One Country, Two Systems
| One country, two systems | |||||||||||||||
| Chinese name | |||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Simplified Chinese | |||||||||||||||
| Traditional Chinese | |||||||||||||||
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| Portuguese name | |||||||||||||||
| Portuguese | Um país, dois sistemas | ||||||||||||||
| Transcriptions | |
|---|---|
| Standard Mandarin | |
| Hanyu Pinyin | Yīguó liǎngzhì |
| Wade–Giles | I4 Kuo2 Liang3 Chih4 |
| Yue: Cantonese | |
| Yale Romanization | yāt gwok léuhng jai |
| Jyutping | jat1 gwok3 loeng5 zai3 |
"One country, two systems" is a constitutional principle formulated by Deng Xiaoping, the Paramount Leader of the People's Republic of China (PRC), for the reunification of China during the early 1980s. He suggested that there would be only one China, but distinct Chinese regions such as Hong Kong and Macau could retain their own capitalist economic and political systems, while the rest of China uses the socialist system. Under the principle, each of the two regions could continue to have its own political system, legal, economic and financial affairs, including external relations with foreign countries.
Hong Kong was a colony of the United Kingdom, ruled by a governor for 156 years (except for four years of Japanese occupation during WWII) until 1997, when it was returned to Chinese sovereignty. China had to accept some conditions, stipulated in the Sino-British Joint Declaration, such as the drafting and adoption of Hong Kong's mini-constitution before its return. The Basic Law ensured Hong Kong will retain its capitalist economic system and own currency (the Hong Kong Dollar), legal system, legislative system, and people's rights and freedom for fifty years, as a special administrative region (SAR) of China. Set to expire in 2047, the current arrangement has permitted Hong Kong to function as its own entity in many international settings (e.g., WTO and the Olympics) rather than as a part of China. The Chinese renminbi is not legal tender in Hong Kong. Likewise, the Hong Kong Dollar is not accepted in stores in China. With this arrangement, a permit or visa is required when passing the borders of Hong Kong and China, people in Hong Kong generally hold Hong Kong SAR passports rather than Chinese passports. The official languages are a major factor besides the history of the former colony that has made Hong Kong and China distinct from each other, as Cantonese and English are the most widely used languages in Hong Kong while Mandarin is the official language of China. The central government in Beijing maintains control over Hong Kong's foreign affairs as well as the legal interpretation of the Basic Law. The latter has led democracy advocates and some Hong Kong residents to argue that the territory has yet to achieve universal suffrage as promised by the Basic Law, leading to mass demonstrations in 2014.
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