By Hugo Novales

According to the Progress in International Reading Literacy Study of 2021, only 16% of parents in Hong Kong read with their children — far below the international average of 42%. Only 32% of Hong Kong’s youth say they are confident with their reading skills (still below the 43% international average) and just 14% of the city’s parents actually enjoy reading.

To discuss how Hong Kong can improve its literacy rates and foster a love for reading in both children and adults, the FCC held a Club Lunch panel featuring representatives from three literacy-focused charities in Hong Kong.

Sitting on the panel was Christine Choi, Director of Elephant Community Press; Matthew Coulson, Executive Director of Kids4Kids; and Manoj Dhar, the Co-Founder and CEO of Integrated Brilliant Education. The three charity leaders sat with Morgan Davis, then the First Vice President of the Club (now President) and Convenor of the Club’s Charity Committee.

Davis first began the discussion by asking the panel about how they define literacy and how children can become more interested in reading every day. The panel agreed that modern technology — particularly TV, smartphones, and videogames — posed a bit of a challenge to developing children’s interest in reading. However, they also advised that parents should provide opportunities for their children to improve their literacy by reading books featuring topics that interest them — without restriction.

“There shouldn’t be boundaries based upon your age of what you should and shouldn’t read. You just have to have partners who are there to support you in what you’re reading and helping you to understand them,” said Matt Coulson, who admitted to being an avid reader when growing up.

Coulson finds that by allowing children to pick any age-appropriate books that interest them will help them develop a positive relationship with reading that they will then carry with them for the rest of their lives.

Christine Choi has a different approach to engaging children with reading. At Elephant Community Press, she leads creative writing workshops for kids. By having children not just read storybooks but also having them attempt to write their own stories, Choi has seen children develop higher interest and proficiency with reading.

“If kids can see why writing and reading [are] useful to them, how adults around them use it in real life, then there’s meaning for them [about] why they should learn to read,” Choi said.

Manoj Dhar, the final panelist, also encouraged parents to become more involved with their children’s education. From his experience at IBEL, he has noticed the tendency that many parents have to simply leave the most critical components of child-raising to their domestic helpers, including reading. He also noted the local education system’s preference to assign homework and promote memorisation versus learning through an enjoyable process.

While it may be difficult to overhaul Hong Kong’s entire educational system, Dhar remained firm that parents must remain responsible for the outcome of their child’s educational success.

“The parents have to remember that the moment they’ve given birth to a child, it’s a lifelong responsibility,” Dhar said.

The panel also discussed AI’s impact on reading and writing, finding bookstores in Hong Kong, and other cultural barriers that impact literacy in Hong Kong.

To watch the full discussion, please visit the FCC’s YouTube channel:

By Hugo Novales

On January 3^rd of this year, Chinese actor Wang Xing went missing after taking a trip to Bangkok, Thailand, for what he thought would be a casting call for a new film.

He was first picked up at the airport and driven approximately 500 kilometers away to Mae Sot, a city located on Thailand’s border with Myanmar. That’s where he lost contact with his girlfriend back in China, who on January 5^th notified both the authorities and the public about Wang’s disappearance. 

In a joint operation between Chinese and Thai law enforcement, Wang was rescued just two days later. He was found in Mywaddy, a small border town in Myanmar that’s become synonymous with the notorious “scam farms” that have spread across Southeast Asia.

These scam farms aren’t new, but they are growing, and regular citizens from all walks of life are their targets.

“It’s open season on us, not just here in this room or in Hong Kong, but really globally and around the world. We are literally living in an epidemic of scams,” said Cezary Podkul.

Podkul, an experienced investigative reporter and author of the upcoming book The Big Trace, organized and moderated an FCC Club Lunch to discuss why Southeast Asia has become a hotbed for the scam industry with two on-the-ground experts: Ling Li and Ivan Franceschini.

