The pro-democrats generally embrace liberal values such as rule of law, human rights, civil liberties and social justice, though their economic positions vary.
The pro-democracy activists emerged from the youth movements in the 1970s and began to take part in electoral politics as the colonial government introduced representative democracy in the mid 1980s.
After the 2004 Legislative Council election, the term "pan-democracy camp" (abbreviated "pan-dems") became more commonly used as more allied parties and politicians of varying political ideologies emerged.
In the 2016 Legislative Council election, the camp faced a challenge from the new localists who emerged after the Umbrella Revolution and ran under the banner of self-determination or Hong Kong independence.
However, the mainstream pro-democrats retained their support for a highly autonomous Hong Kong under the "One Country, Two Systems" framework, as promised by the Basic Law.
[3] The pro-democrats generally embrace liberal values such as rule of law, human rights, civil liberties, and social justice, though their economic positions vary.
In 1986, a number of political groups, activists, professionals and politicians joined hand under the banner of the Joint Committee on the Promotion of Democratic Government (JCPDG) demanding for 1988 direct elections for the Legislative Council and earlier universal suffrage for the Chief Executive and Legislative Council after 1997, as presented in the proposal of the Group of 190.
They generally opposed the British colonial administration and its perceived "kowtowing" to the Beijing government over the issues such as constitutional reform, direct elections, civic rights and Daya Bay Nuclear Plant.
The two pro-democracy Basic Law Drafting Committee members, Martin Lee and Szeto Wah, were stripped from the office after they resigned in protest of the bloody crackdown, many of other pro-democrats were denied entry to the Mainland China since.
Since 1989, the Alliance organise annual candlelight vigil for the June 4 crackdown at the Victoria Park, Hong Kong, which draw thousands of people every year.
Ahead of the first direct election to the Legislative Council in 1991, around 600 democracy activists co-founded the first major pro-democracy party, the United Democrats of Hong Kong.
[11][12] The electoral alliance of United Democrats of Hong Kong and Meeting Point, together with other smaller political parties, groups and independents, won a historical landslide victory in the 1991 election, took 17 out of the 18 geographical constituency seats.
[13] The pro-democrats were often considered strategic allies of Chris Patten, the last colonial governor who proposed a much progressive democratic reform in the last years before the handover of Hong Kong, despite Beijing's strong opposition.
[15][16] The Beijing government argued that the electoral reform introduced by Patten had violated the Joint Declaration and thus they no longer felt obliged to honour the promise of a "through train", a plan to keep the 1995 elected legislature into post-handover SAR era.
[25] The People Power's campaign targeted pan-democracy parties in the 2011 District Council elections that had supported the reform package filled candidates to run against them but only won one seat of 62 contested.
The chairman of the Democratic Party Albert Ho represented the pan-democracy camp to run in the 2012 Chief Executive election.
However, the decision of the National People's Congress Standing Committee (NPCSC) on 31 August ruled out the possibility for any candidate not endorsed by Beijing to be nominated for the election, which the pan-democrats accused as a betrayal of the principle of "one person, one vote," The pan-democrats had supported legal scholar Benny Tai's Occupy Central plan of civil disobedience against Beijing's decision, which later turned into a 79-day occupy protest which often dubbed as "Umbrella Revolution".
[29] Some of them also criticised pan-democrats' demand of the vindication of the 1989 Tiananmen protests, as pursued by the Hong Kong Alliance in Support of Patriotic Democratic Movements of China (HKASPDMC).
The pro-democrats nominated former Financial Secretary John Tsang and retired judge Woo Kwok-hing amid the Liaison Office actively lobbied for Lam.
Yiu Ching-yim who contested in Kowloon West was defeated by Vincent Cheng of the DAB with a thin margin, making it the first time a pro-democrat lost in a single-member district election since the handover.
[33] The pro-democrats fiercely opposed the amendment to the extradition law in 2019 which they feared the erosion of Hong Kong's legal system and its built-in safeguards.
[39] In November 2020, the NPCSC applied the national security law to disqualify the four sitting legislators whose candidacies were previously invalidated.
In response, the pro-democrat convenor and Democratic Party chairman Wu Chi-wai announced the remaining 15 pro-democracy legislators were to resign en masse in protest to the decision, declaring the death of the "One Country, Two Systems" and separation of power in Hong Kong.
[2][40][41] A caucus-like mechanism, without whips, was established on 8 October 2004 and was then known as "Lunchbox Conference", as legislators discussed local and political issues during luncheon on every Fridays.