Residential Alienation and Generational Activism in Hong Kong

ABSTRACT

This paper extends the concept of residential alienation to political activism in Hong Kong in the decade following the Global Financial Crisis. Young adults in Hong Kong have endured growing housing vulnerability with declining real wages, limited social benefits, and spiralling housing prices. Although university-educated, many have been excluded from the wealth accumulation of homeownership and entry to a middle-class asset society. Some have joined the waiting list for public housing. Using varied sources, the paper examines the objective and subjective status of young adults in Hong Kong as a disadvantaged housing class and how their status has corresponded with critical political attitudes. Without disputing the motivational goals of the democracy movement, the paper argues that residential alienation played a part in political mobilization. Economic justice, notably housing inclusion, required a political project to challenge the residential growth machine sanctioned by Beijing.

KEYWORDS:

• Residential alienation
• young adult activism
• homeownership
• political localism
• Hong Kong

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1. I am grateful to Dr. Michael Chan, Director of the Centre for Communication at Chinese University, and Dr. Rachel Wong also of the Centre, for providing a cross-tabulation of attitudinal responses by age group.

2. This analysis overlooks the intermediate identity options “Hongkonger in China” and ‘Chinese in Hong Kong”. Together with Don’t Knows and Other, these categories sum to 100 percent. The sample size in the six-monthly surveys was just over 1000.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by funding from the Canadian Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, Canada Research Chairs programme.