Recent news reports claim that former president Lee Teng-hui (
Particularly noteworthy is Lee's reputed wish to promote a third presidential ticket in the 2008 presidential election to represent forces outside the pan-green and pan-blue camps.
As the fervor behind the anti-Chen campaign is cooling down, it is clear that Lee still has not given up on Taiwan's democratic project in the post-Chen Shui-bian (
A third presidential ticket will not necessarily have a chance of being elected, but it will influence the capacity to attract votes among the other tickets.
If a pro-localization ticket were to materialize, it would take votes from the DPP. This means that a third force would not necessarily be able to achieve Lee's original goals, but it would certainly wreak havoc on the pro-localization vote.
If Wang were to leave the KMT, he would not become a second Lee.
The pan-blue vote would not reproduce the result of the 1996 presidential election when Lee and his vice presidential candidate Lien Chan (
Rather, there would likely be a repeat of the 2000 election. This terrible humiliation for the pan-blues means that there is little room for Wang to come out and run as an independent. One scenario in which this might happen would be that the KMT suffers a defeat in the Taipei and Kaohsiung mayoral elections that forces KMT Chairman Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) to step down only to be replaced as chairman by Wang who would then be nominated as the party's presidential candidate.
Another possibility would be that the DPP loses in Taipei and Kaohsiung forcing Premier Su Tseng-chang (
Chen could then take the opportunity to shuffle his cards and appoint Wang premier. Bolstered by his newly acquired executive position, Wang might then win the KMT's presidential nomination.
These scenarios show that the upcoming mayoral elections may determine the direction of the future political situation. It is, however, difficult to guess how a third force would develop since the advent of the red-clad campaign did not open up space for a new middle-of-the-road force.
Instead, it led to unrest and an intensified stand-off between the pan-green and pan-blue camps, and the current political atmosphere has reduced the ability of new social forces like the DPP's "new generation forum" and the "six green group" from making an impact.
But the will to punish the DPP certainly coincides with Lee's ideas about a third force. "Middle-of-the-road" is but a phrase, and the important thing is to split the elites.
Grassroots mobilization has become a way to split the vote. Together with Ma's high support ratings in the opinion polls, a third force could only harm the DPP without deconstructing the blue-green framework and may even amplify the trend toward a pan-blue majority.
The so-called third force, then, is more like a second wave of anti-Chen activities that instead of reconfiguring the current two-party dominated system, will return us to a situation with one big party and several smaller ones.
Taking a long term view of political developments, this is a struggle between the post-Chen and post-Lee eras. Both Chen and Lee were directly elected and it seems that they have different views of the political landscape after they step down. A concrete manifestation of these differences is the competing attempts to consolidate or split the green camp.
The result will decide whether the post-Lee era will end with the coming of the post-Chen era, or if the post-Chen era will merely be an extension of Lee's legacy.
Hsu Yung-ming is an assistant research fellow at the Sun Yat-sen Institute for Social Sciences and Philosophy at Academia Sinica.
Translated by Perry Svensson?
The first Donald Trump term was a boon for Taiwan. The administration regularized the arms sales process and enhanced bilateral ties. Taipei will not be so fortunate the second time around. Given recent events, Taiwan must proceed with the assumption that it cannot count on the United States to defend it — diplomatically or militarily — during the next four years. Early indications suggested otherwise. The nomination of Marco Rubio as US Secretary of State and the appointment of Mike Waltz as the national security advisor, both of whom have expressed full-throated support for Taiwan in the past, raised hopes that
There is nothing the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) could do to stop the tsunami-like mass recall campaign. KMT Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) reportedly said the party does not exclude the option of conditionally proposing a no-confidence vote against the premier, which the party later denied. Did an “actuary” like Chu finally come around to thinking it should get tough with the ruling party? The KMT says the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) is leading a minority government with only a 40 percent share of the vote. It has said that the DPP is out of touch with the electorate, has proposed a bloated
Authorities last week revoked the residency permit of a Chinese social media influencer surnamed Liu (劉), better known by her online channel name Yaya in Taiwan (亞亞在台灣), who has more than 440,000 followers online and is living in Taiwan with a marriage-based residency permit, for her “reunification by force” comments. She was asked to leave the country in 10 days. The National Immigration Agency (NIA) on Tuesday last week announced the decision, citing the influencer’s several controversial public comments, including saying that “China does not need any other reason to reunify Taiwan with force” and “why is it [China] hesitant
A media report has suggested that Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairman Eric Chu (朱立倫) was considering initiating a vote of no confidence in Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) in a bid to “bring down the Cabinet.” The KMT has denied that this topic was ever discussed. Why might such a move have even be considered? It would have been absurd if it had seen the light of day — potentially leading to a mass loss of legislative seats for the KMT even without the recall petitions already under way. Today the second phase of the recall movement is to begin — which has
RSS