The recent furor over the 18 percent preferential interest rate for retired military personnel, public servants and public school teachers has been very divisive. Many people who do not fully understand the situation would prefer that the pan-blue and pan-green camps stop their incessant wrangling over issues like this one.
In fact, this issue has little to do with pan-blue or pan-green politics and nothing to do with the struggle between pro-unification and pro-independence elements. This is a serious issue involving social justice and fairness, intimately related to the everyday lives of ordinary people.
Despite the fact that Taiwan has been regarded as a free, democratic country ever since the first direct presidential elections in 1996, one should bear in mind that it is still just a fledgling democracy. We believe that the consolidation of Taiwanese democracy can be divided into two stages.
The first of these is the establishment of a political system capable of maintaining the freedom and human rights of the individual and the second is the creation of a society based on the rule of law and founded on the principles of fairness and justice.
During these stages, all of the fighting between the so-called pan-blue and pan-green camps, and what many perceive as political clashes are, in fact, necessary evils in the process of striving for fairness and justice.
Concrete examples of this can be seen in the debates over the 18 percent preferential interest rate, the seniority debate resulting from allowing Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) officials to add the years served as a party official to their years served as a civil servant, the second-generation health insurance and amendments to tax law resulting in the removal of the tax exemption for military personnel and teachers. Of these, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) argued most vigorously about the inherent unfairness of the seniority issue.
In fact, we are not opposed to giving the same retirement benefits civil servants receive to KMT officials who worked under the former party-state system.
Given the special background of that time, KMT employees simply did not know that their career choice was any difference from that of a civil servant. What would they do if they were now not given retirement benefits?
However, the party should pay for those benefits by selling its assets. If it is still unable to cover all the expenses after doing so, then perhaps the government could cover the rest.
By taking sentiment, reason and law into consideration, we believe that this is a more appropriate method for resolving the problem fairly and justly.
Lastly, we must say that all disputes should be finally decided based on the consideration of building a fair and just society. The key to the problem lies in systematic reform. This is in line with the neutral definition of “democratic consolidation” proposed by Andreas Schedler, an academic studying democratization: “organizational democracy,” or, in other words, the systemization of democracy.
To sum up, Taiwan’s democratization must, on the one hand, maintain our free democratic system, while, on the other hand, it requires that we all use our own freedom and rights to create a society of rule of law based on the principle of fairness and justice. The most important examination standard in this process is to make sure that different people and different parties behave in the same way and receive the same treatment.
Lee Yeau-tarn is a professor in the Graduate Institute of Development Studies at National Chengchi University; Hsu Heng-chen is a doctoral student in the Department of Political Science at National Taiwan University.
TRANSLATED BY PAUL COOPER AND EDDY CHANG
President William Lai (賴清德) attended a dinner held by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) when representatives from the group visited Taiwan in October. In a speech at the event, Lai highlighted similarities in the geopolitical challenges faced by Israel and Taiwan, saying that the two countries “stand on the front line against authoritarianism.” Lai noted how Taiwan had “immediately condemned” the Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel by Hamas and had provided humanitarian aid. Lai was heavily criticized from some quarters for standing with AIPAC and Israel. On Nov. 4, the Taipei Times published an opinion article (“Speak out on the
The image was oddly quiet. No speeches, no flags, no dramatic announcements — just a Chinese cargo ship cutting through arctic ice and arriving in Britain in October. The Istanbul Bridge completed a journey that once existed only in theory, shaving weeks off traditional shipping routes. On paper, it was a story about efficiency. In strategic terms, it was about timing. Much like politics, arriving early matters. Especially when the route, the rules and the traffic are still undefined. For years, global politics has trained us to watch the loud moments: warships in the Taiwan Strait, sanctions announced at news conferences, leaders trading
Eighty-seven percent of Taiwan’s energy supply this year came from burning fossil fuels, with more than 47 percent of that from gas-fired power generation. The figures attracted international attention since they were in October published in a Reuters report, which highlighted the fragility and structural challenges of Taiwan’s energy sector, accumulated through long-standing policy choices. The nation’s overreliance on natural gas is proving unstable and inadequate. The rising use of natural gas does not project an image of a Taiwan committed to a green energy transition; rather, it seems that Taiwan is attempting to patch up structural gaps in lieu of
News about expanding security cooperation between Israel and Taiwan, including the visits of Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) in September and Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Francois Wu (吳志中) this month, as well as growing ties in areas such as missile defense and cybersecurity, should not be viewed as isolated events. The emphasis on missile defense, including Taiwan’s newly introduced T-Dome project, is simply the most visible sign of a deeper trend that has been taking shape quietly over the past two to three years. Taipei is seeking to expand security and defense cooperation with Israel, something officials
RSS