Everyday life resistance in a post-colonial global city : a study of two illegal hawker agglomerations in Hong Kong

Abstract

This thesis is an interpretative ethnographic of two illegal hawker agglomerations sustained in the post-colonial Hong Kong. The focus of concern is on researching the everyday life resistance of the urban underclass living in a polarizing global city with a renewed Bourdieuian’s theory of practice. The persistence and resistance of illegal hawking and petty trading has denoted a reoriented street/informal politics countering the regulation and upsurge of the neo-liberal governance from the present entrepreneurial state. These groups of local and trans-local underclass have struggled tacitly and tactically in the margin to gain their independence and autonomy albeit under tight state control. During the research process, the author has identified a multiple layers of informal economic markets overlapping within a poor community located in the inner urban area.

Date of Award	2008
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology