President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) must seek public consensus on the development of cross-strait ties as Taipei-Beijing relations spread into more political areas, some European experts on cross-strait affairs said in interviews with the Taipei Times.
Dafydd Fell, senior lecturer of the Department of Political and International Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, said Ma needs to be very cautious on the pace of liberalizing cross-strait relations.
“Many of the reforms so far are quite consensual, like direct flights [and Chinese] tourists. They have a clear economic benefit for Taiwan,” he said. “Ma needs to consider public opinion in further moves.”
Taking the Ma government’s plan to sign an economic cooperation framework agreement (ECFA) with Beijing as an example, Fell said the government “needs to open a genuine public debate on the issue and not just complete negotiations in closed-door negotiations.”
“Taiwan needs to seek internal consensus on further developments in cross-strait relations,” he said in an e-mail interview.
The political negotiations with China cannot start at this stage because there is no domestic consensus on the issue, he said.
CHINESE CLOUT
Michael Danielsen, chairman of the Denmark-based Taiwan Corner, is also concerned about China’s economic clout, saying it has made inroads into Taiwanese politics.
He used the boycott by Chinese tourists of southern Taiwan and the screening of a documentary about exiled Uighur activist Rebiya Kadeer as examples to prove his point.
“That is what I call the economic invasion of Taiwan, which turns into political power,” he said via e-mail. “So when President Ma says that the [cross-strait] agreements are only about [the] economy, only ignorant people believe it.”
Nicola Casarini, a Marie Curie research fellow of the European University Institute in Italy, said the Ma administration has every reason to pursue its China policy if it has the support of the majority of the population.
“What is needed at this juncture of Taiwan’s history is to have more consultation with the population, because Taiwan is a country that can ask and has to ask the people about the direction where [it is] to go in the future,” he said during a recent visit to Taipei.
To form a strategic view of itself and balance relations with Beijing, Fell said Taiwan should diversify its external economic dependence. For example, Chinese tourists are an economic asset, but Taiwan must also work on other tourist markets to avoid over-reliance on the Chinese market, he said.
This means it must make significant efforts in marketing Taiwan abroad, but also improve the tourist infrastructure in Taiwan.
Casarini emphasized values, saying Taiwan should continue to engage with Beijing, but at the same time it must keep reminding China that Taiwan cares about such values as democracy, human rights and the rule of law.
So when the two sides form a long-term and strategic partnership, hopefully China would also move closer toward those values that Taiwan thinks are universal, he said.
Danielsen said he was not against engaging with China, but people need to be reminded that China’s objective is unification with Taiwan.
If there is any advice he could give to Taiwan, he said he would urge the Ma administration to allow referendums on the agreements signed with Beijing.
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