A line in singer and composer Lim Giong’s (林強) song Moving Forward (向前行) says: “Everyone says all the good stuff is there,” when talking about moving up to Taipei from central or southern Taiwan.
The song gives expression to the longstanding development imbalance between the north and the south. On June 4, Greater Taichung Mayor Jason Hu (胡志強) blasted the central government for what he called the “ill-fitting” changes that have been made since the upgrades, saying it had failed to pass legislation to support the special municipalities’ development.
At present, government ministries are still basing their reforms for the four new special municipalities on the experience of Taipei. For example, there have been many disputes regarding national and municipal high schools, general and municipal hospitals, provincial highways and city roads and labor inspections. The ministries say that since Taipei has handled these issues for many years, the four new municipalities should adopt the same approach. Before the upgrade of the new special municipalities, the Local Government Act (地方制度法) also stipulated the number of city councilors for the four new special municipalities based on the number of city councilors in Taipei. All these problems exist because the ministries model their view of Taiwan on Taipei.
Making things even harder for the special municipality mayors, the Act Governing the Allocation of Government Revenues and Expenditures (財政收支劃分法) and the Public Debt Act (公共債務法) have yet to be amended. After the upgrade, the new special municipalities took on responsibilities that previously belonged to the central government, together with the concomitant financial costs. Because the two laws were not amended at that time, the four new special municipalities never received the necessary funds and suffered from a lack of complementary legislation.
Neither has the administrative zoning law been passed into law yet. In Greater Kaohsiung, for example, Namasiya Township (那瑪夏) has at most 30,000 residents, while Jheng-sing Borough (正興里) in Sanmin District (三民區) has a population of 14,000. The slow progress of the administrative zoning act has caused a misallocation of public resources. Moreover, the rigid rules of the Regulations for Local Administrative Agency Organization (地方行政機關組織準則) have prevented the Greater Tainan Government from initiating changes that should have followed the administrative upgrade. Given the pace at which legislation is moving, it is easy to see why Hu is frustrated.
Hu’s complaints are a reminder that the government should consider how the four new special municipalities require different thinking from that which has governed Taipei. The Taipei administrative region covers a mere 272km2, while the four other special municipalities have administrative regions of 2,000km2 or more — or eight to 14 times the size of Taipei. There is also a wide gap between urban and rural areas in the special municipalities.
Official duties and powers also vary according to the different types of administrative legislation in Taiwan. Laws and regulations must match the developmental needs of the different special municipalities. That could help create a globally competitive niche for all the different regions. Such governance involves acting locally and thinking globally, and comes closer to Hu’s plans for a Greater Taichung that is truly part of the world.
It would be better to stop moulding the future reforms of the five special municipalities after the Taipei experience.
Hoping Wang is a doctoral student at National Taiwan University’s Department of Political Science.
TRANSLATED BY DREW CAMERON
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