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Waste paper disposed in landfills notably contributes to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and impedes more sustainable, circular alternatives, such as recycling. In Hong Kong, this unsustainable approach is currently dominant as 68% of waste paper products are treated in landfills in 2020. To contextualize the impact of local waste paper management and explore mitigation potentials of circular alternatives, this paper develops a quantitative assessment framework around GHG emissions development trajectories. Combining guidelines of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), national GHG inventories, and local parameters from life cycle analysis, five GHG emissions projections were simulated along the Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs) until 2060. Most recent baselines indicate that Hong Kong's current waste paper treatment generated 638,360 tons CO 2 -eq in 2020, comprising 1,821,040 tons CO 2 -eq from landfill and 671,320 tons CO 2 -eq from recycling, and −1,854,000 tons CO 2 -eq from primary material replacement. Proceeding along a Business-as-Usual scenario under SSP5, GHG emissions will dramatically increase to a net 1,072,270 tons CO 2 -eq by 2060, whereas a recycling-intensive scenario will lead to a net saving of −4,323,190 tons CO 2 -eq. To complement the quantitative evidence on the benefits of waste paper recycling, field research was conducted to explore the feasibility of circular policy innovation from the perspective of recycling stakeholders. These empirical qualitative and quantitative findings from stakeholders' business routines and material transactions provide crucial indications for policy and institutional innovation: Essentially, for Hong Kong to improve waste paper recycling capacities and facilitate a circular economy (CE), local stakeholders require support via fiscal policy measures (financial subsidies or tax reductions) and infrastructure improvements (delivery access and material storage). In sum, this study employs a novel analytical framework combining original qualitative and quantitative evidence to provide policy innovation towards circular, GHG emission-saving waste paper management. [Display omitted] • A new framework assessing greenhouse gas emissions from waste paper treatment. • Exploring long-term carbon neutrality pathways for managing waste paper. • Using empirical evidence from recycling stakeholders for circular policy innovation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Collection, as the first stage of the recycling process, and pre-processing to increase waste stream purity constitute key operations for achieving high recycling rates and a closed loop in the circular economy. For wastepaper recycling in Hong Kong, it is the semi-formal-informal recycling (SFIR) sector that plays a central role in both stages. This study analyses the so far little explored SFIR stakeholder network in Hong Kong and sheds light on value chains, recovered waste paper quantities and the impact of policies on the sector. The findings show that SFIR stakeholders reclaim 55.6 t/recycling station/month of wastepaper and thereby achieve about a 5.7 times higher reclaim rate than the formal-private recycling system. Critical to this achievement is the SFIR transaction network, which enables its stakeholders to develop a value chain and thereby generate an added value of around 1900 HKD (243.9 USD/t) for wastepaper. Given limited circular structures in Hong Kong, financial subsidies are critical to sustain the SFIR's operations over the short-term. However, over the long-term legalization and integration of its stakeholders are necessary to ensure an economically and socially sustainable wastepaper recovery system in Hong Kong. [Display omitted] • Qualitative & quantitative analysis of the semi-formal-informal recycling (SFIR) sector. • The SFIR's wastepaper value chain achieves a cumulative added value of 1900 HKD/t. • The SFIR recovered 5.7 times higher capacities than the formal system in 2021. • Financial support can enhance the SFIR sector's recovery capacities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

How did Chinese leaders Deng Xiaoping and Zhao Ziyang feel about Hong Kong? The existing literature has tended to see the Sino-British negotiations over the future of Hong Kong through the economic lens favoured by the British side and described the Chinese side as primarily motivated by nationalism. However, 'nationalism' remains a vague concept in need of further definition. This paper focuses on the Chinese side of the negotiation table. It unpacks what 'nationalism' meant to Deng and Zhao within the context of the negotiations by examining three interrelated components: history, identity and emotion. This paper then analyses how the Chinese side used history, identity and emotion strategically during the negotiations, focusing on the September 1982 leaders' meetings as a case study. Adopting a constructivist lens, this paper examines historical documents against frameworks and theories from the social sciences, producing an interdisciplinary analysis of Chinese negotiation tactics. It unravels how China's leaders used the country's past to broadcast the Party's stance to the people, bolster their leadership position and win the advantage over Britain in the Hong Kong negotiations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The development of efficient and reliable online assessments has become increasingly important in the digital era. We developed a 10-min online word reading assessment of global English based on the existing paper-and-pencil version of our English silent word reading test. The test includes two parts, namely, random word recognition and contextual word reading. A total of 889 participants (437 children and 392 adults; 62.7% female) took part in the study. They were from various regions including mainland China, Hong Kong SAR, Macau SAR, Poland, the United States, and the Philippines. Reliability and validity analyses on various demographics samples (by age and country/region of origin) demonstrated that the WordSword Test is highly reliable and valid (e.g., the correlation of this test with other English reading measures were above.80). Education level was positively correlated with test performance, while the correlations between age and test performance were not consistent. Ninety-seven children participants also took the paper-and-pencil version of the WordSword Test. The correlation between performances on the online and paper-and-pencil versions of the test was.879, one year apart. With more children and adults taking the WordSword Test, we ultimately hope to establish norms by area, grade level, and age. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Important Dates Submission Opens: May 1, 2023 Deadline for Paper Submission: October 8, 2023 Notification of Accepted Papers: October 22, 2023 Registration Deadline: November 1, 2023 Preliminary Program Announcement: November 15, 2023. The 11 SP th sp Hong Kong Economic Association Biennial Conference 2023 will take place on December 14 - December 15, 2023 in Hong Kong. Registration Fee Registration fee includes participation in all program events, the gala dinner, and a one-year membership subscription in HKEA. [Extracted from the article]

