【明報專訊】Political participation refers to people's participation in actions that affect public affairs and government policies in order to advance social reform and monitor the government's administration. There are two types of political participation, namely institutional participation (such as elections and public consultation exercises) and non-institutional participation (such as demonstrations).

Related concepts：

．social justice

．public opinion

．political culture

Elections

District councilors and Legislative councilors are chosen by Hong Kong citizens who are eligible to vote. Furthermore, Article 45 of the Basic Law states that the method for selecting the Chief Executive shall be specified ''in accordance with the principle of gradual and orderly progress''. In the 2016 Legislative Council geographical constituency elections, the turnout was 58.28%, which was an all-time high.

Public consultation

Before launching new policies, the government normally solicits the views of citizens through public consultation exercises. It does so to improve the policies and find a balance between the demands of different stakeholders. But in recent years, the government has been repeatedly criticized for not launching public consultation exercises.

Parades and demonstrations

The Basic Law stipulates that Hong Kong citizens have freedom of assembly, of procession and of demonstration. This is an important part of Hong Kong people's non-institutional means of political participation. In 2003, Hong Kong, faced with a string of social and political problems, an economic downturn and the proposed Article 23 legislation, was convulsed with anger. More than 500,000 people took part in a mass demonstration on 1st July.

Social activism

In social activism, people take part in planned and organized social movements. In September 2014, large groups of students and citizens, striving for ''real universal suffrage'' without a screening exercise, started a mass protest in what was later called the ''Umbrella Movement'', which was to last for 79 days. In August 2017, Joshua Wong, Alex Chow and Nathan Law, leaders of the protest, were sentenced to six to eight months in prison for unlawful assembly and other offences.

◆Mainland China: Defence of rights(維權)

The defence of rights in mainland China was vigorously suppressed by the government. Li Wangyang(李旺陽), who had been in prison on and off for 22 years for his participation in the 1989 fight for democracy, was found to have ''committed suicide'' in hospital in 2012 in mysterious circumstances. For 5 years his younger sister and brother-in-law tried to find the truth, but they were repeatedly stalked, monitored and harassed by government agents. In 9 July 2015, hundreds of right-defensing lawyers and dissidents (異見人士) were spirited away or ''invited for conversation'' in what was called the ''709 great arrest''(709大抓捕).

◆Europe: Referendums(公投)

A referendum is an occasion when all the people of a country or a region vote on an important issue in order to decide whether to support a policy. Examples include the Brexit referendum in June 2016 and the Scottish independence referendum in 2014. In the Brexit referendum, 52 percent of Britains voted in favour of leaving the European Union (EU) as opposed to 48 percent who voted against the motion. Britain will become the first country to leave the EU.

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