Now that the Taipei and Kao-hsiung mayoral elections are over, the country's attention has turned to the 2004 presidential election. A comprehensive view of the developments over the past few years and the recent Kaohsiung mayoral campaign leads to the conclusion that the seven counties and cities in southern Taiwan have gradually become an unstoppable "green-vote machine." What's more, grassroots support for the green camp is still growing steadily. In addition to consolidating its forces, the blue camp will also have to rely on winning more votes in other regions if it is to win the next presidential election.
The impression the man in the street has these days is that the south is green through and through, but it is in fact only over the past few years that it has turned "from the blue skies to the green ground." Take Kaohsiung as an example, where the key to the rise and fall of the two camps is to be found in the mayoral election of four years ago. In that election, the green camp's Frank Hsieh (
In the first mayoral election in the special municipalities in 1994, the green camp's Chang Chun-hsiung (張俊雄) received only 40 percent of the vote, almost 110,000 votes behind the 54 percent of the blue camp's Wu Den-yi (吳敦義). This shows that the green camp has been at a disadvantage for a long period. Its luck didn't turn until 1998.
The many elections since 1998 have shown that support for the green camp is growing steadily. Hsieh's 48 percent of the vote in 1998, Chen Shui-bian's (
But the situation immediately prior to this election did not appear to bode well for the green camp. The DPP's failure to accomplish any eyecatching successes during its two years in power, the huge farmers' and fishermen's demonstration, the blue camp's consolidation and an irksome case of corruption took their toll on Hsieh's campaign. In particular, the blue camp skillfully turned the election into a vote of confidence in the DPP government, making the question of whether the green camp's core supporters could be mobilized absolutely key to the election.
If the green camp could hold on to that foundation in Kao-hsiung, it could be hopeful of winning. The green camp's final collective mobilization was therefore meant to stabilize that foundation. In the end, Hsieh received over 50 percent of the vote, which shows that it is difficult to shake the green camp in Kaohsiung. That the green camp is continuing to grow slowly and that this was the first time it had won more than 50 percent of the vote, should be the focus of attention of both the green and blue camps in the next presidential election.
For politicians in Taipei, this situation may be difficult to understand. The economy has declined during the DPP's two years in power, but the economic situation in the south -- where the electronics industry developed late and where heavy industrial and agricultural development have failed for years -- was already deteriorating seven or eight years ago.
Since the DPP came to power, it has invested large amounts in construction in the south. It has initiated work on the Kaohsiung MRT, and the Ai and Chienchen rivers have been successfully dredged. With such activities, the feeling in the south may be slightly different and the view may even be that the situation is better than before. The increase in votes for Hsieh in each constituency proved that he could attract middle-of-the-road voters and not just die-hard green-camp dogmatists. In the next one-and-a-half years, the DPP government is certain to spend even larger sums on developing the south. Its votes will probably only increase and the southern voting machine stabilize even further.
For the blue camp, the south is definitely not a lost cause. Voter support for the blue camp has been unstable over the past few years. Wu gained 48 percent of the vote in the 1998 mayoral elec-tions. The KMT's presidential candidate Lien Chan (連戰) and independent James Soong (宋楚瑜) won a combined 52 percent in the 2000 presidential elections. The KMT, the PFP and the New Party garnered a combined total of 50 percent of the vote in last year's legislative elections, and Huang Jun-ying (黃俊英) won 46 percent of the vote this time in Kaohsiung.
The distance between the blue and green camps is not vast and there is still plenty of room for a fight. The question of how to nominate candidates capable of inspiring public confidence and eliminating that distance will be the biggest issue for the blue camp in the 2004 elections.
Wang Yu-fong is a doctoral student in the department of history at National Cheng Kung University.
Translated by Perry Svensson
A series of strong earthquakes in Hualien County not only caused severe damage in Taiwan, but also revealed that China’s power has permeated everywhere. A Taiwanese woman posted on the Internet that she found clips of the earthquake — which were recorded by the security camera in her home — on the Chinese social media platform Xiaohongshu. It is spine-chilling that the problem might be because the security camera was manufactured in China. China has widely collected information, infringed upon public privacy and raised information security threats through various social media platforms, as well as telecommunication and security equipment. Several former TikTok employees revealed
The bird flu outbreak at US dairy farms keeps finding alarming new ways to surprise scientists. Last week, the US Department of Agriculture (USDA) confirmed that H5N1 is spreading not just from birds to herds, but among cows. Meanwhile, media reports say that an unknown number of cows are asymptomatic. Although the risk to humans is still low, it is clear that far more work needs to be done to get a handle on the reach of the virus and how it is being transmitted. That would require the USDA and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to get
For the incoming Administration of President-elect William Lai (賴清德), successfully deterring a Chinese Communist Party (CCP) attack or invasion of democratic Taiwan over his four-year term would be a clear victory. But it could also be a curse, because during those four years the CCP’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) will grow far stronger. As such, increased vigilance in Washington and Taipei will be needed to ensure that already multiplying CCP threat trends don’t overwhelm Taiwan, the United States, and their democratic allies. One CCP attempt to overwhelm was announced on April 19, 2024, namely that the PLA had erred in combining major missions
On April 11, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida delivered a speech at a joint meeting of the US Congress in Washington, in which he said that “China’s current external stance and military actions present an unprecedented and the greatest strategic challenge … to the peace and stability of the international community.” Kishida emphasized Japan’s role as “the US’ closest ally.” “The international order that the US worked for generations to build is facing new challenges,” Kishida said. “I understand it is a heavy burden to carry such hopes on your shoulders,” he said. “Japan is already standing shoulder to shoulder