Resurgent Triads? Democratic mobilization and organized crime in Hong Kong
| Date | 01 March 2018 |
| Published date | 01 March 2018 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0004865817698191 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Australian & New Zealand
Journal of Criminology
2018, Vol. 51(1) 23–39
!The Author(s) 2017
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DOI: 10.1177/0004865817698191
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Article
Resurgent Triads? Democratic
mobilization and organized
crime in Hong Kong
Federico Varese
Department of Sociology, University of Oxford, UK
Rebecca WY Wong
Department of Applied Social Sciences, City University of HK, Hong
Kong
Abstract
On 3 October 2014, peaceful pro-democracy protestors were attacked by thugs in Mong
Kok, a working-class neighbourhood of Hong Kong. Using this event, we explore whether the
attackers came from the same neighbourhood and mobilized to protect their illegal business
activities, and whether the attackers were affiliated to the Triads. We conclude that the
attackers were low-level Triads affiliates from outside Mong Kok and were paid to attack
the protesters. While several scholars have suggested that Triads are in inexorable decline in
post-1997 Hong Kong, we suggest that they might have found a new role as enforcer of
unpopular policies and repression of democratic protests in the context of a drift towards
authoritarianism in Hong Kong. The paper is based on field interviews with Triad members,
businesspeople and activists, and on press reports and official documents.
Keywords
China, Hong Kong Triads, Mafias, thugs-for-hire, Umbrella Movement
Date received: 9 August 2016; accepted: 15 February 2017
Introduction
At the end of September 2014, thousands of citizens in Hong Kong took to the streets to
demand universal suffrage. They objected to a decision taken by the Chinese government
to retain veto power over who was allowed to stand for the post of Chief Executive
(i.e. President) of Hong Kong. When a few activists decided to enter Civic Square in
close proximity to the government headquarters, the police used tear gas to remove the
crowd—mainly university students—and arrested them. The excessive use of force
Corresponding author:
Federico Varese, Department of Sociology, University of Oxford, Manor Road Building, Manor Road, Oxford OX1
3UQ, UK.
Email: federico.varese@sociology.ox.ac.uk
outraged the population of Hong Kong and became instant news around the world.
This was the match that sparked the Umbrella Movement (UM), a most extraordinary
peaceful occupation of three sites in Hong Kong for over two months (September
28–December 15, 2014) in the financial district of the city and in the working-class
neighbourhood of Mong Kok (below, we use UM as an equivalent to ‘Umbrella
Movement,’ ‘Occupy Movement’ and ‘Occupy Central’).
While peacefulness and disciplined, the occupation took an eventful turn on
3 October 2014 when the pro-democracy camp became the victim of an organized assault
in the protest sites of Mong Kok. The events which unfolded on that evening constitute
the contextual background of this study. The violence lasted all day, but the attack was
eventually repelled. The New Yorker Magazine report on the event, entitled ‘The Thugs
of Mainland China’ (Lim, 2014), suggested that the Chinese government had paid thugs
to disrupt the peaceful protest. This is a practice that is common in China, as docu-
mented by Ong (2015). An alternative theory also suggested by early observers is that
organized criminals acted on their own initiative to protect business interests from being
disrupted in Mong Kok, where the Hong Kong Triads organize the local sex industry,
impose protection payments on local businesses and control the minibuses (Tweed,
2014). Right from the beginning then two key questions had been posed: were the
attackers locally based or were they coming from the outside? And were the attackers
affiliated to the Triads or not? Scholars have shown that thugs-for-hire tend to come
from outside the area being attacked and are not normally members of structured Mafia
groups.
The events of October 2014 raise more general theoretical questions. First, what are
the differences between the two types of privatized violence: the ‘thugs-for-hire’ phe-
nomenon and Mafias? Second, the events of 3 October speak to the broader question of
the relationship between democracy and organized crime, and the future of the Triads in
Hong Kong. The paper first presents an ideal-type distinction between ‘thugs-for-hire’
and Mafiosi. We then consider the events of 3 October in the context of Hong Kong-
China relationship. We conclude that the events of 3 October are further evidence that
Triads in Hong Kong are behaving as thugs-for-hire. While several attackers were
indeed members of the Triads, they hailed from outside the neighbourhood and did
not mobilize to protect local businesses, as a traditional Mafia would do. Indeed,
some local Triads opposed the attack as they perceived it as an encroachment of their
territory. These events suggest that there is a tension within the Triads. We suggest that,
in the context of greater control of the Beijing government over the affairs of the former
British colony, organized crime will increasingly become an instrument to enforce
unpopular policies or repress social protests. Hence the decline in the Triads noted by
several scholars (e.g. Broadhurst & Lee, 2009; Lee, Broadhurst, & Beh 2006; Zhang &
Chin, 2003), maybe be reversed. We draw upon a set of interviews with key witnesses,
official documents and press reports.
Thugs-for-hire vs Mafiosi
Thugs-for-hire are non-state actors used by authorities to impose policies and decisions
upon a reluctant population. The thugs are ‘agents’ of the authorities and their allies,
albeit the relationship with the ‘principal’ is informal and kept hidden. This type of
24 Australian & New Zealand Journal of Criminology 51(1)
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