Pro-democracy camp (Hong Kong)

For the group in Macau, see Pan-democracy camp (Macau).

Pro-democracy camp
Founded	Late 1980s
Ideology	Direct democracy Liberalism Radical democracy Social democracy Social liberalism
Political position	Big tent
Legislative Council	27 / 70
District Councils	100 / 507
Politics of Hong Kong Political parties Elections

Pan-democracy camp or pro-democracy camp (Chinese: 泛民主派, 民主派) refers to the political factions in Hong Kong that support increased democracy of Hong Kong under "One country, two systems". The pan-democrats would work together in areas of common interest, and not field candidates against one another in elections.

Democratic activists are usually critical of the post-1997 Hong Kong Special Administration Region government and the mainland China's central government, which they say does not properly represent the will of the people. Hong Kong people who vote for pan-democracy candidates are generally hoping to achieve some implementation of checks and balances in government, since parts of the Hong Kong community treat democracy as an important means to guarantee freedom, their lifestyle and their living standard. Its supporters also advocate a faster pace of democratisation and implementation of universal and equal suffrage. The Pan-Democracy camp is aligned with and similar to, but distinct from, the Chinese democracy movement.

Members of the camp represent a very broad social and political demographic, from the working class to the middle class and professionals. Opposite to the pan-democracy camp is the pro-Beijing camp, whose members are perceived to be supportive of the Chinese central government based in mainland China.

Due to its democracy mission in the political scene, the camp is supported by influential radio hosts, news moguls and a large number of Hong Kong citizens, which can be reflected in Hong Kong Legislative Council and District Council elections. They had won 50.73% of the votes in 2012 Legislative Council election but held less than half of the seats in the Council because 30 out of 70 seats (i.e. those in functional constituencies) were not elected by ordinary voters.

Basic beliefs

• Vindication of the Tiananmen Square Protests of 1989
• Democratic reform in China (Oppose the Single-party ruled of Communist Party of China)
• Universal suffrage in Hong Kong
• Improve and support human rights (See human rights in Hong Kong and human rights in People's Republic of China)

History

Members of the camp include social workers and social activists who concern about the question of Hong Kong sovereignty took part in Hong Kong's district board, Urban Council and Regional Council elections in the early 1980s, as well as professionals, mainly lawyers, who entered the Legislative Council when functional constituencies were introduced in the mid-1980s. Several political groups formed the Joint Committee on the Promotion of Democratic Government demanding for 1988 direct election and universal suffrage in the new government after 1997. Among them, the Association for Democracy and People's Livelihood, Hong Kong Affairs Society and Meeting Point were the three major pro-democratic groups and formed a strategic alliance in the 1988 district board elections.

Tiananmen protests and pre-Handover period

The foundation of its public support has its roots in opposition to the 1989 Tiananmen Massacre which aroused widespread horror, sympathy and support of the protesters by Hong Kong citizens. The crackdown on Chinese media and subsequent suppression of student dissent was a mobilizing factor; and the first direct election to the Legislative Council in 1991 brought the amalgamation of some of these groups into the United Democrats of Hong Kong, which including, Szeto Wah and Martin Lee the two major icons in the protests of 1989.

The "Pro-Democracy camp" term has been in common use since the 1991 election of the Legislative Council of Hong Kong, when the electoral alliance of United Democrats of Hong Kong and Meeting Point, together with other smaller political parties, groups and independents, won a historical landslide victory in the election, took 17 out of the 18 geographical constituency seats and controlled nearly half of the seat of the council. Some of the members of the camp, especially the Democratic Party, were often considered strategic allies of the government of Chris Patten, then governor.

The Democrats supported Chris Patten large-scale democratic reform bill for the 1995 Legislative Council election. However, Emily Lau's full-scale direct election amendment was vetoed in the result of Meeting Point's abstaining from voting for Emily Lau. The Democratic Party merged from the United Democrats and Meeting Point was formed in 1994 and won another landslide victory in the 1995 election. Together with other democratic parties and individuals (including Emily Lau, Lee Cheuk-yan and Leung Yiu-chung who formed The Frontier in 1996 and Christine Loh who formed the Citizens Party in 1997), the pro-democrats gained majority in the council for the last two years before 1997.

