On Last Week's Arrests in Hong Kong: An Interview with Sebastian Veg

We talked to one of the world's leading experts on Hong Kong protest movements; plus links for the week.

Last week, more than fifty pro-democracy activists in Hong Kong were arrested under a new national security law passed unilaterally by the mainland Chinese government in Beijing. We checked in with our friend Sebastian Veg, a leading expert on social movements in Hong Kong, and asked him to explain the arrests. We also asked him how he thinks the situation will evolve from here.

A few key takeaways from the interview:

First, Beijing’s national security law signals an unprecedented shift in the Communist Party’s (CCP) relationship to Hong Kong. This is the first time the CCP has taken on a direct role in the city’s governance. The security law also attempts to restructure Hong Kong by creating a parallel set of institutions not subject to local oversight, including an office for national security that is an organ of the central government—which, Sebastian stresses, is an “organ of the party, not a state organ.”

Second, though Sebastian is a vocal supporter of the pro-democracy movement, …