For a few days it proudly flew, nudged between Syria and Tajikistan, amid rows of national flags festooning London’s Regent Street as the city prepares for the Olympics. Suddenly, for reasons unknown, but easily guessed at, it was pulled down, leaving a sad gap in the otherwise festive display of global fraternity.
Granted, the Republic of China (ROC) flag is for many people not a national flag but rather a symbol of a regime that imposed itself on Taiwan after World War II, one that, furthermore, unleashed decades of repression on its people. And yet, despite all the hardships, it now stands as the most readily recognizable symbol of nationhood for all Taiwanese.
Yes, it was first woven as the symbol of a political party in China; and yes, it officially stands for the ROC, but over the years, through the long process of democratization and national consolidation, both the ROC and the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) have become part of the fabric that makes Taiwan what it is today. For people outside Asia who know little about this region’s convoluted history, nothing more immediately distinguishes Taiwan from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) than the ROC flag.
The reaction among Taiwanese worldwide to the removal of the flag on Regent Street testifies to the strength of that symbol. Hours after it was taken down, online social networks and blogs exploded with “before and after” pictures of the street, accompanied by expressions of anger and indignation. Thousands of people — mostly young Taiwanese — mobilized, providing contact information about the civic organization that is responsible for the site, writing letters and visiting the location to take pictures of themselves holding the flag.
With very few exceptions, all referred to the flag as standing for Taiwan, not the KMT or the ROC, and reaffirmed their pride in being Taiwanese, which confirms the view that the once-exogenous flag has been rehabilitated into an indigenous one. Though it took over Taiwan, the ROC has since been absorbed by it, resulting in a symbiotic relationship that continually redefines itself and gives Taiwan its identity.
The strong reaction among Taiwanese, though prompted by disheartening political realities, is encouraging. For one, it debunks the claim that young Taiwanese today are apolitical and cannot be bothered with the future of their homeland. It shows us that on fundamental issues of justice, young Taiwanese will not sit idly by. It also tells us that despite their busy lives (several of those who mobilized are graduate students scattered all over the world), they know who they are and will not countenance anyone telling them otherwise.
One young Taiwanese living in the US could not have put it more bluntly, saying: “Fuck that de facto shit,” referring to Taiwan’s sovereign status.
Another offshoot of this incident is that it demonstrates yet again that despite currently stable relations in the Taiwan Strait, the 23 million Taiwanese continue to live under a shadow that prevents them from exercising their rights as citizens of the world. China’s “goodwill” and “peaceful” cross-strait relations remain contingent on Beijing seeing no true expression of Taiwanese statehood, irrespective of the venue. It has since been confirmed that the flag incident on Regent Street was the result of complaints by Chinese representatives, accentuating China’s refusal to acknowledge the existence of Taiwanese as a people.
With the world’s eyes turned on London over the next few weeks, this is the perfect occasion for Taiwanese and their supporters to express who they are and to demonstrate that the so-called “peace” has rotten foundations. As one flag is ignominiously taken down, hundreds, thousands more should bloom all over London. For the next two weeks, London will be the world’s stage. This is an opportunity not to be missed.
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
Ursula K. le Guin in The Ones Who Walked Away from Omelas proposed a thought experiment of a utopian city whose existence depended on one child held captive in a dungeon. When taken to extremes, Le Guin suggests, utilitarian logic violates some of our deepest moral intuitions. Even the greatest social goods — peace, harmony and prosperity — are not worth the sacrifice of an innocent person. Former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), since leaving office, has lived an odyssey that has brought him to lows like Le Guin’s dungeon. From late 2008 to 2015 he was imprisoned, much of this
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