A study of blame avoidance behaviour in the administration of Tung Chee-hwa : ACI as adapted by Hinterleitner and Sager

Abstract

Blame avoiding behaviour (BAB) has attracted the attention of political scientists in recent decades. Since Weaver turned the previous beliefs of BAB upside down when he established a connection between the negativity bias of constituents and politicians’ preference for avoiding blame over claiming credit, the literature on risk aversion and negativity bias has proliferated. Still, most studies of BAB focus on competitive western democracies. This study attempts to expand the application of BAB to a semi-authoritarian context, a little explored area in BAB literature. The political structure of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) is not democratic in the Western sense, because the central government appoints the HKSAR government. The government is not elected. Still, especially during the early post-1997 period, the focus of this study, the HKSAR retained elements of liberalism inherited from the colonial era. These elements included an elected legislature where elections had consequences for the government’s agenda and legitimacy, a relatively free press and civil and political liberties. While the government was not publicly elected, electoral politics was still influential. The government needed to avoid blame to maintain performance legitimacy. The government also sought to prevent its allies in the legislature from taking blame or becoming scapegoats in public elections. Public election outcomes determined the extent to which the opposition could dominate the legislature and exercise a veto power to hinder or halt the implementation of the government’s program. Through the study of BAB in the early years of the HKSAR, we explore how BAB applies in a semi-authoritarian regime, thus further enriching the BAB literature. This study examines four major policy failures during the administration of Tung Chee-hwa, the first Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (1997-2005). Case studies focus on (1) the new airport opening fiasco, (2) a public housing short piling scandal, (3) the withdrawal of Basic Law Article 23 national security legislation, and (4) the mismanagement of SARS. Using the framework of Actor-Centered Institutionalism (“ACI”) as adapted by Hinterleitner and Sager, the dissertation examines the interaction of political actors endowed with certain capabilities and specific orientations within the given institutional setting and within a given external environment. The dissertation argues that under more centralized political arrangements politicians are less able to shift blame to other actors than under more decentralized arrangements. The popularity of politicians matters and can help them shift blame. Impending elections modify politicians’ blame avoiding strategies. Politicians tend to be more successful in avoiding blame for program and process failures, and less successful at avoiding blame for political failures. These conclusions demonstrate the likely significance of elections even under semi-authoritarian conditions.