On May 13, Chinese President Hu Jintao (
Unfortunately, the two presidents have yet to overcome this obstacle to direct negotiations.
Who is correct? Is Taiwan a sovereign state or a non-sovereign territory? A brief review of two core concepts in the field of international relations -- sovereignty and the state -- might help answer these questions.
The idea of sovereignty was one of the most important intellectual developments that led to the Westphalian revolution. According to Jean Bodin (1530-1596), a French philosopher who contributed much to the development of the concept, sovereignty is the "absolute and perpetual power vested in a commonwealth."
Sovereignty is "the distinguishing mark of the sovereign that he cannot in any way be subject to the commands of another, for it is he who makes law for the subject, abrogates law already made and amends law."
Sovereignty resides in the state -- a body that exercises predominant authority within its geographic borders, possesses a relatively stable population that owes its allegiance to a government and maintains diplomatic ties with other states. Bodin's treatise was penned centuries ago, but it still influences global politics. For example, the 1933 Montevideo Convention on Rights and Duties of States defines a sovereign state as having a permanent population, a defined territory, a government and the capacity to enter into relations with other states. According to contemporary nomenclature, a state is the equivalent of a country.
The ROC exercises predominant authority within its borders, possesses a relatively stable population that owes its allegiance to the central government in Taipei, maintains formal diplomatic ties with roughly two dozen foreign countries and strong "unnofficial" links with many others. Despite China's protestations to the contrary, it is obvious that the ROC does exist and meets all the requirements of sovereignty and statehood.
To be sure, the ROC's territory and governmental system has changed dramatically over the decades. The country has evolved from a corrupt, authoritarian dictatorship into what the US Department of State describes officially as a "multi-party democracy" that exercises jurisdiction over roughly 36,000km2. Like other states, such as the UK, people employ a variety of monikers to describe the Taiwanese government. Some prefer to call it "the ROC," while others call it "the ROC on Taiwan" and still others call it simply "Taiwan."
Irrespective of the designation, however, public opinion polls reveal that an overwhelming majority of Taiwanese consider the country an independent and sovereign state. Other arguments employed by Beijing, such as the suggestion that Taiwan is not a state because it is no longer a member of the UN, are similarly flawed. According to this logic, the People's Republic of China (PRC) has existed only since 1971 (when it gained admission to the UN) and Switzerland has only existed for a few years.
Moreover, it makes no difference whether the US or other major world powers formally recognize Taiwan as a state. The US didn't recognize the Soviet Union from 1917 to 1933 and it didn't recognize the PRC from 1949 to 1979. The US currently recognizes neither the Cuban nor the North Korean government, but few would argue that these states do not exist.
Finally, it is noteworthy that the PRC government has never exercised any control over Taiwan, has never written its laws nor funded its government, and is not accepted by the people of Taiwan as having any authority within their borders. In other words, PRC sovereignty does not extend to Taiwan and Taiwan is not part of the PRC.
Chen recently called on Hu to visit Taiwan to see for himself whether the Republic of China is a sovereign, independent country. But is a summit really required to settle this issue? Rather than quarrel over the thorny sovereignty issue, the two presidents ought to engage in direct talks without preconditions and devote their energies to discussing practical matters like the maintenance of peace, stability and prosperity in the Western Pacific. After all, as one Taiwanese governmental study concluded, "that the ROC has been an independent sovereign state since its establishment in 1912 is an incontrovertible historical fact."
Dennis Hickey is the author of several books on China and Taiwan and a professor of political science at Missouri State University.
As the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and its People’s Liberation Army (PLA) reach the point of confidence that they can start and win a war to destroy the democratic culture on Taiwan, any future decision to do so may likely be directly affected by the CCP’s ability to promote wars on the Korean Peninsula, in Europe, or, as most recently, on the Indian subcontinent. It stands to reason that the Trump Administration’s success early on May 10 to convince India and Pakistan to deescalate their four-day conventional military conflict, assessed to be close to a nuclear weapons exchange, also served to
The recent aerial clash between Pakistan and India offers a glimpse of how China is narrowing the gap in military airpower with the US. It is a warning not just for Washington, but for Taipei, too. Claims from both sides remain contested, but a broader picture is emerging among experts who track China’s air force and fighter jet development: Beijing’s defense systems are growing increasingly credible. Pakistan said its deployment of Chinese-manufactured J-10C fighters downed multiple Indian aircraft, although New Delhi denies this. There are caveats: Even if Islamabad’s claims are accurate, Beijing’s equipment does not offer a direct comparison
After India’s punitive precision strikes targeting what New Delhi called nine terrorist sites inside Pakistan, reactions poured in from governments around the world. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) issued a statement on May 10, opposing terrorism and expressing concern about the growing tensions between India and Pakistan. The statement noticeably expressed support for the Indian government’s right to maintain its national security and act against terrorists. The ministry said that it “works closely with democratic partners worldwide in staunch opposition to international terrorism” and expressed “firm support for all legitimate and necessary actions taken by the government of India
Taiwan aims to elevate its strategic position in supply chains by becoming an artificial intelligence (AI) hub for Nvidia Corp, providing everything from advanced chips and components to servers, in an attempt to edge out its closest rival in the region, South Korea. Taiwan’s importance in the AI ecosystem was clearly reflected in three major announcements Nvidia made during this year’s Computex trade show in Taipei. First, the US company’s number of partners in Taiwan would surge to 122 this year, from 34 last year, according to a slide shown during CEO Jensen Huang’s (黃仁勳) keynote speech on Monday last week.
RSS