Democratic Party (Hong Kong)

The Democratic Party (DP) is a centre-left[3] liberal[1] political party in Hong Kong established in 1994. Chaired by legislator Wu Chi-wai, it is currently the third largest party in the Legislative Council of Hong Kong, having seven seats and 89 District Councillors. It is also the largest pro-democracy party in the legislature.

Democratic Party 民主黨
Chairperson	Wu Chi-wai
Vice-Chairpersons	Lo Kin-hei Andrew Wan
Founded	2 October 1994 (1994-10-02)
Merger of	United Democrats Meeting Point The Frontier
Headquarters	4/F, Hanley House, 776–778 Nathan Road, Kowloon, Hong Kong
Youth wing	Young Democrats
Membership (2017)	733
Ideology	Liberalism (HK)[1]
Political position	Centre[2] to centre-left[3]
Regional affiliation	Pro-democracy camp
International affiliation	Liberal International Council of Asian Liberals and Democrats (through two individual members)
Colours	Green
Slogan	"Giving It All"
Legislative Council	7 / 70
District Councils	89 / 479
Website
dphk.org
Politics of Hong Kong Political parties Elections

Democratic Party
Traditional Chinese	民主黨
Simplified Chinese	民主党
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Mínzhǔ dǎng Yue: Cantonese Yale Romanization Màhn jyú dóng Jyutping Man^4 zyu^2 dong^2

The party was founded in 1994 as a merger of the United Democrats of Hong Kong (UDHK) and the Meeting Point (MP). Founded in 1990, the United Democrats were the first major political party which rose to become the largest party in the last years of the colonial legislature, winning a landslide victory in the first ever direct election led by Martin Lee in 1991. The UDHK and MP later merged into the Democratic Party to further consolidate the pro-democracy bloc. Due to its emergence from the support to the Tiananmen protests of 1989 and its opposition to Beijing's bloody crackdown and calling for the end of one-party rule of the Communist Party of China (CPC), the party was long seen as hostile by the Beijing authorities.

The Democratic Party became the largest party in the first fully elected legislature after winning another victory in the 1995 Legislative Council election and retained the largest party status and the flagship pro-democracy party despite its long decline in the first decades of the SAR period due to intra-party factional struggles and the divisive nature of the post-handover proportional representation system. In the 2004 election, the party lost its largest party status to the flagship pro-Beijing rival Democratic Alliance for the Betterment of Hong Kong (DAB) and faced competition from the new pro-democracy activists and groups emerged from the 2003 large-scale pro-democracy demonstration.

The Democratic Party is considered moderate in the pan-democracy camp. In 2010, it reached a breakthrough agreement with the Beijing government over the constitutional reform proposal, which caused disaffection from its pan-democrat allies and a split within the camp. In 2012, the party suffered the worst result in its history, retaining only six seats. The party rebounded by increasing its number of seats to seven in the 2016 election after three veterans, Emily Lau, Albert Ho, and Sin Chung-kai stepped down to make way for the party's younger members. It saw further electoral success in the 2019 District Council election, winning 91 seats and simultaneously becoming the largest political party in the District Council.

Party beliefs

From the outset, the party supported the restoration of Chinese sovereignty over Hong Kong. However, since the handover it has consistently stressed the "two systems" part of the "one country, two systems" principle. The party's stance on Hong Kong's future development differs from that of pro-Beijing parties. It believes Hong Kong must develop more democratic institutions and preserve freedoms and human rights to achieve prosperity.

The party proposed policies on various areas of governance through designated spokespersons, including:

• Amendment of the Basic Law to achieve more democracy and safeguard freedoms, while achieving closer economic co-operation with Mainland China.
• Protection of human rights.
• Maintain Hong Kong's status as an international finance and trade centre and improve its economic infrastructure (concrete details not given), as well as a more flexible way to control public expenditure.
• Better monitoring of public services and utilities (i.e. more accountability), and strengthened measures to protect the environment.
• More resources for education, with less vague policies.
• Reasonable (i.e. larger) share of economic achievements by the employee for the employee, and increased involvement by the Government to protect labour laws in accordance with social needs.
• Adopt measures to regulate property prices from fluctuation, and provide adequate public housing
• Increase spending on social welfare.

Overall, the Democratic Party advocates economic policies pretty close to liberalism in the sense of John Rawls rather than of Robert Nozick or Friedrich Hayek as commonly accepted outside North America, in sharp contrast with the traditional radical free-market capitalist orientation typical of Hong Kong. However, this point is rarely mentioned in the speeches held by party members during their trips abroad to seek political support.

The party's position on social or cultural issues is not well-defined but verges on the moderate, partly due to some support from centrist pan-democrat supporters. In a way that may seem contradictory to traditional liberal ideology, the party generally opposes the legalisation of commercial sex or gambling operations. However, the Democratic Party generally support to legalise laws which would prohibit discrimination against the LGBT community, despite part of the conservative wing of the party against it.

In recent years with the emergence of the pro-Hong Kong independence tide, the Democratic Party has been criticised by pro-independence voices for its pro-China position. The party has also been accused for years by pro-Beijing media of being anti-China, as many of the core Democratic Party leaders including Szeto Wah, Martin Lee and Albert Ho are self-proclaimed patriots who oppose only the one-party rule of the Communist Party of China but not the country in general and support the Chinese democracy movement.[4] It also does not support Hong Kong being separated from China.

History

Founding

The Party's first logo used in 1994–2003.

The Democratic Party was founded with the merger of the two major pro-democracy parties at the time, the United Democrats of Hong Kong (UDHK) and the Meeting Point (MP). The Meeting Point was formed in 1983 by a group of liberal intellectuals and people from middle class in the background of the Sino-British negotiations on the sovereignty of Hong Kong after 1997. The group favoured the transfer of sovereignty of Hong Kong to the People's Republic of China but called for a "free, democratic and autonomous Hong Kong government under Chinese sovereignty". Together with the Association for Democracy and People's Livelihood (ADPL) and the Hong Kong Affairs Society (HKAS), they were the three major pro-democracy organisations actively participated in the local and municipal elections in the 1980s.

