{"title":"Government without Statistics: Policy-Making in Hong Kong 1925-85, with Special Reference to Economic and Financial Management","authors":"Leo F. Goodstadt","doi":"10.2139/SSRN.1008227","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Until the 1970s, Hong Kongi¦s Government collected as few statistics as possible, a policy only partially explained by its commitment to laisser faire. Statistics were seen as threatening its freedom from Londoni¦s control and its ability to limit political debate locally. Using unpublished material from the Hong Kong Public Records Office, this paper reviews statistical issues of major importance in Hong Kongi¦s transition to an industrial economy and its emergence as a financial centre. It demonstrates how the quality of statistics affected the management of financial markets and banking crises, and identifies the wider costs of the shortage of comprehensive statistics.","PeriodicalId":135206,"journal":{"name":"ERN: Measurement & Data on National Income & Product Accounts (Topic)","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0000,"publicationDate":"2006-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"10","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"ERN: Measurement & Data on National Income & Product Accounts (Topic)","FirstCategoryId":"1085","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.2139/SSRN.1008227","RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":null,"ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"","JCRName":"","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 10
Abstract
Until the 1970s, Hong Kongi¦s Government collected as few statistics as possible, a policy only partially explained by its commitment to laisser faire. Statistics were seen as threatening its freedom from Londoni¦s control and its ability to limit political debate locally. Using unpublished material from the Hong Kong Public Records Office, this paper reviews statistical issues of major importance in Hong Kongi¦s transition to an industrial economy and its emergence as a financial centre. It demonstrates how the quality of statistics affected the management of financial markets and banking crises, and identifies the wider costs of the shortage of comprehensive statistics.