In the Hong Kong Chief Executive's 2020 Policy Address, the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) Government implemented strategies to integrate arts and technology as a new trend in cultural development. With the co-existence of a governmental initiative in 'arts and technology' ('arts tech') development and the rapid advancement of new technologies, it is frequently seen that new technologies (e.g., virtual reality [VR] and augmented reality) have been widely adopted in interactive media art productions in Hong Kong. Drawing on ethnographic research on a commercial virtual event, and a VR theatre performance produced by a Hong Kong cross-media creative studio, this study unveils discrepancies existing between government officials, commercial marketers, and art creators, ranging from objectives to practices in applying technologies to virtual art production. The juxtaposition of a market-driven commercial virtual campaign and the Chinese nationalist agenda embodied in the government-funded arts tech project reflects how the socio-historical background and changing political situation in Hong Kong extends its postcolonial neoliberal nationalism (PNN) to the arts tech arena. The contribution of this paper is two-fold: first, by adopting 'China as method' as epistemological analysis, the mediation of PNN by arts tech explains a 'southbound imaginary' in Hong Kong's arts and cultural practices through a changing relationship between Hong Kong and mainland China. Second, in contrast to the current scholarship focusing on human governance in the formation of neoliberal nationalism, this paper underscores the 'power' of techno-cultural material in mediating the neoliberal nationalism of Hong Kong, after its reversion to China, through arts tech development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

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A considerable body of work now exists on the role that identity plays in understanding teachers and teaching. Developing and sustaining teacher identities in higher education can, however, be challenging given the subordinate positioning of teaching in some educational contexts. Despite the growth of English for Academic Purposes (EAP) programmes in many parts of the world, recent research suggests that EAP practitioners are especially vulnerable to being assigned marginalized identities within the academy. Therefore, this paper reports the results of a study which used a short story approach to investigate the tensions and triumphs one EAP practitioner in Hong Kong experienced in constructing her language teacher identities (LTIs). Findings suggest that her identity tensions and struggles take place across space and time and play out at different scales, including classrooms, educational institutions, and within broader societal discourses. However, the short stories presented in this paper speak not only of tension and struggle, but also of determination and resilience to construct LTIs in the academy. Consequently, the results of this study can help to raise awareness amongst stakeholders, including policy makers, leaders of higher education institutions, and language teaching practitioners, of how they can support and sustain the construction of LTIs within the academy. Implications for professional learning for language teaching practitioners and suggestions for future research are considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Modular integrated construction (MiC) is an innovative construction method that is widely used in practice, but high transportation cost is an obstacle to its wider implementation. This paper is motivated by the real-world need for a scientific approach for MiC transport scheduling, and addresses the practical problem of how to achieve on-time door-to-door MiC delivery in an economical manner. An innovative integer programming model is formulated with the objective of minimising the total transportation costs, including trailer rental, fuel costs, and worker salaries. A case study based on Hong Kong data validates that the developed model can be efficiently solved for problems of practical size. The results also demonstrate that the derived MiC schedule plan can reduce transportation costs by 58.7% compared with a just-in-time (JIT) strategy, thus bringing great economic benefits to off-site construction practitioners. Useful managerial implications related to on-site MiC storage areas are derived through sensitivity analysis. Overall, this paper sets the ground for the application of mathematical programming methodology to the off-site construction field. Future research may be devoted to MiC transport scheduling under uncertainty. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This study explores the politics of ideology in the process of sensegiving and sensemaking at a Japanese retailer in Hong Kong. Studies on power and politics are scarce despite key role of power and politics in understanding the factors behind the conflict between the management's policy legitimization (sensegiving) and employees' policy interpretation (sensemaking). By using the three dimensions proposed in the critical sensemaking approach (discourse, rules and contexts), this paper explores the complex mechanism of power and politics in sensemaking and sensegiving. Design/methodology/approach: Using 15 months of participant observation as a salesperson, this paper discusses how the Japan-centric customer service philosophy (dominant discourse), customer service policies and practices (organizational rules) and asymmetric power structure between the Japanese global headquarters and Hong Kong subsidiaries (formative contexts) are presented and perpetuated through the sensegiving–sensemaking process. Findings: Dominant discourse was observed in the management's sensegiving, which placed the Japanese style of customer service over others. This ethnocentric dominant discourse informed the creation of customer service policies, although the realization of the discourse was determined by the employees' conflicting interpretations of the organizational rules. As a formative context, an asymmetric power structure was present that positioned the Hong Kong subsidiary as subservient to the global headquarters in Japan. This shows that the political process of sensegiving and sensemaking deeply implicates the dominant discourse, organizational rules and power structure as central forces that determine the level of perpetuating ideology. Originality/value: This research illustrates the wider implications of power and politics in sensegiving–sensemaking studies and provides a complex picture of ethnocentric management. