The efforts of the Transitional Justice Commission, established in 2018 and set to be replaced by a “transitional justice board” under the Cabinet in May, have been portrayed as a power game between the Democratic Progressive Party and the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), rather than a struggle for justice, reconciliation and inclusivity.
The Executive Yuan on Feb. 24 approved an amendment to the Act on Promoting Transitional Justice (促進轉型正義條例) that would create the board, which would review and coordinate transitional justice efforts among ministries and agencies following the commission’s dissolution.
Under the Cabinet’s plan, the Ministry of Justice would lead efforts to redress judicial wrongs, while identifying and prosecuting suspects. The Ministry of the Interior would address authoritarian symbols, while the Ministry of Culture would seek to preserve sites of injustice. The Ministry of Health and Welfare would set up programs to address trauma caused by state violence, and the Ministry of Education would handle transitional justice education.
The National Development Council would manage a fund for the promotion of transitional justice, while the Executive Yuan would designate other powers and responsibilities regarding transitional justice.
However, without an overall objective and public support, the transitional justice movement lacks the momentum to progress.
As Academia Sinica research fellow Chen Chia-ming (陳嘉銘) has said, transitional justice should embrace an overall goal aimed at shaping the nation’s democratic culture, promoting mutual understanding among ethnic groups and jointly creating a symbiotic democratic society.
However, in the pursuit of transitional justice tasks, such as monitoring the disclosure of archives, the overall goal is often forgotten.
Chen said that the government should spread the tasks among agencies, as public servants are often reluctant to carry out overly political matters. For example, school teachers might be reluctant to teach about the White Terror era, while many civil servants do not understand the purpose of transitional justice.
Likewise, some agencies might suspect that carrying out high-level transitional justice work could harm their reputation.
In an article published in 2019, Academic Sinica law assistant professor Chen Yu-jie (陳玉潔) and political science assistant professor Chang Liao Nien-chung (張廖年仲) wrote that while some civil society groups advocated for transitional justice issues such as education, the public displayed only a lukewarm interest.
In a survey in June 2016, a month after President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) took office, 13.9 percent of respondents ranked transitional justice as a top priority, whereas 73.5 percent were concerned about the economy, 56.5 percent about food safety, and 37.9 percent about pension and financial reform.
Chen and Liao said that the government creates tension and confusion when transitional justice efforts focus on controversial issues without sufficient public discussion and consensus.
Taiwanese have little trust in transitional justice projects. In a poll last year, more than half of the respondents said they did not trust the commission’s stance or performance.
The Tsai administration must engage the public in more meaningful dialogue. Only through wide social recognition can it advance reconciliation.
Transitional justice is moving into the next stage. Only by gathering momentum can the government regain the social support needed to accelerate transitional justice.
Huang Yu-zhe is a student in National Chengchi University’s Graduate Institute of Law and Interdisciplinary Studies.
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