本文論證「衛生關注」從十九世紀下半葉開始在英國人的殖民經驗中冒現，成為殖民政府結治的一項重要原則，例如，潔淨局（後於二十世紀三十年代改名為市政局）是一個負責衛生事務的機構，對本地居民的日常生活進行衛生性的管制，包括住屋規格又下水道，因而成為香港都市系統的一個骨幹，以及殖民者維持管治的一個手段。這些衛生管制功能一直在殖民體制多次轉換中保留下來，曾是香港城市發展管制的重要機制，後來並延續至戰後的「社區工程」（community-engineering），在實質及意識形態空間中製造「被規範的社區」，這便是作為公共房屋的徒置大廈出現的背景，通過這些過程，殖民者創造出想像的空間來延續殖民主義

　　　　　This paper argues that "sanitary concern", which emerged from the colonial experience in the second half of the 19th century, was one of the major ruling principles of the colonial authority. For example, the Sanitary Council(renamed as "Urban Council" after the 1930s), an institution responsible for sanitary issues, was established to implement sanitary control over a wide range of domains, from natives' everyday lives to building standard and sewage system. The sanitary institutions became the backbone of the urban system of Hong Kong and the colonialists sought to maintain and regulate the sanitation of the native community. The function of sanitary control sustained itself in the processes of colonial institutional changes and became the important mechanism for development control. This function extended to the post-war period and turned into community-engineering. The Urban Council fabricated a physical and ideological space for "regulated community", i.e. the emergence of the Resettlement Housing as a sort of public housing. This was the imagined space for the continuity of colonialism.