Policy-making on the 84-hour workweek and "small three links" fully reflects the superficiality and hollowness of the government.
The government has stirred up a constitutional dispute by firmly refusing to implement the Fourth Nuclear Power Plant project, which had already been passed by the legislature. The dispute is yet to be resolved.
Also, instead of filing a "reconsideration proposal" (
Both these events reflect a lack of in-depth research and solid action. And then there's the forced implementation of the "small three links," in which there was no discussion and no consideration given to the other side's wishes. This unilateral policy fails to take into account objective realities and constitutes rash, superficial administrative behavior.
The "hollowing out of the economy" is a term with which everyone in the country is familiar, reflecting the economic crisis that occurred following the exodus of Taiwan's small and medium-sized businesses to China and other foreign destinations. No one, however, has been aware of the administrative hollowing out taking place. Increased incidences of "black gold" in county and township administrations, administrative decrees that are outdated and neglect the public interest, lagging development in the area of administrative law studies, and administrative teams that lack legal expertise, ethical grounding, and professional research -- all of these constantly reduce administrative efficiency, and conspire to cause the "hollowing out" of the administration.
These matters involve the rights and interests of the public. In February 1999, the legislature passed the Administrative Procedure Law (
In the wave of globalization driving the new century, it might perhaps be difficult to prevent businesses from leaving the country, or the hollowing out of the economy. The administration could have avoided superficiality and hollowness by changing its subjective ideology and governing in the spirit of the Constitution and according to the law. Avoiding hollowness in government would, moreover, help to alleviate and slow down the hollowing out of the economy. But if the cart is put before the horse, and the real problem of administrative hollowness is not faced squarely -- resulting in attempts to solve financial problems and unemployment issues through ritualistic pow-wows such as the National Economic Development Conference or National Administrative Reform Conference -- the administration will only continue to float aimlessly in a sea of political slogans and rantings.
Whether or not Taiwan sinks or swims in the new century rests entirely on the actions of those currently in power.
Lin Terng-yaw is a law professor at Tunghai University.
Translated by Scudder Smith and Francis Huang
Could Asia be on the verge of a new wave of nuclear proliferation? A look back at the early history of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which recently celebrated its 75th anniversary, illuminates some reasons for concern in the Indo-Pacific today. US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin recently described NATO as “the most powerful and successful alliance in history,” but the organization’s early years were not without challenges. At its inception, the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty marked a sea change in American strategic thinking. The United States had been intent on withdrawing from Europe in the years following
My wife and I spent the week in the interior of Taiwan where Shuyuan spent her childhood. In that town there is a street that functions as an open farmer’s market. Walk along that street, as Shuyuan did yesterday, and it is next to impossible to come home empty-handed. Some mangoes that looked vaguely like others we had seen around here ended up on our table. Shuyuan told how she had bought them from a little old farmer woman from the countryside who said the mangoes were from a very old tree she had on her property. The big surprise
The issue of China’s overcapacity has drawn greater global attention recently, with US Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen urging Beijing to address its excess production in key industries during her visit to China last week. Meanwhile in Brussels, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen last week said that Europe must have a tough talk with China on its perceived overcapacity and unfair trade practices. The remarks by Yellen and Von der Leyen come as China’s economy is undergoing a painful transition. Beijing is trying to steer the world’s second-largest economy out of a COVID-19 slump, the property crisis and
Former president Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) trip to China provides a pertinent reminder of why Taiwanese protested so vociferously against attempts to force through the cross-strait service trade agreement in 2014 and why, since Ma’s presidential election win in 2012, they have not voted in another Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) candidate. While the nation narrowly avoided tragedy — the treaty would have put Taiwan on the path toward the demobilization of its democracy, which Courtney Donovan Smith wrote about in the Taipei Times in “With the Sunflower movement Taiwan dodged a bullet” — Ma’s political swansong in China, which included fawning dithyrambs