Li and Franceschini, along with researcher Mark Bo, have recently published SCAM: Inside Southeast Asia’s Cybercrime Compounds, a summary of their decades researching the networks, history, and criminology fueling the online scam underworld.

The expert pair began the discussion by sharing their first encounters with scam farms.

While on a research trip in Phnom Penh with the University of Liverpool, a 21-year-old Li first learned about Cambodia’s massive scam compounds from the Chinese scholars and business professionals living there. She was initially examining the country’s efforts to combat the slavery of women, but became more intrigued by this new cybercrime industry that she never knew existed. From there, she began not only researching, but getting directly involved with rescuing victims from the prison-like scam compounds. 

“I’m a researcher, but I’m also a practitioner. Can I do something?” she said when explaining her motivation behind being more than just an expert on this type of crime.

When asked about why she continues to be an activist, Li answered that it was the victims’ stories that kept her going. She mentioned her experience with a 16-year-old girl who was tricked into traveling to Cambodia for work and became trapped in a scam compound. The girl ended up becoming pregnant while in the compound, and when Li rescued her, Cambodian authorities detained the young mother and her newborn baby for months due to lack of identification. Experiences like this are what remind Li that her work is life-saving.

“It’s just inhuman for me to see this. I just feel like we have to do something, even if it’s very heartbreaking every time to hear their stories,” she said, adding that, “There’s many times that I want to give up, that’s for sure, but then we do have a team to support me.”

For Franceschini, he remembered his 2019 visit to the Cambodian coastal town Sinoukville. He had been there years before and noted how the small town that was once ideal for backpackers searching for a quieter side of Cambodia had transformed drastically.

The Cambodian government’s 2017 plan to turn Sinoukville into a “new Macau” was overturned in August 2019 due to a rise in crime and illicit foreign investment, mostly from Mainland China. Franceschini called this move “completely unexpected” and explained that since the city’s gambling industry was now gone, it left behind the necessary infrastructure for online scams centers to take over.

When Franceschini first saw one of Sinouville’s scam compounds — a massive building repurposed from the city’s casino days — that was enough to make him interested in learning more about what was inside.

So how do these scam farms operate, and how do they differ from other types of scams?

Franceschini and Li first explained the details of two more common types of scams: investment scams — when a fraudster claims to have a good investment deal; and romance scams — when a fake dating profile gains the trust of a victim before asking for money to deal with an unexpected emergency.

The cybercrime compounds across Southeast Asia utilize a unique hybrid of both types of these scams in that they gain the victim’s trust from a variety of angles before claiming to have a good job, investment, or other financial deal in a new location where the victim is eventually kidnapped and moved to a scam farm. The victims then become a part of the system, forced to scam new victims online using technology, and even AI.

“The scammers are really creative. They’re really good at getting your trust… it’s nothing to be ashamed of, I mean, it’s terrifying how good they are,” said Franceschini.

Li emphasized that scammers target literally everyone and have specific procedures to fool people regardless of job, gender, age, or social status.

“Everyone sitting here, you can be a target,” she said.

The panel then touched upon the misconceptions of how the Chinese government combats scam farms and why such misconceptions exist.

The Chinese government has faced criticism for its softer approach to fighting the “scamdemic” (as described by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime) given that most of this crime happens in neighboring countries and not within its own borders. This has led some American NGOs to infer that China only wants to get involved for its own benefit, whether it be politically or financially.

“This idea of China being the mastermind behind the compounds to gain influence or undermine the West or whatever, we find it — I find it — quite unconvincing,” said Franceschini, who added that the central reason why these scams have migrated to Southeast Asia is because of China’s heavy crackdown on organized crime.

“China is an important factor. It’s controversial. It’s complicated, but if we point the fingers only at China, we miss the real point here,” he concluded.

To watch the full discussion, please visit the FCC’s YouTube channel:

By Hugo Novales

“This belonged to your cousin, the war correspondent.”

