Notes
Notes Chapter 1 1. This definition is a conventional one which lays stress on the funding of public sector organisations through taxation. In Hong Kong, the sale of Crown land, all of which is owned by the government, has been an important source of revenue and the definition has been amended accordingly. On definitions of the public sector, see Kai Wegrich, “Public Sector” in Encyclopedia of Governance, ed. Mark Bevir, Vol II (California: Sage 2007), 776–777 and the discussion in Jan-Erik Lane, The Public Sector: Concepts and Approaches (London: Sage, 2000). 2. The government web-site, www.gov.hk, lists 60 departments and agencies but includes theAudit Commission, the Independent CommissionAgainst Corruption, The Office of the Ombudsman and the University Grants Committee and some advisory committees, which, strictly speaking, are not departments but what the government calls “related organisations”. If a department is defined as an agency which has executive powers, the number of departments is smaller. See also Chapter 4. 3. Civil Service Bureau, Civil Service Personnel Statistics 2008 (Hong Kong: Civil Service Bureau, 2008), Table 1.1. The figures are for the number of people actually in position (the “strength”) rather for the establishment which is slightly higher. 4. Calculated from Independent Commission Against Corruption, Annual Report 2007, www.icac.org.hk, Appendix 1. 5. It is difficult to estimate the exact numbers employed in the public sector outside the civil service. If the criterion that defines the public sector organisation is the subsidy that it receives from government, then it would be necessary to determine for each organisation how much of the subsidy is spent on staff and how much comes from fees and charges levied by the organisation itself. 6. A.B.L. Cheung, “Public Sector Reform and the Re-legitimation of Public Bureaucratic Power: The Case of Hong Kong,” International Journal of Public Sector Management 9(5–6) (1996), 37–50; Ian Scott, “Organisations in the Public Sector in Hong Kong: Core Government, Quasi-Government and Private Bodies with Public Functions,” Public Organisation Review 3(3) (September 2003), 247–267. 7. The Commission appointed to investigate the claim that the government infringed academic autonomy at the Hong Kong Institute of Education found that the government had the right to “encourage, steer or direct” tertiary institutions but that it should use proper channels. The government then asked for a judicial review of the finding. See 308 Notes to pages 3–7 Yeung Chun Kuen and Lee Jark Pui, Report of the Commission of Inquiry on Allegations relating to the Hong Kong Institute of Education (Hong Kong: Government Logistics Department, June 2007), 101. See also Chapter 3. 8. See Rikkie Yeung, Moving Millions: The Commercial Successes and Political Controversies of Hong Kong’s Railways (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2008), Chapter 11, Epilogue. 9. Public goods and services are commonly defined as those goods and services which are provided by governments because the market cannot allocate them efficiently. They have the important characteristics that they are non-rivalrous, in the sense that “more than one person can derive benefits from [their] consumption when its supply does not change”, and non-excludable, in the sense that consumption does not preclude further use by another person. See Karthik Srinivasan, “Public Goods” in Encyclopedia of Governance, ed. Mark Bevir, Vol. II, op. cit., 765–766. 10. Donald Tsang, Strong Governance for the People, www.policyaddress.gov.hk (2005), para 71; Donald Tsang, “‘Big market, small government’ key,” www.3.news.gov.hk, September 19, 2006. 11. Financial Secretary, The 2008–09 Budget (Hong Kong: Government Logistics Department, 2008), Appendix B. 12. For a comparison of Hong Kong’s public expenditure as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product with that of other developed countries, see Wilson Wong and Sabrina Luk, “Economic Policy” in Contemporary Hong Kong Politics: Governance in the Post1997 Era, eds. Lam Wai-man, Percy Luen-tim Lui, Wilson Wong and Ian Holliday (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2007), 187. 13. Quoted in Tsang, “‘Big market, small government’ key,” op. cit. 14. See Eliza W.Y. Lee, “The Political Economy of Public Sector Reform in Hong Kong: The Case of a Colonial-Developmental State,” International Review of Administrative Sciences 64(4) (1998), 625–641; Ian Scott, “Administration in a Small Capitalist State,” Public Administration and Development 9(2) (April–May, 1989), 185–199. 15. To quote Miliband, it acts “on behalf of capitalists but not necessarily at their behest.” Ralph Miliband, Marxism and Politics (Oxford...
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