by Sasha Gong
Freedom is not self-sustaining. A society can possess it for generations and still lose it within a few years.
Can communism come to America? Until recently, most Americans would have dismissed the question as alarmist, even absurd. The United States has enjoyed constitutional government for nearly 250 years. Its citizens are accustomed to elections, private property, free speech, independent courts, and a press that openly challenges those in power. Surely, many assume, a people raised in freedom would never tolerate dictatorship.
The rapid rise of Democratic Socialism has made the question less theoretical. The movement draws strength from the same seductive promise that has accompanied every socialist and communist experiment: government can eliminate inequality by taking greater control over economic life and redistributing wealth more justly.
Anyone with even limited knowledge of communist history knows what follows. Equality is promised, but scarcity is delivered. The old upper class is denounced, but a new political class emerges with privileges unavailable to ordinary citizens. Economic control requires political control because people must be prevented from resisting confiscation, rationing, and bureaucratic direction. Institutions intended to be temporary become permanent. Opposition becomes “sabotage,” and criticism becomes “disinformation.” Before long, dissenters become enemies of the people, and the FBI begins to resemble the KGB.
But can an already free society really travel backward? Can people who have known liberty be persuaded, intimidated, or exhausted into surrendering it?
We do not have to speculate. We are staring at the answer in Hong Kong.
For decades under British rule, Hong Kong was one of the freest societies in Asia. The Heritage Foundation consistently ranked it at or near the top of its Index of Economic Freedom. It had independent newspapers, outspoken political magazines, vigorous labor unions, public demonstrations, and courts widely respected for their professionalism. In a territory of only several million people, an extraordinary variety of Chinese-language publications competed for readers. Hongkongers could criticize their government, denounce the Chinese Communist Party, and commemorate events that Beijing had erased from public memory.
The most important of those commemorations was the annual candlelight vigil for the victims of the June 4, 1989, Tiananmen Square massacre. For more than three decades, the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China organized the gathering. Tens of thousands of people assembled peacefully in Victoria Park, holding candles and insisting that the dead would not be forgotten.
On August 21, Hong Kong’s High Court convicted the now-disbanded Alliance and its former leaders Lee Cheuk-yan, Chow Hang-tung, and Albert Ho of “inciting subversion of state power.” Lee and Chow contested the charge; Ho pleaded guilty before the trial. Their mitigation hearing is scheduled for August 28, and under the National Security Law, they could receive prison terms of up to ten years. Two of the defendants are my personal friends. I have known them for decades.
They are not terrorists or insurrectionists. Lee is one of Hong Kong’s best-known labor leaders; Chow and Ho are lawyers. Their alleged offense arose from their work with an organization that defended democratic principles and preserved the memory of Tiananmen. The court’s judgment acknowledged that the Alliance had neither used nor advocated violence. Yet its demand for an end to one-party dictatorship was treated as an attack on the state itself—and, in today’s Hong Kong, as an act of treason.
This transformation did not occur in a single day. After Britain transferred sovereignty over Hong Kong to China in 1997, Beijing promised the territory a “high degree of autonomy” under the formula of “one country, two systems.” Hongkongers were told that their freedoms, legal system, and way of life would remain unchanged for 50 years.
That promise was gradually hollowed out. Beijing tightened its control over elections and political institutions. In 2019, enormous demonstrations erupted, including a march estimated to have drawn two million people. Instead of addressing Hongkongers’ demands for accountable government, Beijing imposed the National Security Law in 2020. The law criminalized broadly defined acts of secession, subversion, terrorism, and collusion with foreign forces. Independent newspapers closed, opposition organizations dissolved, activists fled abroad, and thousands of people were arrested.
The Alliance itself disbanded in September 2021, ending its 32-year history after its leaders were arrested and charged. The June 4 vigil had already been prohibited in 2020, officially because of the COVID-19 pandemic. It never returned.
I recognize this process because I lived under Chinese communism. In 1974, while still in China, I joined an underground pro-democracy group in Guangzhou. We circulated samizdat-style writings calling for political reform. Some of our articles were smuggled into Hong Kong, where sympathetic students supported us. I was eventually imprisoned and spent a year in solitary confinement. After my release, Hongkongers reached out to us with material assistance and solidarity.
I came to the United States as a student in 1987 and became an American citizen in 2001. I have never been a Hong Kong resident. Yet in July, Hong Kong authorities placed a bounty of 200,000 Hong Kong dollars on my head, accusing me of participating in activities intended to overthrow the government.
My supposed crime was exercising my rights as an American on American soil. Since 2020, I have appeared on Cantonese-language online programs. As a native Cantonese speaker, I have explained the American constitutional system—checks and balances, representative government, free elections, and the principle that legitimate authority comes from the consent of the governed. I have criticized Britain for denying Hong Kong full democracy and Beijing for destroying its rule of law.
For this, a foreign authoritarian regime claims jurisdiction over me.
That is the final lesson Americans must learn from Hong Kong. Dictatorship does not always arrive with tanks in the streets. It can advance through legal language, institutional pressure, and the redefinition of ordinary political activity as a threat to “national security.” Courts may continue to operate, newspapers may continue to publish, and elections may still be held—but each gradually loses its independence and meaning.
Freedom is not self-sustaining. A society can possess it for generations and still lose it within a few years. Hong Kong’s people did not suddenly stop valuing liberty. They were deprived of the institutions through which liberty could be defended.
Americans should therefore scrutinize every political movement—left or right—that concentrates power, treats opponents as enemies, suppresses speech in the name of safety, or promises equality at the price of individual independence. Hong Kong’s tragedy is not merely a distant human rights story. It is a warning.
Yes, a free society can become a dictatorship. I know because I have lived under one—and because I have watched another being built where freedom once flourished.
Sasha Gong holds a Ph.D. from Harvard University. Born in China, she joined the
pro-democracy dissident movement at the age of 17 and spent a year in
prison for her activism.
Source: https://amgreatness.com/2026/08/26/hong-kong-shows-how-a-free-society-can-become-a-dictatorship/
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