Competitive political socialization? Explaining the failure of Chinese nationalist education in Hong Kong, 1997-2020 /

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Student Theses

2022

Wang, Xingxing

Hong Kong : The Education University of Hong Kong

Thesis

School education is always an important domain for promoting nation-building, regardless of whether the country is authoritarian, hybrid or democratic. Existing education studies indicated that the structures and contents of school curricula in Hong Kong have become more in line with Mainland China's practices since the handover of its sovereignty by Britain to China in 1997, demonstrating Beijing's official nationalist agenda to cultivate in Hong Kong students a sense of belonging to the Chinese nation. Ironically, two decades after the handover, the number of Hong Kong youth identifying themselves as Chinese has remained on the low side and even dropped to a historic low in recent years. This leads to the question of why the Chinese nationalist school curricula and textbooks fail to build a solid Chinese national identity among Hong Kong's youth.This thesis hypothesizes that the failure of Chinese nationalist education after 1997 is the result of Hong Kong's "competitive political socialization environment". A mix-methods research strategy was used to test this hypothesis through a self-administered campus survey conducted in three secondary schools (which covered 1,146 valid questionnaires from students in Forms 3-6, the final four years of the six-year secondary school structure) and extended interviews with survey respondents (a total of 14 interviews). Based on these quantitative and qualitative findings:(a) Peer, local social media, and local online forums were found to be strong predictors of Hong Kong youth's stronger sense of identity as Hongkongers than as Chinese. Together these factors have created a competitive political socialization environment, competing with, or even pushing back the official Chinese nationalist education.(b) Family socialization was found to have some impact on the sense of national identity of the youth only before their secondary schooling- that is also before they can engage efficiently with peers, the local social media, and local online forums using their mobile phones.(c) The teacher factor was found to have a limited impact on the youth's national identity. This result was related primarily to the scarcity of students' opportunities for political discussion or co-participation with their teachers.(d) The failure of nationalist education initiatives has its own uncertainties, as the curriculum and extra-curricular activities have not been effective in promoting national identity among young students. This is further compounded by the offsetting external competitive political socialisation environment, which further affects young people's national identity.This study pioneered a comprehensive analysis of the failure of Chinese nation-building for Hong Kong's youth, based on an integrated assessment of family, peers, teachers, and media factors

LG51.H43 Dr 2022eb Wangx

https://educoll.lib.eduhk.hk/records/8yd2YorZ