95 On 30 June 1997, the day before the handover of sovereignty and the ofcial ending of Hong Kong as a British colony, there was an alternative “celebration” event that happened in the central area of the city. The event was organised by “The Hong Kong People’s Coalition for the Alternative Handover” (Mathews, Ma and Lui 2008: 50). The Coalition was formed by over 20 non-governmental groups such as labour unions, students, religious and women’s groups. The “celebration” showcased the diferent voices of grassroots groups towards the handover of sovereignty and acted as a resistance to the series of ofcial celebration that to- tally ignored the diverse and dissident voices existed in the civil society. Feminist activits and progressive women’s groups played a prominent role in this alternative handover event. 1 On the eve of Hong Kong’s handover, these events symbolically showed how feminist activism is intimately linked to the political development of Hong Kong and how it is going to be a constituting part of Hong Kong’s political struggle after 1997. In this chapter, we will ofer an overview of feminist activism of Hong Kong before and after 1997 and in particular, focus on the emerging issues and challenges in the aspects of cross-border politics, ethnicity and class. It is hoped that the experience of Hong Kong, esp- cially that in the postcolonial period, can demonstrate the possibilities of feminist struggle at a time when overall political freedom is at risk, and how feminsit movement is an integral part of the fght for democracy. Feminism before 1997 Since the late nineteenth century, Hong Kong had been ceded to Britain for over a 100 years. While the colonial experience of Hong Kong has contributed to its complicated political environment, the patriarchal ideology within the Chinese traditions still remained deeply embedded in the social fabric. In the early period of the colonial rule, most of the Chinese in Hong Kong lived in poor conditions. To make ends meet, some poverty-stricken families sold their daughters at their early age as adopted daughters, concubines, sex workers or mui tsai (domestic servants), as if they were properties for exchange (Lim 2015: 22). After the Second World War, the global infuence of women’s and feminist movements in the United States and Britain started to be felt in Hong Kong through, in part, the work of elite-led 5 Feminist activism in Hong Kong Joseph M. K. Cho, Trevor Y. T. Ma and Lucetta Y. L. Kam