That’s what Bill Lascher’s grandmother told him as she handed him an old typewriter that belonged to Melville Jacoby — the famed WWII foreign correspondent who worked as a radio broadcaster, United Press stringer and photographer for Time Magazine and LIFE. 

Jacoby was also the first cousin of Lascher’s grandmother, who spent the next few years telling Lascher about his distant, famous relative. Lascher then set out to research as much as possible about Jacoby’s life before, during, and after his time living in wartime China, which led him to publish A Danger Shared: A Journalist’s Glimpse of a Continent at War (2024). 

Featuring never-before-seen images depicting war-torn Chongqing (then Chungking), as well as the origins of the FCC at the aptly named Press Hostel, extracts from A Danger Shared also made it onto the FCC’s Van Es Wall in April. 

To learn more about Jacoby’s life and how he and his fellow journalists collaborated to form what would later become the FCC, Lascher had an in-depth conversation with then-President Lee Williamson at a Club Lunch in early April. He began by first describing what early-1940s Chungking was like. 

“It was a place that was hectic, and lively, and hopeful, and painful, and tragic, and energetic, and broken. It was a place of contrasts, a place of extremes. Most importantly though, it was the new capital of wartime China — at least ‘free China’,” he said, referencing the Kuomintang (KMT) and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), who were fighting for control over the mainland while simultaneously battling the invading Japanese Empire. 

Jacoby, along with many other journalists covering the war from Chungking, found himself at odds with the KMT’s influence over his reporting, particularly how the police and military changed facts and screened reports before they were broadcast. Jacoby worried how these conditions might affect his journalistic reputation. 

“How can I be seen as an independent journalist while I’m putting across a certain message?” was how Lascher interpreted Jacoby’s mindset during that time. 

After finally having enough, Jacoby joined forces with other journalists at the Press Hostel and, on 18 May 1943, the group issued a memorandum that voiced their concerns to the authorities in Chungking. 

“…as correspondents who are personally sympathetic for China in a struggle against aggression, we strongly object to the constant surveillance to which we are subjected in the course of our activities in Chungking,” said a key part of the memorandum, which can be read in full on pages 12-15 of the July issue of The Correspondent. 

This memorandum became the foundation upon which the FCC was later built, with many of the sentiments expressed in it still echoing in modern initiatives by the Club, especially the camaraderie between members with shared goals and a vision. 

“That community was everything to him and to many of these reporters,” Lascher said, adding that, “It’d be great to find the original bylaws.”

Jacoby only lived for 25 years. After his birthday on 11 September 1941, he reached two significant milestones in his professional and personal life. 

First, he met Annalee Whitmore Faidman, who he quickly proposed to and married. The couple then made plans to relocate from Chungking to The Philippines, where Jacoby would be taking on a new role as Time’s Far East Bureau Chief in Manila. Jacoby left first, with Annalee leaving for Manila on the same day that Japan set off to attack Pearl Harbor, thus beginning the United States’ involvement in the Second World War. 

The newlywed Jacobys couldn’t stay long in Manila. Japan soon began their invasion of the island nation, with the couple escaping via blockade runners until they made it to Australia, where they were finally safe. 

Continuing his job as a reporter, Jacoby found himself in northern Australia alongside General Harold H. George, an American military officer he became acquainted with during his time in Chungking. Jacoby and General George were standing on Batchetor Airfield when a collision between two aircraft caused a runaway propeller to strike them. Jacoby was killed instantly while General George died in a nearby hospital the following day. 

Jacoby’s death was a shock to his wife, his family, and to his network of journalists across the world, who often described him as a “soldier of the press.”

“He dies having accomplished something by 25 years old that many of us can’t claim to accomplish in our entire lives,” said Lascher when summarising the short, impactful life of Melville Jacoby. 

