It used to be common practice to begin a history of Hong Kong by saying that before the Opium War, Hong Kong was a fishing village, and that after it became a colony, the combined efforts of the colonial government and the predominantly Chinese population built it into a great city. Nowadays, we know that both halves of this statement are problematic.
Inasmuch as History has to be about decisions and their consequences, the attempt to portray Hong Kong history as the result of consensus politics was fundamentally dishonest and politically distracting. Hong Kong history, therefore, has to be rewritten so that it faces its colonial past head on. It does that by discovering the circumstances in which a historical view of society became dominant, whatproblems were hidden within such a view, and how the sentiments it served were sustained.
科大衛 其他作品
活出夢想──重建破碎的夢
香港社會史讀本
此叢書 香港讀本系列 書目
Between Home and World: A Reader in Hong Kong Cinema (越界光影︰香港電影讀本)
香港性別論述──從屬.不公.差異.越界 (Gendering Hong Kong)
香港經濟︰非經濟學讀本 (Economy of Hong Kong in Non-economic Perspectives)