The like-minded liberals also formed the Joint Committee on the Promotion of Democratic Government (JCPDG) and the Group of 190 to strive for the 1988 Legislative Council election and the faster democratisation the political structure towards 1997 and after 1997 during the drafting of the Hong Kong Basic Law, under the leadership of liberal drafters Martin Lee and Szeto Wah. During the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989, the liberals stood firmly with the student protestors, formed the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements in China (HKASPDMC) and condemned the bloody suppression on 4 June.

In preparation for the first Legislative Council direct election in 1991, members of the three political groups and many liberal activists of the JCPDG joined together and formed the United Democrats of Hong Kong in April 1990.[5] Chaired by the Martin Lee, the United Democrats of Hong Kong formed an alliance with Anthony Cheung Bing-leung's Meeting Point in the campaign.[6] The liberal alliance won a landslide victory in the direct election, receiving over 52% of the vote[7] and winning 14 of the 16 geographical constituency seats in September. The popularity of the pro-democratic alliance was principally rose from its position towards the Tiananmen Square protests and the widespread fear towards the Beijing government afterwards.

The United Democrats stood a firm anti-Beijing stances, criticising the Tiananmen crackdown and also the democratic situation. As a result, Lee and Szeto were deprived their posts in the Basic Law Drafting Committee and were accused of "treason". The United Democrats supported the last governor Chris Patten's democratic reform proposal, which allowed a much extended electorate for the first fully elected Legislative Council election in 1995 and was ferociously opposed by Beijing.

The United Democrats of Hong Kong and the Meeting Point further united by announcing the formation of the Democratic Party on 18 April 1994.[8] They formally merged into the Democratic Party on 2 October 1994, in eve of the three-tier elections in 1994 and 1995. Martin Lee became the first Chairman of the party and Anthony Cheung and Yeung Sum became the Vice-Chairmen, elected on the first general meeting on the establishment day. The ADPL continued to keep its own identity, arguing that it represented grassroots' interest whereas the Democratic Party was more focused on the "middle class".[5]

The founding manifesto of the Democratic Party said it would seek to further unite democratic forces, strive for a high degree of autonomy and an open, democratic government, and would promote welfare and equality in Hong Kong. The party also tried to appropriate the discourse of nationalism as it stated "We care for China and, as part of the Chinese citizeny, we have the rights and obligations to participate in and comment on the affairs of China." It also called for the condemnation of the 1989 Tiananmen Incident as well as an amendment of the Hong Kong Basic Law before 1997 to allow full election of the Chief Executive and the Legislative Council of Hong Kong.[9]

1994/95 elections and Provisional Legislative Council (1994–1998)

The electorate base of the 1995 LegCo election was largely extended by the Governor Chris Patten's controversial electoral reform package supported by the pro-democrats. Facing the challenge from the newly formed business conservative Liberal Party and pro-Beijing loyalist Democratic Alliance for the Betterment of Hong Kong (DAB), the Democratic Party was able to win handsome victories in the three-tier elections in 1994 and 1995. In the LegCo election in September 1995, the party secured 42% of the vote and 19 of the 60 total seats, emerging as the largest party in the Legislative Council, compared to Liberal Party's 10 seats and DAB's 6 seats. Together with the ADPL and other pro-democracy independents, the democratic coalition was able to garner one- or two-vote majorities on certain anti-government issues during the last term of the legislature.[10]

The party's stance conflicted with the PRC government's, which, for a while, earned the party more popularity and recognition both locally and overseas. The party chairman Martin Lee became well-known internationally in the run-up to reunification as a human rights and democracy fighter, and won a number of international human rights awards.

After Patten's reform package was passed, Beijing decided that the legislature elected in 1995 could not ride the "through train" beyond the handover of Hong Kong, as the first legislature of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (SAR). Instead, Beijing set up a highly controlled Provisional Legislative Council (PLC) in December 1996. The Democratic Party refused to join the Selection Committee as it opposed to Beijing's decision "to scrap Hong Kong's elected legislature and replace it with a hand-picked version."[11] The party thus lost all 19 seats until the PLC was replaced by the first Legislative Council of the Hong Kong SAR in 1998.

At the midnight on 30 June just after the handover ceremony, the Democratic Party LegCo members protested against the abrupt termination of their tenure and call for the establishment of democratic government at the balcony of the Legislative Council Building, and vow to return to the legislature by means of election in 1998.[12]

Return to Legislative Council and early crises (1998–2002)

Decided by the Provisional Legislative Council, the first-past-the-post voting system was replaced by the proportional representation system in the first LegCo election in 1998. The proportional representation gave an advantage to the weaker pro-Beijing DAB as it did not require a majority to win a seat. Thus in 1995 the Democratic Party won 12 seats in the geographical constituencies with 42.3% of the vote, but it got only 9 seat with 40.2% of the vote in 1998.[13]

After the handover, the Right of Abode litigation was initiated immediately and reached its climax in the Court of Final Appeal's (CFA) decisions favouring the right of abode seekers in Ng Ka Ling and Chan Kam Nga lawsuits in January 1999. The Democratic Party supported the right of abode seekers and opposed strongly to the government's decision to refer the National People's Congress Standing Committee (NPCSC) to interpret the Basic Law.[14] Party chairman Martin Lee condemned this move as "a dagger striking at the heart of the rule of law" and in symbolic protest walked out of the Legislative Council with 18 other members, all dressed in black.[15] However, the party appeared to suffer from popular discontent with the party's position.[16] The party was also criticised for failing to broaden its post-1997 agenda and develop a well-defined social base.[17]

The party also appeared to suffer from the internal dissension. In December 1998, the "Young Turks" led by Andrew To staged a successful coup d'état in the party leadership election, which promptly brought the party into a phase of factional struggle. The Young Turks formed their own list of about ten candidates to run for the Central Committee and nominated Lau Chin-shek to run for vice-chairman against the former Meeting Point chairman Anthony Cheung. Some hoped to make Lau as their factional leader, to lead the party from the Meeting Point faction's pro-middle class, pro-laissez-faire and pro-Beijing positions to a more pro-grassroots and confrontational position.[18] Although Lau was elected vice-chairman, he resigned after the election. Lau was subsequently forced to leave the party in June 2000 after a one-year membership freeze, due to Lau's Democratic Party/Frontier dual membership.

