I have taught in universities and served in governmental institutions both in Taiwan and abroad. Since I returned to Taiwan to teach in 1992, I have been researching and teaching industrial economics. I was able to make my expertise useful in providing arguments for the anti-media monopoly and the Sunflower movements.
My involvement with corporations, the government and academia in Taiwan has helped me identify the following problems in the nation’s governance.
The first problem concerns procedural and informational injustices during legal reviews
I used to be an expert witness at a public service commission in a US state government, reviewing an electricity monopoly’s pricing policy. The energy company, the state government and a consumer protection foundation would send their own lawyers and expert witnesses, consisting of economists, engineers and accountants. After providing ample information for one another and publicly debating the matter for several months, committee members appointed by the governor would deliberate and decide, based on the testimonies offered during the hearing, if and by how much the electricity price should be raised.
In contrast, when I was asked by the National Communications Commission (NCC) to serve as an expert witness at a hearing over the acquisition of cable TV operator Kbro Co by Fubon Financial Holding Co chairman Daniel Tsai (蔡明忠), I did not receive any information or report in advance, so there was nothing to review.
Later, when I attended a hearing, as a spectator, convened by the NCC over the acquisition of cable television operator China Network Systems Co by Want Want China Times Group chairman Tsai Eng-meng (蔡衍明), I found that the experts invited to that hearing had also not been given any information prior to conducting their reviews. Moreover, the data that the NCC presented at the hearing was provided solely by the business operators.
Review processes in the legislature are similarly problematic — I printed 50 copies of relevant data and brought them with me to a hearing on the cross-strait service trade agreement to distribute them to legislators of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), only to find, to my astonishment, that the legislators did not even show up.
It is not hard to imagine that hearings on urban planning, environmental protection, urban renewal and similar issues would have similar problems with injustice in proceedings and the provision of information.
The government fails to conduct discussions and assessments in a fair and transparent manner with regard to the rights of the beneficiaries and victims of public policy. Consequently, collusion between government officials and big business takes place and corruption spreads.
The second problem is that government officials lack a sense of responsibility.
When I was working in the Ministry of the Interior’s Construction and Planning Agency, the director-general at the time, who was pushing for the establishment of Taroko National Park, had to address opposition from the cement industry. If then-minister of economic affairs Chao Yao-tung (趙耀東) had simply stuck to his department’s interests, he would of course have backed the cement industry.
However, to my surprise, he took a stance and agreed that the development of Hualien should focus on tourism and prioritize conservation over development. His integrity and responsibility are worthy of respect.
In contrast, current officials are rather subservient and follow orders unquestioningly.
For example, when I took part in the legislative hearings on the cross-strait service trade agreement, I saw that the interior ministry and the Ministry of Education’s comments on the impact assessment of the agreement simply said there was “no impact.”
The many problems that the nation faces, such as overpriced housing, overwork and underpay in the medical profession, food safety, and issues concerning the 12-year compulsory education system remain unsolved mainly because government officials do not fulfill their responsibilities out of fear of upsetting their superiors and vested interests.
The third problem is that government officials do not dare to tell the truth.
There have been several controversial policies and corruption cases recently. In addition to high-ranking government officials, who should take the political responsibility, technocrats and other civil servants should also be held accountable. High-ranking officials might not have sufficient expertise in a certain field, or might altogether lack such expertise, but their subordinates, who take the attitude of “the less I do, the fewer mistakes I would make,” are afraid of telling the truth and thus fail to prevent disasters from happening.
For example, a department in the National Development Council, which used to be in charge of drafting the act for the free economic pilot zones, was considering to allow city and county governments to expropriate land without providing carefully planned regulations. According to reports, members of the council’s other departments thought that this was a problematic measure, yet they did not dare speak up, and so the act got stuck during its legislative review.
The fourth problem is that under the single-district two-vote system, lawmakers only follow the party line and neglect public opinion.
During former premier Jiang Yi-huah’s (江宜樺) term in office, tens of thousands of people took part in the anti-media monopoly movement. In response, Jiang announced that he would prioritize the creation of an anti-monopoly law along with two other bills. The public believed what he said, so everyone was surprised to see the bill defeated by lawmakers during the second reading in the legislature.
Together with other academics, I conducted a total of nine workshops on the service trade agreement eight months before the Sunflower movement started in March last year. None of the KMT legislators or their assistants showed up, so I prepared a slide show based on the results of the workshops and e-mailed it to all of them, but received no response. I could not help but feel that under the current single-district two-vote system, lawmakers only follow the party line and ignore public opinion.
The final problem I have identified is that academics and think tanks do not fulfill their advisory functions.
Political parties and the private sector have set up many think tanks. Since most of the funding comes from the government, political parties or business consortia, they frequently end up working to make government policy look good, or defend the interests of political parties and business consortia. Most think tank directors are retired government officials and they all pretty much use the same group of experts and academics.
These people might have contributed to the nation’s economic development in the past, but since the global economic environment is subject to rapid change, and new technologies bring fresh changes to economic and social structures, policymaking requires advice from people with new ways of thinking and doing things.
The worst part of all this is that in the past few years, in order to improve their university rankings, most academics in social studies have been busying themselves writing papers, unwilling to conduct research on public policies and accept government projects. As a result, government projects are being delegated to private schools, which is having an impact on the quality of the government’s policymaking.
Jang Show-ling is chairperson of the Public Economics Research Center at National Taiwan University.
Translated by Ethan Zhan
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