When Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) presidential candidate Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) went to Taichung County to visit towel producers last Tuesday, he discussed the idea of tightening testing standards to limit imports of Chinese towels, much as Japan once raised its vehicle emission standards to control US imports. Imports would be limited because some Chinese towels would not pass the test.
Ma also said, however, that the KMT was in favor of a "cross-strait common market" as part of the nation's economic strategy.
This would be taking a customs union one step further, with goods, labor, capital and services flowing freely between the two member states. Towels would be one of those goods flowing back and forth, with no restrictions.
Ma's proposal of raising testing standards is a form of trade protectionism mostly employed by developed nations. It is completely at odds with his proposal to liberalize trade and facilitate the flow of goods through a common market.
So what we have now is Ma contradicting himself. After calling for a "cross-strait common market" that would allow Chinese towels to be imported freely, he now wants the government to prevent Chinese towels from being dumped on the local market.
This flip-flopping economic policy reveals two possibilities: First, his talk of preventing the dumping of Chinese towels is a short-term political move; Second, when his camp proposed a "cross-strait common market," it had not thoroughly considered the needs of Taiwan's economic development and was rashly proposed.
Since the common market proposal was made, Ma's camp has had to go back and amend its ideas over and over again. For example, it says it wants restrictions on Chinese labor working in Taiwan. And now Ma's talk about opposing Chinese towel dumping has once more highlighted the contradictions in the economic strategy he advocates.
If Ma doesn't agree to let Chinese labor come to Taiwan unrestricted and doesn't agree to let Chinese towels be dumped in Taiwan, then perhaps we should request that he simply rescind his support for the establishment of a "cross-strait common market."
Ma should reconsider the logic and consistency of his economic strategy from the perspective of the nation's economic development.
Lu Jiun-wei is a doctoral student at National Taiwan University's department of political science.
Translated by Marc Langer
Jan. 1 marks a decade since China repealed its one-child policy. Just 10 days before, Peng Peiyun (彭珮雲), who long oversaw the often-brutal enforcement of China’s family-planning rules, died at the age of 96, having never been held accountable for her actions. Obituaries praised Peng for being “reform-minded,” even though, in practice, she only perpetuated an utterly inhumane policy, whose consequences have barely begun to materialize. It was Vice Premier Chen Muhua (陳慕華) who first proposed the one-child policy in 1979, with the endorsement of China’s then-top leaders, Chen Yun (陳雲) and Deng Xiaoping (鄧小平), as a means of avoiding the
The immediate response in Taiwan to the extraction of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro by the US over the weekend was to say that it was an example of violence by a major power against a smaller nation and that, as such, it gave Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) carte blanche to invade Taiwan. That assessment is vastly oversimplistic and, on more sober reflection, likely incorrect. Generally speaking, there are three basic interpretations from commentators in Taiwan. The first is that the US is no longer interested in what is happening beyond its own backyard, and no longer preoccupied with regions in other
A recent piece of international news has drawn surprisingly little attention, yet it deserves far closer scrutiny. German industrial heavyweight Siemens Mobility has reportedly outmaneuvered long-entrenched Chinese competitors in Southeast Asian infrastructure to secure a strategic partnership with Vietnam’s largest private conglomerate, Vingroup. The agreement positions Siemens to participate in the construction of a high-speed rail link between Hanoi and Ha Long Bay. German media were blunt in their assessment: This was not merely a commercial win, but has symbolic significance in “reshaping geopolitical influence.” At first glance, this might look like a routine outcome of corporate bidding. However, placed in
The last foreign delegation Nicolas Maduro met before he went to bed Friday night (January 2) was led by China’s top Latin America diplomat. “I had a pleasant meeting with Qiu Xiaoqi (邱小琪), Special Envoy of President Xi Jinping (習近平),” Venezuela’s soon-to-be ex-president tweeted on Telegram, “and we reaffirmed our commitment to the strategic relationship that is progressing and strengthening in various areas for building a multipolar world of development and peace.” Judging by how minutely the Central Intelligence Agency was monitoring Maduro’s every move on Friday, President Trump himself was certainly aware of Maduro’s felicitations to his Chinese guest. Just
RSS