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Taiwan and ROC converge in DPP

At the second meeting of the DPP's ninth National Congress the party passed a resolution making its 1999 resolution about the future of Taiwan, in which it recognized the nation's formal name as the Republic of China, equal to the clause in the party's charter advocating a referendum on Taiwan independence. The resolution will take priority over the party charter should the two come into conflict in the future. The significance of this is that the DPP's concept of Taiwanese sovereignty and the concept of the ROC as a sovereign and independent state are effectively deemed to be almost equals.

Looking at the past development of the charter and resolutions, there were no planned stages in the party's earliest proposed solutions to the Taiwan issue. The meaning of the concept of self-determination, however, has changed along with the interaction between different party factions pursuing power within the party, gradually elevating and deepening the advocacy of Taiwan independence.

The DPP charter, passed at the first national congress in 1986, takes the position that the future of Taiwan shall be determined by the people as a whole. In 1987, the second national congress included the words: "The people of Taiwan have the right to advocate Taiwan independence," in its resolution. The April 17 resolution of 1988 asserts Taiwan's international sovereignty and independence, and proposes that, given the "four ifs," Taiwan should be independent. Resolution No. 1007 from 1990 states that Taiwan's real sovereignty does not extend to China and Outer Mongolia.

In August 1991, the DPP joined with other opposition groups to convene a meeting to discuss a constitution created by the people, and passed a draft of a Taiwanese republican constitution, clearly determining the nation's name as "The Republic of Taiwan."

At the fifth national congress in October that same year, the establishment of a "sovereign, independent and self-determining Republic of Taiwan" was added to the charter. This clause, which has since been called the "Taiwan Independence Clause" by outside observers (sometimes also called the "Referendum Party Clause," the "Taiwan Independence Referendum Clause," or the "Referendum for Taiwan Independence Clause"), has been repeatedly criticized as a primary obstacle on the DPP's road to becoming the ruling party. Factions within the DPP have been constantly promoting amendments to the clause, thus causing a change in the meaning of "Taiwan independence."

The gradual elevation of the independence debate is also a sign of the compromise between party factions that has developed from their pursuit of power. Although the Formosa faction (美麗島系) and the de facto independence advocated by that faction eventually gave way to the New Tide faction (新潮流系) and its de jure independence, the centrist faction which originally centered on now President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and now Kaohsiung Mayor Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) was the mediating party between the two, not only alleviating the fierce clashes, but also delaying the birth of the Taiwan Independence Clause.

Without the centrist faction, the charter may have taken shape at an earlier stage. This process was also accompanied by the departure of a number of party members with a strong awareness of China.

The Taiwan independence debate changed shape after 1995, however, following the departure of the fundamentalist Taiwan independence faction. This change implied that the DPP neither needed to, nor intended to declare independence if it became the ruling party. Neither needing nor intending to declare independence can be seen as a paradigm shift in the independence debate.

This shift saw a gradual moving away from the old independence paradigm based on independence and nation building and replacing it with a new debate based on reforming the protection of Taiwan.

Then in 1998, the DPP's Central Standing Committee passed a seven-point declaration changing the Taiwan Independence Refer-endum Clause into a Unification Referendum Institution (統一公投憲典). In the past, the charter denied the present status of the ROC, while the new declaration instead acknowledged and protected it.

In the resolution about the future of Taiwan, passed in May 1999, the above points take even firmer shape, pointing out that "even though Taiwan, in accordance with the current constitution, is called the Republic of China, it is not a part of the People's Republic of China" and "any change in the independence status quo must be decided by all the residents of Taiwan by means of plebiscite."

It clearly shows that the DPP's position has developed from the past complete denial of the existence of the ROC to an acceptance of the ROC as the official name for Taiwan. This change is part of the ongoing dilution of the advocacy of independence. The party sees the ROC and Taiwan as a set of equal concepts, emphasizing that "maintenance of the status quo is independence."

Equating the resolution about the future of Taiwan to the party charter is the result of the centrist faction's "Justice Alliance" (正義連線), "Welfare State Alliance" (福利國連線) and "New Era Institute Alliance" (新世紀, a splinter group from the traditional Formosa faction) joining hands. This shows that the power struggle between the traditional Formosa and New Tide factions has been broken and that the power of the centrist faction is growing gradually. It also gives the New Middle Way (新中間路線) an even more powerful foundation within the party.

This development will widen the gap between the diverging views of the mainstream and dogmatic factions both within and outside of the party.

The result of Taiwan evolving toward the ROC is that the two concepts -- Taiwan as an independent nation and the ROC as an independent nation -- have been equated. The gradual convergence of Taiwan and the ROC has already become a severe challenge to traditional fundamentalist advocates of independence. Will they eventually admit that Taiwan today is a country, and that her name is the ROC?

Liu Chin-tsai is a PhD candidate of the Graduate Institute of East Asian Studies at National Chengchi University.

Translated by Perry Svensson
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