Page 99 - JCAU-5-3

Journal of Chinese

Architecture and Urbanism

BOOK REVIEW
Building colonial Hong Kong: Speculative

development and segregation in the
city – A book review

John Walls *
†
Glasgow, United Kingdom

Abstract
Cecilia Chu, an urban historian, was surprised at her studies that unmasking the
19 -century colonial land tenure system resulted in “good government” in Hong Kong.
th
She found the colonial governance evolved to respect traditional Confucian values of
impartiality, integrity, and a commitment to the public interest. The need for Hong Kong
government to be self-sufficient by Britain was the original driver for this to happen; that
is, the requirement to sell public land to raise revenue from the European and Chinese
Speculators essential for the development of Hong Kong. Chu’s research revealed that
both events and politics over time required the government to move beyond laissez-
faire economics and to become interventionist to tackle diseased slum areas and unsafe
† Retired urban planner;
MRICS (Ret.) & MRTPI (Ret.) buildings and to shape new urban development to deliver healthier housing and better
environments. Overseas experience of epidemics had led to a growing understanding
*Corresponding author: of the relationship between health and economy in the 19 century. Populations fleeing
th
John Walls
(jmwalls50@gmail.com) Hong Kong during epidemics served to demonstrate that the city needed to be healthy
if it was to prosper. This caused the government to adopt interventionist policies. In
Citation: Walls, J. (2023). Building
colonial Hong Kong: Speculative particular, the government intervened in its land sales strategy to reduce fiscal revenue
development and segregation in income from sales to induce the private sector to contribute towards social provision
the city – A book review. Journal of in public health, housing and modern town planning. It also had a bearing on colonial
Chinese Architecture and Urbanism,
5(3): 1110. segregation strategies to reflect d ifferent ex pectations of th e Eu ropean an d na tive
https://doi.org/10.36922/jcau.1110 Chinese communities. Crucially, while the colonial administration remained in power,
greater involvement of the Chinese elites in the bureaucracy gave legitimacy portraying
Received: June 20, 2023
Hong Kong as a “land of justice.” This demonstration of “good government” helped
Accepted: July 6, 2023 maintain the loyalty of the Chinese merchant elites and native Chinese population.
Published Online: July 27, 2023
Copyright: © 2023 Author(s). Keywords: Hong Kong; Land tenure; Fiscal system; Laissez faire; Economy; Health
This is an open-access article
distributed under the terms of the
Creative Commons Attribution-
Non-Commercial 4.0 International
(CC BY-NC 4.0), which permits all Building Colonial Hong Kong: Speculative Development and Segregation in the City. By
non-commercial use, distribution,
and reproduction in any medium, Cecilia L. Chu. Routledge. 2022, 228 pp. ISBN 9781138344655
provided the original work is
properly cited. Cecilia Chu’s book on Building Colonial Hong Kong emerged from her research on
Publisher’s Note: AccScience the development of Hong Kong between the 1880s and 1920s. As an urban historian,
Publishing remains neutral with she marveled at the realization that her studies revealed the colonial land tenure
regard to jurisdictional claims in th
published maps and institutional system established in the mid-19 century had led to “good government,” namely, a
affiliations. form of governance which emphasized impartiality, integrity, and a commitment to

Volume 5 Issue 3 (2023) 1 https://doi.org/10.36922/jcau.1110