As Taiwan prepares for the presidential election, the people face a choice for their future. This goes beyond a choice for the next four years: It is more than a continuation of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) government under the new leadership of Frank Hsieh (謝長廷), or a return to the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) under new leadership, that of Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九).
The choice between the two men also harbors longer-term consequences for the future of the country: continuation of the trend towards increasing emphasis on Taiwan's own identity and treatment of Taiwan as a nation-state in its own right, or closer ties with Beijing, eventually drifting towards absorption by China in one way or another.
Hsieh is an advocate of the former line: Building on the legacy of the fight for democracy in the 1970s and 1980s, and the consolidation of democracy under former president Lee Teng-hui and President Chen Shui-bian(
Ma is an advocate of eventual unification, but realizes that he cannot move too swiftly since this would anger the Taiwanese majority and make the US and Japan -- already apprehensive about China's military buildup -- increasingly nervous, so he will emphasize the "status quo" while gradually pushing the envelope toward closer ties with China.
How will they perform if they are elected? How will they stand up to pressure from China -- or from the US for that matter? Are they committed to democracy?
To get a glimpse into their character, it is useful to examine how they acted and reacted in an earlier era: when Taiwan was suffering under martial law in the 1970s and 1980s, and when they rose to prominence, each in his own right.
Both Hsieh and Ma were educated to be lawyers. But there the similarity ends.
Hsieh is a native Taiwanese, who became well-known in Taiwan in 1980, when -- together with a number of other lawyers including Chen -- he voluntarily took up the defense of eight prominent leaders of the tangwai (outside-the-party) democracy movement (including Vice President Annette Lu [呂秀蓮] and Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chu [陳菊]), who had been arrested and imprisoned by the KMT regime on spurious political charges.
Hsieh was thus willing to stick his neck out and stand up for justice when it counted -- and when few others dared to do so. In the 1980s he became a member of the Taipei City Council, and later was elected to the Legislative Yuan. He was a founding member of the DPP in 1986. Ten years later, in 1996, he was the DPP's vice presidential candidate in Taiwan's first-ever democratic presidential elections (together with Peng Ming-min), but lost to Lee.
Ma, on the other hand, is a Mainlander, who was born in Hong Kong and whose parents came over to Taiwan with Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石). His father was a high-ranking KMT official, and young Ma grew up in the political elite of the Chinese Nationalists. In the 1970s he went to Harvard for his graduate studies, but several of his Taiwanese fellow students complained that Ma was a "student spy" who collected data for the secret police in Taiwan.
After his return to Taiwan In 1981, he quickly rose to prominence within the KMT. He started as an aide and personal translator for then-president Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國), and in 1984 became deputy-secretary general of the KMT. In 1993 he was appointed minister of justice by Lee and served in that position until 1996.
Let us examine what his position was during the crucial moments in Taiwan's transition to democracy: In 1985-1986, when Taiwan was still under martial law, he was an ardent defender of martial law, arguing that it enhanced "stability" on the island. He also defended the long prison sentences given to proponents of democracy and human rights.
In lengthy letters to foreign governments and political parties which expressed concern about the lack of democracy in Taiwan, Ma waxed eloquently in defense of the indefensible.
Finally, after many hearings and resolutions in the US Congress by senators such as Ted Kennedy and Claiborne Pell and representatives Jim Leach and Steven Solarz, and after increasing pressure from the bottom up in Taiwan, Chiang Ching-kuo relented and lifted martial law in 1987. Ma had been on the wrong side of history.
Almost the same thing happened in 1991 and 1992, when the democratic movement started to push for abolishment of the "eternal" legislators who had been elected in China in 1947, and who were in their 80s and 90s still representing "China" in the legislature and National Assembly. Again, Ma came out against such changes and wanted to maintain a semblance of "China" representation in the legislature.
Fortunately, Lee had vision and pushed through the legislative reforms. Again, Ma was on the wrong side of history.
Fascinatingly, three years later, the same pattern occurred: Lee started to push for direct presidential elections -- to replace the anachronistic system in which the KMT-controlled National Assembly had rubberstamped the KMT choice for president.
Ma was one of the KMT opponents of this move toward full-fledged democracy. Again, his instincts had been to preserve an outdated status quo, and oppose democratic change.
Ma was a follower, who went along with developments when they became inevitable, while Hsieh stood up when it counted, and defended his principles.
The choice for the people of Taiwan is thus between someone who has opposed democratic change, and wants to edge closer to a repressive, undemocratic China, and someone who has been at the forefront of democratic change, and wants to propel Taiwan forwards in the international family of nations.
It will be a decisive moment in Taiwan's history.
Gerrit van der Wees is editor of Taiwan Communique, a publication based in Washington.
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