The politics of social policy development in Hong Kong: mobilization by civil society in a semi-democracy

Abstract

This paper studies the politics of social policy development in postcolonial Hong Kong, focusing on how societal mobilization has affected social policymaking in a liberal autocratic and semi-democratic setting. The significance of social mobilization in affecting social policy development has been receiving more scholarly attention. For instance, Kwon (2002, 2005) has adopted the concept of advocacy coalitions to study the politics of health care reform in Korea (Kwon, 2002) and comparative social policy reform in Korea and Taiwan (2005), paying particular attention to the collaboration between actors across the state and nonstate institutions. Hsiao’s (2001) study of the social welfare movement in Taiwan has also shown how the structure of civil society and the linkages of important societal actors may have a direct impact on social policy development....