In a general meeting in September 1999, the Young Turks also proposed to put the minimum wage legislation on the 2000 LegCo election platform of the party. The Mainstreamers which included the "triumvirate", Yeung Sum, Cheung Man-kwong and Lee Wing-tat, saw the minimum wage debate was a challenge to the party authority and decide to fight back by joining hands with the Meeting Point faction to defeat the Young Turks. Andrew To wrote a newspaper article accusing the Mainstreamers of suppressing intra-party dissent, "just like the butchers in the Tiananmen massacre."[19] To's comment led to a backlash of opinion within the party and led to the defeat of the minimum wage motion.[19] The debate, largely took place in the mass media, publicised the factional rivalries and created a bad image within the party.[20]

The popular discontent and internal fragmentation appeared to have marked a turning point in the prospects of the Democratic Party and the DAB. In the 1999 District Council elections, the DAB more than doubled its representation, while Democratic Party performed less well than anticipated, winning 86 seats.[21] In the second LegCo election in the following year, Tsang Kin-shing and Steve Chan Kwok-leung left the party and ran as independents after failing to be nominated on the candidates list by the Central Committee.[22] The election results showed the party's share in the geographical constituencies dropped to 35%, and the party secured 9 out of the 24 directly elected seats. Its total number of seats in LegCo remained at 12.

In December 2002, Yeung Sum succeeded Martin Lee as Party chairman in the leadership change, legislator Albert Chan, belonging to the pro-grassroots relatively "radical" faction, left the party.[23] By the end of 2002, more than 50 members of the party which had already formed a political group, Social Democratic Forum, defected to the Frontier, mostly Young Turks.[23]

2003 July 1 march and rebound in popularity (2002–2004)

In 2002 and 2003 the party saw a rebound in popularity, largely due to the low popularity of the Tung Chee-hwa's administration, and more significantly the controversy over the Basic Law Article 23 legislation. The pro-democrats worried that the anti-subversion law would threaten the rights and freedom of the Hong Kong people and damaged the rule of law and "One Country, Two Systems." The Article 23 legislation turned into a territory-wide debate and led to a re-awakening of civil society, mobilising different sectors to join the opposition movement.[24] The Democratic Party used many of their 94 district offices for community-level mobilisation. In the weeks before the 1 July march, the Democratic Party managed to collect phone numbers of about 40,000 supporters. The party's volunteers and staff called them one by one to call on them to join the demonstration.[24] The demonstration resulted in a record-breaking number of people, more than 500,000 Hong Kong people joined the march. The SAR government had to back down and shelve the bill indefinitely.

In the following 2003 District Council elections in November, the pro-democracy camp turned the popular support into the demand of democratisation, universal suffrage of the Chief Executive and Legislative Council in 2007 and 2008, their primary goals for years. The Democratic Party received a great victory by claiming 95 seats out of the 120 candidates in the election.[25]

The civil movement in 2003 also broadened the spectrum of the pro-democracy camp. A number of pro-democracy groups such as Article 45 Concern Group and individuals such as Leung Kwok-hung and Albert Cheng were elected in the 2004 LegCo election. Although the pan-democracy camp took 25 of 60 seats, the Democratic Party won only 9 seats, falling from the largest party in the Legislative Council to the third, behind DAB's 13 (including the FTU members) and pro-business Liberal Party's 10.[26] Worried by pre-election surveys indicating that Martin Lee might be in danger, the Democratic Party sent out a last minute S.O.S. call to "save Martin Lee" who was listed second on the Democratic Party's list behind chairman Yeung Sum in the Hong Kong Island constituency. As a result, Yeung's and Lee's list absorbed too many votes at the expense of pro-democracy ally Cyd Ho losing by just 815 votes to DAB's Choy So-yuk.[27] It caused some dissatisfaction among some supporters of the party and the camp generally. Yeung Sum announced he would not seek for re-election as chairman after the election as a result and subsequently replaced by Lee Wing-tat in the party leadership election in December.

Campaign for 2007/08 universal suffrage and merge with the Frontier (2004–2008)

Although lack of breakthrough in the legislative elections, the pan-democracy maintains its basic position of seeking universal suffrage in 2007 and 2008 for Chief Executive and Legislative Council respectively, even though the NPCSC's interpretation of the Basic Law in April 2004 rejected the demand. After Tung Chee-hwa's resigned as Chief Executive in March 2005, Party chairman Lee Wing-tat attempted to run for the post against Donald Tsang but failed to get enough nominations in the Election Committee. Donald Tsang was elected uncontestedly in the Chief Executive election.

In October 2005, Donald Tsang's administration issued a blueprint for the electoral reform. The proposal aimed to double to size of Election Committee to 1,600 and add 10 seats to the Legislative Council, half of which would be directly elected and the rest returned by District Councillors.[28] The pro-democracy parties criticised the proposal as conservative as it did not move towards to universal suffrage. In December, the camp held a mass rally against the government's reform package and demanded a timetable and road-map to democracy be attached to the proposal. The reform package was at last vetoed by the pan-democracy camp.[28] In December 2006, 114 of the 137 pro-democracy candidates filled by the Democratic Party and the newly established Civic Party won the Election Committee subsector elections which secured the threshold of 100 nominations to enter the next Chief Executive election.

