Indefinite healing: China’s ‘One Country, Two Systems’ formula over Hong Kong from a Daoist–Zhongyi perspective

Wan-Ping Lin

Third World Quarterly, 2024, vol. 45, issue 6, 1159-1176

Abstract: How can liberalist Hong Kong and socialist China coexist without posing a threat to each other? Based on L. H. M. Ling’s Daoist–Zhongyi theory and China’s ‘One Country, Two Systems’ (OCTS) policy over Hong Kong, this article analyses how the differences could be addressed through the Daoist–Zhongyi treatments of political healing, namely mutual resonances with respective legacies and desires, open engagement of parity and comity, power-sharing and trust. However, it also discusses how the Daoist–Zhongyi treatments might be misused for control when principles of healing are abandoned. First, drawing on the Chinese classics Daodejing and Huangdinejing, it outlines healing treatments of the Daoist–Zhongyi theory. Second, by examining the formation of the OCTS in the 1980s, it illustrates how the Daoist–Zhongyi treatments could be practised through mutual recognition, compassion, and trust through political commitments and compromises. Third, it discusses how the recent imposition of China’s National Security Law for Hong Kong exploits the Daoist–Zhongyi approach, making OCTS a tool for control rather than healing. The article concludes by indicating the indefinite nature of the Daoist–Zhongyi approach as a dialectical statecraft. Its potential for healing or control depends on whether the treatments deviate from Dao.

Date: 2024
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1080/01436597.2023.2267019 (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:taf:ctwqxx:v:45:y:2024:i:6:p:1159-1176

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.tandfonline.com/pricing/journal/ctwq20

DOI: 10.1080/01436597.2023.2267019

Access Statistics for this article

Third World Quarterly is currently edited by Shahid Qadir

More articles in Third World Quarterly from Taylor & Francis Journals
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Chris Longhurst ().