China: democracy struggles

There are two separate struggles going on in China over democracy, one in Hong Kong, where people would like more, and soon, and one in Beijing, where they have their own understanding of the concept, but one far removed from the liberal tradition that spawned it. Hong Kong’s chief executive, Donald Tsang, has submitted a report on constitutional reform, which the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress (NPC) will consider this week.

The NPC will be pleased that it is sufficiently vague to give them leeway. It does not recommend full democracy by 2012, which is what democrats in the former British colony want; an aspiration the report does say should be given serious consideration. Instead, it leans towards 2017, as more likely to be accepted. The NPC might feel this still puts them on the spot. At least it also gives them scope to put off any hard and fast decisions on constitutional reform in the Special Administrative Region for a few more years.

Some tinkering with the way elections are to be held can be expected if not this week, then later. The NPC will want to look responsive to demands being made in Hong Kong, short of caving in. But there will be no road map and a clear timetable for universal suffrage as called for in Hong Kong's Basic Law, even beyond 2017. The NPC will want to leave that struggle for another day.