Since early 2005, 24 members had quit the party, including district councillor Stephen Fong Chun-bong (who was forced out by the party) and Lau Tak-cheung. Twelve district councillors also left the party. Another district councillor died in a car accident. The number of district councillors decreased by 13 to 79. In March 2006, the Mainstreamer faction alleged that some senior members were involved in spying activities of China. The "suspects" were all Young Turks Reformist members including vice-chairman Chan King-ming and Gary Fan. The Young Turk members were all ousted in the following leadership election in December, with Mainstreamer Albert Ho defeating Chan King-ming as the new party chairman.

The democrats suffered a humiliating defeat in the District Council elections in November 2007. The Democratic Party took the heaviest loss of 36 seats as compared with 2003.[29] 23 of the party's incumbent Councillors were ousted, with just over half of its candidates elected.[30] The Democratic Party was by far outstripped by the Beijing loyalist DAB which won total of 115 seats, recapturing the loss in 2003 and also much expanding.

On 29 December 2007, the NPCSC unveiled a timetable for the universal suffrage of the Chief Executive in 2017 and for the entire Legislative Council by 2020 with a host of conditions. The NPCSC decision helped reducing the political pressure on Tsang while removing pan-democracy camp's key rallying cry in the following LegCo election, although the pro-democratic parties were still calling for the universal suffrage of the Chief Executive and Legislative Council in 2012.

In the 2008 LegCo election, the Democratic Party's share of vote further dropped to 20.6%, winning only 8 seats. The emerging pro-democratic parties professionals-formed Civic Party and left-wing League of Social Democrats (LSD) took the share of 13.7% and 10.1% and won 5 and 3 seats respectively. Facing the emerging new parties, the two old political parties the Democratic Party and the Frontier merged. At the time, the Democratic Party had 636 members, 8 legislators and 57 District Council members, while the Frontier had one legislator, Emily Lau, three District Councillors and around 110 members.[31] In the following month, Albert Ho was re-elected chairman, and Emily Lau became a Vice-Chairman of the new combined party in the party leadership election.[32]

2010 reform proposal breakthrough and 2012 elections (2008–2012)

In the following electoral reform for the 2012 Chief Executive and LegCo elections in 2009 and 2010, Donald Tsang proposed a reform package which had not much difference from the 2005 proposal. The pan-democracy camp were saying they were going to veto it again. The Civic Party and League of Social Democrats launched a de facto referendum by resigning and triggering territory-wide by-elections to let the voters voice out their demand on democracy. The Democratic Party refused to participate as it argued it was not an effective way. The party's heavyweight veteran Szeto Wah said the Democratic Party would not join in the resignations itself, but would support pan-democrats who stood for re-election. In December 2009, the Democratic Party members voted 229 voted against, 54 in favour and one abstention not to join the resignation plan after a four-hour debate at a general meeting.[33]

Instead in May 2010, the party leaders met with the officials of the Central Government's Liaison Office in Hong Kong to negotiate on the reform package, which was the first meeting between Democratic Party leaders and senior officials from the central government since the Tiananmen massacre of 1989.[34] The central government subsequently accepted the Democratic Party's revised proposal in the run-up to the LegCo vote, which allowed the five new functional constituency members of LegCo to be elected by popular vote. However, the Democratic Party failed to get any promises on the 2017 Chief Executive and 2020 Legco elections.[35] The Democratic Party's move significantly divided the opinion within the pan-democracy camp but the bill was ultimately passed in June 2010 with the support of the Democratic Party. After the agreement with Beijing, 30 Young Turk Reformists (comprising 4% of the membership) left the party before the December Party leadership election, accusing their leaders of betraying the people and slowing the pace towards universal suffrage.[36] LegCo member Andrew Cheng had also quit the party earlier at the LegCo voting in June.

The party's refusal of participating the by-election and the agreement with Beijing heavily damaged the solidarity of the pan-democracy camp. The "radical" League of Social Democrats accused the Democratic Party for "selling out" Hong Kong people. During the annual 1 July march in 2010, the Democratic Party leaders were verbally attacked by other democratic protestors, chanting "Shame on you, Democratic Party, for selling out Hong Kong people."[37] In the following District Council elections in November 2011, the newly formed People Power headed by Wong Yuk-man, who quit as the Chairman of the League of Social Democrats early the year, launched an anti-Democratic Party campaign and filled in candidates run against the Democratic Party members. The Democratic Party was able to retain 47 seats with an increase of the vote. The People Power failed to get any seat against the Democratic Party but one seat where was no other democratic candidates.

In the Election Committee Subsector elections in December 2011, pan-democracy camp was able to get more than 150 seats to secure the threshold of nominating a candidate in the 2012 Chief Executive election. Democratic Party chairman Albert Ho won over Frederick Fung of ADPL in the pan-democracy primary election[38][39] and stood for the camp in the election. The election was dominated by the two candidates from the pro-Beijing camp, Henry Tang and Leung Chun-ying and marked by scandals, dirty tactics and smears from both sides. Albert Ho fell behind in the opinion poll throughout the campaign partly due to the impossibility of him being elected by the Beijing-controlled Election Committee. The pan-democracy camp called for casting blank votes on the election day. During the election 1,132 votes were cast, CY Leung received 689; Henry Tang received 285, and Albert Ho received 76.[40]

In the LegCo election in the following September, the party successfully gained two of the five seats of the territory-wide based new District Council (Second) constituency which were created by its own proposal. However, the total seats of the party dropped from 8 to only 6 seats, the worst results in the party's history. The party could only gained 13.7% of the popular vote, even less than Civic Party's 14.1% and lost all its seats in the New Territories West. Chairman Albert Ho resigned after the election outcomes announced, vice-chairwoman Emily Lau took over as acting chairman. Lau defeated Sin Chung-kai as the first chairwoman of the party in the December party leadership election. In December 2014, Emily Lau secured her chairwomanship against three challengers in the chairperson re-election, which was the most competitive leadership election in party's history.

