Policing in Hong Kong: Research and Practice

289 Pages·2015·1.912 MB·English

by  Kam C. Wong (auth.)

Policing in Hong Kong: Research and Practice
Palgrave Advances in Criminology and Criminal Justice in Asia
This bold and innovative series provides a much needed intellectual space for
global scholars to showcase criminological scholarship in and on Asia. Reflecting
upon the broad variety of methodological traditions in Asia, the series aims to
create a greater multi-directional, cross-national understanding between Eastern
and Western scholars and enhance the field of comparative criminology.
The series welcomes contributions across all aspects of criminology and criminal
justice as well as interdisciplinary studies in sociology, law, crime science and
psychology, which cover the wider Asia region including China, Hong Kong,
India, Japan, Korea, Macao, Malaysia, Pakistan, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand and
Vietnam.
Series editors:
Bill Hebenton
School of Law, Manchester University, UK
Susyan Jou
Graduate School of Criminology, National Taipei University, Taiwan
Lennon Y.C. Chang
School of Social Sciences, Monash University, Australia
Series advisory board:
Borge Bakken , University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, L iqun Cao , University of
Ontario, Canada, Mark Finnane, Griffith University, Australia, Peter Grabosky ,
Australian National University, Australia, D avid T. Johnson, University of
Hawaii, USA, Peter Manning , Northeastern University, USA, M ahesh Nalla ,
Michigan State University, USA, K en Pease OBE, University College London, UK,
John Pratt , Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand, R ichard Sparks ,
Edinburgh University, UK, Ivan Sun , University of Delaware, USA, Lening
Zhang , Saint Francis University, USA.
Titles include:
Riccardo Berti
VICTIM-OFFENDER RECONCILIATION IN THE PEOPLE’S REPUBLIC
OF CHINA AND TAIWAN
Anqi Shen
OFFENDING WOMEN IN CONTEMPORARY CHINA
Gender and Pathways into Crime
Kam C. Wong
POLICING IN HONG KONG
Research and Practice
P algrave Advances in Criminology and Criminal Justice in Asia
Series Standing Order ISBN 9781–137–39700–3 hardback
( outside North America only )
You can receive future titles in this series as they are published by placing a standing order.
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Policing in Hong Kong
Research and Practice
Kam C. Wong
Associate Professor, Department of Criminal Justice, Xavier University, USA
Faculty Fellow, School of Criminal Justice,
State University of New York (Albany), US A
© Kam C. Wong 2015
Foreword © Hans Toch 2015
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2015 978-1-137-55707-0
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First published 2015 by
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ISBN 978-1-349-56896-3 ISBN 978-1-137-55708-7 (eBook)
DOI 10.1057/9781137557087
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A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Wong, Kam C.
Policing in Hong Kong: research and practice / Kam C. Wong.
pages cm.—(Palgrave advances in criminology and criminal justice
in Asia)
1. Police – China – Hong Kong. 2. Police administration – China – Hong
Kong. 3. Criminology – Research – China – Hong Kong. I. Title.
HV8263.A2W66 2015
363.293095125—dc23 2015021912
To my brother Dr. Kam Fai Wong, our family’s treasure and
pride
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Contents
Foreword viii
Professor Hans Toch
Preface x i
Acknowledgements xiv
Part I Study and Research
1 Study and Research 3
2 Literature Review 17
3 A-theoretical Policing 61
4 Expectation Policing 81
5 Research Method 112
Part II Culture and Practice
6 HKP Culture and Practice 135
7 Future of Policing in Hong Kong 173
Notes 199
Bibliography 253
Index 271
vii
Foreword
Several decades ago I became convinced that in a clearly foreseeable
future I would find myself studying erudite books written by Kam C.
Wong, who at that time was an impressive, though superannuated,
graduate student. The evidence that was at hand in those days happened
to be overwhelming. KC (even then, his preferred appellation) went
about reading everything that was not nailed down, no matter how
off-beat or esoteric. More conspicuously, he took on the self-appointed
responsibility to monitor material presented in the classroom for any
nuggets of enlightenment he might be able to discern. He engaged in
this enterprise tirelessly and assiduously, but almost invariably did so
overnight, thus demonstrating that he could do nicely without sleep. It
