Lau Siu Kai () (born 1947), GBS, is a sociologist from Hong Kong. He graduated from the

University of Hong Kong The University of Hong Kong (HKU) (Chinese: 香港大學) is a public research university in Hong Kong. Founded in 1887 as the Hong Kong College of Medicine for Chinese, it is the oldest tertiary institution in Hong Kong. HKU was also the fi ...

, and taught at the Department of Sociology of the

Chinese University of Hong Kong The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) is a public research university in Ma Liu Shui, Hong Kong, formally established in 1963 by a charter granted by the Legislative Council of Hong Kong. It is the territory's second-oldest university an ...

, where he is emeritus professor of sociology, after earning a PhD degree from the

University of Minnesota The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Tw ...

. During his tenure at CUHK he was also associate director of the university's Hong Kong Institute of Asia-Pacific Studies. He was head of the

government A government is the system or group of people governing an organized community, generally a state. In the case of its broad associative definition, government normally consists of legislature, executive, and judiciary. Government is a ...

's think tank, the

Central Policy Unit The Central Policy Unit, established in 1989, was responsible for advising the Chief Executive (previously the Governor) of Hong Kong. It was replaced with the Policy Innovation and Co-ordination Unit in 2018. Previous heads * Leo Goodstadt ( ...

, for a decade from 2002. In this role, he famously under-predicted attendance on the 1 July 2003 protest march at '30,000', when in fact more than 500,000 joined to reject the planned introduction of legislation to enact Article 23 of the Basic Law, along with other grievances, ultimately leading to the resignation of

Chief Executive A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...

Tung Chee Hwa Tung Chee-hwa (; born 7 July 1937) is a Hong Kong businessman and politician who served as the first Chief Executive of Hong Kong between 1997 and 2005, upon the transfer of sovereignty on 1 July. He is currently a vice-chairman of the Chine ...

. Lau was appointed delegate to the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference in 2003 and is vocal in his support for watering down democratic development in Hong Kong by, for example, restricting the scope for nomination of candidates for the election of Chief Executive of the Hong Kong SAR in 2017, and for greater integration of Hong Kong into China's economic planning. In January 2021, Lau said that only "patriots who love Hong Kong" and are supportive of the government should be able to run in elections. In February 2021, he said that the Legislative Council at the time did not have enough members to approve changes to electoral laws, and predicted Beijing would step in to pass changes to the electoral system.

References

External links

HKIAPS
1947 births Living people Government officials of Hong Kong Members of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference Alumni of the University of Hong Kong Hong Kong sociologists Alumni of St. Paul's College, Hong Kong University of Minnesota alumni Chinese University of Hong Kong faculty Hong Kong Affairs Advisors {{Asia-sociologist-stub