Umbrella movement and aftermath (2012–present)

In March 2013, the Democrats formed the Alliance for True Democracy with other pan democratic parties for pressing the government to give out a genuinely democratic reform proposal. The party supported Benny Tai's Occupy Central with Love and Peace proposal to launch a civil disobedience movement to further pressure the Beijing government. The party took a supporting role in the 2014 Hong Kong protests with many of its party figures arrested. In June 2015, the party voted against the government's proposal.

In the 2015 District Council election, the Democrats won total number of 43 seats with several second-tier figures, including vice-chairman Lo Kin-hei and chief executive Lam Cheuk-ting, scored victories, while others like former chairman Albert Ho and vice-chairman Andrew Wan lost.[41]

For the 2016 Legislative Council election, the party proposed an unprecedented pre-election primary to hold public debates before selecting candidates for each constituency.[42] 14 nominations were received on 31 December 2015, in which three incumbents, chairperson Emily Lau and veterans Albert Ho and Sin Chung-kai did not seek for re-election to hasten the party's rejuvenation.[43] They chose to stand as second candidates behind young party colleagues, Lam Cheuk-ting, Andrew Wan and Hui Chi-fung respectively in order to boost the chances for them to get elected. Despite the decrease in their vote share, the Democrats gained seven seats, one more than the previous election, by retaking a seat in the New Territories West. Roy Kwong, a young progressive Democrat District Councillor also received most votes of nearly 500,000 in the District Council (Second) "super seat". By taking seven seats, the Democrats retook the status of flagship pro-democracy party.

In the December leadership election, legislator Wu Chi-wai was elected new chairman uncontestedly. The Democrats supported former Financial Secretary John Tsang, making the first time a pro-democracy party to support an establishment candidate, after the pro-democrats decided not to field their candidate in order to boost the chance of an alternative candidate against incumbent Leung Chun-ying. The Democrats opposed former Chief Secretary for Administration Carrie Lam, the eventual winner of the election. However, the party has developed a warmer relationship with Carrie Lam government, evident in the attendance and donation of the Chief Executive to the party's 2018 anniversary dinner.[44]

The Democrats suffered a historic loss of headcount on 12 December 2018 when 59 members, including five District Councillors from New Territories East, resigned en masse, after a row over the 2019 District Council election, accusing Legislative Councillor Lam Cheuk-ting of despicable character, his lack of political ethics and conflict of interest.[45]

The relations between the party and Carrie Lam turned sour as the administration was embattled numerous controversies including the raising of the age threshold for the Comprehensive Social Security Assistance and the dropping of Leung Chun-ying's UGL case. Lam was not invited to the party's 24th anniversary dinner in March 2019.[46] The relations between Lam and the party completely fell out in May 2019 over the extradition law controversy in which the Democrats strongly opposed. Party chairman Wu Chi-wai even shouted at Lam "Why don't you die? You're a waste of life, bitch!" at a LegCo meeting after Lam dismissed the opposition views as "extreme" and "unnecessary fear" and called the claims that it was a deliberate decision by the colonial government to exclude the mainland from any rendition arrangements in the 1990s as "nonsense". On 29 May, Democrat Andrew Wan moved the first motion of no confidence against Lam since she took the office on the grounds that she "blatantly lied" about the extradition bill and misled the public and the international community. The motion was defeated by the pro-Beijing majority.[47]

Organisation

The Democratic Party is governed by a 30-member Central Committee, including one chairmanship and two vice-chairmanships elected by the party congress. All public office holders, including the members of the Legislative Council and District Councils, are eligible to vote in the party congress.[48] The electoral method changed since 2014, the eligibility of members electing a delegate who holds one vote in the congress from 30 members each delegate to only 5 members.[49] Candidate for the chairmanship also needs a majority in order to claim victory.[50] A 14-member Executive Committee including the secretary and treasurer posts is elected by the Central Committee members. The party is currently the second largest party in the Legislative Council, having seven legislators, 37 District Councillors and around 788 members.

Factions

• Mainstreamers – led by the "triumvirate", Yeung Sum, Cheung Man-kwong and Lee Wing-tat[51] and consisting of members including Albert Ho, Sin Chung-kai and Tik Chi-yuen. In 1999, Lee asserted that the Democratic Party should strive to serve as representative of middle class interests, and take balance between parliamentary politics and street action. Yeung and Lee were the party chairmen from 2002 to 2004 and 2004 to 2006 respectively.
• Meeting Point – consisting of former members of the Meeting Point, including Lo Chi-kin, Andrew Fung and led by the former Meeting Point chairman Anthony Cheung.[52] The Meeting Point faction prefers a more pro-middle class, pro-market and moderate agenda.[51] It also stresses dialogue with Beijing and Hong Kong governments over struggle, and parliamentary politics over street action.[52] Anthony Cheung quit the party in 2004 and was appointed to the Secretary for Transport and Housing by Leung Chun-ying in 2012; Andrew Fung quit the party in 2012 in an unpleasant manner and was appointed government's information coordinator in 2013.
• Young Turks – consisting of the relatively radical, left-wing and pro-grassroots activists and local-level party members including Steve Chan Kwok-leung, Tsang Kin-shing, Andrew Cheng, Albert Chan and Eric Wong Chung-ki. Led by Andrew To, the Young Turks believed that the party should take struggle over dialogue and mass movements over parliamentary politics as the party's strategy.[52] They also suggested adopting more grassroots platform such as minimum wage. The Young Turks were more like a "factional clique" than an organised faction as they were a group of young politicians with poor discipline and only had some vague common ideas, without a clear leader, coherent ideologies or positions.[53] The Young Turks attempted to challenge the party leadership by nominating Lau Chin-shek to run for vice-chairman against Anthony Cheung in the 1998 party leadership election.[54] Lau was expelled from the party in 2000 and Andrew To, Tsang Kin-shing and Albert Chan left the party and subsequently formed the left-wing League of Social Democrats in 2006.
• Reformists – as many original Young Turks left, a new Reformist group emerged as the main opposition faction against the Mainstreamers party leadership, which included Chan King-ming who contested for chairman in the 2004 election and 2006 election and Legislative Council member Andrew Cheng. New Territories East was the Reformists' stronghold; Chan King-ming was the Chairman of the New Territories East branch and Andrew Cheng was the legislator from the same constituency. The faction was involved in alleged spying activities of China which led to the intra-party investigation in 2006. Andrew Cheng and other Reformists quit after the party supported the controversial electoral reform package. Many of them became the backbone of the Neo Democrats formed in 2010.

