Chinese Journal of Communication

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Political scandals, “black materials,” and changing

backstage imaginary in the Hong Kong press,
2001–2015

Francis L. F. Lee

To cite this article: Francis L. F. Lee (2017) Political scandals, “black materials,” and changing
backstage imaginary in the Hong Kong press, 2001–2015, Chinese Journal of Communication,
10:4, 450-465, DOI: 10.1080/17544750.2017.1372492

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/17544750.2017.1372492

Published online: 20 Sep 2017.

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Chinese Journal of Communication, 2017
Vol. 10, No. 4, 450–465, https://doi.org/10.1080/17544750.2017.1372492

Political scandals, “black materials,” and changing backstage

­imaginary in the Hong Kong press, 2001–2015
Francis L. F. Lee*

School of Journalism and Communication, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong

This article examines changes in political communication in Hong Kong in the past
15 years by analyzing the portrayals in mainstream newspapers of the political “back-
stage,” that is, the part of the political process that is kept from public view. Specifically,
the empirical analysis focuses on how the media have utilized the phrase “black mate-
rials” in association with political scandals. Based on the qualitative textual analysis of
news and commentary articles published in six local newspapers, the findings showed
that a significant change occurred in media portrayals of “black material collection”
during the study period. Before 2012, the practice was largely ad hoc or tied to elec-
tions, and the collection of black materials followed largely legal means. After 2012, the
practice was portrayed as routinized, pervasive, and illegal. The changes in the media
portrayals both reflected and constructed China as a powerful state with increasing
levels of intrusion on Hong Kong affairs.
Keywords: political scandals; backstage imaginary; black material; media discourses;
China

Introduction
After the transfer of sovereignty in 1997, Hong Kong was supposed to be governed under
the principles of “one country, two systems” and a “high degree of autonomy.” Many
scholars have recognized that in the immediate years after the handover, China refrained
from intervening deeply and openly in Hong Kong affairs (Tai, 2009; Lee & Chan, 2011).
However, it was believed that China retained control of the most important matters, such as
who would become the chief executive (CE) of the Special Administrative Region (SAR).
In this context, local commentators noted the presence of a “politics of hearsay” in
post-handover Hong Kong (e.g. Leung, 2005). News coverage and commentaries often
discussed the internal operations of the government and the covert communications
between the Central Government and the SAR based on information from so-called “reli-
able internal sources.” Moreover, the news media tended to infer the motivations for the
words and deeds of the political leaders in Hong Kong.
In all societies, politics is conducted both publicly and privately. According to Goffman
(1959, 1974), all political processes consist of a “front stage” and a “backstage.” However,
particularly in authoritarian systems, many government decisions are made backstage and
little information is disseminated about the rationale for them. Hence, it is difficult for
people in such systems to know “what they want to know” (Schedler & Hoffman, 2016).
Hence, in such contexts, there can be a particularly strong dependency on political hearsay.
Against this background, this article examines the Hong Kong media’s changing back-
stage imaginary in the past 15 years. The term backstage imaginary refers to the range of

*Email: francis_lee@cuhk.edu.hk

© 2017 The Centre for Chinese Media and Comparative Communication Research, The Chinese University of Hong Kong
 Chinese Journal of Communication   451

constructed images of the operations of governmental agencies, interactions among polit-

ical actors, and conflicts among political factions, which occur in arenas that are usually
not publicized. Examining the media’s backstage imaginary is a unique means of gaining
insights into the changing processes of political communication in Hong Kong.
Although the term backstage imaginary may be used in different types of news, this
study focuses its use with regard to political scandals, which are an increasingly prominent
phenomenon both worldwide (Allern & Pollack, 2012; Thompson, 2000; Tumber & Wais-
bord, 2004) and in Hong Kong (Scott, 2014). A scandal typically involves a politician’s
transgressions backstage. In Hong Kong, media discourses about scandals often involve
the representation of another backstage: the ways in which information about such scandals
is collected and disseminated. In such discourses, “black materials” (hak-coi-liu) are used
to construct images of the secretive operations of political organizations.
The research questions addressed by this study are the following: How do the media
construct images of backstage political operations in stories about political scandals? How
do these images change over time? What are the implications of the backstage imaginary?
Answering these questions is a means to understand the changes in political communica-
tion in Hong Kong.