To watch the full discussion, please visit the FCC’s YouTube channel:

By Hugo Novales

Within the last seven years, Hong Kong has revamped its arts and culture scene by opening three new institutions: the Hong Kong Palace Museum, M+, and Tai Kwun. Auction giants Christie’s, Phillips, and Sotheby’s have all established new Asia/APAC headquarters in the city within the past two years, with Phillips setting up office in the popular West Kowloon Cultural District.

If you were to step back in time about 20 years and ask Bernard Chan if Hong Kong would one day develop such a vibrant local arts scene, he might be doubtful.

“I never believed we were serious about it,” he said while reflecting on his past experiences in public life, including five years as Convenor of the Executive Council.

His impression back then was that Hong Kong would always be focused on its role as a financial hub, and that the arts would always be an afterthought. Now, Chan serves the city in a much different – and perhaps unexpected – role as the Chairman of M+.

He shared his personal history in witnessing the rise of Hong Kong’s arts scene at an FCC Club Lunch along with Dr Pi Li, the Head of Art at Tai Kwun. Then-President Lee Williamson sat as the moderator of the discussion, and asked what it takes for a city like Hong Kong to be committed to the arts.

Chan explained that while the local government can lead policy-making and infrastructure plans, everyday citizens also need to be involved. Without their support, Hong Kong’s arts scene wouldn’t be able to go beyond a blueprint.

“Does everybody in Hong Kong agree to that? Because it’s all taxpayers’ money at the end of the day,” he said, adding that, “great things [are] ahead of us, but we still need to get the buy-in from everybody in the community.”

The discussion then shifted into how Hong Kong’s political atmosphere may affect its arts, culture and freedom of expression.

Beijing imposed the National Security Law (NSL) on Hong Kong at the end of June 2020, after over a year of city-wide protests against the local government stemming from public backlash against a proposed extradition bill. Hong Kong later enacted Article 23 of the Basic Law in the beginning of 2024 to “plug the gaps” that Beijing’s NSL did not cover. Both laws have resulted in considerable changes to Hong Kong society.

So how about the arts? Both panelists said that local art hasn’t been subject to increased scrutiny by the government. In fact, the duo agreed that audience opinion was what worried them more than being in violation of any kind of security law.

“We always say as people running the institution, ‘Who are the most dangerous enemies for cultural institutions in the 21st century?’ It’s the audience,” said Li.

Li then gave several examples to illustrate his point that the global art audience has been highly divided over the past two decades, specifically since 2008.

He cited incidents that took place at the Whitney Museum of American Art and The Guggenheim that saw specific works or entire exhibitions to be removed due to backlash from the general public. Whether it was due to racial tension, animal rights, or other social issues, these institutions eventually censored themselves to appease their audience.

Hong Kong, to Chan and Li, doesn’t have this problem – at least for now.

“Hong Kong is not the worst place in the world, and it’s not the best place in the world. We are like many museums in the world. We are really facing such a dynamic time, and the audience changes so fast,” said Li.

Chan also pointed out how social divisions are more prevalent in Western countries, like the US. He noted the various cultural divisions that dominate American headlines and how these societal debates haven’t made their way into Hong Kong life.

“Our issue here is simple. If you look at the US, my God, you’re divided on gender, race, you name it, ethnicity. Can you imagine? Is there absolute freedom there anymore?” he said.

To watch the full discussion, please visit the FCC’s YouTube channel:

By Hugo Novales

According to the Pew Research Center, about 62% of adults in the United States self-identified as Christian from 2023-2024. The decline of Christianity over the past few decades in the US has now plateaued, with young Americans from “Gen Z” now surpassing previous generations’ interest in the Christian faith.

On the global scale, Christianity remains to be the most popular religion with 2.3 billion followers, but its growth wasn’t in pace with the global population increase from 2010-2020.  Other religions, particularly Islam, reported higher growth during the same timeframe, as did the number of people who do not follow any religion.

In a modern world with increasingly secularised governance and societies, where exactly does theology fit? How does Christianity hold up now with the outstanding progress of science and technology, as well as the presence of other religions? How is faith still relevant today?

