Hong Kong as an Economic Gateway

Hong Kong has played a major role as an economic and financial center in the Asia-Pacific. This role has not been simply as a "connecting point" for economic activity among different worlds, but also as a "gateway" for regulating these differences. Since opening the port in the mid-19th century, following the free trade framework under the "Era of Empires", Hong Kong has cultivated the "connections" and "flows" of people, goods, money, and information from South China to Southeast Asia, the Americas, Oceania, and inland areas of North and Central China. Later, with the emergence of a new era of globalization due to a new world order at the end of the 20th century, the rise of "Open China" makes Hong Kong once again as a gateway between China and the world. However, this role was not established in a day; rather, it is an extension of the multilevel and countless "connections"and "flows" that the city has inherited since the mid-19th century. On this basis, Hong Kong functions as part of not only the Chinese economy but also the regional and global economy even more than before.