The political backstage and its communication

In Goffman’s (1959, 1974) dramaturgical theory of everyday social life, individuals
perform in the public arena on a daily basis according to socially accepted rules and norms.
Public spaces constitute the front stage where social life is conducted. In contrast, the
backstage refers to the private arena, which is not open to the public, and which constitutes
a space where people rehearse their social roles. It is important to restrict access to the
backstage in order to protect the perceived integrity, quality, and authority of the perfor-
mances that take place on the front stage. A person’s sincerity may be questioned and his or
her authority undermined when others gain access to information about his or her actions
backstage (Meyrowitz, 1985).
Goffman’s ideas have been critiqued by subsequent scholars, some of whom ques-
tioned the concept of a backstage where a non-performative self could be found. Moreover,
the backstage of a certain role may simply be the front stage of another role. However, as
a conceptual tool, the front stage–backstage distinction remains highly useful for specific
purposes. For political scientists, the distinction fits with the commonsensical idea that
politicians and government organizations need to maintain a positive public image through
public speech-making, press conference appearances, public visits, and so on (Busby &
Belkacem, 2013; Mawby, 2014; Wodak, 2009). Successful public performances depend on
not only backstage rehearsals but also the support of administrative and/or public relations
operations behind the scenes (Busby & Belkacem, 2013; Dan & Ihlen, 2011; Figenschou
& Thorbjornsrud, 2015; Pallas, Strannegård, & Jonsson, 2014). The front stage–backstage
distinction is also applicable to the analysis of the negotiation processes that take place
among politicians (Naurin, 2007).
Although the backstage is by definition not easily accessible by the audience, it does
not mean that the audience never gains access to it. In some cases, people and o­ rganizations
may strategically offer their audience access to the backstage. Television stations, for
example, may allow fans of certain programs regulated access to studios and shooting
sites (Couldry, 2000). Such visits could serve to reinforce fan loyalty and the perceived
“magic” of television. Celebrities may offer the media glimpses at their private lives, treat-
ing the latter as a kind of “off-screen performance” in order to strengthen their image
452  Francis L. F. Lee

(Breese, 2010). In fact, scholars have noted a trend toward the increasing presentation of
the “backstage” in a wide range of TV programs (Klein Shagrir, 2015; Thornborrow &
Haarman, 2012). Nevertheless, in these cases, the backstage is carefully crafted. It is a
“staged backstage” and not the actual backstage where the behind-the-scenes operations
are conducted.
Similarly, the selective presentation of information about and the construction of publi-
cized images of “backstage activities” could also suit the interests of politicians. Inter-
estingly, Schedler and Hoffmann (2016) argued that authoritarian governments need to
present the political backstage to the public to communicate the cohesion of the elite. On
one hand, authoritarian governments are typically more opaque than democratic states are.
On the other hand, authoritarian governments need to convince the public of the credibility
of their power. If a dictator “wants to prevent his subjects from making ‘rash inferences’
about weakness, he needs to deliver observable evidence of power” (Schedler & Hoff-
mann, 2016, p. 94).
However, the political backstage can be communicated to the public despite politicians’
reluctance to do so, such as by journalists’ endeavors to “uncover the truth.” Zaller (1998)
developed the product-substitution hypothesis with regard to American political commu-
nication, which states that the increasingly sophisticated public relations by politicians
lead journalists to make ever-increasing efforts to debunk the “appearances” in political
campaigning. Schudson (2008) observed that questioning the motivations for officials’
words and deeds is crucial for political journalists to retain their sense of independence.
Reporting about the backstage is also essential for investigative journalists to reveal politi-
cians’ abuse of power and their moral transgressions (Ettema & Glasser, 1998). Moreover,
journalists may simply reveal the political backstage in order to provide the public with
comprehensive information about the political process.
The ways in which the political backstage is constructed in the news can both reflect
and reinforce the society’s and the media’s conception of politics and politicians. In the
US, representations of politicians as selfish in the backstage both reflect and encourage the
political cynicism of the public (Jamieson & Cappella, 1997). In Hong Kong, portrayals of
the operations of the Chinese and Hong Kong government in the backstage arena signify
the society’s understanding and expectations of the government and its leaders.

Media and political scandals

In his influential analysis, Thompson (2000) defined scandals as “actions or events involv-
ing certain kinds of transgressions which become known to others and are sufficiently seri-
ous to elicit a public response” (p. 13). A scandal has five major characteristics. It involves
the transgression of moral, legal, or political norms by an actor. The transgression is first
concealed, but it becomes known to others, or it is strongly believed to have occurred.
The knowledge or the perception of the transgression then elicits the expression of strong
public disapproval in opprobrious discourse. The communication and condemnation of the
transgression usually serve to undermine the reputation of the protagonist.
Hence, a scandal does not refer only to the transgression itself but to the pattern of
communication activities surrounding the publication of the misconduct (Esser & Hartung,
2004). Because the mass media constitute the major platform for the revelation and
communication of scandals, they are also typically media events or media rituals (Cottle,
2006). Some scholars have attempted to characterize a typical scandal process. Kantola
and Vesa (2013) borrowed from Victor Turner’s (1975) theory of social drama to define
a scandal as involving a breach of norms, a crisis following the revelation of the breach,
 Chinese Journal of Communication   453

a redressive action, and a moment of reintegration. Similarly, Jiménez (2004) developed