To discuss theology’s continued role in 2025 and onwards, the FCC hosted a Club Lunch with Reverend Dr Michael Lloyd just a few weeks after the Roman Catholic Church elected its new leader, Pope Leo XIV.

Dr Lloyd serves as the Principal of Wycliffe Hall, a permanent private hall at the University of Oxford, where he teaches theology. He’s also the author of Café Theology (2012), a co-author of Image Bearers (2023), and co-host of GodPod, a faith-based podcast run by St Mellitus College.

Sitting alongside Dr Lloyd was then-FCC President Lee Williamson (now Correspondent Governor) who first asked why studying theology was important for everyone, even for people who do not believe in religion. Dr Lloyd responded by highlighting various examples of how previous generations have used religion as a blueprint for how societies should operate.

“Whether one believes or not, theology has shaped society in extraordinary ways all the way down through history. You don’t understand the world if you don’t understand the role that religion and theology have played in that world,” he said, adding that religion “puts ground under our feet.”

Williamson followed up by addressing the political polarisation that has dominated global headlines, particularly in the US where President Donald Trump has found increased support amongst evangelical Christians despite his views and policies that some find to be against biblical values. Dr Lloyd and Williamson discussed how this differs from their home country, the UK, where, as Dr Lloyd put it, “political maps” don’t necessarily overlap with the “church map”.

Dr Lloyd cautioned against the church – any church – from allowing political differences to seep into the social fabric of their congregations.

“I think it’s really important that the church doesn’t fight the culture wars. It’s got to be a place where those debates can happen civilly, rationally, charitably, in a way that people will actually listen to each other,” Dr Lloyd said.

Williamson also asked if Dr Lloyd thought Trump was a good Christian. Dr Lloyd laughed and said that this particular judgment is best left to God and that his role as a religious leader was not to know anyone’s heart.

The discussion then shifted into a broader look at how religion can be used to understand why suffering exists despite the presence of a forgiving and loving God.

Dr Lloyd, as an expert in the faith-based analysis of evil, its origins, and the pain it causes, explained how suffering allows humans to feel compassion for others. His belief is that God is right where suffering occurs, too, and that He is also against it.

So then why do things like this happen in the first place? Dr Lloyd attributes this to the free will that God has granted to humanity. This same free will that causes pain and suffering is also what enables people to take action to prevent further pain and suffering versus just waiting for God to intervene every time something bad happens.

“If God were always intervening whenever we didn’t bother, we wouldn’t bother,” Dr Lloyd said.

The pair also discussed how the church is using AI, how Christianity can build better relationships with other religions, and how the existence of life on other planets might affect religion. 

To watch the full discussion, please visit the FCC’s YouTube channel:

By Hugo Novales

Shortly after beginning his second term as President of the United States, Donald Trump initiated another trade war and hit China with tariffs of 145%. China retaliated with 125% tariffs on US goods, before both countries declared a 90-day truce. The truce is expected to end on August 10^th while agreements with the US’ other global trade partners must be made by July 8^th — just next week. The US and China announced a trade deal in late June, but few details came out, other than an agreement to resume sales of Chinese magnets and rare earths to the US.

In her opening remarks at an FCC Club Lunch discussing US-China trade and how it may affect Hong Kong, Karen Koh remarked that anything her panel talks about may quickly become old news.

“Whatever you hear today may be out of date next week, simply because we don’t know what Mr. President is going to say week to week,” she said, commenting on the constantly in flux nature of President Trump’s decision-making.

Koh, now the First Vice President of the Club, then turned to her two panellists and asked if they could predict the future of American trade with the rest of the world.

“I think nobody really knows,” said Irina Fan, the Director of Research for the Hong Kong Trade and Development Council.