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based on the view that community participation can be defined as the continuous trans-local mobility and localisation of not only organisations and individuals but also various nonhuman elements such as information and events, this paper explores how the community participation of Hong Kong in the conservation of Pokfulam Village is understood as socially extrospective and introspective processes. This paper is aimed to reveal how the knowledge of Treasure Hill in Taipei has been adapted (or not) to the community participation of Hong Kong's Pokfulam Village's heritage conservation. This provides insights into how the global flow of people, information, discourse, and technology has influenced the community participation in heritage conservation, especially across the Pacific Rim cities. Finally, the research discusses how local community can play a role in the dynamic local social structure of conserving their heritage, as well as 'whose heritage' in the mobility of global knowledge. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper draws on the hands-on experience of HSBC in implementing distributed ledger technology (DLT)-based solutions through building its own proprietary tokenisation platform, HSBC Orion, and participating in various industry initiatives such the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA)'s inaugural tokenised green bond issuance. The paper highlights key considerations for building DLT-based solutions and provides a view of the future state of digital assets as the ecosystem continues to grow and evolve. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the countryside, where intensive rural development and rising property values have been observed since the late 1970s, the preservation and meaning of traditional dwellings have emerged as crucial considerations in shaping Hong Kong's countryside conservation policy. The focus of this paper is on the conservation of temples, as we are drawn to these structures not only for their architectural merit but also for their role as public buildings within the countryside. Consequently, their cultural significance is heavily influenced by the stakeholders they are associated with, distinguishing them from other types of dwellings. This paper examines the coastal landscape of South Lantau, which includes several villages with distinct traditions that have undergone significant transformations since the 1960s. Located at the southwest edge of Hong Kong, Lantau Island had a rural lifestyle that was relatively undisturbed before WWII because of the difficulty in accessing the island. However, in response to the large people influx from China's mainland after 1949, the Hong Kong government introduced the Lantau Development Plan in 1953, mainly to open up new sources of freshwater resources for Hong Kong Island. The construction of South Lantau Road in 1955 and Shek Pik Reservoir in 1957 gradually led to the decline of agricultural activities in South Lantau and the population exodus of local villagers, resulting in a rupture to regional traditions. In multilineage communities such as the villages on South Lantau, worship of a common deity provides a vital source of social bonding, particularly for an area long beset by typhoons, piracy and banditry. Local people pray for safety and prosperity through collective rituals and celebratory activities. Therefore, temples are not only religious establishments but also embody the sense of social solidarity among villagers on South Lantau. Through the case study of three rural villages on South Lantau, this paper examines how temples play an important role in the continuity of the communal network amid repercussions from the postwar disruption of traditional rural life. Significantly, this pilot study also draws attention to the functions of temples in their historical context. It emphasises the importance of recognising and re-evaluating these buildings for cultural enhancement as part of community engagement. This study provides valuable insights for future conservation efforts for religious buildings in the countryside. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper draws on the hands-on experience of HSBC in implementing distributed ledger technology (DLT)-based solutions through building its own proprietary tokenisation platform, HSBC Orion, and participating in various industry initiatives such the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA)'s inaugural tokenised green bond issuance. The paper highlights key considerations for building DLT-based solutions and provides a view of the future state of digital assets as the ecosystem continues to grow and evolve. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Rapid urbanization has resulted in the substantial population growth in metropolitan areas. However, existing research on population change of the cities predominantly draws on grid statistical data at the administrative level, overlooking the intra-urban variegation of population change. Particularly, there is a lack of attention given to the spatio-temporal change of population across different urban forms and functions. This paper therefore fills in the lacuna by clarifying the spatio-temporal characteristics of population growth in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA) from 2000 to 2020 through the methods of local climate zone (LCZ) scheme and urban–rural gradients. The results showed that: (1) High population density was observed in the compact high-rise (LCZ 1) areas, with a noticeable decline along urban–rural gradients. (2) The city centers of GBA experienced the most significant population growth, while certain urban fringes and rural areas witnessed significant population shrinkage. (3) The rate of growth tended to slow down after 2010, but the uneven development of population-based urbanization was also noticeable, as urbanization and industrialization varied across different LCZ types and cities in GBA. This paper therefore contributes to a deeper understanding of population change and urbanization by clarifying their spatio-temporal contingences at landscape level. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed several chinks in the armour of public health infrastructure across the world. However, the impact of the pandemic has been assessed primarily from the perspective of the 'privileged' members of society. The experiences of the 'other' world inhabited by the marginalised communities, who have had their livelihoods crushed under the weight of the pandemic, have been scarcely documented. As thousands of migrant workers were more scared of death caused by hunger rather than the disease itself, the various steps taken by different countries to curb community transmission have unveiled the ugly side of these measures. For example, as several states such as the US, the UK, Singapore, Hong Kong, and India/Bharat imposed lockdowns, border closures, quarantines, inter alia, the most vulnerable section of the human population has been the migrant workers, especially those individuals who were employed in the unorganised sector. Thus, the global health crisis has unravelled deep-rooted deficiencies, racial biases, and an overall lack of concern and empathy for the lesser privileged, apart from the growing socio-economic divide between the rich and the poor. This research paper aims to explore the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on migrant workers in the informal sector by exploring the measures imposed by the US, the UK, Singapore, Hong Kong, and India/Bharat and analyse how their fundamental rights, including the right to development, were compromised. Through this paper, the author provides a five-point strategic framework that can be adopted globally to prevent such instances in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper contributes to the ongoing debate on the nature and characteristics of the volatility transmission channels of major crash events in international stock markets between 03 July 1997 and 09 March 2021. Using dynamic conditional correlations (DCC) for conditional correlations and volatility clustering, GARCH-BEKK for the direction of transmission of disturbances, and the Diebold-Yilmaz spillover index for the level of volatility contagion, the paper finds that the climbs in external shock transmissions have long-lasting impacts in domestic markets due to the contagion effect during crisis periods. The findings also reveal that the heavier magnitude of financial stress is transmitted between Asian countries via the Hong Kong stock market. Additionally, the degree of volatility spillovers between advanced and emerging equity markets is smaller compared to the pure spillovers between advanced markets or emerging markets, offering a window of opportunity for international market participants in terms of portfolio diversification and risk management applications. Furthermore, the study introduces a novel early warning system created by integrating DCC correlations with a state-of-the-art deep learning model to predict the global financial crisis and COVID-19 crisis. The experimental analysis of long short-term memory network finds evidence of contagion risk by verifying bursts in volatility spillovers and generating signals with high accuracy before the 12-month crisis period. This provides supplementary information that contributes to the decision-making process of practitioners, as well as offering indicative evidence that facilitates the assessment of market vulnerability for policymakers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The informational domain related to COVID-19 reflects the degree of uncertainty and pace of evolution of the pandemic. This places a burden on peoples' searches for information to guide their choices, importantly including for COVID-19 vaccines. Thus, it is important for health communications that support vaccination campaigns to attenuate vaccine hesitancy to be accessible, including in terms of readability, and adapted to the evolving pandemic. This paper aims to understand internet searches on COVID-19 vaccination, specifically the mix of sources and readability of the sources over a two-year period (2021–2023) in Singapore, Hong Kong, and the Philippines, for search results in English, as English is a main language for each of these locations. The sources accessed through online searches in June 2021 and May 2023 were categorized by type of source and whether they were from one of the focal locations or elsewhere. The readability of information from web-search results was assessed using a set of readability tests (Flesch–Kincaid Reading Ease, Flesch–Kincaid Grade Level, Gunning Fog Index, Coleman–Liau Index, and Simple Measure of Gobbledygook Grade level). Over the two-year period there was an increase in government sources and reduction in mass media sources with distinct local patterns. Local government sources increased in Singapore whereas foreign government and multi-lateral organization sources increased in Hong Kong, with the Philippines being an intermediate pattern. In contrast to the changing mix of sources, the readability tests indicate a low proportion of URLs scoring within recommended readability thresholds across locations and types of sources over the two years. Information on COVID-19 vaccine development and deployment is an important part of health communications that includes internet search. The paper contributes to understanding health communications during a pandemic, including mix of local and non-local sources and contingency on local social and health context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Qianhai—an innovation park in Shenzhen—has the possibility of boosting innovation in Hong Kong, Shenzhen and in the wider region. This paper reviews the existing evidence about which policies have promoted profitable innovation in the Qianhai region (Hong Kong and Shenzhen) in the past. We also point to the importance of profitable innovation—rather than just innovation for its own sake. Profits attract and keep firms in an international financial centre. Yet, until we know exactly how much profitability these innovative firms require and how to promote such profitability, the advice given in the literature to Qianhai's and other policymakers will remain woefully inadequate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most comparative studies of media are undertaken between different countries. It is normally assumed that there are considerable commonalities between the media in a given country and it is usually argued that these are sufficient to form a 'media system', which can usefully be contrasted with that of another country. It is relatively unusual to find two sets of media within one country that are sufficiently distinct as be considered as different systems. This paper explores one of the exceptions to that general rule: the case of the Hong Kong media as compared with those of mainland China. Given the different historical and current situations of the two locations at the time the research was conducted, it is to be expected that the kinds of journalism practised would be radically dissimilar. The results of a content analysis of five mainland and three Hong Kong papers demonstrate that, at the aggregate level, there are indeed important differences. A more detailed analysis, however, demonstrates that each