Formosa Foundation

An American’s Observation on Taiwan’s Democracy and 2008 Elections

More than 150 people packed the Taiwan Center in Los Angeles on August 10 to hear Dr. Jerome F. Keating speak about his observations of Taiwan. The event was co-hosted by the Formosa Foundation, Friends of Taiwan and Taiwan Center Foundation of Los Angeles. Dr. Keating’s theme was “Taiwan 2008: Asian Democracy at the Crossroads.”

With the on-going tension in the Taiwan Strait, many people are focused on the legislative and presidential elections that are scheduled for Taiwan in January and March 2008, respectively. Dr. Keating joins many others in viewing the results of the elections to be crucial to the preservation of Taiwan’s democracy. During his speech Dr. Keating emphasized that the Legislative Yuan election is more crucial, in that the Taiwan government has been in a state of limbo for the last several years because the opposition party legislators who are the majority in the LY were determined to blockade many measures proposed by the ruling party.

Dr. Keating named five elements that every Taiwanese voter should be conscious of when making their political decision. 

(1) Taiwan must preserve and strengthen its democracy. “Such topic should be the central plank and sine qua non of any candidate’s campaign platform,” stated Keating. “Having true democracy automatically equals having de facto independence.”

(2) The on-going transitional justice that is still present in Taiwan’s society.  Dr. Keating made the example that the Nationalist party, or Kuomintang, still possesses assets in excess of U$750 million, most of which were usurped from government holdings, compared with less than U$ 1 million from all other parties combined. This creates an uneven playing field and as a result Taiwan cannot have full democracy. Other evidence of transitional justice includes the fact that many crimes of political persecution from the White Terror days remain unsolved and their perpetrators still walk the streets freely.

(3) Taiwan’s economy can be an important campaign issue, but must be seen with a global perspective. As some doomsayers would have the people believe otherwise, Taiwan’s economy has been performing consistently better than many countries including the United States and Japan. In comparison to China’s economic growth, one must also examine the fact that China has been able to sustain growth mainly because the communist government has allowed other countries to outsource their pollution to China, causing enormous damages to the people as well as the environment, locally and globally. Shamefully, by giving China their pollution, many countries are also giving China a say in their foreign policy in regards to Taiwan.

(4) Taiwan needs to establish a national symbol and strengthen its national identity. 

(5) Unification vs. Independence.  Dr. Keating cites the European Union as an ideal model of unification, where each country retains its own identity and democracy, but stays united for a common cause. The Taiwanese people must realize that China’s idea of unification is nowhere close to the EU model.

The United States has always been ambivalent regarding Taiwan and its policies on Taiwan were purposely ambiguous, from the San Francisco Treaty to the Shanghai Communique to the present day. “So much of Taiwan’s problems are in some way created by the United States, because the U.S. at first didn’t know what to do with Taiwan and therefore always wanted to keep its options open” said Keating. In response to these problems created by ambiguity, the United States tried to force Taiwan into a solution, “like forcing round pegs into square holes.” In saying so, Dr. Keating called on the U.S. government to bear its own share of responsibility in creating the dangers and challenges to Taiwan’s democracy.

Jerome F. Keating, Ph.D., an international training consultant, educator and writer, has been living and working in Taiwan for nearly twenty years. Coming there in 1988 with Bechtel Engineering as Manager of Technology Transfer on the multi-million dollar Taipei Mass Rapid Transit System project, he has since written over 150 articles on all aspects of Taiwan life from presidents to people to pubs.His writings are insightful and refreshingly witty. Many of his essays are available on the web, http://zen.sandiego.edu:8080/Jerome/.A poignant political observer with a pro-democracy bias, Dr. Keating’s most recent book is Taiwan, the Struggles of a Democracy (2006); his co-authored book Island in the Stream, a Quick Case Study of Taiwan’s Complex History is in its 3rd edition (2005).