The story of Hong Kong and the rise of China in an era of globalisation, authoritarian power and democratic defiance. The recent protests and crackdown in Hong Kong shook the world. A prosperous city with its freedoms enshrined by international treaties and conventions, Hong Kong is a unique part of the People's Republic of China. Its passage from a British colony to Chinese rule was a joint diplomatic accomplishment. But since then its people have struggled for democracy against dictatorship. In The Gate and the Wall, Michael Sheridan, who served for two decades as a foreign correspondent in Asia, provides a vivid modern history of Hong Kong from China's break with Maoism in 1977--its first step towards economic superpower status--to the present. Hong Kong stood astride two of the most important events in modern world history; the rise of China and the economic transformation of East Asia. Its great port and Chinese culture made it the natural gateway for China to reach a wider world