Hong Kong is now China’s Special Administrative Region with some sorts of electoral democracy. The Hong Kong Police also missioned to provide ‘service’ and must be ‘accountable’ to the citizens under the government leadership who are composed of ‘elected’ politicians. The Hong Kong Police got quite good public satisfaction rate for their performance in the first decade of sovereignty retrocession, but it is now subject to public skepticism over their responsiveness accompanying the outbreak of controversial policing issues, and integrity issue of individual officers.
Hong Kong adopts the ‘Review Board Oversight Model’ in enhancing police accountability to the public and ensuring the disciplinary management of the police officers. This ‘two-tier auditing mechanism’ was considered as an optimal arrangement for effective law enforcement and behavioral supervision for the police force. However, the mechanism has been consistently suspected as ‘toothless tiger’ due to the absence of proactive investigation power and elected representatives in the institute. The police authorities, nevertheless, still emphasize the effectiveness of the prevailing model as it could integrate the professionalism of policing and external supervision from elites across sectors.
This study conducts an in-depth review to police oversight mechanisms of the selected common law jurisdictions and fellow Asian cities, aiming at exploring the key practices and their merits/ limitations in achieving the two most important purposes of police oversight- ensuring internal hierarchical accountability and enhancing external public accountability of the police force. Three major areas of controversies addressed in literature will be particularly investigated- representation, empowerment and professionalism of the oversight mechanism. On the top of overseas experience, the study would also include a comprehensive assessment on the opinion orientation of different stakeholders who have pleasant, unpleasant and also no experience from the current police oversight mechanism. The study expects to provide both qualitative and numerical findings that should be valuable references for introducing possible reforms on the current amateur-led, review board oversight model that was inherited from the colonial period.
1 – To overview and highlight the key features of police oversight agencies in selected western common law jurisdictions and Asian cities - their mission. organization, empowerment, and major controversies of their effectiveness
2 – To review the evolution and practices of the police oversight mechanism in Hong Kong. How does it evolve to the prevailing form and its major similarities and differences with the overseas practices?
3 – To examine the latest feedback of stakeholders (police, oversight agency members, complainants and citizens) to the police oversight mechanism in Hong Kong for enhancing accountability and discipline management of the force.
4 – To offer comprehensive data and recommendations for possible reforms on the practicing CAPO- IPCC ‘Review Board Model’ of police oversight in Hong Kong to rebuild the public trust towards the police after the six months saga.