Based on Hood and Lodge (2006) we examine various public service bargains in Hong Kong that have seen civil servants exchange loyalty and expertise for rewards. Colonial Hong Kong, similar to many pre-democratic states, was characterized by a trustee-type bargain that provided considerable autonomy for the civil service. In 1997 China resumed sovereignty over Hong Kong. Regime change saw Hong Kong’s new political elite attempt to impose an agency-type bargain, which the civil service resisted. As a result, from 1997 to 2002 no bargain may be said to have existed. During that time, the loyalty of the civil service was called into question and civil service salaries were cut. In 2002 the post-colonial political elite imposed a new governance structure, the ‘principal official accountability system’ that established the conditions for an agency-type bargain. But this new system required civil servants play a less significant role in the policy making process. They were no longer responsible for policy as they had been for the previous 150 years. After a brief interregnum of rule by a political executive composed mostly of outsiders, in 2007 retired civil servants were appointed to most political positions, which made the terms of an agency-type bargain more acceptable to the bureaucracy. The paper is based on archival material and 55 interviews with current and retired political appointees and very senior civil servants, who describe in detail their perception of how the relationship has changed since 1997.
