Then & Now | When Madeleine Albright called Hong Kong ‘Asia’s glittering jewel’ in 1997; what would she think if she were alive today?

In her speech on July 1, 1997, then United States Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, who died recently aged 84, made striking observations about Hong Kong, as the city was handed back from Britain to China.

“Hong Kong is the glittering jewel in Asia’s economic emergence. But it owes its success not to the glitter of gold but to the gold of principle. The ability of journalists to tell it like it is, of legislators to raise their voices in dissent, of businesspeople to know that their agreements will be honoured and of residents to know that the courts are fair and the civil service accountable to all, not just a handful of powers that be.”

Much has altered in the past quarter of a century. That reassuring pre-handover mantra – “fifty years, no change” – was unrealistic to begin with; no place or people survive being glazed over with history’s aspic, or having the key pillars of their former success white-anted out.

The four pillars of Hong Kong’s resounding international success that Albright identified – free flow of information; loyal dissent among popularly elected legislators; justified respect for the courts; a first-class civil service – have all come under pressure with the passage of time.

Where does one even begin to deconstruct all that has changed since Albright’s speech, when the gap between how matters are publicly paraded by those in power, and how individuals perceive them to be in their own daily lives, has widened into a dizzyingly deep chasm?

Among examples too disheartening to enumerate: how many journalists these days “tell it like it is”?; how many legislators “raise their voices in dissent”?; and how many residents genuinely believe “that the courts are fair”?