The internationalism of stateless nations: The case of Hong Kong

Abstract

Nationalism is often associated with xenophobia and isolationism in academic literature. The negative image of nationalism has been further strengthened by the electoral success of far‐right political figures across the world. However, treating all nationalism as a uniformly negative phenomenon risks over‐simplification, as nationalism might manifest differently given different social context and rhetorical resources available. Taking Hong Kong as a case, this paper theorises Hong Kong as a stateless nation and examines the alleged negative association of nationalism. It moves beyond the traditional ‘Hong Kong vis‐a‐vis China’ framework and explores the relationship between Hong Kong nationalists and non‐Chinese international actors. Drawing on data from major Hong Kong political parties' Facebook page, this paper shows that Hong Kong nationalism exhibits a high level of internationalism in both inward and outward dimensions, theorised, respectively, as the willingness to accept foreign influence and to invite international cooperation, and therefore offers a nuanced understanding about the relationship between nationalism, xenophobia and isolationism.

Redefining consumer nationalism: The ambiguities of shopping yellow during the 2019 Hong Kong Anti-ELAB movement

“…The results show that online discussion centers on socio-cultural identity as a Hong Konger vis-à-vis a Chinese (Chan, 2022; Wong et al, 2021). They also raise concerns about whether using products made in China, considering price affordability, would hinder the foundation of the yellow economic circle and Hong Kong nationalism (Ho, 2022; Tang and Cheng, 2022).…”

“…Further, the Anti-ELAB’s status as a leaderless movement (Lai and Sing, 2020) makes it difficult to define the boundaries of political consumerism in Hong Kong as “yellowness” as a commodity has not been officially defined. This context causes us to ask whether the “yellow economic circle” can be considered “consumer nationalism” as defined by Castelló and Mihelj (2018) or should be seen only as an expression of “Hong Kong nationalism” (Ho, 2022). To this end, this article investigates three questions: (1) How does political consumerism in Hong Kong reflect and influence Hong Kongers’ identity?…”