Based on media reports, most of the top spots in the new immigration office have already been decided on, and the office will be ready to start operating tomorrow. The media are mainly focusing on the question of who will be heading the office, but regardless of who that person is, he or she will be forced to immediately deal with both internal and external pressures and challenges.
Without support from within and outside the government, it will be difficult for the office to fill the role it really should have. It therefore becomes necessary to initiate a debate about, and to organize, supervision of current immigration affairs issues.
The office's first challenge will be the lack of a strong supervisory system. When dealing with immigration affairs, officials will have law enforcement powers similar to those of the police, albeit without the establishment of any kind of supervisory system.
Not long ago, disciplinary issues surfaced in the National Police Agency's (NPA) Immigration Office. This led to worries that the lack of internal control mechanisms will result in lax standards or disciplinary issues in the new immigration office.
One example is the slackness that resulted from the lack of a supervisory mechanism after city and county fire departments became independent from the police about a decade ago.
Although the fire departments have now realized the importance of such a system, their failure to establish one earlier was a missed opportu-nity. The problem is that adding a supervisory system involves changes to both organization and job positions -- things that the new immigration office will not be able to solve.
The question of how to add internal control mechanisms in the absence of a supervisory system will thus be the office's first challenge.
The second challenge comes from the pressure applied by human rights organizations. The interviews, investigations, approvals, supervision and management that constitute immigration policy also involve sensitive human rights issues.
The policies created by an immigration administration are therefore the focus of human rights organizations and other non-governmental groups.
One example of this is the interview procedure, where human rights groups and other non-governmental organizations (NGOs) provide assistance and supervision. The design of the interview process must deal with questions such as whether the interview should take place in or outside Taiwan, whether the interview questions invade the interviewee's privacy, follow-up supervision and accommodation management, repatriation and assistance to individuals -- especially for new immigrants, if they have fallen victim to unfair treatment or prejudice -- and ensuring that everyone receives the assistance they are entitled to.
The second challenge is thus the question of how government should respond to the pressure and demands from human rights groups and NGOs.
The third challenge involves the necessity to put an end to human trafficking. The US State Department last year demoted Taiwan from the tier-one -- the highest rating -- to the tier-two watchlist in its annual Trafficking in Persons Report.
Tier two means that active efforts are being made to meet tier-one standards. The fact that Taiwan's rating fell last year means that human trafficking is a serious problem in Taiwan.
As a result, American Institute in Taiwan Director Stephen Young organized a video conference discussing human trafficking in Taiwan on Dec. 8. The conference involved experts in Washington, Taipei as well as Kaohsiung.
The Cabinet is also holding cross-departmental talks and initiating an action program to address human trafficking. The issue of human trafficking in Taiwan has been internationalized, which means that pressure from the US and other parts of the international community will increase rather than de-crease. This, then, is the new office's third challenge.
The fourth challenge consists of encouraging compromise and contacts between different organizations. At the very least, immigration policy and human trafficking involve police affairs which fall under the Ministry of the Interior (MOI), international affairs which fall under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, labor affairs which fall under the Council of Labor Affairs, investigation and sentencing which fall under the judiciary and human rights organizations.
These are all issues that the new immigration office will be unable solve on its own. In particular, the office must maintain close contacts with police authorities and prosecutors as part of the law enforcement process, but much work is required to resolve the issues involved in the division of responsibilities and cooperation over law enforcement issues.
For example, when the fire department became independent from the police, the attitude of many police officers was that since the fire department was no longer part of the police, they did not want to have anything to do with activities related to the fire department. The resulting division between the police force and the fire department led to a drop in firefighting efficiency. The fourth challenge to the immigration office will thus be to build cross-organizational compromise and cooperation and, in particular, to establish a mechanism for cooperation with police and prosecutors.
The fifth challenge is internal organizational integration. The new immigration office will be given staff from the NPA, the NPA's Immigration Office, the NPA's Aviation Police Office, harbor bureaus, the Overseas Chinese Affairs Commission, the MOI's Population Administration Department and local police offices. Because each agency has its own organizational culture, modus operandi and individual training programs, internal organizational integration will create problems.
When the Coast Guard Administration was established, for example, it was immediately faced with the problem of integrating staff from military, police and customs agencies.
Only under the leadership of Wang Chun (王郡) was a program to promote unity implemented and internal integration began to develop. Internal organizational integration will likely be the new office's fifth challenge.
In short, in dealing with these five challenges, the immigration office will not only need to build internal consensus, but also has to obtain support from outside the organization. This will be a test for the person chosen to lead the office and an issue that will require the participation of every government agency and the general public.
Yang Yung-nane is a professor in the department of political science and the Graduate Institute of Political Economy at National Cheng Kung University.
Translated by Perry Svensson
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