CCPL Zoom Webinar Book Talk:
Political Censorship in British Hong Kong: Freedom of Expression and the Law (1842–1997) (CUP, 2022)
with the author – Michael Ng

27 OCT 2022 (THUR) 17:00-18:15 (HK TIME)

Drawing on archival materials, Michael Ng challenges the widely accepted narrative that freedom of expression in Hong Kong is a legacy of British rule of law. Demonstrating that the media and schools were pervasively censored for much of the colonial period and only liberated at a very late stage of British rule, this book complicates our understanding of how Hong Kong came to be a city that championed free speech by the late 1990s. With extensive use of primary sources, the free press, freedom of speech and judicial independence are all revealed to be products of Britain’s China strategy. Ng shows that, from the nineteenth to the twentieth century, Hong Kong’s legal history was deeply affected by China’s relations with world powers. Demonstrating that Hong Kong’s freedoms drifted along waves of change in global politics, this book offers a new perspective on the British legal regime in Hong Kong.

AUTHOR:
Michael Ng, Associate Professor of Law, HKU

DISCUSSANT:
Johannes Chan SC (Hon), Honorary Professor of Law, HKU

CHAIR:
Po Jen Yap, Professor of Law, HKU

This webinar is organized by the Centre for Comparative and Public Law, HKU and will be held via Zoom Meeting. Prior registration is required. For inquiries, please email Phoenix To at .