a six-stage model of scandal. First is the revelation of the transgression, followed by its
publication. The accused parties then defend themselves, and the revealed transgression is
dramatized. Institutional mechanisms then intervene to address the matter. A scandal ends
in stigmatization through which a certain label associated with the misconduct is applied
to the accused protagonist.
Thompson (2000, 2011) attributed the recent increase in political scandals to the chang-
ing social condition of visibility. The development of communication media gave rise to a
kind of de-spatialized publicness, “which allowed for an intimate form of s­ elf-presentation
freed from the constraints of co-presence” (Thompson, 2000, p. 40). In other words, poli-
tics has become personalized. In Goffman’s terminology, the rise of scandal is related to
the blurring of the boundaries between the front stage and the backstage. Political lead-
ers become increasingly adept at presenting a “staged backstage” to the public, which
provokes the media to uncover the “real backstage.” Advanced media technologies have
equipped the media with ever-higher levels of the capacity to do so.
Notably, what constitutes a scandal is partly dependent on social and cultural contexts.
For instance, it is widely observed that sex scandals are prominent in some European
countries (e.g. the UK) but not others (e.g. Germany and Spain), partly because the latter
countries respect politicians’ private lives (Canel & Sanders, 2006; Downey & Stanyer,
2013; Esser & Hartung, 2004). The characterization of the transgression can also evolve
during the scandal event. In some cases, how politicians respond to the revelation of their
transgressions may constitute “second-order transgressions” (Thompson, 2000) that are
perceived as even more serious than the original misconduct.
An example occurred in early 2012 during the election of the chief executive (CE)
in Hong Kong. The election was marked by several scandals concerning the two major
candidates (Scott, 2014).1 Henry Tang, the original favorite in the race, was embroiled in
a scandal about an extra-marital affair, an illegitimate son, and illegal construction in his
home. C. Y. Leung, who won the election, was also charged with having illegal building
structures in his home and having close connections with gangsters. Particularly relevant
to this study is that Leung was accused of systematically collecting information about
the misconduct of Tang and then using it to attack his opponent. The accusation thus was
posited as a scandalous behind-the-scenes collection of information about the moral and
political transgressions of political opponents.
C. Y. Leung denied the accusation. In the present study, the important point is not
whether Leung had indeed operated a systematic scandal-collection machine; the point is
that the backstage of the production of the scandal news story was thematically problem-
atized. For a scandal story to break, investigative journalists often have to depend on the
willingness of insiders to leak the story. Hence, scandals tend to appear more frequently
when there are heightened conflicts among the political elites (Balán, 2011). However,
citizens seldom have access to how a scandal is publicized. In Hong Kong, concrete and
fact-based accounts of scandals are rare, but there is no lack of representations of how
scandal-related information is collected. Portrayals of the production of scandals are often
tied to imagined backstage operations by the Chinese and Hong Kong governments.

Background, data, and method

Hong Kong has witnessed the increasing prominence of political scandals in recent years.
In addition to the broad changes in the social condition of visibility, another plausible
reason for the increase in the number of scandals is the heightened level of conflict among
454  Francis L. F. Lee

the pro-establishment elites, which could have led to the leakage of information to the
press. In any case, a survey of citizens conducted in September 2013 (Lee, 2015a) found
that when asked to name up to three scandals involving politicians or officials, 26.1% of
the respondents named three, while 27.7% named two, and 24.4% named one. Only 21.8%
failed to remember any political scandal. In contrast, when asked to name up to three
government policies that were regarded as “good,” nearly 60% of the respondents did not
name any. These findings indicate the capacity of political scandals to capture the attention
of citizens.
Only a few studies have examined political scandals in Hong Kong. Scott (2014) found
that political scandals illustrated the weaknesses of the current institutions to hold the chief
executive accountable. Lee (2015b) analyzed public opinion about scandals. He focused
on the tendency of people to engage in motivated reasoning and dismiss the factuality and
seriousness of a transgression if they have a positive attitude toward the protagonist. In
another study, Lee (2014) examined how online political satire affected the effects of scan-
dals. However, no previous study has focused on media discourses regarding the construc-
tion and negotiation of particular scandals and/or the general concept of scandals.
This study focuses on media portrayals of “the production of scandals.” Specifically,
it focuses on the use of hak-coi-liu, which literally means “black materials,” in media
discourses. The phrase originated in the Chinese Cultural Revolution when Mao sent
“working groups” to schools to collect information about potential rebels (Lu, 2005). The
term was later generalized to refer to information about political enemies, which could be
utilized to attack them (Siu, 2002; Ma, 2003). In Hong Kong, the term is commonly used to
refer to information about a person or organization that when publicized would “blacken”
them.
Therefore, the phrase has long existed in public discourse, but it became more promi-
nent over time. A search of the electronic news archive Wise News revealed that only nine
articles in the Hong Kong news and commentary pages of six newspapers used the phrase
hak-coi-liu in 2001 (Figure 1). The number fluctuated around 40 and 50 throughout the
2000s. It rose to 95 in 2011 and peaked at 790 in 2012, the year of the CE election. The
number subsequently dropped but remained higher than it was during the 2000s.

Figure 1. Number of newspaper articles using the phrase “black materials” 2001–2015.
 Chinese Journal of Communication   455

The keyword search yielded 1506 articles in six newspapers: the Apple Daily, which
is highly critical of the government; the professional and somewhat liberal-oriented
Ming Pao (MP); the pro-government Oriental Daily and Sing Tao Daily (STD); and two
Communist-sponsored newspapers, Ta Kung Pao (TKP) and Wen Wei Po (WWP). The
­liberal-oriented newspapers used the phrase more frequently: Apple and MP contributed
432 and 322 articles to the corpus. Oriental, STD, TKP, and WWP published 226, 253, 125,
and 148 articles, respectively.
The 1506 articles constituted the corpus used in the textual analysis. The author and
a research assistant read the articles several times to determine the ways in which the
notion of black materials was articulated in the context of themes and ideas. Because of
the study’s conceptual focus on the backstage imaginary, the analysis was focused on three
issues. First, when a collection of black materials was portrayed, we tried to identify who
was portrayed as collecting what kinds of black materials when and about whom. Second,
we paid attention to the descriptions of the methods employed to collect the black materi-
als. Third, we attended to the “pragmatics” of the notion of “black materials” in the texts.
These three focuses were applied to determine whether there were significant changes in
the discourses over time.

The four Ws of collecting black materials

We began the analysis by reviewing the most basic components of the portrayals of collec-
tion and dissemination of black materials. The most basic facts of a news story can be
summarized as 5Ws and 1H. Similarly, the basic characteristics of the portrayals were
determined by focusing on a slightly different set of Ws: who, whom, when, and what.
Table 1 summarizes the number of times someone was portrayed as collecting or
disseminating the black materials against whom.2 We divided the sample into three peri-
ods: before 2012, 2012, and after 2012. In Table 1, the pro-democracy or liberal-oriented
newspapers (Apple and MP) are separated from the pro-establishment press. Several find-
ings are worth highlighting. Before 2012, pro-democracy politicians were the main targets
of black materials in both types of newspapers. In 2012, pro-establishment politicians
became the main targets. This shift reflects the scandal-infused CE election in that year.
After 2012, pro-establishment politicians and Hong Kong government officials remained
the “main targets” of the collection and dissemination of black materials. In other words,
there was a shift in targets during the study period.
However, these findings do not indicate that pro-democracy politicians actively
collected scandal-related information about their opponents. Here, the distinction between
the pro-democracy and pro-establishment newspapers is highly significant. Regarding the
pro-democracy newspapers, the Chinese government, the Hong Kong government, and
the pro-establishment camp have always been the main collectors of black materials. After
2012, no article identified the pro-democracy faction as a collector. In contrast, regard-
ing the pro-establishment newspapers, especially after 2012, the Chinese government was
rarely identified as a collector of black materials. Before 2012, the pro-democracy faction
was the most likely to be identified as a collector. After 2012, the pro-democracy faction
was as likely as the Hong Kong government and pro-establishment politicians were to
be identified as collectors of black materials. In other words, the press mainly identified
people and organizations on the other side of the political divide as the main collectors of
black materials.
This pattern of findings strongly suggests that the collection of black materials was
generally treated as “immoral.” Hence, the portrayal of the collectors of black materials
456  Francis L. F. Lee

Table 1. The who and whom of black material collection.

Period CN gov. HK gov. Pro-gov. Pro-dem. Foreign Others
Who collects/reveals the black materials?
Pro-democracy I (115) 10.4 8.7 17.4 3.5 1.7 58.3
II (391) 5.9 4.9 22.8 6.1 2.3 58.1
III (203) 16.7 17.2 17.7 0.0 2.0 46.2
Pro-establish- I (110) 6.4 10.0 2.7 16.4 3.6 60.9
ment
II (325) 2.8 4.0 22.5 10.8 2.5 57.5
III (95) 1.1 10.1 11.2 11.2 16.9 49.4
Black materials about whom?
Pro-democracy I (116) 1.7 21.6 5.2 50.0 0.0 21.5
II (349) 0.6 13.8 47.0 10.0 0.0 28.7
III (193) 0.0 17.6 29.5 15.5 0.5 36.8
Pro-establish- I (108) 2.8 25.9 9.3 35.2 0.0 26.8
ment
II (285) 0.7 14.4 45.6 7.4 0.0 32.0
III (97) 5.6 25.8 28.1 11.2 0.0 29.3
Note: Entries are percentages. Numbers in parentheses are number of articles based on which the percentages are
calculated. Period I: 2001–2011; Period II: 2012; Period III: 2013–2015. “Others” includes cases in which the
collector/target’s identity is not clearly stated.

was used to undermine the credibility of opponents and/or to defend the politicians on
the same side. This usage was clearly seen in the rise of “foreign powers” as collectors of
black materials in the pro-establishment press during the third period. For example, in late
2014, during the Umbrella Movement, the Australian media broke the story that the Hong
Kong SAR Chief Executive C. Y. Leung had received HKD50 million from an Australian
company immediately before he took office. The following commentary was published in
the Oriental:

In the sensitive moments of Occupy Central, Australian media revealed that Chief Executive
CY Leung had received a huge amount of compensation from an Australian company…. Inter-
nal intelligence of the Chinese Communists has recognized this as a part of “a five-step process
toward overthrowing Leung.” The “black materials” are first provided by foreign intelligence
agencies to their agents in Hong Kong. The information is then leaked to Western media….
Finally, there will be “white-heart” SAR officials to cooperate from within. (“Western powers
plan a five-step process to overthrow Leung,” Oriental, 15 October 2014)

In one sense, the portrayal of “foreign powers” as troublemakers that provoke the social and
political uprisings in Hong Kong has been a frequent theme used by the Chinese govern-
ment and the pro-establishment media (e.g. Lee & Chan, 2011, p. 71). Foreign powers are
portrayed as evil-minded. Discourses such as the above passage may or may not contest
the factuality of such accusations. However, when foreign powers are accused the scandal
becomes a conspiracy, thus undermining the credibility of the scandal by questioning its
motivation.
Another basic element of the portrayal of black material collection is timing. A compar-
ison of the periods before and after 2012 reveals an important shift in the detachment
 Chinese Journal of Communication   457

between the discourses that mention black materials and elections. From 2001 to 2012,
there were three Legislative Council (LegCo) elections (2004, 2008, and 2012), three
District Council elections (2003, 2007, and 2011), and two changes in in the CE (2005
and 2007). There was also a highly controversial LegCo by-election in 2010. In other
words, in the study period only 2001, 2002, 2006, and 2009 were non-election years. They
are precisely the four years with the smallest numbers of articles that mentioned black
­materials.
In contrast, although both 2013 and 2014 were non-election years, the number of arti-
cles mentioning black materials remained relatively large and comparable to 2015 when
a District Council election was held. The dissociation between election times and discus-
sions of black materials indicates a shift toward a perception of the routinized and perva-
sive collection and dissemination of black materials, a point to which we will return below.
Finally, what constitutes the core of the “black materials”? Thompson (2000) differen-
tiated sex scandals, financial scandals, and power scandals. All three categories appeared
in the articles analyzed in the present study. For instance, the category of financial scandals
includes claims about concealed conflicts of interests, failure to declare interests and/or
rewards from other entities, and the severe lack of personal financial discipline. Black
materials that could constitute power scandals include misconduct in the hiring process in
public organizations, misconduct in the performance of the leadership role in the govern-
ment, and so on. Sex scandals include extra-marital affairs, sexual harassment in work-
places, and obtaining sexual services from prostitutes.
In Hong Kong, a unique type of “black materials” consists of allegations in the
­pro-establishment press regarding pro-democracy politicians’ “connections with foreign
powers.” Such allegations are consistent with the tendency of China to emphasize the
threat of intervention by foreign powers. Interestingly, this type of “black materials” often
does not involve words and deeds that are secretive and/or illegal or immoral in any appar-
ent sense (e.g. receiving donations from US institutions). However, in the discourse of
the pro-establishment media, nationalism is the underlying frame of reference. Hence, the
actions of the pro-democracy politicians can be elevated to the “crimes” of “linking with
foreign powers” and “betraying one’s country.”

The pragmatics of black materials

The analysis also considered how the phrase “black materials” was used in the articles.
Three main usages were identified: (1) reporting of “black materials” after their revelation;
(2) attribution to “black materials” when an event called for an explanation; (3) prediction
of the possible revelation of black materials.
The most straightforward use of the term was in post-revelation reporting, particularly
when transgressions by government officials or politicians had already been publicized.
“Black materials” was used simply to refer to the negative information being revealed. The
following two examples are from Apple:

Two days before C. H. Tung’s scheduled announcement … of the list of top government offi-
cials for the accountability system, some of the revealed candidates already have their black
materials being dug up. (“Announcement of name list,” Apple, 19 June 2002)

After the budget announcement, the scandal of his suspected attempt to evade taxes through
gun jumping to purchase his car was revealed, and then there were more and more black
458  Francis L. F. Lee

materials being publicized, leading to calls for his resignation. (“Winning applause through
distributing candies,” Apple, 24 April 2003)

In these passages, the term “black materials” is used to refer to specific pieces of infor-
mation that were already publicized. It functions as a collective reference to a range of
negative information about a politician. Hence, the term is not tied to speculations about
what the politicians or officials may have done, which would be different when “black
materials” were used as a plausible explanation for “otherwise inexplicable” happenings.
The following examples were published in MP:

Cyd Ho suddenly withdraws from the by-election of the Hong Kong Island district. It surprises
quite a few pan-democrats…. Yesterday, there was news saying that Ho withdrew because she
had misrepresented her educational qualification when she was a legislator. (“Black material
scares Cyd Ho,” MP, 5 September 2007)

After Tony Choi [closed down House News] and threw out the statement “I am afraid,” he
did not appear publicly to explain his decision. This led the political circle to speculate if his
family was under pressure, or if there is the threat for revealing black materials related to his
work in the financial sector. (“The downfall of House News,” MP, 28 July 2014)

The similarities between the two articles are so apparent that they may be regarded as having
used the same “news template” (Kitzinger, 2000). In this template, the story begins with
a certain action or decision by a politician or official, which is seen as highly unusual and
therefore requiring an explanation. However, the main actor does not provide a convincing
explanation, which leads to speculation about the “real reasons.” The existence of some
kinds of “black materials” thus becomes a plausible “hypothesis.”
A notable difference between the two passages is that, in the first case, the content of
the black materials is suggested, but unconfirmed. The identification of the content of the
black materials contributes to ideas regarding the kinds of negative information that may
be regarded as scandalous. In the second passage about the founder of an online news site,
the black materials hypothesis remains a general one. The plausibility of the statement
“black materials related to his work in the financial sector” is grounded in the plausibility
of the idea that people in the financial sector are likely to be guilty of some misconduct.
This kind of narrative, therefore, is arguably grounded in the general distrust of politicians
and political organizations, a point to which we will return in the concluding section.
The possibility of invoking the notion of black materials without identifying their
contents expands the applicability of the notion. If it is generally believed that all politi-
cians and officials are guilty of some backstage misconduct that could constitute “black
materials,” and it is unimportant to be able to name the specific misconduct, then the gener-
alized idea of black materials could constitute a convenient explanation for any seemingly
inexplicable behavior. Moreover, the generalized idea of black materials also leads to the
possibility that it could be invoke before a predicted political event actually occurred. The
following two excerpts are examples:

People in the political sector believe that Beijing would prosecute people who have joined the
occupation, attack them through legal means and blackening them through public discourses
… “in order to damage the image of the pan-democrats. Those who come out to run for the
District Council or Legislative Council elections would either have legal cases to deal with
or have black materials being unearthed.” (“Beijing starts the election machine,” Apple, 24
January 2015)
 Chinese Journal of Communication   459

The Snowden case has shown that America is closely collaborating with the “strategic lurkers”
in Hong Kong in its Internet war. It is not a surprise that … a large number of “black materials”
emerge … hanging over the heads of future chief executive election candidates like a sword.
(“Beware of lurkers in the occupation,” WWP, 4 June 2013)

The two examples are from different sides of the political divide, but they share the charac-
teristic of the highly generalized reference to “black materials.” Moreover, both passages
treat the collection and dissemination of black materials as part of a holistic and compre-
hensive strategy for attacking opponents. The “black materials” that are to be publicized,
therefore, would be questionable not because of the validity of their contents but because
of the motivation for their dissemination. In the political process, such discourses could
function as a pre-established “bumper” that could help “cushion the blow” when negative
news is published about the politicians or officials on the same side. The publication of
any negative information about politicians or officials that emerged afterwards could be
deemed part of a political conspiracy that was predicted beforehand. In the conspiracy
script, the politicians or officials whose misconduct was publicized would become the
victim of an organized attack instead of an immoral figure who tried to conceal backstage
transgressions.
The two examples cited above were published in 2013 and 2015. Indeed, the invocation
of black materials to explain inexplicable events and to predict future events increased in
frequency during the study period. This finding is consistent with that showing the disso-
ciation between elections and the invocation of black materials. When “black materials” is
used in a generalized manner, and the term no longer refers to publicized information, it is
easier to invoke at any time. The expansion in the utility of “black materials” thus contrib-
uted to the increased pervasiveness of the concept in the public discourse.

Imagining the process of black material collection

In the previous section, passages were quoted that indicated certain political operations in
the backstage arena. However, how are “black materials” about others collected? Relevant
descriptions do not appear frequently. Nevertheless, the articles involving such descrip-
tions were in the minority and published mainly in the pro-democracy papers, positioning
the government as a collector of black materials. This finding is highly illustrative of the
changing imaginations of the political backstage in Hong Kong. The following two exam-
ples were published in the mid-2000s:

[P]eople in the political field were running around and saying that, several months ago, quite
a few people from the mainland – believed to be staffs from the national security department
– had a “prolonged stay” of one week in the Legislative Council’s library in Central…. They
were checking records, “finding stuff.” There are claims that what they looked at was primar-
ily publicly available information about legislators’ declaration of interests. (“Big machine
collecting ‘black material,’” MP, 24 August 2004)

Before Ching Cheong surrendered his computer, those national security people who talked to
her said that Ching “is not the suspect.” However, after the surrendering of the computer, the
national security people found the articles Ching wrote for Taiwan organizations, and they
immediately treated the articles as black materials, charging Ching for working as a spy for
Taiwan. (“Mrs. Ching plans to launch an appeal to the leaders,” Apple, 27 November 2006)
460  Francis L. F. Lee

Both examples claim that the Chinese government collected black materials using “legal
means.”3 In fact, the operations were conducted only partially backstage. In the first
example, the national security officers looked at publicly available records in a publicly
accessible place. It was a backstage operation only in the sense that the operation was not
publicized. In the second example, the “black materials” were collected during a formal
investigation in China. It was a backstage operation only in the sense that the investigation
processes concerned were typically not under public scrutiny. Moreover, the collection of
black materials was portrayed as ad hoc and temporary. In the first passage, a one-week
stay is described as a “prolonged” stay.
In both examples, the process of collecting black materials depicted is not particularly
“scandalous.” If the second example involved some questionable conduct, the national
security officers in China could treat articles written by a veteran journalist as evidence of
spying. The process by which the national security officers collected the articles did not
seem to be problematic.
In contrast, after 2012, the collection of black materials was often tied to illegal organ-
izations and/or conduct. The first new feature of the relevant depictions was the involve-
ment of gangsters. The following provides an example:

[T]he political circle has long heard of the news that national security was involved in col-
lecting black materials about Tang. In the collaboration between the China Liaison Office and
national security to push Leung to become the CE, they had relied on a group of people from
the Societies, and people in the political field or local districts who are connected with the
Societies. (“The dinner at Siu Tao Yuen,” Apple, 8 October 2014)

This passage is in a “background article” that recounts a rumored meeting between C. Y.

