Law Patriarchies and State Formation in England and Post-Colonial Hong Kong

Abstract

The rise of the modern state is often associated with the demise of particularistic ties and authoritarian patriarchy. Classically, particularism gives way to universalism, patronage, hierarchy, and deference to the ‘equalities’ of contract. But history is not a one-way street nor is patriarchy all of one kind. Society's legal arrangements, structure, custom, power, affect, and sex swing back and forth between values of distance, deference, and patronage and those stressing greater egalitarianism in personal and political relations. Though they vary in type, patriarchy and particularism as cultural systems do not disappear but ebb, flow, and are revived, their oscillation driven by particular economic goals and political insecurities.