Electoral performance

Chief Executive elections

Election	Candidate	No. of votes	% of votes
2005	Lee Wing-tat	Not nominated
2012	Albert Ho	76	7.24

Legislative Council elections

Election	Number of popular votes	% of popular votes	GC seats	FC seats	EC seats	Total seats	+/−	Position
1995	385,428	41.87	12	5	2	19 / 60	4	1st
1998	634,635	42.87	9	4	0	13 / 60	–	1st
2000	417,873	31.66	9	3	0	12 / 60	0	1st
2004	445,988	25.19	7	2		9 / 60	2	3rd
2008	312,692	20.63	7	1		8 / 60	1	2nd
2012	247,220	13.65	4	2		6 / 70	2	2nd
2016	199,876	9.22	5	2		7 / 70	1	2nd

Municipal elections

Election	Number of popular votes	% of popular votes	UrbCo seats	RegCo seats	Total elected seats
1995	205,823	36.91	12 / 32	11 / 27	23 / 59

District Council elections

Election	Number of popular votes	% of popular votes	Total elected seats	+/−
1994	157,929	23.01	75 / 346	15
1999	201,461	24.85	86 / 390	13
2003	223,675	21.27	95 / 400	17
2007	175,054	15.38	59 / 405	21
2011	205,716	17.42	47 / 412	3
2015	196,068	13.56	43 / 431	1
2019	362,275	12.36	91 / 452	54

Leadership

Chairpersons and Vice-Chairpersons

№	Chairperson (Birth–Death)	Portrait	Constituency	Took Office	Left Office	Leadership election	Vice-Chairpersons
1	Martin Lee (born 1938)		Hong Kong Island East (1991–1997) Hong Kong Island (1998–2008)	2 October 1994[n 1]	1 December 2002	1994, 1996, 1998, 2000	Anthony Cheung, 1994–1998 Yeung Sum, 1994–2000 Lau Chin-shek, 1998 Albert Ho, 1999–2000 Law Chi-kwong, 2000–2002 Lee Wing-tat, 2000–2002
2	Yeung Sum (born 1947)		Hong Kong Island	1 December 2002	17 December 2004	2002	Lee Wing-tat Albert Ho
3	Lee Wing-tat (born 1955)		New Territories West	17 December 2004	17 December 2006	2004	Albert Ho Chan King-ming
4	Albert Ho (born 1951)		New Territories West	17 December 2006	10 September 2012[n 2]	2006, 2008, 2010	Sin Chung-kai, 2006–2012 Tik Chi-yuen, 2006–2008 Emily Lau, 2008–2012
5	Emily Lau (born 1952)		New Territories East	10 September 2012	4 December 2016	2012, 2014	Lo Kin-hei, 2012–2016 Richard Tsoi, 2012–2014 Andrew Wan, 2014–2016
6	Wu Chi-wai (born 1962)		Kowloon East	4 December 2016	Incumbent	2016, 2018	Lo Kin-hei, 2016–present Li Wing-shing, 2016–2018 Andrew Wan, 2018–present

1. As Chairman of the United Democrats from 23 April 1990 to 2 October 1994.
2. Resigned, Emily Lau served as acting chair between 10 September and 16 December 2012.

Secretaries

• Law Chi-kwong, 1994–1998
• Cheung Yin-tung, 1998–2006
• Peggy Ha Ving-vung, 2006–2008
• Cheung Yin-tung, 2008–2014, 2016–present
• Li Wing-shing, 2014–2016

Treasurers

• Andrew Fung Wai-kwong, 1994–2000
• Wong Bing-kuen, 2000–2002
• Tsui Hon-kwong, 2002–2006
• Cheung Yin-tung, 2006–2008
• Tsui Hon-kwong, 2008–2012
• Stanley Ng, 2012–2014
• Ramon Yuen, 2014–2018
• Sin Chung-kai, 2018–present

Vice-secretaries

• Mark Li Kin-yin, 2014–2016

Representatives

Legislative Council

The Democratic Party has currently seven seats in the Sixth Legislative Council (2016–2020):

James To, the most senior representative for the Democratic Party in the Legislative Council.

