bribes to the police by syndicate leaders and revealed a 42-year history of corruption. Governor McDonald had also exclaimed, ‘I had never seen nor heard of any colonial police force that could be as corruptive, useless, unreliable and inefficient as the Hong Kong Police.’ See Ng Chi-wa, “Establishment and Early Development of the Police System in Hong Kong (in Chinese),” Unpublished PhD Thesis (1999), The Chinese University of Hong Kong.

  3. 3.

    Since the mid-1980s, Hong Kong Superintendents have been nominated for official duties in a UK force in order to expose them to the latest trends in policing. See Ibid., pp. 122–123.

  4. 4.

    The Immigration, Fire Service and prions departments were all the units in the Hong Kong Police before their independence from the Force. The Custom & Excise was under the Economic Branch before it was reorganized as one of the disciplinary forces accountable to the Security Bureau. See Ho Pui Yin, The Administrative History of Hong Kong Government Agencies 1841–2002 (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2004), p. 68.

  5. 5.

    Georgina Sinclair, At the End of the Line: Colonial Policing and the Imperial Endgame 1945–80 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2006), pp. 1–5.

  6. 6.

    Daniel Neep, Occupying Syria under the French Mandate: Insurgency, Space and State Formation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012), p. 179.

  7. 7.

    Georgina Sinclair, At the End of the Line, pp. 1–5.

  8. 8.

    Hong Kong Police College, Policing in Hong Kong at the Turn of the Century (Hong Kong: Hong Kong Police College, 2007), p. 2.

  9. 9.

    King (1996) identified seven features of paramilitary police force: (1) centralized command system; (2) constables subject to a disciplinary code that required them to obey the lawful orders of their senior officers; (3) members of the force should not be deployed in district from which they originated; in terms of integrity; (4) officers should be regularly rotated between districts; in terms of capability; (5) the force was to be capable of dealing with large-scale disturbances; (6) the force was to have a mobile reserve that could be deployed anywhere in the country to deal with unrest; and (7) the men were given comprehensive training. See Michael King, Public Order Policing: Contemporary Perspectives on Strategy and Tactics (Leicester: Perpetuity Press, 1996).

  10. 10.

    Georgina Sinclair, At the End of the Line, pp. 1–5; Ng Chi-wa, “Establishment and Early Development of the Police System in Hong Kong (in Chinese)”.

  11. 11.

    Tsui Yiu-kong, “The Promotion System in the Officer Cadre of the Royal Hong Kong Police Force,” Unpublished M. Soc. Sci. Thesis (1982), The University of Hong Kong; Jon Vagg, “Policing in Hong Kong,” Policing and Society, Vol. 1, No. 235, (1991), p. 47.

  12. 12.

    Ho Ka-ki Lawrence, “Policing in Hong Kong and Macau: Transformations from the Colonial to Special Administrative Region” in James M. Campbell and Vivien M. L. Miller (eds.), Transnational Penal Cultures: New Perspectives on Discipline, Punishment and Desistance (London: Routledge, 2014), pp. 83–85.

  13. 13.

    Ng Chi-wa 吳志華, “Establishment and Early Development of the Police System in Hong Kong (in Chinese),” Unpublished PhD Thesis (1999), The Chinese University of Hong Kong.

  14. 14.

    Ho Ka-ki Lawrence, Chu Yiu Kong 朱耀光, Policing Hong Kong 1842–1969, pp. 18–19.

  15. 15.

    Ibid., pp. 25–29.

  16. 16.

    Secretary for Chinese Affairs, “Report of the Secretary for Chinese Affairs” in Appendix C, Hong Kong Administrative Report 1929 (Hong Kong: Government Printer, 1930).

  17. 17.

    Ho Ka-ki Lawrence, Chu Yiu Kong, Policing Hong Kong 1842–1969, pp. 18–25.

  18. 18.

    Ibid., pp. 67–70.

  19. 19.

    Lee Hong-nee Connie, “Society and Policing in Hong Kong: A Study of the 1956 Riot,” Unpublished Thesis (1995), The University of Hong Kong.

  20. 20.

    The old platoon could only break up into individual sections, and each section was equipped with only one type of riot weapon. Each officer could ‘choose’ whatever position he wished to take up. The new regime assigned each officer to a fixed post carrying a designated weapon.

  21. 21.

    Jin Yao-ru, the chief editor of pro-Beijing Hong Kong-based newspaper Wen Wei Po and member of Hong Kong and Macau Work Committee of the Chinese Communist Party in 1967, recalled that ‘his comrades in Hong Kong’s leftist organizations were encouraged by Macanese developments, and thought they could follow the footstep of these leftists, ultimately triggering a struggle with the British colonial government.’ Jin Yao-ru, Zhonggong Xianggang zhengcemiwenshilu: Jin Yaoru wushinian xiangjiangyiwang (The Secrets of the CCP’s Policy in Hong Kong) [in Chinese] (Hong Kong: Tianyuan Shuwu, 1998).

  22. 22.

    The colonial government’s account said that the riots in 1967 should be understood in three developmental stages, with reference to the sequence of the following events: (1) Demonstrations to gain public support; (2) Stoppages of work to paralyze the colony’s economy; and (3) Urban terrorism to undermine citizens’ morale. See Hong Kong Police, Annual Departmental Report, 1967 (Hong Kong: Government Printer, 1967). On the strengths of leftist organizations in Hong Kong, see Wong Cheuk-yin, “The Communist-Inspired Riots in Hong Kong, 1967: A Multi-Actors Approach,” Unpublished M. Phil Thesis (2001), The University of Hong Kong.