then became his practice to arrive early on the morning after each of our
classroom sessions so he could squeeze a bulky manuscript under my
door for my edification and instruction. Each of these bi-weekly submis-
sions consisted of a densely-reasoned and meticulously documented
commentary on the preceding day’s lecture and discussion. Taking
these documents into consideration, it would become hard to pin down
exactly which of the two of us (KC or I) was teaching whom.
Given this memorable history, I am not at all surprised to be now
reading Wong’s newest book nor am I discomfited by the role reversal
I am experiencing. This time around, though, there can be no possible
ambiguity about who happens to be learning from whom. P olicing in
Hong Kong bears KC’s unmistakable imprint. It is an immensely personal
book, filled with variegated approaches to its subject matter and bristling
with the meticulous scholarship that is still KC’s hallmark. The book’s
coverage is also distinctive, in that it benefits from intimate knowl-
edge that only close, first-hand familiarity with its diverse protagonists,
conditions and settings could convey.
KC’s book is intended as a propaedeutic manifesto. In his own words,
“The challenge is set. The road ahead is for Asia bound comparative
policing researchers and [Hong Kong police] scholars to nurture and
develop a scholarly discipline that is about, for, and most importantly, of
Hong Kong.” In delineating the direction of scholarship he thus antici-
pates, KC begins by surveying the current state of police science (and
art). His review of the literature and academic programs in the area are
predictably omnivorous, demonstrating an impressive familiarity with
viii
Foreword ix
what is available. KC’s encyclopedic approach also characterizes the
invocation of data sources he uses in filling in the details of his argu-
ment. For instance, KC draws on information about Hong Kong police
force morale from free-ranging comments exchanged in a chat room
that local officers deploy as a stress-reducing wailing wall. Though this
data source may lack some of the statistical representativeness of a survey
sample, it arguably makes up for this deficit by offering immediacy and
genuineness of feeling and expression.
The nature of the comments buttresses their credibility, however,
because the grievances of the Hong Kong blurbers are surprisingly similar
to complaints that have been recorded elsewhere by officers in agen-
cies undergoing accelerated community-oriented reform. Almost redun-
dantly, some targets of such organizational change will complain about
being arbitrarily circumscribed, and having their effectiveness as (self-
defined efficacious, aggressive, no-nonsense) crime-fighters curtailed.
As it happens, though, the situation in Hong Kong does not appear
to be the standard scenario in which a traditional police department is
being invited to become more responsive to its clients. KC characterizes
the history of the Hong Kong force as “colonial” policing, but suggests
that the approach may have been congruent with Hong Kong’s diver-
sified constituency. KC describes a bifurcated strategy, in which euro-
centric and sino-centric practices have diverged to accommodate two
co-existing communities with different sets of requirements for police
service. KC is particularly interested in fleshing out the accommoda-
tions that he feels needed to be made to conform to Chinese cultural
traditions and expectations.
I was reminded by KC’s thinking of an encounter I had some years back
with a prison system whose mission statement described the inmates
who were clients of the system as consumers of correctional services. I
felt at the time that it might make sense to distinguish between passive
and active consumption, because it occurred to me that the former
might increase dependency (which is undesirable), while the latter might
promote maturation. KC appears to be making pretty much the same
argument for what he calls “Personal Expectation Policing,” which he
favors, and which he says must be “based on self-help,” so that “police
is kind of a social resource made available to the people in solving their
own problems in their own ways.” KC goes on to specify that under his
(PEP) arrangement the police (as agent) cannot override the people’s (as
principal) assessment of the situation, however irrational or objection-
able. The police of course can offer advice as expert consultant as to
how best to deal with the problem. This necessarily gives the right to