As long as the international community chooses to allow the PRC to define unacceptable change, so that Taiwan is warned about holding a referendum, or to change a Constitution written in the mid-1940s for a government on the "mainland," while at the same time the PRC is given to understand that an arms buildup is natural and that fear of China's anger is sufficient reason for the global community's acquiescence in continuing restrictions on Taiwan's ability to function internationally, good men are doing nothing.
In essence, the status quo is being used as a pretext for a return to the "decent interval" that Henry Kissinger seems to have envisioned.
June Teufel Dreyer is a professor of political science at the University of Miami, Coral Gables, Florida (this is part 2 of a two-part article. Part 1 appeared yesterday).
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