Political Science Associate Professor Charles Burton writes about Hong Kong’s modern history and its struggles with Beijing in a recent piece published in The Globe and Mail.

Burton writes:

Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to Hong Kong, marking 20 years since it was returned to China from British rule, has been met by a fierce security lockdown, hordes of protesters, thousands of armed police and the arrests of political activists.

On this milestone anniversary, Hong Kong is reeling as it is dragged deeper into a status whose blueprint is a string of broken promises by Beijing. 

Hong Kong’s modern history has been unorthodox, a free-wheeling but Westernized speck on a decidedly undemocratic regional map. It had been ceded to the U.K. in 1842 after China lost a war that was waged to defend Britain’s continuing exports of India’s opium (after China had outlawed its use).

Continue reading the full article here.