of the three Hong Kong papers is in fact closer to mainland groupings than they are to each other. One Hong Kong paper, Ta Kung Pao, is closest to the most 'official' grouping of mainland papers, while Ming Pao falls in to a grouping with the 'liberal' mainland paper. The now defunct Apple Daily, on the other hand, has the closest links with the 'popular official' mainland press. Taken together, these findings suggest that the common assumption that different forms of journalism are best compared on a national basis is incorrect and that factors like market position and ideological orientation have an important influence on the kinds of journalism practised across borders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper aims to make a systematic review of the manpower prediction model of the construction industry. It aims to determine the forecasting model's development trend, analyse the use limitations and applicable conditions of each forecasting model and then identify the impact indicators of the human resource forecasting model from an economic point of view. It is hoped that this study will provide insights into the selection of forecasting models for governments and groups that are dealing with human resource forecasts. Design/methodology/approach: The common search engine, Scopus, was used to retrieve construction manpower forecast-related articles for this review. Keywords such as "construction", "building", "labour", "manpower" were searched. Papers that not related to the manpower prediction model of the construction industry were excluded. A total of 27 articles were obtained and rated according to the publication time, author and organisation of the article. The prediction model used in the selected paper was analysed. Findings: The number of papers focussing on the prediction of manpower in the construction industry is on the rise. Hong Kong is the region with the largest number of published papers. Different methods have different requirements for the quality of historical data. Most forecasting methods are not suitable for sudden changes in the labour market. This paper also finds that the construction output is the economic indicator with the most significant influence on the forecasting model. Research limitations/implications: The research results discuss the problem that the prediction results are not accurate due to the sudden change of data in the current prediction model. Besides, the study results take stock of the published literature and can provide an overall understanding of the forecasting methods of human resources in the construction industry. Practical implications: Through this study, decision-makers can choose a reasonable prediction model according to their situation. Decision-makers can make clear plans for future construction projects specifically when there are changes in the labour market caused by emergencies. Also, this study can help decision-makers understand the current research trend of human resources forecasting models. Originality/value: Although the human resource prediction model's effectiveness in the construction industry is affected by the dynamic change of data, the research results show that it is expected to solve the problem using artificial intelligence. No one has researched this area, and it is expected to become the focus of research in the future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the controlling entity's perspective in business combinations under common control (BCUCC) and suggests some issues for the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) to consider in its redeliberations on the preliminary views in the Discussion Paper. The paper explains the use of a book‐value approach in practice, specifically by listed companies and pre‐listing initial public offering (IPO) candidates in Hong Kong, the relevance of the controlling entity perspective and the importance of pre‐combination information to users of the financial statements. This paper discusses the controlling entity's perspective in BCUCC and suggests some issues for the IASB to consider in its redeliberations on the preliminary views in the Discussion Paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While public consultation is a signature process of democratic policy formulation, many governments manoeuvre to refract citizen's opinions or conduct it perfunctorily. Using the case of a medium of instruction policy in Hong Kong, this article unveils the strategies that the state and citizens employ to put their opinion through to the final policy text, during a public consultation process. Recent literature has identified the mechanisms through which individual actors or organisations contribute to broad policy agenda-setting or policy programme development. However, yet to be investigated is how they – sometimes with conflicting interests – collectively negotiate a policy with the state via public consultations. This paper investigates this very phenomenon, building on previous work conducted in the public policy field, analysing 51 government-generated documents through both thematic content analysis and critical discourse analysis. The paper uncovers four strategies adopted by administrations (non-commitment, case closure, disengagement for irrelevance, and placation) to evade citizens' equity-oriented demands and stakeholders' three counter strategies (mobilising other stakeholders into a coalition, reopening the case pointing out a new problem, and appealing by affirming relevance). The state's discrete refusals and stakeholders' conjoint reengagement tactics draw our attention to the complexity and subtlety involved in negotiation via public consultations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This essay explores how and why protestors from the 2019 anti-ELAB (Extradition Law Amendment Bill) movement turned to popular Chinese religious practice for political dissent, and simultaneously tracks the negotiation of emerging sociocultural identities of Hong Kongers in the face of political upheaval. Attempting to pressure the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region government into meeting their demands, protestors adopted a wide range of tactics that brought protest activities to previously unaffected residential districts. Although no less hectic than other months during the movement, August 2019 also produced indelible moments of nonviolent innovation that attracted international media coverage. One of the protest events from this fertile period, the Hong Kong–wide Night Assemblies for Freeing Spirits, Almsgiving, Prayers for Merit, and Removal of Evil 全港超幽佈施祈褔除惡晚會, was held on August 9, 2019, in the districts of Wong Tai Sin and Shatin and specifically centered religious practice as a creative and potent source of political expression. To better understand this intersection of religion, politics, and