Social quality and the social harmony campaign in Hong Kong

Abstract

This paper is a response to the increasing internationalization of the concept of social quality. It is intended to examine whether research projects on social quality reduce or increase the ethnocentric bias in the study of social welfare. To fulfill this objective, it carries out two analytical tasks. The first is to discuss the views of Walker and Wong (2004) on the ethnocentric bias in the study of social welfare. Walker and Wong (2004) argue that overemphasizing the differences between how social welfare is organized and assessed in Western countries and that in non-Western countries causes the bias of excluding the latter in comparative analyses. Hence to deal with this bias, it is necessary to pay attention to the similarities between the social welfare development in western countries and that in nonwestern countries. Secondly, to provide evidence to Walker and Wong’s argument, this paper discusses the relevancy of the social harmony campaign in Hong Kong to research projects on social quality.