The DPP's central standing committee recently passed a proposal saying the party "does not rule out cross-party cooperation" in the upcoming election of legislators, county commissioners and provincial-level city mayors, due by the end of next year. DPP Chairman Frank Hsieh (謝長廷) further explained that, in some cities and counties, the party cannot hope to win both the legislative and local elections. The DPP can therefore cooperate with other parties as appropriate, providing "mutual support" at the upcoming elections, Hsieh said.
The cooperating partners will not be limited to any specific political party but will be selected according to the political situation in each locality. To maximize its haul of county commissioner, mayoral and legislative seats, the DPP will not rule out cooperating or even undertaking "exchanges" with non-party members in counties and cities where the party enjoys relatively low support.
Such a public announcement was indeed unprecedented in Taiwan's party politics. In fact, in many other democracies, such open inter-party cooperation or alliances are not uncommon. For example, the Fourth French Republic adopted a proportional representation system for its parliamentary elections.
Also, in today's East European and Latin American countries, we hear frequently about open cross-party cooperation in the run up to elections.
In Taiwan, due to realpolitik and systemic factors, the major political parties do not dare to completely rule out the possibility of cooperating with other parties. It is likely that none of the three major parties will win a majority in next year's legislative election. No matter who has more seats, cooperation between any two parties may build a majority against the third party. Thus, the cooperating parties can demand leading roles in forming a Cabinet.
This kind of political reality, which is very likely to emerge after the election, compels every major party to start thinking now about the possibility of cooperating with the others in the run up to the elections. If the legislative elections are not held earlier than scheduled, they are very likely to be held simultaneously with the county commissioner, provincial city mayor, county councilor and city councilor elections by the end of next year.
Many positions will be available as chips for give-and-take cross-party cooperation. What's more, Taiwan's legislative and county/city councilor elections are held in a framework of multiple-member districts -- which means the elections are not zero-sum games by nature. This will be conducive to allocations and cooperation between the political parties or factions within them. Each takes what it needs and seeks the maximum number of seats for itself, thus creating room for a win-win situation.
However, many problems remains to be overcome, since each party has its own axe to grind and therefore calculates a mode of cooperation most beneficial to itself. Also, the parties can very easily fall into a "prisoner's dilemma," causing the cooperation to collapse.
First of all, does so-called cross-party cooperation also imply the possibility of forming a coalition after the election? If "yes," then should the cooperating parties seek some kind of consensus on the many major policies even before the election? If not, cooperating merely in the run up to the election would be like a "one-night stand." The parties will have a hard time winning the sympathy of their supporters for it.
Next, should such cross-party cooperation be conducted in a framework of "national unanimity," or should they go for what is appropriate for each region? If the answer is the latter, then it may appear like an arbitrary matchmaking process in the eyes of the voters.
The parties may also have to amend their current inflexible nomination systems to make room for possible future cooperation with other parties. For example, both the DPP and KMT nominates candidates on the basis of membership votes and public opinion surveys. This does not help the "exchange" and "allocation" of candidates between parties.
The DPP plans to decide on the nomination quotas for legislative candidates in each constituency before the end of this year. Set nomination quotas will further shrink opportunity for cross-party cooperation. Finally, whether the KMT will choose to boycott the Cabinet at an advantageous time before the end of next year will be another important factor influencing whether cross-party cooperation will occur.
Given its legislative majority, the KMT currently seems to have no intention of boycotting the Cabinet, but it only has one more year of such good fortune. If the KMT thinks it will lose some legislative seats, there is certainly the possibility that the party may choose to boycott the Cabinet at a time when the loss of legislative seats will be at a minimum. Of course, after such a boycott, whether Chen would dissolve the Legislative Yuan, thereby necessitating an early election, will be another question of making a rational choice.
The experience of other countries tell us that pre and post-election cooperation between political parties is not impossible. But their ideological proximity and the mutual policy compatibility are still the most important preconditions for any talks on cooperation. If the parties cooperate in the style of illicit lovers merely for sake of election victory, not only will they lose their ideals but Taiwan's highly independent electorate will pass a final judgment on them.
Wang Yeh-lih is chairman of the political science department at Tunghai University.
Translated by Francis Huang.
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