How best to include national security education in Hong Kong schools

Allowing schools to devise their own strategies to teach national security not only puts the burden on overworked staff, but could also lead to varying outcomes

A single-subject solution concerned with civic education would be better, even after the botched roll-out of a national education curriculum in 2012

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Kerry Kennedy

Kerry Kennedy is professor emeritus and adviser (academic development) at The Education University of Hong Kong.

Published: 6:15am, 22 Mar 2021Updated: 6:15am, 22 Mar 2021

When the Education Bureau unveiled its programme for national security education, it noted that “national security education is a part of, and inseparable from, national education”, and that it aims to “develop in students a sense of belonging to the country, an affection for the Chinese people, a sense of national identity”.

Of course, the focus of the programme is the national security law itself, but the broader context presented here is important to note.

National education, or education for national identity building, has a long history in Hong Kong’s post-handover period. National identity discourse was present in the early discussions of curriculum reform at the turn of the century.

There were multiple voices with different agendas. In civil society, there was an effort to build democratic education into the reform process. Within the government, and particularly on the part of the chief executive, Tung Chee-hwa, there were concerted efforts, often stated publicly, to ensure that a key aspect of civic education was developing a “passion” for China.