Chi-Kwan Mark

I am a diplomatic/international historian with a focus on Hong Kong, Britain and China in the Cold War period. When I did my D.Phil. at Oxford many years ago, my approach was more of traditional Diplomatic History than what is now called ‘International History’. Based on my D.Phil. thesis, my first monograph examines how the British and American governments discussed, debated and disagreed over Hong Kong’s role in the Cold War, and revealed the dynamics of the Anglo-American alliance and the dilemmas of vulnerable allies in a global conflict. By embracing the ‘cultural turn’ in the study of diplomatic relations, my second monorgaph explores Anglo-Chinese relations between 1950 and 1972. Inspired by the concept of ‘the everyday’, it argues that Britain and China were engaged in an ‘everyday Cold War’, characterised by diplomatic ritual, propaganda rhetoric and symbolic retaliation. My third monograph examines Britain-China-Hong Kong relations in the 1980s from global, diplomatic, and imperial perspectives. Influenced by neoliberalism, Thatcher's Britain actively engaged with China in order to promote globalisation and manage Hong Kong's decolonisation.

Whatever the approach, Hong Kong is an important lens through which I illuminate a range of broader themes. As such, the Hong Kong case is used to explore not only the city's history, but also British imperial history (defence, decolonisation, and development), diplomatic history (Sino-British, Sino-American, and Anglo-American relations), and global history (refugees, tourism, and globalisation).

I am interested in supervising Ph.D. topics relating to Hong Kong history, Anglo-Chinese relations, British decolonisation, and the Cold War in Asia.