The analogy between China-Taiwan and US-Mexico economic integration does not mean the economies of the two groups of countries are integrated by the same model.
A book by Dani Rodrik, a professor of international political economy at Harvard University, Has Globalization Gone Too Far? provides an introduction to the US-Mexico relationship. One section posits the question: Is social discord the price to pay for economic integration? Rodrik points out that, in addition to the gap between rich and poor, another negative result of globalization is that it will harm social cohesion and even the operation of democracy.
One problem is that globalization will create social conflicts between those with advanced technical skills or highly mobile capital that can profit from the globalization of markets and those that cannot profit. Domes-tically, this will lead to fundamental conflicts between parts of society and political groups regarding basic values and public policies. Social conflict is of course no big deal and democracy is a mechanism for dealing with conflicts of interest.
In other words, the soul of democracy depends on all mem-bers of political groups being willing to participate in public policy debate and being willing to solve their conflicts through political compromise. Thus, the damage to democracy caused by globalization remains: when the economic interests of a certain group are more sensitive to international policies than to domestic ones, their concern for domestic politics and economic policies will diminish.
When, for example, the major-ity of a company's investment lies in China, will that company show more concern for China's foreign currency policies and overall economic situation or for Taiwan's economic policies? What will the prospects be when most of Taiwan's listed companies are investing in China?
The new social divide is an inevitable result of globalization. As long as the economic strategies pursued by Taiwan are highly integrated with the international economy, it will have a negative social result that we accept, regardless of whether we establish direct links or not.
It can't be denied, however, that for Taiwan it seems as if globalization means "China-fication." This is also where I see the similarity between the cross-strait relationship and the US-Mexico relationship: the economy of a small country becoming highly integrated with the economy of a large neighbor. It is exactly because of this that the creation of new social contradictions may become a daily fact of life in a situation where every country is striving for globalization.
The situations in Mexico and Taiwan however are special: the beneficiaries are all concentrated in a single market, making their interests even more unitary. This enhances social conflict, and makes the polarization even more obvious.
If one believes that globalization brings social divides, that Taiwan's future lies in the even closer integration with China, and that this must lead to the establishment of direct links and the "no haste, be patient" policy -- then how can these social divides have nothing to do with the same links and policies?
Will this new social divide be the main one in tomorrow's Taiwan and the center of political debate? To what extent could the concern for economic interests change the issue of identity? Whether we want to promote local culture or whether we think localization is just political spin, we may still have to add consideration of economic interests to the established ideas about localization. It is only by clearly understanding this social contradiction that we can create and restructure a cohesive social mechanism.
Chang Tieh-chih is a political analyst.
Translated by Perry Svensson
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