identity in Hong Kong, this article analyzes protestors' ritual utterances and interview responses from the protest event's proceedings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Elsewhere in this issue I state 'Chiropractic is the diagnosis and management of the neuromusculoskeletal system of the human body' and discuss the emergent problem of an increasing shrinkage of the constitutional framework of the discipline where current arguments continue to remove reference to subluxation from the profession's lexicon, even flagitiously mandating against teaching the idea within its natural context. In this editorial I give some examples of the good work being done to carry our profession to greatness, and balance that with some examples of wackiness from Canada and the United States of America, and once again from the usual dismal suspects in Europe. I am starting to think that Australia is one of the better places in the world to practice Conventional Chiropractic, yet offer caution that this may be about to change. Above all I hold that a Chiropractor carries spontaneous unspoken trust in what they see and feel, and conclude with a marvellous video of a Philosophy discussion about how strongly we can 'know things' from our patient's testimony. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines a new first-year EAP course in a Hong Kong university. It utilizes teacher and student reflections to understand the course's strengths and weaknesses, aiming to enhance its design and delivery. The study employed a qualitative approach whereby textual analysis was used to interpret the data collected in the form of written teacher reflections, written student reflections, and notes of teacher reflective dialogue. The thematic categories for coding the data were established based on the course's main learning outcomes: Effective Learning, Spoken Language, and Written Language. Findings reveal that teachers were more critical of the course compared to learners. Teachers expressed dissatisfaction with the pedagogical approach to Effective Learning unit, insufficient time provided in the course to teach solo speaking, and the inability to cover too many organizational and linguistic features in the writing unit. Students, however, did not have much to reflect on about Effective Learning, had mixed views about Spoken Language with some worried about reading from notes, and wrote extremely positively about their learning of Written Language. Nonetheless, their views provide valuable insights for course improvement. Consequently, the paper advocates for a reflective pedagogy approach to EAP that considers both teacher and student reflections to enhance teaching and learning outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Large-scale assessment of window views is demanded for precise housing valuation and quantified evidence for improving the built environment, especially in high-rise, high-density cities. However, the absence of a semantic segmentation dataset of window views forbids an accurate pixel-level assessment. This paper presents a City Information Model (CIM)-generated Window View (CIM-WV) dataset comprising 2,000 annotated images collected in the high-rise, high-density urban areas of Hong Kong. The CIM-WV includes seven semantic labels, i.e., building, sky, vegetation, road, waterbody, vehicle, and terrain. Experimental results of training a well-known deep learning (DL) model, DeepLab V3+ , on CIM-WV, achieved a high performance (per-class Intersection over Union (IoU) ≥ 86.23%) on segmenting major landscape elements, i.e., building, sky, vegetation, and waterbody, and consistently outperformed the transfer learning on a popular real-world street view dataset, Cityscapes. The DeepLab V3+ model trained on CIM-WV was robust (mIoU ≥ 72.09%) in Hong Kong Island and Kowloon Peninsula, and enhanced the semantic segmentation accuracy of real-world and Google Earth CIM-generated window view images. The contribution of this paper is three-fold. CIM-WV is the first public CIM-generated photorealistic window view dataset with rich semantics. Secondly, comparative analysis shows a more accurate window view assessment using DL from CIM-WV than deep transfer learning from ground-level views. Last, for urban researchers and practitioners, our publicly accessible DL models trained on CIM-WV enable novel multi-source window view-based urban applications including precise real estate valuation, improvement of built environment, and window view-related urban analytics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the role of standard block and modular dwelling designs in Hong Kong's public housing provision since the mid-1950s. It explores how standard types have evolved in relation to housing policies, demographic and socio-economic changes, and minimum space requirements. In contrast to other countries, Hong Kong lacks defined space or room standards. In the absence of space standards, Hong Kong relies on a living density standard. This paper studies the historical development of Hong Kong's public housing in terms of dwelling size as a measure of housing quality, questioning the effectiveness of standard block and dwelling designs as housing design controls and highlighting the contextual nature of dwelling usability and size. The analysis is based on public housing design projects, policies, and data implemented or presented by the Hong Kong government, particularly the Hong Kong Housing Authority. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hong Kong's cultural heritage and tourism offerings include several prominent symbols and legacies drawn from the waters that surround it, including dragon boat racing, Tin Hau temples honouring the Goddess of the sea, and iconic junk boats sailing on the harbour. Within the growing field of Hong Kong heritage studies, however, there has been little work addressing these and other aspects of its maritime past. This paper addresses this contradiction, of the simultaneous presence and absence of maritime heritage. It does so by considering the story of the 'coming ashore' (上岸) of people who lived on boats in the fishing centre of Aberdeen on the south side of Hong Kong Island. In the 1960s, many of them moved into Yue Kwong Chuen, an early public housing estate which is now being redeveloped. Drawing on archival research and oral history interviews, we consider the significance of the estate as an important example of the heritage of public housing that sheds light on the status of boat dwellers, excluded for centuries in South China, and their eventual incorporation into land-based society. The paper contributes new insights on collective memory and identity formation in Hong Kong under and after colonial rule. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to delineate the transformation of theatre design in Hong Kong, which was initially born out of Chinese settlements, through socio-cultural dimensions. It studies the factors that altered the design of theatre buildings from the early colonial years in the 1860s to around the second World War in the late 1930s. By adopting a postcolonial analytical framework as well as interpretive-historical and archival research methods to examine primary resources including government documents, historical photos and drawings, interviewing descendants of cinema operators and architects, as well as film archivists and architectural historians, this paper details how socio-cultural factors evolving building regulations and the local industry had impacted upon the transition of theatre architecture over half a century, witnessing indigenous efforts that resisted certain colonial narratives in the design process. The paper also scrutinises what potentials the architectures, demolished or still existing, can serve in the context of theatre heritage in postcolonial Hong Kong. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Discursive experiences can contribute to shaping lives and their identities. For minoritized youth in Hong Kong, the 2019 protest movement provided many such experiences, although very little has been heard about them. Instead, reporting has focused on the experiences of the dominant Chinese population. This paper aims to highlight the voices of minoritized youth in relation to the social movement that dominated Hong Kong in the second half of 2019. It is well recognized that identity is not fixed and that there are more likely multiple identities that transition from one to the other. Yet little is known about the influences on identity formation and the processes that underlie them. This was the issue addressed here. The paper draws on Lacan's theory of identity in examining interviews involving minoritized youth and their engagement in Hong Kong's 2019 protest movement. It shows how individual responses to the movement differed, how the movement challenged identities, and how these challenges were resolved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Analysis of the spatial patterns and dynamics of tourism services and facilities is crucial for tourism and land use planning. However, most studies in the spatial analysis of tourism rely on the city- or regional-level data; limited research has used POI (point of interest) data to accurately uncover the spatial distribution of tourism, especially its interactive and coupling relationship with the local economy and population. Based on POI data, this paper, therefore, investigates the spatial patterns and driving forces of tourism services distribution and how tourism space is coupled with the local economy and population in the Guangdong–Hong Kong–Macao Greater Bay Area (GBA) of China. The results show the following: (1) Different categories of tourism services (catering, shopping, scenic spots, leisure, and sports) exhibit diverse spatial patterns and agglomerations, but they tend to align with the variables of economic level and population in a grid of 1 km2. (2) The spatial econometric models further reveal that population density, transportation, and hospitality facilities are positively correlated with the spatial distribution of tourism services, but GDP in a grid of 1 km2 shows a weak negative correlation with the POI of tourism services, which may be attributed to the incoordination between GDP and tourism in some areas. (3) The analysis of coupling degree further identifies the areas where tourism services have good interaction/coupling with the local GDP and population density, such that these areas can be viewed as hotspots suitable for tourism promotion. This paper thus offers meaningful policy implications by calling for an optimization of the coupling of tourism services with local social–economic factors in the GBA. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Shopping malls have replaced traditional public spaces and become an integral part of urban life in many cities. This paper seeks to explore the role of shopping malls as protest sites in Hong Kong during the Anti-Extradition Law Amendment Bill protest movement in 2019. As the protests decentralised and filtered throughout the city, shopping malls became sites of protest and battlegrounds between riot police and protesters. In addition to singing and chanting, organising sit-ins, and exhibiting protest art inside shopping malls, protesters also confronted mall employees as well as disrupted businesses. Based on information gathered through media reports, planning and policy documents, as well as ethnographic observations, this paper aims to examine the role of shopping malls in the urban development of Hong Kong, their function as public spaces during the protest movement, and how the politicisation of shopping malls shaped and sustained the protest movement. This paper contends that the protesters' appropriation of shopping malls not only represented an important first step of reclaiming the right to the city, but also exemplified how such struggle and resistance can be extended beyond traditional protest sites and into different everyday spaces. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper investigates the economic development within the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area from two perspectives--spatial pattern and influencing factors--to promote coordinated development across the area. This paper employs Moran's I test and local Getis-Ord G statistic from spatial statistics. Furthermore, it constructs a hierarchical spatial econometric model to facilitate empirical investigation. It is found that the overall economic development of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area exhibits a "mountain-shaped" spatial pattern of the high-level homogeneous regions with "high-high correlation" and the low-level homogeneous regions with "low-low correlation." The internal difference in economic density is moderate, with an obvious trend of decrease year by year. Economic density shows a significant spatial positive correlation, with the expansion of the scope of areas exhibiting "high-high correlation." The differences in economic density between hotspots and sub-hotspots have decreased, but the economic density of cold spots has failed to keep up with the development of other regions. The difference in factor input density among the influencing factors explains most of the differences in economic density among different regions. The results from the R&D capital investment coefficient indicate that in recent years, the effect of investments in urban scientific and technological innovation factors has been more extensive and uniform among the regions under its jurisdiction, but the spatial spillover effect of innovation factors at both layers is not significantly positive. Apart from