  23. 23.

    Ho Ka-ki Lawrence, “Policing the 1967 Riots in Hong Kong: Strategies, Rationales and Implications,” Unpublished PhD Thesis (2009), The University of Hong Kong, pp. 189–190.

  24. 24.

    Ibid., p. 189. See also Kevin Sinclair, Royal Hong Kong Police: 150 Anniversary Commemorative Publication, 1884–1994 (Hong Kong: Police Public Relations Branch, Royal Hong Kong Police, 1994).

  25. 25.

    Ibid., pp. 194–197.

  26. 26.

    Carol Jones, Jon Vagg, Criminal Justice in Hong Kong (London: Routledge-Cavendish, 2007).

  27. 27.

    Ho Ka-ki Lawrence, Chu Yiu Kong, Policing Hong Kong 1842–1969, pp. 89–91.

  28. 28.

    Ibid. Meanwhile another structural transformation wrought by Sutcliffe was the abandonment of the old rank of Staff Sergeant.

    The holders of this rank were either promoted to officer grade as Probationary Inspector (PI), or re-titled as Station Sergeant (SS). At the same time, a large number of Sergeants were also promoted to SS.

  29. 29.

    Ibid.

  30. 30.

    Scott Ian, Political Change and the Crisis of Legitimacy in Hong Kong (Hong Kong: Oxford University Press, 1989).

  31. 31.

    Carol Jones, Jon Vagg, Criminal Justice in Hong Kong (London: Routledge-Cavendish, 2007).

  32. 32.

    Since the mid-80s, Hong Kong Superintendents were nominated for official duties in a United Kingdom force in order to expose them to the latest trends in policing.

  33. 33.

    K. O. Hui, “Management reforms in the police force,” in Cheung, A. B. L. & Lee, Jane C. Y. (eds.) Public Sector Reform in Hong Kong: Into the 21st Century. Hong Kong: Chinese University of Hong Kong Press, 2001), pp. 167–199.

  34. 34.

    Raymond W. K. Lau, “History as Obstacle to Change: A Neo-institutionalist Analysis of Police Reform in Hong Kong.” International Journal of the Sociology of Law 32, (2004): 1–15.

  35. 35.

    A. Goldsmith, “Disgracebook policing: social media and the rise of police indiscretion,” Policing and Society 25:3 (2015): 249–267. https://doi.org/10.1080/10439463.2013.864653

  36. 36.

    E. Ma & A. Fung, “Re-sinicization, Nationalism and the Hong Kong Identity,” in So, Clement & Chan Joseph (eds.), Press and Politics in Hong Kong: Case Studies from 1967 to 1997. (Hong Kong: Chinese University Press, 1999), pp. 497–528; A.Y. So, “A new wave of anti-mainland protests since 2012: Characteristics, socio-political origins, and political implications,” Asian Education and Development Studies 6, no. 4, (2017): 333–342.

  37. 37.

    Peter Manning, Democratic Policing in a Changing World (New York: Routledge, 2010); Cao Liqun, Huang Lanying & Ivan Sun “From Authoritarian Policing to Democratic Policing: A Case Study of Taiwan.” Policing and Society 26, no. 6, (2016): 642–658.

  38. 38.

    Hong Kong Public Opinion Research Institute (HKPORI) (2019). People’s Satisfaction with the Performance of the Hong Kong Police, half-year average, 7–12, 1997 – 1–6, 2019). Website URL https://www.hkupop.hku.hk/chinese/popexpress/hkpolice/halfyr/hkpolice_halfyr_chart.html, (Accessed 26 February 2021).

  39. 39.

    Georgina Sinclair, At the End of the Line; Ho Ka-ki Lawrence, Chu Yiu Kong, Policing Hong Kong 1842–1969.

  40. 40.

    Ng Chi-wa, “Establishment and Early Development of the Police System in Hong Kong (in Chinese),” Unpublished PhD Thesis (1999), The Chinese University of Hong Kong.

  41. 41.

    Sinclair, K. Royal Hong Kong Police: 150 Anniversary Commemorative Publication, 1884–1994. (Hong Kong: Police Public Relations Branch, Royal Hong Kong Police, 1994).

  42. 42.

    Ho Ka-ki Lawrence, Chu Yiu Kong, Policing Hong Kong 1842–1969.

  43. 43.

    Lo Wing-Hung, C. & Cheuk Chun-Yin, A. “Community policing in Hong Kong: Development, performance and constraints,” Policing: An International Journal, Vol. 27 No. 1 (2004): 97–127. https://doi.org/10.1108/13639510410519949

  44. 44.

    HKU POP, 2006.

  45. 45.

    Ho Ka-ki Lawrence, Lam Iok Fong Agnes, Policing from Colonized to Decolonized Territories in Greater China: Hong Kong & Macau (In Chinese) (Hong Kong: Chung Wah Book Store, 2020).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Social Sciences, The Education University of Hong Kong, Tai Po, Hong Kong

    Lawrence Ka-Ki Ho

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  1. Department of History, Hong Kong Baptist University, Kowloon, Hong Kong

    Man-Kong Wong

  2. Department of History, Hong Kong Baptist University, Kowloon, Hong Kong

    Chi-Man Kwong

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Ho, L.KK. (2022). Policing. In: Wong, MK., Kwong, CM. (eds) Hong Kong History. Hong Kong Studies Reader Series. Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-16-2806-1_3

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