Strike While the Iron is Hot: A Centennial Collection of Essays on Strike 1925-26
As the world marks the centenary of two monumental strikes that shook an empire, this collection of essays revisits the audacious Canton-Hong Kong Strike of 1925-26. For sixteen months, a quarter of a million workers brought a vital colonial port to its knees, not just through picket lines, but through a profound social reorganization. These essays move beyond grand narratives to uncover the concrete details of this struggle: the women who went from managing households to running their own unions and hospitals; the children, freed from factory floors, who formed their own scout corps and found adventure in the streets; and the forgotten solidarity of Chinese Muslims who joined the labor movement. This collection traces how the strike’s success forced a revolution in imperial governance, creating a harsh “colonial boomerang" where the policing tactics honed in Hong Kong were brought back to be used in Britain itself. This is the story of a strike that did more than challenge an empire—it forever changed it.
Editor
Leung Po Lung
A Hong Kong history researcher specializing in the history of the labour movement. In the 1980s, he assisted historian Chan Ming-kou in compiling books such as A Review of Hong Kong and Chinese Labour Movements (《香港與中國工運回顧》). He is the author of works including Sweat and Blood in Victoria City: Early Hong Kong Workers and the Labour Movement (《汗血維城──香港早期工人與工運》), The First Shot Towards the Modern Labour Movement: Centennial Anthology of the 1920 Mechanics’ Strike (《邁向現代工運第一炮：1920年機工罷工百年紀念文集》), and Cries from Within the Government: An Oral History of the Hong Kong Civil Servants’ Labour Movement (《政府內部的吶喊：香港公務員工運口述史》).
Book Information
Publisher: Consteller Publishing
Date: 10/2025
ISBN︰978-988-76727-8-4
Table of Content
The Hong Kong Lesson and its Imperial Echoes
Chinese Muslims and the Labour Movement in Canton and Hong Kong: Selected Materials
On the Success and Failure of the Canton-Hong Kong Strike: How Disparate Geographical Resources Forged Divergent Paths
The Revolution Within the Revolution: Women’s Mobilization in the Canton-Hong Kong Strike
Introduction
Between Adventure and Movement: Working-Class Childhood in the Canton-Hong Kong Strike
Spaces of Resistance: Urban Mobilization and Governance in the Canton-Hong Kong Strike
constellerpublishing.com 