The Making of a Corporatist State in Hong Kong: The Road to Sectoral Intervention

Extant Hong Kong studies have under-stated the corporatist nature of the Hong Kong state. From the 1980s, as part of its political strategy, the Chinese government had helped to build a corporatist state in Hong Kong that incorporated various sectoral elites, leading to a change in the role of the state after 1997. Through an empirical study of the behaviour of functional constituency legislators and policy outputs after 1997, this article shows that the functional constituencies as a corporatist structure introduced many sector-oriented demands. These sectoral representatives lobbied for favourable polices, increased representation for their sectors, and more state resources. This drove the post-1997 Hong Kong state to sectoral intervention, as resources were diverted to selected sectors, creating new legitimacy problems for the regime.