Fan explained how it takes many years, and sometimes decades, for trading partners to form agreements. Trump’s tendency to change his policies on a daily basis threatens economic stability between the US and China, as well as the rest of the world that will also have to maneuver around such steep tariffs.

However, the intended goal behind Trump’s actions isn’t clear to Fan. To her, Trump’s new wave of economic policies may not actually have any economic goal in mind, but they may rather serve ulterior (and perhaps political) purposes.

“What we’ve seen from the massive tariffs announced by the new president, to me, from an economist point of view, it doesn’t make any economic sense,” she said, citing how US consumers will feel the burden from Trump’s tariffs the most with a minimum 2.2% increase on prices and no federal strategy to offset costs.

When it comes to how Hong Kong will manage its trade relationship with the US, Fan reminded the audience that exports to US make up only 6.5% of Hong Kong’s total exports, and it’s easy for HK exporters to get growth from other markets.

Also, the city still has over 50 trade offices around the world, and will plan to diversify. While the Hong Kong Dollar is pegged to the US Dollar (US$1 = HK$7.84903), the city has plenty of other trade opportunities to keep business thriving.

“Probably, we can plan ahead with other markets,” Fan said.

Cameron Johnson, the second panellist, has spent his career — and the majority of his life — in mainland China and the US. As a supply chain expert based in Shanghai, Johnson is able to meet with policy makers in Washington DC and see both sides of trade negotiations. To him, tariffs are just another aspect of Trump 2.0 that everyone will have to live with.

“I think the reality is [that] tariffs are here to stay. It’s just a matter of how high they are. There will always be some form of global tariffs,” Johnson said.

He also addressed the spending habits of Chinese citizens under Trump’s new tariffs. Unlike US consumers who will soon face the economic burden of Trump’s trade war, the average Chinese person still has a high amount of spending power — except they’re not spending at all.

“The assumption that Chinese will spend like Americans is ridiculous. Chinese will never spend like the West. They’ll just never do it, and consumption is very much in the eye of the beholder,” he said.

Johnson clarified that lack of Chinese consumption isn’t related to inflation or rising costs of living, but can be attributed towards Chinese cultural attitudes that value getting more for less. He referenced trends of younger Chinese traveling on vacations and making competitions out of who could spend the least amount of money.

While Chinese economists are looking to create new initiatives to encourage domestic consumption, Johnson reassures that the lack thereof isn’t an indicator of economic decline or struggle due to all these new potential tariffs.

“The restaurants are okay. People are traveling. The numbers are all up. They’re just not spending,” Johnson said.

To watch the full discussion, please visit the FCC’s YouTube channel:

By Hugo Novales

Polo Bourieau, a long-time FCC member, first arrived in Hong Kong in 2003. As an artist who studied at Académie de Nantes and developed his interests through his early work in France, Bourieau made a name for himself in Asia by commissioning monumental, site-specific sculptures that can be found in iconic locations across Hong Kong and mainland China.

Bourieau recently documented his artistic journey in his book, Written in Stone: A Journey Shaping Places in New Millennium China, which was published by HKU Press earlier this year. Filled with photographs of his unique and though-provoking creations, Bourieau’s new book explores the relationship between sculptures and urban spaces, as well as how this relationship creates community and identity amongst the everyday people that interact with his art.

Sitting alongside Associate Board Governor Barbara Yu Larsson at an FCC Club Lunch in early June, Bourieau discussed the ideas behind his new book and the impact he hopes to achieve through his sculptures.

“I like this idea that art is for the people. It should be known in the street, not only within the white walls of the galleries and museums, and in a city like Hong Kong, I think we need more art history,” Bourieau said, kicking off the discussion.

He explained the relationship between artists and property developers, who often only allocate 1-2% of their budget for artistic works that may complement a pond, a public square, a wall, or other types of urban features. This relationship — and how it can be improved — is what motivated Bourieau to write Written in Stone.

