For an authoritarian regime facing a restive population, it¡¯s an ugly version of the Goldilocks conundrum: How to exert just the right amount of repression to quell demands for democracy without going so far that you provoke disparate voices to unite in solidarity and opposition?
In ¡°Indelible City,¡± Louisa Lim charts how her own identity as a Hong Konger had never been so clear until China¡¯s brutal attempts to crush pro-democracy protests in 2019. She had been feeling increasingly alienated from a densely populated place where extreme inequality, soaring costs and shrinking real estate made ¡°the very act of living¡± ¡ª even for ¡°still very privileged¡± people like her ¡ª completely exhausting. Lim¡¯s experience as a reporter amid a swell of protesters changed that. She could feel her face flush and her throat well up ¡ª not from the tear gas, of which there was plenty, but from a surge of emotions: ¡°I¡¯d fallen in love with Hong Kong all over again.¡±
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