When the campaign aimed at ousting President Chen Shui-bian (
The most obvious examples can be found among the anti-Chen actions on Ketagalan Boulevard, such as veteran actor Chin Ti's (
The crowd in red shouted along, forgetting that former Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) chairman Shih Ming-teh (
Without Chiang's crackdown on the democracy movement, Shih would never have been called "Taiwan's Nelson Mandela." But without the support of Chiang's followers, there would not be an anti-Chen demonstration today. In the face of this historical irony, it is hard to say if Shih has betrayed himself or if his pan-blue supporters have betrayed Chiang.
The former is probably more likely. When campaign spokeswoman Wang Lie-ping (王麗萍) called out "Republic of Taiwan" during a speech, she was booed by the crowd and had to issue a public apology, which showed the anti-independence sentiment of those participating in the sit-in.
By contrast, no one criticized Chin for praising the KMT. Nor was he given a dressing down in the way Shih lectured Liao Lin Li-ling (廖林麗玲), the Taiwan Solidarity Union's (TSU) candidate in the upcoming Taipei City councilor elections, when she suggested that the nation should apply for UN membership under the name "Taiwan" instead of the Republic of China.
I wonder what "Taiwan" -- a place that Shih sacrificed so much for -- means to the people dressed in red? Will he now compromise his past ideals just to maintain his leadership?
What is being betrayed here is not only the "Republic of Taiwan," but also the spirit of the nation's democratic history. If Shih really was one of the most important individuals in this historical discourse, his position is now at risk of being seriously distorted.
The campaign to depose Chen represents a certain set of values. But if these values are tied to Chiang's legacy, that would negate the claim to transcend partisan politics and the unification-independence debate. The protesters would inadvertently become the political mainstream.
Some academics are so naive. They see the "love" and non-violence demonstrated on Ketagalan Boulevard as a beautiful song that will purify people's hearts and develop into a new creed. They also believe that even if Chen does not resign, the seeds of democracy have been firmly planted. However, the confrontation between the pan-blue and pan-green camps would only lead to rising hatred and violence, and possibly even to a national strike that would feed social unrest.
The Kaohsiung Incident in 1979 remains a milestone in Taiwan's democratic development. Its influence has actually increased over time. Answering the question of whether the campaign's "siege"of the Presidential Office on Friday was a glorious replay of the Kaohsiung Incident or a betrayal of that incident is critical for evaluating the nation's democratization, and Shih's role in that movement.
Hsu Yung-ming is an assistant research fellow in the Sun Yat-sen Institute for Social Sciences and Philosophy at Academia Sinica.
Translated by Eddy Chang
On May 7, 1971, Henry Kissinger planned his first, ultra-secret mission to China and pondered whether it would be better to meet his Chinese interlocutors “in Pakistan where the Pakistanis would tape the meeting — or in China where the Chinese would do the taping.” After a flicker of thought, he decided to have the Chinese do all the tape recording, translating and transcribing. Fortuitously, historians have several thousand pages of verbatim texts of Dr. Kissinger’s negotiations with his Chinese counterparts. Paradoxically, behind the scenes, Chinese stenographers prepared verbatim English language typescripts faster than they could translate and type them
More than 30 years ago when I immigrated to the US, applied for citizenship and took the 100-question civics test, the one part of the naturalization process that left the deepest impression on me was one question on the N-400 form, which asked: “Have you ever been a member of, involved in or in any way associated with any communist or totalitarian party anywhere in the world?” Answering “yes” could lead to the rejection of your application. Some people might try their luck and lie, but if exposed, the consequences could be much worse — a person could be fined,
Xiaomi Corp founder Lei Jun (雷軍) on May 22 made a high-profile announcement, giving online viewers a sneak peek at the company’s first 3-nanometer mobile processor — the Xring O1 chip — and saying it is a breakthrough in China’s chip design history. Although Xiaomi might be capable of designing chips, it lacks the ability to manufacture them. No matter how beautifully planned the blueprints are, if they cannot be mass-produced, they are nothing more than drawings on paper. The truth is that China’s chipmaking efforts are still heavily reliant on the free world — particularly on Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing
Keelung Mayor George Hsieh (謝國樑) of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) on Tuesday last week apologized over allegations that the former director of the city’s Civil Affairs Department had illegally accessed citizens’ data to assist the KMT in its campaign to recall Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) councilors. Given the public discontent with opposition lawmakers’ disruptive behavior in the legislature, passage of unconstitutional legislation and slashing of the central government’s budget, civic groups have launched a massive campaign to recall KMT lawmakers. The KMT has tried to fight back by initiating campaigns to recall DPP lawmakers, but the petition documents they