On the surface, the legislature's decision to upgrade the status of Taipei County to a special municipality is overdue, given its proximity to and degree of integration with Taipei City.
Taipei County, with nearly 4 million people, acts as a poor sibling of Taipei City, which receives a much larger amount of funding from the central government. The difference between the two is readily detected the moment the city-county border is crossed: Taipei County is dirtier and shabbier, with block after block of poor planning, narrower roads and apparently little maintenance.
Much of the responsibility for this situation lies with the decades-old system that elevated Taipei to a status more or less equivalent to that of a province -- and for a time directly administered by the Executive Yuan.
As the nation's wealth grew, the benefits of this wealth were distributed disproportionately to Taipei City -- and Kaohsiung City -- even though a good proportion of the people who generated this wealth lived elsewhere.
There was a time only a few years ago when much of Taipei County had a rural feel, but today the metropolis of Taipei expands in several directions with such density that the location of the border has become arbitrary.
The argument that has been advanced -- and it is a compelling one -- is that the residents of Taipei County are no less deserving of the funds that provide better services and better government, and indeed, that Taipei County in effect subsidizes Taipei City through its contribution to the local economy but with a lot less return.
One problem with the decision is that it adds a layer of complexity to an already crowded administrative structure. It also prompts people in other parts of the country to ask: "If Taipei County can, why can't we?"
Politicians from greater Taichung and Tainan already have their sights set on arrangements that would make them qualify and so increase their relatively tight budgets.
The result of all this will be a coalition of local politicians campaigning for border redistributions that will tip a merged county/city region over the population threshold of 1.25 million -- the magic number that allows an application for special municipality status.
Taken to the logical extreme, what densely populated Taiwan could end up with is somewhere near half the country defined as special municipalities -- which defeats the meaning of "special."
That leads to the final, and more troubling, question: How could the government justify the difference in spending between two groups of Taiwanese? Originally, the difference was explained in terms of the need to take special care of Taipei and Kaohsiung cities -- areas of key economic and security interest -- and leave the rest to the now defunct Taiwan Provincial Government.
The equally troubling answer may well be that politics is the sole reason, and that the distribution of resources to all Taiwanese may become less equitable over time, not more.
Could Asia be on the verge of a new wave of nuclear proliferation? A look back at the early history of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), which recently celebrated its 75th anniversary, illuminates some reasons for concern in the Indo-Pacific today. US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin recently described NATO as “the most powerful and successful alliance in history,” but the organization’s early years were not without challenges. At its inception, the signing of the North Atlantic Treaty marked a sea change in American strategic thinking. The United States had been intent on withdrawing from Europe in the years following
My wife and I spent the week in the interior of Taiwan where Shuyuan spent her childhood. In that town there is a street that functions as an open farmer’s market. Walk along that street, as Shuyuan did yesterday, and it is next to impossible to come home empty-handed. Some mangoes that looked vaguely like others we had seen around here ended up on our table. Shuyuan told how she had bought them from a little old farmer woman from the countryside who said the mangoes were from a very old tree she had on her property. The big surprise
The issue of China’s overcapacity has drawn greater global attention recently, with US Secretary of the Treasury Janet Yellen urging Beijing to address its excess production in key industries during her visit to China last week. Meanwhile in Brussels, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen last week said that Europe must have a tough talk with China on its perceived overcapacity and unfair trade practices. The remarks by Yellen and Von der Leyen come as China’s economy is undergoing a painful transition. Beijing is trying to steer the world’s second-largest economy out of a COVID-19 slump, the property crisis and
As former president Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) wrapped up his visit to the People’s Republic of China, he received his share of attention. Certainly, the trip must be seen within the full context of Ma’s life, that is, his eight-year presidency, the Sunflower movement and his failed Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement, as well as his eight years as Taipei mayor with its posturing, accusations of money laundering, and ups and downs. Through all that, basic questions stand out: “What drives Ma? What is his end game?” Having observed and commented on Ma for decades, it is all ironically reminiscent of former US president Harry