Reform in Search of Politics: The Case of Hong Kong’s Aborted Attempt to Corporatise Public Broadcasting

Abstract

Following the recommendation of the 1985 Broadcasting Review Board Report, the Hong Kong government proceeded to corporatise Radio-Television Hong Kong, the public broadcaster. The corporatisation process encountered various intra-bureaucratic and extra-bureaucratic problems, as identified in this article. By 1993 it was more or less aborted amidst Sino-British diplomatic impasse. This short-lived organisational reform had appeared on the governmental agenda as a result of the political opportunity provided by the Broadcasting Review Board and the political circumstances in Hong Kong after the signing of the Sino-British Joint Declaration in 1984. In the end, however, it was also politics which derailed the plan.