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Two Hong Kong Luxuries in Peril: Dolce & Gabbana and Specialness

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It’s no secret that purveyors of luxury goods are eyeing the growing mainland Chinese market with glinting eyes. Dolce & Gabbana (D&G), the Italian fashion powerhouse, can certainly afford a crack public relations team in Hong Kong, the former British colony where China’s newly minted RMBs are spent with abandon by shopper-tourists from the mainland. They definitely need one now.

On January 5, the Hong Kong press reported that security guards at D&G’s flagship store on Canton Road, Hong Kong’s version of Fifth Avenue, shooed away local pedestrians taking photographs of the store front. Significantly, the reports say, guards allowed mainland tourists to shoot away. As of the publication of this article, D&G has done nothing more than issue a one-sentence statement denying the alleged discrimination.

The incident has enraged the locals. Over the weekend of January 7, hundreds of banner-carrying Hong Kong residents picketed D&G’s stores to protest thefaux pas. But the real target of their frustration, judging by commentaries from local newspapers and social media, is their mainland compatriots.

On Canton Road, dubbed a “mainland concession area” by some locals, mainland shoppers regularly form queues outside the likes of Chanel, Cartier, and Louis Vuitton. Some would doubtlessly be glad if images of them clad in bling appeared online. Others, particularly anyone shopping with ill-gotten gains from China’s Wild Wild East economy, would almost certainly prefer anonymity. If the guards were acting on corporate orders, it was likely because D&G wished to protect this lucrative segment of its customer base from unwanted scrutiny.

The D&G incident has evolved from a simple matter of alleged discrimination by one vendor to become an “outlet of tension in Hong Kong’s relationship with mainlanders.” Hong Kong locals commenting online described nouveau riche mainlanders’ increasingly flagrant displays of wealth as “an eye sore” and resent the fact that “store clerks now greet shoppers in Mandarin first” instead of Cantonese, Hong Kong’s native tongue.

Locals’ complaints go beyond mere perception. Professor Po Chung Chow of Hong Kong Chinese University summarized Hong Kong’s dilemma on Weibo, China’s Twitter, in the following terms:

There is no possibility of democratization of the political process. Most wealth is monopolized by capitalists. More and more have fallen into poverty but social welfare has not caught up. Inequality of opportunity has worsened. Only [after understanding] this dilemma can you comprehend why many Hong Kong locals believe mainlanders are a threat and feel resentful towards them.

Two trends magnify Hong Kong natives’ sense that Damocles’ sword is dangling over their lifestyle. Birth tourism has become so prevalent that around half of all babies born in Hong Kong in 2011 had mainland parents. In addition, many mainlanders use Hong Kong real estate as a haven to park their extra cash, causing speculative volatility in Hong Kong’s property market and pricing many locals out of better homes.

It is thus disappointing but not surprising that xenophobic comments saturate Hong Kong’s social media sphere in any discussion of these issues. Even milder views among locals charge the Hong Kong government with “kowtowing to their bosses in Beijing and the interests of big businesses” and “losing touch with the needs of the ordinary people.”

Hong Kong netizens who lambast mainland visitors are probably barking up the wrong tree. While some microbloggers in the mainland have fought back by proffering their own stereotypes of Hong Kong people, many others have pointed out that this is “not really a quarrel between ordinary mainlanders and Hong Kong people,” and “many social problems [in Hong Kong] have been over-simplified and blamed on mainlanders.” Indeed, many mainland microbloggers have cheered on the Hong Kong protesters to “exercise their rights of assembly” and “take photos in front of the luxury stores to catch corrupt [mainland] officials” who presumably make up some of the clientèle.

Although Hong Kong’s legal absorption into mainland China will be complete by 2047, Beijing must be keen to know how fast it can nudge the timetable forde facto control. From the glaring lights of Canton Road to the secretive corridors of power, Hong Kong’s “specialness” will continue to be tested.