 As the British free port of Hong Kong and taking advantage as the gateway to the vast Chinese market, Hong Kong merchants, the local Chinese elites so-called compradors, had taken the leading role in investment and trading opportunities by serving as middlemen between European and indigenous population in China and Hong Kong, in the principles of "laissez-faire" classical liberalism, which has since dominated the discourse of the economic philosophy of Hong Kong.For that reason, Hong Kong has been rated the world's freest economy for the past 18 years, a title bestowed on it by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative Washington think tank, and was greatly admired by libertarian economist Milton Friedman.Hong Kong as a predominant Chinese society has its own cultural conservatism which could be found in the Confucian teachings.