Recently a number of environmentally related protest movements in Taiwan have hit the headlines, including forced farmland expropriations in Dapu (大埔) and Siangsihliao (相思寮), fears over work safety because of fires at Formosa Group’s Mailiao naphtha cracker plant, which is also involved in controversy over plans to expand it, and finally the construction of another plant by Kuokuang Petrochemical Technology.
Some have gone as far as to interpret these protests against the government as being politically motivated, and there have also been accusations that they are “anti-business.” It strikes me that, while you can say these protests are, indeed, “anti-big business,” the thing the public is really opposed to here can be better described as “bad business,” with its lack of regard for either the “little people” or the environment.
If we were talking about good business practice, what we might call “benevolent business,” that sought to bring regional prosperity and improve people’s quality of life, what would there be to protest?
In the past, the focus has been on economic development, be it in industry or commerce, in order to improve the lot of the Taiwanese. The price paid for this was the serious pollution it caused. Wealthy businesspeople, with the government’s blessing, built plants and factories wherever they saw fit, regardless of the damage to the environment.
They would release toxic waste water and gases into the environment with impunity, polluting our rivers and poisoning our farmland. The result was that wealthy businesspeople lined their pockets at the expense of the health and heritage of the common person, day in, day out.
Just to rub salt in the wounds, the general public gets to foot the bill for the clean-up operations to deal with the mess these businessmen have left behind. It’s the all-too-familiar scenario of the rich getting richer while the poor just get screwed. Now that the public’s eyes have been opened to what is going on, it is little wonder that they are not happy.
Unfortunately, it seems that neither the government nor the businesspeople in question really get it: They don’t appear to realize the public is wising up to their game. For them it’s business as usual, for which you can read “trying to pull a fast one over the public.” The arrogance is astounding. Environmental Impact Assessments are either dealt with in a cursory manner or not at all.
This is how you get a situation in which the premier of the country can dismiss concerns over endangered dolphins having their routes blocked: “Dolphins know how to make a detour in the waterfront at Taichung harbor, why can’t they do the same in Changhwa?”
And then you have the kind of behavior where the rights of farmers are trampled just so the government can get itself into the good books of large corporations, like we have seen in the forced expropriation of farmland in Taichung. Seen like this, it is not so much that the public are protesting against the government or taking an anti-business stance; it is more like the government and big business colluding together and the people no longer standing for it.
There is no reason to suppose that industrial development and environmental protection are mutually exclusive. For them to co-exist, however, it requires a change in the way the government and businesses behave: They need to up their game and learn to put the environment first.
When I was in Germany I witnessed the operation of garbage incinerators, and discovered that the majority of Germans actually approve of a method that has been met with such suspicion in Taiwan. Here we see it as polluting, but when you go over there you see how clean the rivers are, how green and beautiful the parks are and how the energy created by the incineration of garbage enables the provision of a free supply of hot water and central heating for local residents. It’s not difficult to see why the German public are so positive about green initiatives when they mean transforming disgusting, putrid waste into something good and useful.
There is an old Chinese saying to the effect that water keeps a ship afloat, but can also engulf it. Commercial development can drive economic growth, and enhance people’s material existence. However, when money is the sole end, and when one disregards the importance of sustainable management of the environment, there is a huge imbalance. For the sake of making a tiny elite richer, the vast majority of the public suffer.
It’s not good enough simply to dismiss the public’s criticisms as anti-business. This is not going to solve the stalemate we now have between the public on one side, and business (and the government) on the other.
The only way forward is to understand how we can cultivate benevolent business, something that people will welcome with open arms.
Hsu Yu-fang is an associate professor and director of Chinese Literatures department at National Dong Hwa University.
TRANSLATED BY PAUL COOPER
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