Constituency	Member
Hong Kong Island	Hui Chi-fung
Kowloon West	Helena Wong
Kowloon East	Wu Chi-wai
New Territories West	Andrew Wan
New Territories East	Lam Cheuk-ting
District Council (Second)	Kwong Chun-yu
	James To

District Councils

The Democratic Party currently holds 89 seats in 15 District Councils (2020–2023):

District	Constituency	Member	District	Constituency	Member
Hong Kong Island & Kowloon			New Territories
Central & Western	Chung Wan	Hui Chi-fung	Tsuen Wan	Tsuen Wan West	Angus Yick Shing-chung
	Mid Levels East	Ng Siu-hong		Tsuen Wan Centre	Li Hung-por
	Castle Road	Cheng Lai-king		Cheung Shek	Matthew Lai Man-fai
	Belcher	Victor Yeung Sui-yin	Tuen Mun	Tuen Mun Town Centre	Lai Chun-wing
	Sheung Wan	Kam Nai-wai		So Kwun Wat	Ma Kee
	Tung Wah	Bonnie Ng Hoi-yan		Lok Tsui	Lo Chun-yu
	Centre Street	Cheung Kai-yin		San King	Catherine Wong Lai-sheung
Eastern	Tai Koo Shing West	Andrew Chiu Ka-yin		Siu Hong	Josephine Chan Shu-ying
	Aldrich Bay	So Yat-hang		Prime View	Ho Hang-mui
	Nam Fung	Cheung Kwok-cheong	Yuen Long	Nam Ping	Zachary Wong Wai-yin
	Upper Yiu Tung	Chow Cheuk-ki		Pek Long	Kwong Chun-yu
Southern	Ap Lei Chau North	Chan Ping-yeung		Yuen Long Tung Tau	Lam Ting-wai
	Lei Tung I	Chan Yan-yi		Yiu Yau	Ng Hin-wang
	Lei Tung II	Lo Kin-hei		Kingswood South	Katy Ng Yuk-ying
	Wah Kwai	Poon Ping-hong		Shui Oi	Lai Po-wa
	Wah Fu South	Li Shee-lin		Ching King	Kwok Man-ho
	Wah Fu North	Yim Chun-ho	North	Fanling Town	Wong Hoi-ying
	Wong Chuk Hang	Tsui Yuen-wa		Cheung Wah	Chan Yuk-ming
Yau Tsim Mong	Charming	Lee Wai-fung		Choi Yuen	Lam Tsz-king
	Olympic	James To Kun-sun		Shek Wu Hui	Lam Cheuk-ting
	Tai Kok Tsui South	Tsang Tsz-ming		Tin Ping West	Kwok Long-fung
	East Tsim Sha Tsui & King's Park	Leo Chu Tsz-lok	Sha Tin	Sun Tin Wai	Ching Cheung-ying
Sham Shui Po	Pik Wui	Zoe Chow Wing-heng		Tai Wai	Kudama Ng Ting-lam
	Lai Chi Kok Central	Ramon Yuen Hoi-man		Chun Ma	Felix Chow Hiu-laam
Kowloon City	Ma Hang Chung	Lai Kwong-wai		Fu Lung	Tsang So-lai
	Ma Tau Kok	Ma Hei-pang		Yiu On	Sin Cheuk-nam
	Sheung Lok	Wong Wing-kit		Heng On	Cheng Tsuk-man
	Ho Man Tin	Joshua Fung Man-tao	Kwai Tsing	Kwai Luen	Ng Kim-sing
	Kadoorie	Siu Leong-sing		Upper Tai Wo Hau	Hui Kei-cheung
	Prince	Wong Kwok-tung		Lower Tai Wo Hau	Wong Bing-kuen
	Hok Yuen Laguna Verde	Tony Kwok Tin-lap		Shek Yam	Andrew Wan Siu-kin
	Hung Hom Bay	Pius Yum Kwok-tung		Tai Pak Tin East	Lau Kwai-mui
	Ka Wai	Chau Hei-man		On Yam	Leung Wing-kuen
	Oi Man	Mak Sui-ki		Shek Lei North	Lam Siu-fai
Wong Tai Sin	Fung Wong	Tang Wai-keung		Shek Lei South	Leung Kwok-wah
	Tsz Wan West	Cheung Mau-ching		Hing Fong	Tong Ho-man
	King Fu	Rosanda Mok Ka-han		Wah Lai	Sin Chung-kai
	Choi Wan South	Shum Wan-wa		Cheung Ching	Hon Chun-yin
	Choi Wan West	Chan Lee-shing		Ching Fat	Lau Chi-kit
	Chi Choi	Wu Chi-kin	Islands	Tung Chung North	Sammy Tsui Sang-hung
Kwun Tong	Kwun Tong Central	Edith Leung Yik-ting
	Kai Yip	Wan Ka-him
	Ping Shek	Lai Po-kwai
	Shun Tin	Mok Kin-shing
	Hing Tin	Nelson Ip Tsz-kit
	Pak Nga	Chan Man-kin
	Tsui Ping	Hung Chun-hin
	Po Lok	Cheng Keng-ieong
	Ting On	Wong Kai-ming

See also

• Democratic development in Hong Kong
• Liberalism in Hong Kong
• Liberal democracy
• List of liberal parties

Notes

1.^ Majority merged into the Democratic Party on 23 November 2008.

