The society of Hong Kong objected strongly when the government instructed schools to change their medium of instruction from English to Chinese at the junior secondary level soon after Hong Kong was reunited with the People's Republic of China in 1997. This paper tries to make sense of the objection to this piece of politically correct and pedagogically sound policy. It analyses the situation from Bourdieu's ideas of habitus and various types of capitals. The paper argues that the government's effort to persuade Hong Kong society to accept mother-tongue education on pedagogical grounds alone was to no avail because the English language has not only become a habitus of society; it also serves to distinguish Hong Kong people from mainland Chinese. The failure of the government was partly due to its insensitivity to the nature and social functions of language.
[Copyright of British Journal of Sociology of Education is the property of Routledge . Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01425690220137756]

In this article Hong Kong's policy on initial teacher training is used as a case study of the interplay between international trends and local policy. Traditionally initial teacher preparation in most countries has been based in higher education institutions. In recent years alternative routes for initial teacher education have proliferated in the United States and the United Kingdom. Meanwhile university-based pathways to teacher certification have been criticised as deterring talented candidates from entering the profession. The authors argue that these trends have had significant impact on Hong Kong's policies for initial teacher preparation. In Hong Kong untrained teachers have served as a convenient buffer to meet teacher demand for many decades. It was only in 1997 that the new Hong Kong Special Administrative Region government announced the policy objective of requiring all new teachers to be degree holders and professionally trained. However, this policy was short-lived. There is substantial evidence that government policy has been influenced by the development of alternative routes of teacher preparation elsewhere. This case study can provide useful insights for policy formation elsewhere.
[Copyright of Journal of Education for Teaching is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website:
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02607470802401370]

Most chapters of this book are prepared basing on the papers presented in 1995 at the inaugural symposium of the Comparative Education Research Centre of the University of Hong Kong. The main focus of the chapters is on the impact of political transition on education, especially in East Asia. Each chapter deals with different themes: for example, language policy, pedagogy, and moral education in the context of political transition.

The paper analyzes through a historical perspective the impact on the school curriculum on the return of Hong Kong's sovereignty to China. The authors argue that the transition has had a significant impact on the intended curriculum due to attempts by the departing colonial government to reform the curriculum. However, these reforms have had a limited impact on the implemented curriculum, which has been more strongly influenced by the emergence of a market in which schools compete for academically more able students.