The Executive Yuan's restructuring and downsizing plan has finally entered the final phase. In accordance with the Organic Standard Law of the Central Government Agencies (中央行政機關組織基準法) passed in June by the Legislative Yuan, the Cabinet can only consist of 13 ministries, four councils and five independent commissions. As such, the current 36 organizations of the Executive Yuan will soon face important organizational challenges.
Few people have taken particular note of the Cabinet's downsizing plan, since most view it as a simple large-scale Cabinet adjustment. But following a recent evaluation of the plan by the Research, Development and Evaluation Commission, and an opinion survey collected by academics, many have become concerned that the impact of the downsizing will not just be limited to the administrative bodies, but will also affect the lives and rights of all Taiwanese people.
In principle, the Executive Yuan's reorganization is an issue involving the redistribution of the nation's administrative resources, rather than a calculation of whether "A plus B is greater than or less than C." Because government officials and some academics have regarded the downsizing as simply an integration of administrative tasks, and have not considered the issue of redistribution of administrative resources, this has made their proposal unreasonable.
The government's downsizing must be based on the principle of fair distribution of administrative resources. When conflicting claims between different government bodies arise, there needs to be a set of measures in place for resource allocation to convince the public and win their support. A rapid downsizing won't escape difficulties but, at the least, it cannot be at the expense of the government's administrative goals and the Constitution.
Viewed from the perspective of jurisprudence and social fairness, the allocation of administrative resources must follow the principle of equality enshrined in the Constitution, otherwise administrative power and organizational design will lack a legal basis. Administrative resources are part of a society's public resources and include public property, political participation, rights of freedom, etc.
The meaning of "resource equality" is the ability of a regulation or legal system to ensure relative or absolute equality in the allocation of a society's resources. Based on the theory of "equality of resources" advocated by Ronald Dworkin, a US legal and constitutional expert, resource distribution should result in the creation of opportunities for everyone to develop himself or herself equally. In this way, people can independently select their goals in life and bear social responsibilities.
In the current situation, minority groups usually remain in a weak position due to limited opportunities for development. Aboriginal people in every country are usually the weakest of the weak because of their disadvantages in property, education, language and the development of information networks. As such, every single systematic distribution of administrative resources should adhere to the principle of fairness in order to provide socially disadvantaged populations with opportunities to develop themselves within the larger society.
The Cabinet's restructuring strategy is currently geared toward downsizing and merging the Cabinet's Council of Indigenous Peoples and the Hakka Affairs Commission. This is in complete opposition to the jurisprudential principle of resource equality.
According to the Cabinet's latest statement, the two Cabinet bodies will likely be combined to become the "council of ethnic equality."
The Cabinet said such a merger will not only not affect the two bodies' original functions, but also help them achieve efficiency. But everyone knows that the policy and the law are directed at downsizing government bodies, with the result being that they will only be given very limited resources. No wonder government officials have moved early to urge the public to accept the idea of mutual "sharing."
But, the problem is these so-called "shared" resources may turn out to be the scraps left after other, more powerful, government bodies have taken their share.
As it begins a new phase in resource distribution, the government -- while promoting the slogan of ethnic equality -- is using the excuse of restructuring and mergers to further deprive disadvantaged groups of access to resources. So, shouldn't the reasoning behind the action, as well as its pros and cons, be clarified?
Especially worrying is the impact of the restructuring plan on the rights, cultures and living space of minorities and the weak. The Cabinet's primary draft shows that in the future the government will promote issues related to the lives and rights of all Taiwanese people, including wealth, transportation information, environmental ecology, culture and sports, education, sanitation and social security, among others, with each to have a respective government body in charge of carrying them out.
But it's worth questioning whether -- among the government's innumerable tasks and various target populations -- there are people who will remain disadvantaged because of their nationality, gender, ethnicity and cultural differences. Or are these people being placed in a dark corner because they are disadvantaged?
Taking the possible merger of the Council of Indigenous Peoples and the Hakka Affairs Commission as an example, the only reason to support such a move would be an improvement in their administrative performance. Further, how can we use legislative policies to support and realize the government's important human rights goals related to the existence and cultural development of Taiwan's Aborigines?
We might also ask, would it be more suitable to incorporate organizations under the organizational structure of the future "national development committee" -- much like the ethics committees seen in the UK and Germany -- to bring the functions of research, development, evaluation and communication into full play on important issues such as ethnic equality, ethics in technology and privacy issues? All these questions and concerns should be made clear; otherwise, the merger plan seems impractical.
Given the global trend of localization, forging a compact and efficient government to increase global competitiveness requires that we no longer imitate what has been done by others, but rather create our own unique way. Because of a long history of cultural barriers, Taiwanese academics in law generally believe there is still a need to increase the public's understanding of the habits and traditional values of Aboriginal people before we can improve legal equality and human rights. Making our culture as diverse and abundant as possible is also an important element for future manpower and resources in knowledge, economics, arts and sports, as well as communications.
If we only consider the structure of the Cabinet's plan, and ignore the principle of resource equality, the effects of this quick achievement will not last. Downsizing is a must, but we should not ignore the essence of the administrative values provided by cultural and constitutional factors.
Chen Miao-fen is an assistant professor of law at National Taiwan University.
TRANSLATED BY LIN YA-TI
Saudi Arabian largesse is flooding Egypt’s cultural scene, but the reception is mixed. Some welcome new “cooperation” between two regional powerhouses, while others fear a hostile takeover by Riyadh. In Cairo, historically the cultural capital of the Arab world, Egyptian Minister of Culture Nevine al-Kilany recently hosted Saudi Arabian General Entertainment Authority chairman Turki al-Sheikh. The deep-pocketed al-Sheikh has emerged as a Medici-like patron for Egypt’s cultural elite, courted by Cairo’s top talent to produce a slew of forthcoming films. A new three-way agreement between al-Sheikh, Kilany and United Media Services — a multi-media conglomerate linked to state intelligence that owns much of
The US and other countries should take concrete steps to confront the threats from Beijing to avoid war, US Representative Mario Diaz-Balart said in an interview with Voice of America on March 13. The US should use “every diplomatic economic tool at our disposal to treat China as what it is... to avoid war,” Diaz-Balart said. Giving an example of what the US could do, he said that it has to be more aggressive in its military sales to Taiwan. Actions by cross-party US lawmakers in the past few years such as meeting with Taiwanese officials in Washington and Taipei, and
The Republic of China (ROC) on Taiwan has no official diplomatic allies in the EU. With the exception of the Vatican, it has no official allies in Europe at all. This does not prevent the ROC — Taiwan — from having close relations with EU member states and other European countries. The exact nature of the relationship does bear revisiting, if only to clarify what is a very complicated and sensitive idea, the details of which leave considerable room for misunderstanding, misrepresentation and disagreement. Only this week, President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) received members of the European Parliament’s Delegation for Relations
Denmark’s “one China” policy more and more resembles Beijing’s “one China” principle. At least, this is how things appear. In recent interactions with the Danish state, such as applying for residency permits, a Taiwanese’s nationality would be listed as “China.” That designation occurs for a Taiwanese student coming to Denmark or a Danish citizen arriving in Denmark with, for example, their Taiwanese partner. Details of this were published on Sunday in an article in the Danish daily Berlingske written by Alexander Sjoberg and Tobias Reinwald. The pretext for this new practice is that Denmark does not recognize Taiwan as a state under