“Constructing a decolonized world city for consumption: Discourses on Hong Kong Disneyland and their implications.” Social Semiotics 20 (5): 573-592.

Abstract

The paper argues that, under the globalized economy, state power is far from diminishing. I study how the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region government officials in 1999 developed “competition-development” discourse and “disappearing-world-city” discourse to persuade the public to approve the unequal and non-transparent Hong Kong-Disney deal for setting up the Hong Kong Disneyland (HKDL). I also examine how newspaper reports have circulated and have reinforced these two pairs of political discourses in wider popular discourse. I further reveal, in the post-colonial context of HongKong, how the HKDL project functions to accomplish decolonization tasks and to reshape Hong Kong as a consumption-based tourist spot instead of a citizen-based participatory community.

Keywords: cultural studies; Hong Kong Disneyland; Hong Kong; globalization; discourse; urban development; city politics