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A telephone survey was conducted from 20 to 24 November 2014 by Hong Kong Institute of Asia-Pacific Studies, The Chinese University of Hong Kong to gauge people’s feelings towards and views on recent social confrontations in Hong Kong.  803 respondents aged 18 or above were successfully interviewed, with a response rate of 43.3%.  The sampling error is + or –3.46 at a confidence level of 95%. 

Major findings are summarized as follows: 

73.0% of 803 respondents expressed feelings of unhappiness about the increasing polarization of views and intensifying conflicts in society.  Among these 586 respondents, 24.9% indicated a low level of unhappiness, 37.7% reported a moderate level, and 36.7% showed a high level.  The respondents were also asked if their relationship with others had deteriorated because of different political positions.  18.5% said so and 80.0% indicated no effect.  Among these affected respondents, 58.8% responded that their relationship with friends got worst, 27.0% reported a worsening relationship with family members, 22.3% and 19.6% mentioned colleagues and relatives respectively. 

While over two-thirds of the respondents (68.8%) said they disapproved the radical behavior of anti-government protesters, only 8.7% expressed their approval and 19.3% answered “in-between”.  61.8% of the respondents did not approve with the radical behavior of pro-government protesters, 12.9% found that acceptable.  One-fifth (21.4%) neither approved nor disapproved. 

Concerning their views over the possibility of more frequent occurrence of physical clashes between anti- and pro- government groups in the future, 54.8% of the respondents were worried and 22.7% felt otherwise.  19.5% said “in-between”.  Furthermore, two-fifths of the respondents (40.4%) predicted that these confrontations would become more serious in the next three years.  On the contrary, one-fifth (19.1%) were more optimistic and believed that these would be eased.  A quarter of the respondents (25.8%) indicated no change. 

The respondents were also asked if they agreed with the view that “In nowadays Hong Kong, taking radical actions is the only way of making the government respond to public demands.”  12.4% agreed and 62.6% disagreed.  22.6% reported “in-between”.  In fighting for public interests, while 14.4% of the respondents would stick to one’s own principle and not make any compromise, three-quarters (76.3%) said they prefer the approach of making concession by both sides in order to seek common ground.

Attachment (Chinese version only)