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Political inertia will rule the day

Rain seems to have dampened the enthusiasm for the Million Voices Against Corruption protest against President Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁). Just like the statement by a group of pan-green academics demanding Chen's resignation on July 15, the demonstration is unlikely to achieve what the organizers are hoping for, unless something dramatic occurs.

Although the Black Gold Investigation Center of the Taiwan High Court Prosecutors' Office has stepped up its investigation into the handling of Chen's special state affairs expenditure account, it has yet to come up with anything that could be used to indict Chen on corruption charges.

Most of Chen's supporters believe that although there may be evidence of Chen's involvement, it is still too early to conclude that he has violated the law.

Recent opinion polls indicate that more than half of the public support the removal of Chen from office, while less than 20 percent support him. Experience suggests, however, that those who say they do not know or have no comment on whether Chen should step down -- around 30 percent of the public -- are probably sympathetic to Chen.

In view of this, I venture to say that Chen's approval rating remains around 35 percent to 40 percent, roughly the percentage of votes he garnered in the 2000 presidential election. Clearly, this is an obstacle that the recent anti-Chen campaign cannot surmount very easily.

I believe that the campaign to unseat Chen is a major problem for Taiwan's fledgling democracy. Why? First, because the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) has to consider the opinion of those who support Chen, it cannot emulate the normal behavior of Western democracies and rein in the behavior of party members, be they the president or the premier.

Not only that, several qualified would-be leaders of the DPP are so concerned about these supporters that they dare not voice even reasonable doubt about Chen through the party's internal mechanisms. Elected popular representatives are struggling to keep their voter support and have no choice but to support Chen.

Second, numerous Western studies on political parties indicate that a sound bipartisan system provides the best conditions for complete democracy.

However, studies on the party preferences of Taiwanese voters show that support for the two major political parties in Taiwan is closely related to issues of national identity and ethnicity.

Although the parties have some supporters with differing national identification and ethnic backgrounds, party support from individual ethnic groups remains concentrated.

The ethnic homogeneity of the support base of the smaller parties is very high.

This political climate is directly related to the complex history of Taiwan's colonial experience and this is, in turn, reflected in our two main political parties. The support base of the major parties is inflexible and supporters are more worried about who is in power than who is more suitable to rule.

Those centrist voters who say they don't know or have no comment on the anti-Chen demonstration are either diehard supporters of "our government" or helpless cynics.

We should expect our party leaders to be visionary, directing society toward benevolent interaction and dialogue through policy competition.

However, the many corruption scandals and the anti-Chen campaign are evidence that the opposite holds true, and the leadership is merely a passive reflection of the broader cleavages that characterize our society.

Third, Shih's campaign to oust Chen cannot set an example to or put pressure on China. The DPP's inability for self-reflection and the conservative preferences of the bipartisan system has made it impossible to deal with the president through normal, democratic mechanisms, and this has led to a rift between people in northern and southern Taiwan and deadlocks in many different areas.

As regards the value of Taiwanese democracy, Chinese democracy activists Wei Jing-sheng (魏京生) and Wang Xizhe (王希哲) recently said that if Taiwan could unseat a sitting president through democratic means, that would not only become a crucial factor in cross-strait exchanges but would also put pressure on Beijing to speed up its political reform by forcing people to discuss China's track record for political reform.

The inefficacy of Taiwan's constitutional and partisan systems has made a mockery of democratic values and ideals, making people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait disappointed in the democratic system. I believe that this is the last thing that those who are seeking Chen's ouster would like to see.

Shih's campaign to oust Chen is facing a provisional alliance of sorts. Chen's supporters, Washington, Beijing and Taiwan's biggest opposition party want to stop the current situation from spinning out of control.

The shield provided by these forces has greatly diminished the pressure the current campaign can exert on Chen.

Chang Teng-chi is a doctoral candidate in the department of politics at the University of Sheffield.

Translated by Daniel Cheng
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