“I hope this book is going to inspire the city planners and urbanists to create some format of incentive for the developers, because this book proves – and illustrates, pretty much – how developers and architects are ready to collaborate with artists like me,” he said.

With all the developers, architects, and other stakeholders that may be involved with the commissioning of one of Bourieau’s sculptures, one question remains: Who are these sculptures for? Are they for the developers? The architects? Are they for Bourieau himself? 

The answer: none of the above. Bourieau’s personal philosophy is that his art is for the people who will interact with it on a daily basis.

“Art is for the people. So typically, my clients are these anonymous people who cross the square every day. I’m working for them,” he said.

The intersection between the art world and advancing technology also became a talking point during the discussion.

When he first started working, Bourieau didn’t have the level of computers, software, or AI programs that are easily accessible today. He explained how his career progressed alongside the technological revolution of the 21st century, but that the vision and creation of a sculpture is still within the hands of the artist.

“The artist, the sculptor, should be the guy who masters the tool… he’s the one who is handling it, because if not, where is the art? From chisel to robot, there is not really too much [of a] difference. It’s just an extension of your hand that you need to control,” he explained.

During the audience Q&A session, Bourieau was asked if he has ever felt any kind of attachment to a particular piece, and if so, how does he manage to control such feelings.

Bourieau advised that it’s important to let the piece go in the same manner in which parents must let their children grow up. However, he clarified that while this attachment to art may be the case for other artists, this is not how he views his own art. Finishing each piece, no matter how much he liked it or felt proud about his work on it, gives him room to begin something new.

“My favorite piece is the next one,” Bourieau said.

To watch the full discussion, please visit the FCC’s YouTube channel:

By Hugo Novales

Hong Kong is often referred to as “Asia’s World City” and is home to over 7.5 million people from a variety of ethnic backgrounds. Over 90% of the city’s residents are ethnic Chinese, while the remaining population comes from South and Southeast Asia, Europe, North America, Africa, and other regions.

Despite featuring such a multicultural landscape, racial tension still exists in Hong Kong. Ethnic minorities (Indonesians, Filipinos, Indians, Pakistanis, and Nepalese) face systemic challenges when it comes to education and employment, even if their families have lived in Hong Kong for generations. These groups have also been depicted negatively in local media whenever reports of crime or societal issues make the headlines.

To discuss race relations in Hong Kong, the FCC held a dinnertime discussion with three experts: Jeffrey Andrews, the city’s first-ever ethnic minority social worker; SCMP’s Kathryn Giordano; and Innocent Mutanga, a former asylum seeker who founded the Africa Center Hong Kong.

Leading the discussion was FCC Clare Hollingworth Fellow Jay Ganglani, who also grew up in Hong Kong and has covered issues relating to the city’s ethnic minorities throughout his journalism career.

Ganglani first asked if each of the panellists believed that racial equity (fairness and impartiality) exists for Hong Kong’s ethnic minorities. They all agreed that equity was still a long-term goal.

“[Racial equity] is still a challenging thing we’re going through in Hong Kong,” said Andrews as he recalled many instances of being stopped by the police who wanted to check his HKID. He also cited the lack of Cantonese education in non-Chinese schools — and the mere existence of segregated schools — which can result in diminished job prospects for the city’s ethnic minority youth.

Giordano, an SCMP reporter who specialises in covering ethnicity and race stories in Hong Kong, agreed that improving the local education system would help the city’s non-Chinese population.

“With hopefully more education and exposure, [we] can slowly start to help these students and these members of society,” she said.

Giordano also explained how newsrooms may accidentally mislead their audiences to draw unfair conclusions about different ethnic groups. She finds that the media in Hong Kong and the US (where she’s originally from) can both improve how they handle stories on diversity. Given this shortcoming, she aims to set a good example for other reporters to follow and help improve the lives of Hong Kong’s ethnic minorities.

“I hope I’ve been able to highlight some of these ways in which young people, students, and people who are starting their careers [all] have such obstacles to overcome just [because of] their background,” she said.

