John D Wong\u2019s \u2018Hong Kong Takes Flight: Commercial Aviation and the Making of a Global Hub, 1930s-1998\u2019 (Harvard University Asia Center) is ostensibly a work of history, taking in the early days of flight in the former colony, the incredible sensation of landing at the old Kai Tak Airport, the rise of Cathay Pacific and Dragon Airlines, and HKIA\u2019s role in building Hong Kong as an East-West hub and gateway into China. But Wong, an Associate Professor at the University of Hong Kong, has thoughts about HKIA\u2019s more recent history and potential future. Paul French checked in for an aisle seat and a chat with the academic and author.<\/p>\n
Commercial aviation promised to rewire global traffic flows in the first half of the 20th century. In the 1930s, the British Empire extended its aerial reach to its Hong Kong outpost through the expanding network of Imperial Airways (British Airways\u2019 predecessor). At the same time, American and Chinese interests (Pan Am and its joint venture in Republican China) strove to assert their power by expanding their flight networks in Asia. On this budding route map, Hong Kong appeared as a puddle-jumping stop along the world\u2019s burgeoning skyways.<\/p>\n Keenly aware of the disruptive potential of commercial aviation, both political powers and commercial enterprises attempted to shape the new industry to their advantage and mitigate the risk of seismic impact on the competitive landscape. Institutionally, key players in the logistics business that had dominated previous generations of transportation, particularly shipping, needed to safeguard their commercial interests by asserting their presence on this new technological platform. It should therefore come as no surprise that Swire and Jardine Matheson entered the fray immediately after World War Two<\/a>.<\/p>\n In the decades that followed, with advances in aviation technology, airplanes were able to cover longer distances between stops. To maintain its place on the map, Hong Kong needed to reinforce constantly its strategic criticality, as well as its economic significance to generate the prerequisite traffic flow.<\/p>\n![\"launchpad](\"https:\/\/focus.cbbc.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/lp-general.png\")
<\/a><\/p>\nOne of the most immediately interesting arguments in your book is the notion of the long-term development of Hong Kong as an air traffic \u201chub\u201d. I think many of us think of this strategy as much more recent, but you suggest Hong Kong really worked hard to avoid ending up a peripheral air base from the 1930s?<\/h4>\n