Polarization of political trust indicates a diminishing middle ground where compromise and consensus can be achieved, a challenge different from a straight decline of trust which actually implies a consensus for a solution. Focusing on Hong Kong and analyzing multiple available surveys, this study finds, in addition to a decline in political trust, a trend of trust polarization, where both strong trust and strong distrust in the central government have been increasing since the transfer of sovereignty to China in 1997. Among other factors, this study finds that the national identities of Hongkonger and Chinese are strongly correlated with trust in the central government, but only for those who went through the mandatory education after 1984 when the curricula were politicized to foster an affinity for mainland China. Their Hongkonger identity is associated with less moderate trust, less moderate distrust and more extreme distrust, while the Chinese identity is associated with trust in opposite directions. For those who came of age before 1984, these identities are not correlated with trust. However, perceived democratic deficit or lack thereof is consistently associated with less or more trust rather than polarizing it, suggesting that democratic reform is a pathway out of polarization.
