Our Beginnings
Hong Kong is at a historical juncture. This is not only because of its decaying autonomy; Hong Kong society has long been suffering from problems. Even if the Chinese Communist Party does not apply further pressure, this does not mean that ordinary working people in Hong Kong are able to live their lives with dignity or that life’s basic necessities are affordable. On the contrary, the disparity between the rich and the poor increases every year. Government collusion with corporate monopolies continues to suffocate the Hong Kong people and will impact on countless future generations. Anyone who cannot see that our problem is one rooted in the foundations of society and instead tells the public to “just put your trust in me and you will be saved” is a demagogue, pure and simple.
In China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and the rest of the world, although to different degrees, we are all facing a major social crisis. The 2008 economic crisis is far from over and may continue to deteriorate in the future. Environmental pollution and climate change have already brought about a global crisis, such that in recent years climate experts have said that the earth has entered into a new Anthropocene geological age, replacing the Holocene age that began more than 10,000 years ago, because human activity has now begun to fundamentally rewrite the future of the planet. How could it be possible that Hong Kong can remain protected when the sky fall? If people have the aspiration, it is not difficult to see that an unprecedented multi-level global crisis has already broken out in front of us.
We do not have simple answers, but we do make three basic starting points.
1. Hong Kong people want their own autonomy and ordinary people want life and employment protection. To achieve this we will have to rely on our own collective struggle and social resistance movements.
2. We need to be responsible for protecting the ecological balance as otherwise people will not be able to eat safe food or breathe clean air.
3. Although there are no ready-made answers, we can learn from the experiences of struggles not only in Hong Kong but elsewhere as well. It is therefore especially important to learn from international experiences and establish international links in the common resistance against enemies of democracy and the environment.
Due to the first point, we are strongly committed to democracy. Due to second point, we want to hold all those who are privileged and cause harm to the earth’s ecosystem accountable. We call ourselves “Borderless Movement” due to the third point, and we hold a global vision of struggle from the ground up.
From these three basic points, we have begun our exploration. The road ahead is long but let us grope for the way forward together.
* We want to let a hundred schools of thought contend and so welcome contributions. Signed articles do not represent the position of the Borderless Movement.
Borderless Movement