Former Morgan Stanley Asia chairman Stephen Roach’s recent claim that Hong Kong has lost its essence rests less on objective analysis than on selective interpretation, cultural insinuation, and an oddly narrow understanding of how great cities survive historical change.
The most revealing device in Roach’s argument expressed in his recent article, Yes, the Hong Kong of Old Is Over, is his repeated use of “Xianggang”, as though the Mandarin pronunciation of Hong Kong’s Chinese name were evidence of Hong Kong’s being “over”. That move is rhetorically clever but intellectually weak. A city with Chinese sovereignty, Cantonese memory, an English legal practice, international finance, and deep national belonging cannot be reduced to a pronunciation game. To treat Mandarin as a symbol of Hong Kong’s loss is to imply that Chinese identity itself is somehow foreign to Hong Kong. That implication or insinuation is not analysis. It is sophistry disguised as argument.
Hong Kong has never been a frozen artifact of one language, one class, one inheritance, or one economic model. Its historic strength lies in combination and evolution. Cantonese street life, English commercial drafting, Chinese family capital, international banking, common law reasoning, Chinese mainland enterprises, and global risk management strategy have long coexisted in the same civic space. The city did not become significant because it stood outside the Chinese mainland. It became important because it connected the mainland and the wider global market with unusual efficiency and pragmatism. If that connecting function now operates in a more explicitly national context, the proper question is whether the function remains valuable, credible, and sophisticated. The answer is plainly yes, supported by recent data on financial flows, trade volumes, and international investment trends that affirm Hong Kong’s ongoing economic significance.
What Roach calls the end of “old Hong Kong” is better understood as the end of a convenient and entrenched illusion about a Hong Kong remaining under foreign control. The city was never destined to remain a “colonial memory” with a Chinese address. Its future depends on combining national sovereignty, opportunities brought by national development, and international functions. The use of “Xianggang” as a sneer misses the reality. Hong Kong is proving, sometimes uneasily but unmistakably, that a Chinese city can still speak the language of global capital, law and ambition with authority
The assertion that Hong Kong has become “just another big Chinese city” therefore cannot survive objective scrutiny. Hong Kong remains a separate customs zone. It keeps its own currency that is linked to the United States dollar. Its courts continue to apply common law, with rulings deemed as precedent cases in overseas jurisdictions. Its capital markets follow disclosure, governance, accounting, and regulatory practices that align with international standards. Its professional services sector remains dense, international, and technically advanced. Its arbitration, shipping, insurance, asset management, banking, and legal communities continue to serve international transactions. These are not decorative features. They are the operating machinery of an international financial center. A city does not become “ordinary” because it belongs to its country.
Roach’s treatment of IPO activity is similarly flawed and weird given the fact that he is a senior economist. He presents the rise of mainland listings in Hong Kong as though it proves dependence. But Hong Kong has flourished and become an international financial center by serving the various needs of the mainland economic hinterland. Financial centers exist to intermediate capital and enterprises, a plain fact that even someone without Roach’s expertise can easily understand. New York does not become less New York when companies from America’s hinterland seek access to international investors attracted by American corporate success. London does not become less global when it bridges British companies with global investors. Singapore does not lose its status when it serves its economic hinterland — the Southeast Asian region — by bridging it with international capital. Hong Kong’s comparative advantage and its success have always been its ability to make the Chinese mainland’s growth legible, fundable, and tradable through a platform trusted by professional investors. If major mainland companies and global investors choose Hong Kong, that is a market verdict on Hong Kong’s usefulness, not evidence of Hong Kong’s decline, much less a sign of being “over”.
Nor is support from national authorities evidence that Hong Kong’s resilience is artificial; rather, it is part of the city’s competitive edge. No major financial center floats above state power. Wall Street depends on the US Federal Reserve, federal regulations, liquidity facilities, securities law, and the geopolitical weight of the US. London’s status has long rested on British legal credibility, monetary institutions, tax policy, and diplomatic reach. Singapore’s rise reflects deliberate state strategy. Yet Hong Kong alone is asked to prove its authenticity by detaching itself from national policy. That standard is not principled. It is selective. If national strategy channels liquidity, listings, talent, infrastructure, and policy attention through Hong Kong, the logical conclusion is that Hong Kong remains strategically indispensable.
The rule-of-law discussion also requires discipline. Roach treats national security law as inherently incompatible with the legal order, although every serious jurisdiction protects sovereignty, public order, classified information, and constitutional stability through law. The real question is whether legal rules are applied through courts, counsel, evidence, written judgments, appellate processes, and reasoned interpretation. Hong Kong continues to possess those features, with recent case law, judicial procedures, and enforcement actions demonstrating operational integrity. Critics may dispute cases, penalties, or legislative choices, but disagreement with outcomes is not proof of legal collapse, or in Roach’s words, resulting in the rule of law being “severely compromised”. A professional assessment must distinguish political disappointment from institutional collapse.
The resignation of several foreign judges is not conclusive. Individual judges left for various reasons. Their decisions deserve respect, but they have not disrupted the daily operation of Hong Kong’s courts across contracts, trusts, insolvency, shipping, commercial disputes, family law, criminal procedure, and administrative review. Market confidence is tested less by commentary than by whether parties still choose Hong Kong law, Hong Kong arbitration, Hong Kong listings, and Hong Kong enforcement. The continued use of these systems and functions shows that practical confidence has remained solid.
The demographic argument is perhaps the weakest. The suggestion that the sound of more Mandarin on the streets proves the fading of Hong Kong is weird. Great cities absorb people. More Mandarin-speaking professionals, students, entrepreneurs, and visitors do not erase Hong Kong’s character. They participate in it, test it, and extend its reach. No serious city can define its future by resisting new accents that enter its public life.
What Roach calls the end of “old Hong Kong” is better understood as the end of a convenient and entrenched illusion about a Hong Kong remaining under foreign control. The city was never destined to remain a “colonial memory” with a Chinese address. Its future depends on combining national sovereignty, opportunities brought by national development, and international functions. The use of “Xianggang” as a sneer misses the reality. Hong Kong is proving, sometimes uneasily but unmistakably, that a Chinese city can still speak the language of global capital, law and ambition with authority.
The author is a solicitor, a Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area lawyer, and a China-appointed attesting officer.
The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.
