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Surveying Hong Kong in the 1950s: Western humanitarians and the ‘problem’ of Chinese refugees

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 November 2014

LAURA MADOKORO
LAURA MADOKORO*
Affiliation:
Department of History and Classical Studies, McGill University, Montreal, Canada Email: [email protected]
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Abstract

At the end of the Second World War, there were over a million displaced persons and refugees in Europe alone. Hundreds of thousands of people were uprooted with the expansion of the Japanese empire across the Pacific Theater, and many others were similarly displaced when Japan was defeated. Others later fled civil conflicts, in South Asia, for instance, and in China, where thousands left the mainland during the final days of the Chinese Civil War. Among this massive displacement in Asia, unlike in Europe, only a few groups were identified as refugees. One such group consisted of the migrants in Hong Kong who, after 1949, were understood to be refugees fleeing communist oppression in the People's Republic of China. This article examines the critical role that surveys (population studies designed to account for, and define, refugee groups) played in shaping particular, Westernized Cold War understandings of the refugee experience in Hong Kong. These surveys were organized by non-state interests and undertaken with financial support from major American philanthropies. In examining the objectives and methodologies of the refugee surveys conducted in Hong Kong in the early 1950s, in contrast with studies undertaken contemporaneously in Europe, this article observes that, although at the time the flaws in the surveys were recognized and regularly disregarded in the pursuit of broad political objectives, scholars have failed to adequately recognize the subjective nature of the surveys' supposedly empirical evidence. As a result, the dominant European-based narrative about modern refugees has obfuscated the distinctive aspects of the refugee experience in Hong Kong.

Type
Chinese Refugees Forum
Information
Modern Asian Studies , Volume 49 , Issue 2 , March 2015 , pp. 493 - 524
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Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2014 

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References

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35 Vernant Survey, 1.2 Projects 100 International, Box 21, File 144, United Nations—Refugee, Study, January 1952, Rockefeller Foundation Archives.

36 ‘UN to Disown Report by Rockefeller Unit’, New York Times, 14 January 1952.

37 Vernant Survey, 1.2 Projects 100 International, Box 21, File 144, United Nations—Refugee, Study, January 1952, Rockefeller Foundation Archives.

38 See correspondence in Vernant Survey, 1.2 Projects 100 International, Box 21, File 144, United Nations—Refugee, Study, January 1952, Rockefeller Foundation Archives.

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50 Ibid.

51 Ibid.

52 Ibid.

53 Ibid.

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56 Ibid.

57 Ibid.

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59 ‘Preliminary Report’, Ford Foundation Archives.

60 In crafting a definition that essentially defined anyone with two years of education as an intellectual, Aid Refugee Chinese Intellectuals knew that it was making it possible ‘for a large number of ex military and ex-police to apply for registration on the basis of military academy or similar training’. Ibid.

61 Dean Rusk delivered the opening address at the Hotel Plaza fund-raising event in New York on 28 April 1952.

62 Dean Rusk recalls, ‘. . .we always tried to keep the Rockefeller Foundation out of politics. . . Most people abroad accepted us for what we were—a private philanthropy with no political fish to fry, operating independently of Washington. . .’. Rusk, As I Recall It, p. 186.

63 Bernard Gladieux to H. Rowan Gaither, ‘Problems of China Area’, 25 June 1953, PA 52–90 Reel 645, Ford Foundation Archives.

64 Gladieux to Joseph M. McDaniel, Jr., 29 December 1952, PA 52-90, Reel 645, Ford Foundation Archives.

65 ‘Report to the High Commissioner on Trip to South East Asia’, James M. Read, in PA 52–90, Reel 645, Ford Foundation Archives.

66 Lewis Hoskins to Arnold, 12 May 1952, PA 52-90, Reel 645, Ford Foundation Archives.

67 The numbers (including the cost of resettlement to Taiwan, which was estimated at $350 per person) suggested that the size of the problem was one that required government intervention. The Rockefeller Foundation was also wary of contributing to work that its staff believed was the responsibility of governments. Staff noted in 1954 that the United States government had contributed significant sums to Aid Refugee Chinese Intellectuals. They were reluctant to use the Foundation's funds to support its work since the amount of money involved suggested that this was ‘to a considerable extent an instrumentality of the United States Government, which has contributed $410,000’. See R64 (Nelson A. Rockefeller), Series L, Box 4, F-27 Aid to Chinese Intellectuals, 1952–55, Rockefeller Foundation Archives.

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77 Ibid.

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80 Ibid.

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91 Ibid, p. 141.

92 Ibid, pp. 140–141. The survey team acknowledged there might be some discrepancy in the statistics, suggesting that the corresponding figures might be 10 to 15 per cent below what they had estimated.

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97 Ibid, p. 130.

98 The International Social Service was established in 1924 with the objective of assisting migrants moving across international borders. In the post-war period it became deeply involved with family reunification issues in Europe and in facilitating international adoptions through the documentation of individual cases.

99 Hambro, Problem of Chinese Refugees, p. 112.

100 It was a view shared by senior colonial administrators as well as the authorities responsible for security in the colony. See Annual Report. Hong Kong Police. 1951–52. Chapter XV, ‘Special Problems’, p. 46.

101 Secretary of State for the Colonies to Governor of Hong Kong, 29 May 1957, CO 1030/777 Refugees from China in Hong Kong (1957–1959), National Archives of the United Kingdom.

102 Where the survey proved most useful was in ensuring that the Chinese refugees in Hong Kong were prioritized during the United Nations World Refugee Year (1959–1960).

103 Document A/AC.79/12, referenced in Extract from the Report on the Third Session of the UNREF Executive Committee (Geneva, 26 May–1 June 1956) Document A/AC.79/41, Fonds UNHCR 11 Records of the Central Registry, Series 1, Classified Subject Files, 1951–1970 15/2/HK, Box 262, Part 3, UNHCR Archives.

104 Ford Foundation to Goedhart, 18 April 1956, PA 52–90, Reel 645, Ford Foundation Archives.