Democratic Reforms and the Agreement on Convergence

After the signing of the Joint Declaration, the UK introduced democratic reforms in Hong Kong. The introduction of democracy at the eleventh hour of British rule aroused Chinese suspicion. In 1985, in an incident known as the “deviation crisis”, the Hong Kong director of Xinhua, Xu Jiatun, strongly criticized the British reforms for violating the Joint Declaration. To prevent the British from changing Hong Kong’s political system too quickly, and worried about the negative impact on Hong Kong’s prosperity, China accelerated the drafting of the Basic Law. In 1986, an agreement was reached on “convergence”, whereby the British agreed that the reforms should align with the clauses on Hong Kong’s political system in the Hong Kong Basic Law.