For Innocent Mutanga, his evolution from asylum seeker to investment banker has shown him how both status and race intersect in Hong Kong. Throughout his time in Hong Kong, he’s noticed how people may interact with him differently if depending on how they view him — as an African, or an asylum seeker, or an investment banker.

These nuances in his own personal identity are what motivates Mutanga to continue his work as a community leader aiming to change racial stigma and bias in Hong Kong.

“What I do in terms of the refugee or asylum-seeking community, I do it because I’m part of the community. I’m never out of it. I’m still part of the community,” Mutanga said. “If I think I have made it, but somebody else hasn’t made it, it means we all haven’t made it.”

Like Mutanga, Andrews also believes that despite defying adversity and becoming an impactful leader, he’s still part of the community as well. For him, truly “making it” would mean that all of Hong Kong’s ethnic minorities would simply be viewed as regular citizens.

“Hopefully in a few years’ time, we can just be called Hong Kongers. In America, you’re called American. In Singapore, you’re Singaporean. But in Hong Kong, you’re still ethnic minority, refugee, [or] domestic helper,” he said.

This Club Lunch is available on the FCC’s podcast The Correspondent: https://open.spotify.com/episode/2M9CDzm6Fufjy4K2vbmAEW?si=o-u0SYDPS_-TQF6fHD50vQ

To watch the full discussion, please visit the FCC’s YouTube channel:

By Hugo Novales, FCC In-House Journalist

Han Shih Toh, a native Singaporean who’s been based in Hong Kong for the past few decades, has paved an uncommon career path. He has a PhD in theoretical physics from Oxford University, works as a full-time consultant for Headland Intelligence, and freelances as a  business and economics reporter for various news outlets.

If that’s not enough, he’s now written not just one, but two books.

Following up on the question posed in his previous book Is China An Empire? (2016) in which he described China as a “semi-empire” for its economic and military strength, Toh’s new book Is China a Menacing Empire? (2024) examines China’s relationship with the rest of the world to determine if it’s a benign or malevolent superpower.

In short, Toh finds that China’s actions cause unintended disruptions in other countries, making it a “risky” semi-empire — just like the United States.

At an FCC Club Lunch, Toh sat alongside William Zheng, a Senior Reporter for SCMP and a Correspondent Board Governor of the Club, for a detailed discussion about his latest book.

His reasoning for not describing China as a full-blown empire is due to its choice to not invade other countries that fall behind on repaying Chinese loans, which contrasts with how other superpowers have historically handled debt. He cited the British invasion and occupation of Egypt in 1882 and British-French takeover of the Suez Canal in 1956 as clear traits of “menacing empires” and how other superpowers, primarily the United States, perceived these events negatively.

“China doesn’t invade other countries, but they should make sure their economic influence doesn’t affect other countries so much that you see cartoons of Chinese octopuses in other countries’ newspapers,” Toh said, referencing political cartoons that depicted the UK as an octopus for its previous colonial actions.

Toh’s added description of China as a “risky” semi-empire is linked to the country’s expansive economy that has the potential to create unplanned challenges for its trading partners in property, investments, and more.

“China can unintentionally create problems for other countries… not so menacing, but a risk. China is a risky, semi-empire,” he said.

Toh further explained this concept during the audience Q&A session. The primary risk is the public opinion of China in countries that may perceive its actions as a threat to the local economy or political landscape. While China may be seeking a deal, it may also cause political tension, and even backlash leading to a change in government, in the countries it wishes to do trade with.

“China inadvertently can create social instability in other countries, even though it doesn’t plan to. And China has a dilemma because China’s foreign policy is not to interfere with other countries, but they do business with some corrupt dictators in other countries. That creates a lot of resentment among the local people, and these corrupt dictators lose power,” Toh said.

To watch the full discussion, please visit the FCC’s YouTube channel: