ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses social mobilization processes behind a number of large-scale protest campaigns in Hong Kong between 2003 and 2014. It focuses particularly on the role of citizen self-mobilization in the formation of these protests. Discussions of the July 1 protest series, the annual June 4 commemoration rallies, the anti-national education movement, and the Umbrella Movement lead to the identification of three overlapping but distinctive meanings of citizen self-mobilization. That is, established social movement organizations, informal and ad hoc groups, and the self-mobilizing individual citizen-protesters relate to and interact with each other in the various movements differently, leading to a number of protest formations. Generally speaking, the analysis illustrates how citizen self-mobilization compensated for the weaknesses of social and political organizations in Hong Kong and made large-scale protests possible. Against the background of a culture of de-politicization, citizen self-mobilization also became idealized in public discourses. However, the case of the Umbrella Movement illustrated the tension between citizen self-mobilization and effective movement coordination.
