"Hong Kong the Super Paradox cuts into the cold reality of post-colonial Hong Kong, which demonstrates a paradoxical normalcy in its internal politics belying all pre-1997 prophecies of doom, and offers plausible reasons for the wide discrepancy between expectations and outcome.

It reveals that despite earlier contrary rosy expectations about the continuity in its international status, the post-1997 Hong Kong has, again paradoxically, encountered difficulties in its external eligibility to act, as in the actual cases examined.

On the economic front, the book likewise contrasts the earlier high expectations in some quarters regarding Hong Kong's future after the handover and the totally unanticipated economic downturn brought on by the financial turmoil hitting the Asian Pacific region in 1997-1998."--BOOK JACKET.