Speeches and Articles by Former Consul General Michael Klosson

Remarks by U.S. Consul General Michael Klosson
at the Inauguration of the Fulbright Hong Kong Scholar Program

March 26, 2002

Vice Chancellor Li, Professor Young, distinguished guests:

I'm very pleased to join you this evening to help inaugurate an important, new initiative in educational exchanges between Hong Kong and the United States, one that gives further expression to Hong Kong's international orientation.

In the 1940s, shortly after the end of the great conflict in Europe and Asia, American Senator J. William Fulbright acted on a vision - a vision that academic exchanges could build bridges between America and the rest of a war-torn world. His legislation established a program of educational exchange that has promoted scholarship and greater international understanding for over a half a century. This program opened possibilities for students and teachers in America and abroad to deepen their knowledge through exposure to foreign learning, cultures and societies.

The prestigious worldwide program that bears his name, the Fulbright Program, got its start in Asia - the first agreement was signed with China in 1947. The program with Hong Kong started soon after that. From then until 2000, the last year for which we have statistics, 180 Americans - lecturers, students, researchers and teachers or participants in seminars - have come to Hong Kong to live and work in what most of them would describe as one of the most important experiences of their lives. Many of them have spent their sojourn here at The Chinese University of Hong Kong. During that same period, 94 Hong Kong lecturers, students, researchers and teachers have had similar experiences in the United States.

The flow of American Fulbright participants to Hong Kong has been steady over the years, but for a variety of reasons the flow of Hong Kong scholars to the United States was less regular. Through the generosity of the Research Grants Council, I am very pleased that local scholars now have the opportunity to participate in the new Fulbright Hong Kong Scholar Program, under which they can spend a year at an American institution. This transforms the Fulbright program in Hong Kong into a truly two-way exchange, in keeping with Senator Fulbright's vision. I offer my sincere thanks and appreciation to the Council through Professor Kenneth Young, its Chairman, for undertaking this initiative with us towards greater interaction between the academic communities of Hong Kong and the U.S.

After considerable preparation and hard work by the Research Grants Council, the U.S. Consulate General and the Hong Kong-America Center, early this year a Fulbright Advisory Committee and an Academic Review Committee met to implement the new Fulbright Hong Kong Scholar Program. Four local scholars were selected from a larger group of applicants to take up the initial grants at U.S. schools. These scholars are with us tonight, and we are here to honor them.

As a number of you know, my working life started here in Hong Kong in the early 1970's: I taught history at then Hong Kong Baptist College before joining the American Foreign Service. I was also closely involved with the Fulbright program in several of my European assignments. I have thus always had a deep appreciation of the role educational exchange has played in American relationships with other societies. Here in Hong Kong, it is one of the many ways in which our two societies have built up enduring ties between people and institutions. Hong Kong and American faculty, students and administrators have enjoyed opportunities to build lasting connections at both personal and institutional levels. These exchanges have continued over the years through good times and hard times: Chinese University's Pro-Vice-Chancellor Dr. Liu Pak Wai was the Hong Kong Fulbright Distinguished Lecturer in the United States last fall, barely two weeks after the terrible events of September 11, and I wish to express my thanks to him for his determination to go ahead with his lecture tour at that difficult time.

We are also here to celebrate the move of the Hong Kong-America Center to its new quarters. The Center and its activities, which are an important aspect of exchanges between campuses here and in the U.S., would not be possible without the support of many Hong Kong citizens, including its Board of Directors, led by C.C. Tung. The Chinese University has been very supportive of the Center over the years, and I wish to thank Vice Chancellor Dr. Arthur Li for his and his university's continuing interest and help. Dr. Glenn Shive, now the Center's director, and Lloyd Neighbors, now serving in our Embassy in Beijing, who is here tonight, were active in the Center's founding in 1993. One of the aims of the Center has been to promote exchanges from Hong Kong to the U.S. With the opening this week of the Fulbright China Research Forum, the Center has taken on a new role by inviting American scholars from all over China to Hong Kong to discuss their research. With the Center's active role in the Fulbright Program, and the Program's new balance towards true two-way exchange, many of the Center's founding goals, which hark back to those Senator Fulbright espoused in his vision of international understanding, have been reached.

The Fulbright program with its new Hong Kong Scholar component represents a commitment to the future, not just of scholarly exchange, but of our two societies. It is yet another strand in Hong Kong's web of connections with the international community, another expression of Hong Kong's international orientation that underlies its unique character and contributes so importantly to its dynamism and prosperity. This new program of academic exchange deepens further the economic, commercial, cultural and other ties between the United States and Hong Kong - ties that like this academic research produce mutual benefit. I am confident that, with the great interest that we can see here tonight, Hong Kong and the United States will continue to work together towards even greater exchanges of people and ideas.

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