First Research Book

This week I have been reading "A Modern History of Hong Kong" by Steve Tsang.

Growing up in Hong Kong, Steven Tsang was a Louis Cha Fellow and University Reader at Oxford. During his time at Oxford (1997-2003) he served as the Director of the East Asian Studies Centre, making him incredibly knowledgeable on the subject of Hong Kong.

His book covers the time period from the Ming Dynasty to Hong Kong's return to China in 1997. So far, I have reached the point regarding the Treaty of Nanking.

Besides just covering the basics, such as "Hong Kong was given to the British as part of the Treaty of Nanking," Steve Tsang goes into the brutal history, analyzing the psychological and societal influences between the belligerent countries. For example, even though the treaty was signed by both countries, China and Britain had very different views of the treaty from societal points. While Britain viewed the treaty as economical, providing new ports for trade and allowing the British merchants equal footing; China viewed the treaty as completely diplomatic: a necessary evil in order to get rid of the "barbarians" from their land. As such, China had no wish to integrate the British economy into theirs and still made British merchants go through the pre-war cohong system. Due to these different view points, many tensions still arose, making future confrontations all but unavoidable.

I will be updating more in-depth about this book as it provides a very solid foundation to develop my project.

Till next time,
Victor