The PRC government argued that the electoral reform introduced by Patten had violated the Joint Declaration and thus they no longer felt obliged to honour it. A parallel Legislative Council, the Provisional Legislative Council, was formed in 1996 under the control of the Pro-Beijing camp, this became the Legislative Council upon the founding of the new SAR government in 1997.

Handover to China and 1 July 2003 Protest

All of its members, except the Association for Democracy and People's Livelihood, declined to join the extralegal Provisional Legislative Council installed by the government of the People's Republic of China, and were ousted from the territory's legislature for a year until the 1998 election. Starting from the 1998 election, since the plurality electoral system was changed to proportional representation, compounded with the restoration of corporate votes in the functional constituencies, and replacement of broad-based functional constituencies with traditional ones, the number of seats of the camp dipped, albeit having similar share of vote. Within the camp, share of smaller parties and independents increased relatively, with the share of the Democratic Party falling from around two-thirds in 1995 to less than a half by 2004.

In recent years, use of "pan-democrats" is gaining in popularity, as it is typically meant to be non-denominational and all-inclusive. Members of the camp tend to use the latter term to identify themselves the "Pan-Democracy Camp" term is often used in negative tones by its detractors. "Pan-Democrat" as a title has grown in usage especially during the passage of the national security and anti-subversion legislation, so-called Article 23. The pan-democracy camp was the strong opposition to the Article 23 and they successfully called for 5 millions people to protest on 1 June 2003 against the legislation. The pro-democrats received victories in the subsequent 2003 district councils and 2004 LegCo elections. The Article 23 Concern Group formed by the pro-democracy lawyers transformed into Article 45 Concern Group and its member Audrey Eu, Alan Leong and Ronny Tong were elected in the 2004 LegCo election.

In 2006, the group formed the middle class and professional oriented Civic Party. On the other hand, the left-wing radical group League of Social Democrats was formed in the same year by Trotskyist legislator Leung Kwok-hung and radical radio host Wong Yuk-man.

In the 2007 Chief Executive election, Civic Party's Alan Leong successfully gained enough nominations to challenge the incumbent CE Donald Tsang, but he was not elected as expected due to the control of the Election Committee by the pro-Beijing camp.

After the 2008 LegCo election, The Frontier merged into the Democratic Party and the convenor Emily Lau was elected vice chair of the party.

2012 Reform Package and split

Donald Tsang, the Chief Executive, promised to resolve the question of universal suffrage in his office during the election. He carried out the 2012 constitutional package in 2009 which was criticised by the pro-democracy as lack of genuine progress. The League of Social Democrats called for a de facto referendum in five geographical constituencies. Civic Party, the second largest pro-democratic party joined the referendum. However, the largest party, Democratic Party was reluctant to participate. The Democratic Party and other moderate democrats and pro-democracy scholars launched the Alliance for Universal Suffrage and started to have contact with the mainland officials. The Democratic Party brought out a revised proposal of the package to Beijing and the revised proposal was passed in the Legislative Council in the support of the government and Pro-Beijing camp.

However, it triggered a major split within the camp and also in the Democratic Party. The Young Turks including the LegCo member Andrew Cheng quit the party and formed the Neo Democrats. The Democratic Party was accused by the LSD and the radicals of betraying democracy and its supporters. On the matter of whether to coordinate with the moderate democrats in the 2011 district council elections, the League of Social Democrats was suffered in the factional fighting and the two of the three LSD legislators left the party in disarray and formed the People Power. The People Power's campaign targeted pan-democrat parties in the 2011 DC elections that had supported the reform package filled candidates to run against them but only won one seat of 62 contested.

Nevertheless, the People Power managed to won three seats in the 2012 LegCo election and the radical democrats (People Power and the League of Social Democrats) topped 264,000 votes, compared to the Civic Party's 255,000 and Democratic Party's 247,000 respectively. Despite the pan democrats secured three of the five District Council (second) constituency seats nominated by newly created under the constitutional package, the ratio of the vote share between pan democrats and pro-Beijing camp narrowed from traditional 60% and 40% to 55% and 45% significantly.

The chairman of the Democratic Party Albert Ho represented the pan-democracy camp to run in the 2012 Chief Executive election. On the election day the pan democrats rejected to vote for both Henry Tang and Leung Chun-ying called for blank vote from the electorates.