References

1. Lee 2011, p. 206. sfn error: multiple targets (2×): CITEREFLee2011 (help)
2. Sonny Lo Shiu-Hing (2019). "Hong Kong". In Joseph, William A. (ed.). Politics in China: An Introduction. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-087070-6. The main pro-democracy parties are the centrist Democratic Party and the professional-oriented Civic Party.
3. Li, Pang-kwong; Newman, David (1997). "Give and Take: Electoral Politics in Transitional Hong Kong". Asian Perspective. 21 (1): 219. JSTOR 42704125.
4. Lee, Eliza Wing-Yee (2011). Gender and Change in Hong Kong: Globalization, Postcolonialism, and Chinese Patriarchy. UBC Press. p. 71.
5. Allen 1997, p. 169.
6. Lau 1993, p. 118. sfn error: no target: CITEREFLau1993 (help)
7. Beatty 2003, p. 21.
8. Preston 2001, p. 72.
9. Chan 1997, p. 69.
10. Beatty 2003, p. 26.
11. Chan 1997, p. 73.
12. Eur 2002, p. 333.
13. Bush 2005, p. 95.
14. Khun 2009, p. 79-80. sfn error: no target: CITEREFKhun2009 (help)
15. Krasner 2013, p. 133.
16. Sharpe 2001, p. 3.
17. Nery 2008, p. 49-50.
18. Ma, Ngok (2001). "The Decline of the Democratic Party in Hong Kong: The Second Legislative Election in the HKSAR". Asian Survey. 41 (4): 577. doi:10.1525/as.2001.41.4.564.
19. Kuan 2002, p. 139. sfn error: no target: CITEREFKuan2002 (help)
20. Kuan 2002, p. 140. sfn error: no target: CITEREFKuan2002 (help)
21. Pretson 2001, p. 77. sfn error: no target: CITEREFPretson2001 (help)
22. Kuan 2002, p. 144. sfn error: no target: CITEREFKuan2002 (help)
23. Leung, Ambrose (3 December 2002). "Albert Chan quits day after Democrat leadership change". South China Morning Post.
24. Khun 2009, p. 58. sfn error: no target: CITEREFKhun2009 (help)
25. Poon 2007, p. 164.
26. Chan 2008, p. 11.
27. Pepper 2008, p. 378.
28. Poon 2007, p. 165.
29. Chan 2008, p. 86.
30. Lam 2012, p. 117. sfn error: no target: CITEREFLam2012 (help)
31. Party pact sees women as kings of a new frontier Archived 30 May 2009 at the Wayback Machine
32. Emily Lau elected DP vice-chairman RTHK 14 December 2008
33. Chiang, Scarlett (14 December 2009), Democrats say `no' to resign plan Archived 2 February 2014 at the Wayback Machine, The Standard
34. Staff reporter (17 March 2010). "Reform on agenda as alliance readies for talks with Beijing" Archived 29 June 2011 at the Wayback Machine
35. Ngok, Ma (2011). "Hong Kong's Democrats Divide". Journal of Democracy. 22 (1): 64.
36. "A more united Democratic Party predicted as Young Turks leave". South China Morning Post. Hong Kong. 20 December 2010.
37. "Democratic Party under fire at rally". South China Morning Post. Hong Kong. 2 July 2010.
38. "Ho wins CE race ticket". The Standard. 9 January 2012. Archived from the original on 2 February 2014.
39. "投票結果及統計數據". pdce-primary.hk. Archived from the original on 15 March 2012.
40. The Fourth Term Chief Executive Election – Result. Government of Hong Kong.
41. "Out with the old: Two big-name pan-democrats ousted in tight district council election races". South China Morning Post. 23 November 2015.
42. Lam, Jeffie (5 December 2015). "Hong Kong's Democratic Party to vote on pre-election primary proposal". South China Morning Post.
43. Lam, Jeffie (31 December 2015). "Hong Kong Democratic Party leader Emily Lau decides not to seek re-election in 2016". South China Morning Post.
44. "'Great reconciliation': Chief Exec. Carrie Lam donates HK$30k to Democratic Party at its anniversary dinner". Hong Kong Free Press. 21 March 2018.
45. "Hong Kong Democrats lose 59 members after row over district council elections". South China Morning Post. 12 December 2018.
46. "Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam not invited to Democratic Party's 24th anniversary dinner despite her HK$30,000 donation last year". South China Morning Post. 4 March 2019.
47. "Hong Kong leader Carrie Lam survives first no confidence vote, as democrats cite 'lies' over extradition row". Hong Kong Free Press. 30 May 2019.
48. Kuan, Hsin-chi; Liu, Zhaojia; Wang, Jiaying, eds. (2002). Out of the Shadow of 1997?: The 2000 Legislative Council Election in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. Chinese University Press. p. 156.
49. "隔牆有耳：白鴿選舉　卿姐愛刺激". Apple Daily. 13 December 2014.
50. "八方人物：尹兆堅想做民主黨「膠水」". Apple Daily. 13 December 2014.
51. Kuan 2002, p. 136. sfn error: no target: CITEREFKuan2002 (help)
52. Kuan 2002, p. 137. sfn error: no target: CITEREFKuan2002 (help)
53. Kuan 2002, p. 153-4. sfn error: no target: CITEREFKuan2002 (help)
54. Kuan 2002, p. 135-6. sfn error: no target: CITEREFKuan2002 (help)

Bibliography

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• Bush, Richard C. (2005). Untying the Knot: Making Peace in the Taiwan Strait. Brookings Institution Press. ISBN 0815797818.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
• Chan, Ming K. (1997). The Challenge of Hong Kong's Reintegration with China: Modern Diasporic Femininity. Hong Kong University Press. ISBN 9622094414.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
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• Eur (2002). The Far East and Australasia 2003. Psychology Press. ISBN 1857431332.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
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• Khun, Eng Kuah; Gilles, Guiheux, eds. (2009). Social Movements in China and Hong Kong: The Expansion of Protest Space. Amsterdam University Press. ISBN 978-9089641311.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
• Krasner, Stephen D. (2013). Problematic Sovereignty: Contested Rules and Political Possibilities. Columbia University Press. ISBN 978-0231505413.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
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• Lau, Siu-kai; Louie, Kin-shuen, eds. (1993). Hong Kong tried democracy: the 1991 elections in Hong Kong. Hong Kong Institute of Asia-Pacific Studies, Chinese University of Hong Kong. ISBN 978-962-441-515-5.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
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• Nery, Felipe B. (2008). A Collection of Poems and Essays of Past Decades Involving Discussions of Important Matters and Topics. AuthorHouse.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
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• Sharpe, M. E. (2001). Chinese Law and Government. 34.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)

External links

• Democratic Party official site
• Democratic Party on Facebook