Leung and gangsters during the 2012 CE election. The meeting itself was a minor scandal
during the CE election. In the above passage, the meeting was embedded in a more elab-
orate story about the role played by the gangsters (i.e. the Societies) during the election.
The involvement of criminal organizations made the process of collecting black materials
highly questionable both morally and legally.
In addition to gangsters, hackers constitute another category of people who were
portrayed as the agents responsible for collecting black materials for the government:

Those rich people … have changed what they say in the past year. Those who are discerning
have inferred that many rich people … have already had their materials falling into the hands
of the “special forces,” who could dispatch national-level hackers to steal commercial and
personal secrets. The hackers are larger in number, more efficient and cheaper than the Red
Guards. Maybe the rich people and the second generation were only smoking a bit of marijua-
na in the mainland or gambling a few hands in Macau with a few [beautiful girls], but all these
would be filed. (“Pocket it first,” Apple, 2 September 2014)

This passage illustrates several other characteristics of the depictions of the collection of
black materials in recent years. First, it depicts the process as highly efficient and effective,
involving the use of new technologies by “national-level talents,” which contrasts with
sending a large number of officers to Hong Kong checking published records “by hand.”
Second, it depicts the collection process as pervasive, including almost all important busi-
ness people in Hong Kong and their “second generation.” The extension of the targets
from politicians to business people reflects, on one hand, the public roles played by many
business people in the city. On the other hand, it connotes the state’s attempt to exert even
tighter ideological control of the city through ensuring the absence of dissenting views.
 Chinese Journal of Communication   461

Third, different from the idea of collecting information about politicians’ d­ eclarations
of interests, the black materials referred to in the above passage did not concern the
misconduct of the targets when they carried out their public duties. The black materials
were believed to include commercial and personal privacies. Fourth, the reference to items
such as “smoking a bit of marijuana” connotes that the collection was comprehensive.
Detailed information was obtained. In its collection of black materials, the state is therefore
portrayed as omniscient.
Finally yet importantly, the depiction alters the purpose of collecting black materials.
It is no longer a method used to prepare attacks on political opponents at strategic times
(e.g. elections). Instead, it is portrayed as a routinized method utilized by the state to ensure
the obedience of its supporters. This finding is consistent with the previous finding that
black materials were increasingly linked in recent years in relation to predictions of what
could happen in the future. Overall, the analysis showed that passages such as the above
constructed an arguably more chilling scenario in which a potent state extended its back-
stage operations into a regularized “panopticon” in order to surveil public figures in Hong
Kong.

Concluding discussion
This study examined how the notion of black materials was invoked in newspaper
discourses concerning political scandals in Hong Kong and the kinds of backstage imagi-
naries that were constructed in such discourses. The analysis showed a significant change
in the dominant backstage imaginary over time. Before 2012, the collection of black mate-
rials was portrayed, especially in the pro-democracy press, as mainly conducted by the
government and the pro-establishment forces against pro-democracy politicians. Black
materials were collected specifically in the electoral context. Furthermore, the notion of
black materials was often used to describe publicized negative information. The process of
collecting black materials was portrayed as largely an ad hoc effort to obtain information
through legal means.
In contrast, after 2012, the notion of black materials was frequently invoked to explain
public figures’ actions or to predict future events. The process used to collect black mate-
rials was also more elaborately described than in previous years. After 2012, the collection
of black materials was deemed scandalous, and the collection process was portrayed as
involving illegal means and/or organizations. The process was sometimes portrayed as
part of an elaborate scheme. Moreover, although the pro-establishment press continued to
portray “foreign powers” as agents that collected black materials in order to attack China,
in the pro-democracy press the collection of black materials became a method used by the
Chinese state to ensure the loyalty of political and business figures. In line with the change
in purpose, the notion of black materials was detached from specific information. The
collection of black materials was considered a pervasive and routinized practice.
It should be emphasized that the immorality of the collection of black materials is unre-
lated to whether they are true or not. In fact, in the portrayals analyzed in this study, the
black materials are always presumed truthful. If the black materials were not truthful, the
Chinese state or any political organizations would not need to “collect” them; they would
only need to fabricate them. Therefore, the process of collecting black materials could be
scandalous not because of issues of truthfulness but because of the identity of the collector,
the motivations for the action, and the selectivity exercised. That is, compared with a news
organization that indiscriminately reveals the misconduct of politicians in order to serve
the public interest, “black material collection” could be regarded as scandalous when the
462  Francis L. F. Lee

power holders selectively collected negative information about their political opponents in
order to strengthen their power.
In this study, 2012 is the “cut-off” point because the CE election in that year provoked an
extraordinary amount of discussion about political scandal. On one hand, there are reasons
to believe that the events in 2012 had a significant impact on media discourses surround-
ing political scandal. During the CE election in 2012, the collection of black materials
was treated as a “scandal” for the first time. It was also during the election that conflicts
among the pro-establishment elites were foregrounded by the media. The 2012 election
thus provided new themes and templates for subsequent media reporting and commentary
on political scandal. On the other hand, the changes in the backstage imaginary were also
consistent with the broad social and political changes that emerged in other years. The
portrayal of the intrusive, potent, and routinized collection of black materials as initiated
by China is consistent with the perceived changes in China’s approach to Hong Kong since
2003. After the 1 July protest in 2003, which compelled the Hong Kong government to
postpone national security legislation, the Chinese government was concerned with the
failure of “the return of Hong Kong people’s hearts.” Hence, it has intervened increasingly
in Hong Kong affairs (Lee & Chan, 2011; Tai, 2009). In recent years, especially after
C. Y. Leung took office as the CE, there were also discussions of “governing of Hong
Kong by Sai Wan,” which is the district where the China Liaison Office is located. The
new portrayal of the collection of black materials is therefore part of a broad backstage
imaginary that concerns the backstage process by which the Chinese government seeks to
exercise direct control over Hong Kong.
Because of China’s increasing influence in Hong Kong, it is certainly plausible that
the portrayals of the systematic collection of black materials are based on reality. Never-
theless, such portrayals remain imaginary to the extent that the factuality of the portrayals
cannot be directly confirmed. Moreover, for the portrayals to be convincing, they have to
be grounded in the reality that is already constructed through other public discourses. That
is, the plausibility of the portrayal depends on how well it fits the web of intertextuality
created through the relationships in a full range of news texts. As mentioned, the portrayal
of China’s attempt to collect black materials in Hong Kong is consistent with the image of
an increasingly interventionist China. The involvement of gangsters and hackers is consist-
ent with news stories emerging from other contexts, such as the suspected involvement of
gangsters in the counter-protests against the Umbrella Movement in 2014, and the news
about hacker attacks against pro-democracy parties, media, and even universities in Hong
Kong. In other words, the backstage imaginary created is not arbitrary. It can be considered
a representation that is constructed by the interweaving of widely publicized and adopted
themes and ideas.
Moreover, the backstage imaginary is probably grounded in deeply rooted elements in
a society’s public culture. The portrayal of an omnipotent Chinese state that employs illegal
means to attack its political opponents and threaten its allies may be considered rooted in
the strong fear of the Chinese Communist Party-State and the perception that the Chinese
state could be unscrupulous. Moreover, for the generalized notion of black materials to
constitute a plausible explanation for politicians’ actions, one has to accept the plausibility
that most politicians are likely to conceal some transgressions. Carey (1986) pointed out
that the question “why” is elusive in journalism. However, journalism grounded in a certain
culture tends to offer specific types of explanations. In the Hong Kong context, citizens
have long held the view that politics is dirty and politicians are not trustworthy (Lam,
2004). Thus, in Hong Kong, people accept the idea that politicians’ actions can be affected
when their “black materials” are in the hands of others, even when the content is unknown.
 Chinese Journal of Communication   463

Overall, this study showed that a society’s political culture and social and political
changes are reflected in the backstage imaginary that surrounds political scandals. Beyond
the Hong Kong context, the findings of this study have implications for the ways in which
backstage imaginaries can arise in contexts of political opacity. By examining such back-
stage imaginaries, researchers could gain insights into society’s perceptions and beliefs
about the political process.
It was beyond the scope of the present study to examine the effects of the backstage
imaginaries analyzed. We do not know whether the portrayal would indeed result in a chill-
ing effect on politicians and public figures. Interestingly, the possibility of such a chilling
effect may also lead to the question of whether the portrayal of the potent state machine is
in the interests of the Chinese state. As Schedler and Hoffmann (2016) explicated, authori-
tarian states are typically non-transparent, yet they also have an interest in communicating
their power in order to avoid being perceived as weak and vulnerable by the opposition.
The image of a potent state machine that collects black materials may undermine the
perceived moral integrity of the Chinese government, but it would serve to strengthen the
perception of a powerful state.
The findings showed that newspapers in Hong Kong typically assumed that politi-
cians on their side of the political divide were the targets of black materials. Hence, it is
suggested that the invocation of black materials to predict future events may help “cushion
the blow” when negative information about a politician is published. However, whether
this impact indeed exists is another question that requires empirical investigation. Moreo-
ver, it would be interesting to determine whether discourses about the collection of black
materials generated or reinforced political cynicism. Empirical studies have examined how
the consumption and effects of actual political scandals relate to levels of political cyni-
cism among the public (Dancey, 2012; Lee, 2014). However, in the context of the present
study, the question is whether portrayals of the operation of the black material collection
machine could have similar effects on public cynicism. In any case, the effects of back-
ground imaginaries on the behavior of politicians and public opinion constitute an intrigu-
ing topic for future research.

Notes
  1. There were three candidates in the 2012 CE election. However, the CE election in Hong Kong
is not democratic. Only the 1200 members of the electoral committee could vote, and political
conservatives dominated the committee. Hence, only the two pro-establishment candidates had
a realistic chance to win.
  2. Since the present study is not a quantitative content analysis, and discerning the basic compo-
nents of the portrayals of black material collection requires judgment and familiarity with the
political field in Hong Kong, no inter-coder reliability was calculated.
  3. Regarding the first case, it could be contested that mainland national security officers do not
have the right to conduct formal investigations in Hong Kong. However, it could also be argued
that checking publicly available materials does not constitute a formal investigation. In any
case, even if the mainland officers were considered to act in contravention of the constitutional
arrangement of the SAR, their actions were “legal” in the sense that they did not violate specific
criminal laws in Hong Kong.

Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
464  Francis L. F. Lee

Funding
This work was supported by a General Research Fund Grant offered to the author by the Research
Grants Council of the Hong Kong SAR Government (project no.: cuhk14405914).

Notes on contributor
Francis L. F. Lee is Director and Professor at the School of Journalism and Communication, Chinese
University of Hong Kong. He is the author or lead author of Media, Social Mobilization and Mass
Protests in Post-colonial Hong Kong (Routledge, 2011), Talk Radio, the Mainstream Press, and Pub-
lic Opinion in Hong Kong (Hong Kong University Press, 2014), and Media and Protest Logics in the
Digital Era: Hong Kong’s Umbrella Movement (Oxford University Press, forthcoming).

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