In March 2013, all 27 democratic legislators formed the Alliance for True Democracy, replacing the Alliance for Universal Suffrage, to show solidarity of the camp to fight for genuine democracy. But Raymond Wong soon left People Power, meant he was not a member of ATD.

Political parties

• Democratic Party, is the flagship pro-democracy party succeeded the United Democrats of Hong Kong which won a landslide victory in the 1991 first ever direct elections of the Legislative Council. It was originally founded in 1990 as a grand alliance of the pro-democracy activists from all sectors and was further merged with the Meeting Point in 1994. It positions itself as centrist and social liberal.
• Civic Party, is the professional-based pro-democracy party formed in 2006 which the founders are mostly barristers rose into fame in the anti-Article 23 legislation Its scored fairly well in the recent elections and has overtaken the Democratic Party with more popular votes in the geographical constituencies in the 2012 Legislative Council election.
• Labour Party, is a pro-labour social democratic party founded by veteran politician Lee Cheuk-yan of the Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions (CTU) in 2012.
• People Power, is considered to be a radical democratic group backed by businessman Stephen Shiu in 2011. It was first formed as a breakaway group from the League of Social Democrats which its former chairman Wong Yuk-man had disagreement with the the then party leadership over the strategy of spinning the Democratic Party who had reached a compromise with the Beijing government on the 2010 Hong Kong electoral reform.
• Professional Commons, is a professional-based group which consists of pro-democracy legislators through the professional functional constituencies.
• League of Social Democrats, is a left-wing social democratic party founded in 2006 by Wong Yuk-man. It initiated the Five Constituencies Referendum in 2010 and suffered a major split in 2011. Its sole representative in the Legislative Council is its chairman Leung Kwok-hung.
• Hong Kong Association for Democracy and People's Livelihood, is a pro-grassroots party which was formed in 1986 as a political group. It was one of the major pro-democracy groups in the 1980s and participated in municipal elections. It has had one legislator every term in 2000. It is considered the moderate faction in the camp.
• Neighbourhood and Worker's Service Centre, is a small pro-grassroots group based in Kwai Chung in the New Territories formed in 1985. Leung Yiu-chung has been its sole legislator since 1995.
• Neo Democrats, is originally the reformist faction in the Democratic Party which broke away from the party in 2010 after the compromise of the electoral reform packages. Gary Fan Kwok-wai was elected in the 2012 Legislative Council election with a nativist agenda.

Civil groups

• Civil Human Rights Front
• The Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China
• Hong Kong Federation of Students
• Scholarism

Criticism of the camp

The camp is criticized as an "opposition camp" by numerous groups including media which is controlled by the mainland Chinese government, since the camp's idea of western-style liberal democracy would not be accepted easily by the Chinese government run by Communist Party. In some cases, pan-democracy activists have been accused of high treason.

Electoral performance

Chief Executive elections

Election	Candidate	# of votes	% of vote	Total vote
2007	Alan Leong	123	15.38	123 / 796
2012	Albert Ho	76	6.37	76 / 1,193

Legislative Council elections

Election	Number of popular votes	% of popular votes	GC seats	FC seats	EC seats	Total seats	+/−
1991	888,729	64.91	16	4	−	20 / 60	13
1995	581,181	63.73	17	10	4	31 / 60	11
1998	982,249	66.36	15	5	0	20 / 60	—
2000	799,249	60.56	16	5	0	21 / 60	1
2004	1,096,272	61.93	18	7	−	26 / 60	3
2008	901,707	59.50	19	4	−	23 / 60	3
2012	1,036,998	57.26	18	9	−	27 / 70	4

Municipal elections

Election	Number of popular votes	% of popular votes	UrbCo seats	RegCo seats	Total elected seats
1989	68,831	32.38	5	5	10 / 27
1991	200,877	51.28	6	7	13 / 27
1995	255,490	45.82	17	14	31 / 59

District Council elections

Election	Number of popular votes	% of popular votes	Total elected seats	+/−
1988	139,982	22.16	61 / 264
1991	170,757	32.11	83 / 272	22
1994	242,557	35.34	121 / 346	38
1999	271,251	33.45	122 / 390	1
2003	459,640	44.67	194 / 400	72
2007	445,781	39.15	127 / 405	30
2011	464,512	39.34	103 / 412	18

See also

• Pro-Beijing camp
• List of political parties and political groups in Hong Kong
• Democratic Progressive Party
• Pan-green Coalition