the city's location within the Greater Bay Area, the relative location of the jurisdictions within the city equally influences the economic development configuration of the Greater Bay Area. Although economic density in regions adjacent to cities outside the Greater Bay Area is notably lower than in other regions, their growth rate and production efficiency remain on par with other regions. T-test and model results underscore the rapid development of the areas encircling the bay. The coefficient of location dummy variables in areas adjacent to cities in the Greater Bay Area varies among cities. At a particular factor input density, some cities have higher output efficiency in areas contiguous to cities in the Greater Bay Area. This study uniquely adopts low-level city jurisdictions and high-level cities to shape a two-tiered hierarchical dataset with nested geographic units. This innovative approach fully leverages insights from distinct layers, delving into spatial interdependence and interplay across layers. This paper aims to explore the spatial pattern and influencing factors steering economic development in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area. In doing so, it aims to identify problems and present pertinent policy recommendations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to analyze the factors contributing to the limited availability of short-term financial products in Hong Kong. Firstly, it examines the characteristics of the Hong Kong market, including its level of financial industry development and the operating models of financial institutions. This examination serves as a foundation for further analysis. Secondly, the study explores the demand and supply dynamics of short-term financial products in the Hong Kong market. Investigating the preferences and demands of Hong Kong residents and analyzing the product offerings of financial institutions it reveals the insufficient supply of short-term financial products at present. Lastly, the paper analyzes the underlying reasons for this phenomenon. From the perspective of financial institutions, the scarcity of short-term financial products in Hong Kong is primarily attributed to the prevalent traditional long-term investment mentality and model deeply embedded in the market. Additionally, regulatory policies impose certain constraints on the innovation and development of short-term financial products. Consequently, the paper proposes recommendations, including the need for financial institutions to give attention to residents' demand for short-term financial products and for the government and regulatory bodies to implement measures that encourage innovation and development in this area. Through a comprehensive analysis, this paper provides insights into the factors contributing to the limited availability of short-term financial products in Hong Kong and offers recommendations to stimulate market growth. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper benchmarks the challenges involved with major sea, or fixed link, bridge crossings from their planning to final construction. An overview of existing major fixed link crossings globally, including statistical information such as length and inflation-adjusted project costs, is given. Data for well-known links such as the Øresund Crossing in Europe and the more recent Hong Kong–Zhuhai–Macau Bridge are included. The construction methods required to surmount the challenges of bridging such crossings and how advancements are making long-mooted crossings more feasible are discussed. Statistics on the construction durations of these crossings are presented and links between construction time, cost aspects and carbon dioxide emissions are considered. Finally, the paper looks to the future and considers how the data can be used to better bound estimates of time, costs, and emissions for fixed link projects. The viability of some of the more notable future fixed link projects is also addressed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chinese cultural conservatism used to participate in shaping the course of modernization to a large extent. In this paper, I aim to describe a hidden lineage of Chinese cultural conservatism of the twentieth century that is still alive and appears to be more and more influential in mainland China. Relying on several ideas developed by Neo-Confucians of the early twentieth century, Gan Yang's paper in 2007 represented a contemporary revival of Chinese cultural conservatism. More importantly, in recent years, this kind of revival of conservative discourse went through another big change, which not only matters to the self-underpinning of the legitimate basis of the current regime, but also combined with the political conservations related to the Hong Kong protest of 2019–2020 explains why this country is so ideologically different from the West. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Variation theory, which is a theory of learning developed by Marton and others, has quickly become popular in education research. Our purpose of this paper is to articulate the application of variation theory in the form of a number of concrete design principles that offer prescriptive and practical guidelines for improving the designs of educational software programs. To achieve this, we analyzed a wide range of educational software programs produced over the years in our previous projects for learning Chinese characters. From this analysis, we identified four design principles, namely, (i) not aiming to test but to bring about learning, (ii) focusing on a specific object of learning, (iii) allowing learners to explore variation to be learned, and (iv) keeping all other aspects invariant. These design principles are specialized for designing how learners interact with educational software programs, which is the major practical contribution of this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Greater Bay Area (GBA) is to become a major innovation and technology hub of global impact. Such a transformation is to take place in the midst of a policy-driven economy in GBA's Mainland region and a market-driven economy in Hong Kong and Macau. In this paper, we examine the uniqueness and complexities of logistics and trade facilitation in GBA. This study establishes a discourse in GBA's logistics and trade facilitation between government and non-government stakeholders. Based on the discourse, we provide a conceptual context on the unique aspects of GBA, pinpointing critical issues such as the coexistence of differing institutional systems and interplay between state planning and market economy. A major objective of the paper is to identify and conceptualize unique logistics and trade features of GBA development, and to highlight opportunities for academic and policy research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]