I live in Taiwan because, like many foreigners, I fell in love with and chose to align my life with a Taiwanese. In an era where personal freedoms are mandatorily ceded to government decree, I am thankful to the Taiwanese government for the spousal visa, as well as the lack of demeaning bureaucratic hoops and hurdles needed to get a work permit, residency permit and healthcare.
However, if I then choose to attempt citizenship, this enlightened attitude spasms to seizure, culminating in what appears to be blatant xenophobia.
In contrast to Western countries, the path to citizenship mandates a protracted period of demeaning, discriminatory and expensive bureaucratic challenges that eventually are rewarded in citizenship and equality under law.
Why does Taiwan start the process so graciously and then, in a bureaucratic absolute reminiscent of a religious dogma, demand that finally you forgo all nationalities but your new Taiwanese? Taiwanese nationals can hold more than one consecutive nationality, but the freshly minted “new Taiwanese” cannot.
Governments actively promote the concept that being a citizen of their country makes you belong to an elite with intrinsic cultural values so highly regarded that you are expected to fight to the death to preserve the integrity of your country.
Nationalism, tribalism or groupism — all social constructs of grouping that have potential to benefit those within the group, and equal potential to demonize those outside the group.
What is it about being born inside the geographical limits of a country that makes you special, an elite, or in this case, Taiwanese? Is it genetic complement?
Humans, having survived one or more historical bottlenecks, are genetically very similar. Humans are wanderers. A migratory species that has dispersed in pursuit of prey, resources or peace for millennia.
Countries are newcomers to human history, changing and dissolving over time, and the new exclusionist countries with borders that require passports are an invention of governments after World War I, little more than 100 years ago.
Countries are, at best, a politically agreed upon Rubicon that encircles people genetically very similar to those who live in neighboring countries.
Is there something special about being born on the land inside that political circle? Perhaps yes, if all people born inside a country’s boundaries receive citizenship and equality under law.
However, children who are born in Taiwan to foreigners with legal residence and work status are not given Taiwanese citizenship, despite being schooled in Taiwan and being as culturally Taiwanese as Taiwanese nationals. So it is not about geography per se.
Is it about the unifying effect of the culture inside a country’s boundaries?
Taiwan has 16 indigenous tribes, Hakka and Han ethnicities, numerous foreign workers and many Taiwanese nationals who have lived for extended periods in other cultures. All are free to display their ethnicity, use whatever language that most efficiently aides communication and adopt practices from other cultures. It is a living, growing interdependence of diversity that makes ascribing unique attributes as distinct to Taiwanese culture virtually impossible.
What defines a Taiwanese national if it is not genes, geography or culture? What remains is politics.
In these turbulent times of bellicose political posturing by nations, Taiwan tries to project an image of democratic internationalism, justly lobbying for recognition and inclusion in the international community. Justly trumpeting how Taiwanese expertise and experience can add to international aid, regulation and administration. Justly stating that it is immoral for a democratic country to be excluded by the international community because of historical animosity and the rules of an autocrat.
However, the parallels between the plight of Taiwan in the international community and the plight of foreigners born in Taiwan, or residing long-term in Taiwan, and the Taiwanese political bureaucrats who control the allocation of Taiwanese citizenship are obvious. The plea common to the government and foreigners inside Taiwan is: Let us be treated as equal.
Allowing long-term foreign residents to hold dual citizenship would provide an immediate security benefit to Taiwan by making conflict with China an event with international implications, rather than the regularly espoused domestic Chinese conflict.
The National Development Council’s Mandarin and English bilingual 2030 policy would benefit from allowing foreign professors to be included. They should have equal rights to employment in the Taiwanese academic community, and rights to apply for research funding from the Ministry of Science and Technology.
There are almost no foreign full professors permanently employed at Taiwanese universities. This is protectionism by design, which decreases the research output of Taiwan and the quality of tuition given to students.
It is morally wrong to deny dual citizenship to children born to foreigners in Taiwan. It is unjust to suggest that foreign long-term residents do not contribute economically and culturally to the nation.
Allowing foreigners to become Taiwanese citizens without renouncing their existing citizenship is not constitutionally impossible, as every year about a dozen priests, doctors, business people and tall people who play sport are put on parade as they are given dual citizenship in exchange for services rendered.
The government wants Taiwan to go out and be legitimately international on the world stage, but perplexingly, it does not want Taiwan to be an international community that practices equality under law inside the country.
With the stroke of a pen, these inequalities could be removed. Taiwan would gain the respect and loyalty of many new citizens. Please do it.
Peter G. Osborne is a professor working in the field of agriscience in Taitung County.
Two sets of economic data released last week by the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) have drawn mixed reactions from the public: One on the nation’s economic performance in the first quarter of the year and the other on Taiwan’s household wealth distribution in 2021. GDP growth for the first quarter was faster than expected, at 6.51 percent year-on-year, an acceleration from the previous quarter’s 4.93 percent and higher than the agency’s February estimate of 5.92 percent. It was also the highest growth since the second quarter of 2021, when the economy expanded 8.07 percent, DGBAS data showed. The growth
In the intricate ballet of geopolitics, names signify more than mere identification: They embody history, culture and sovereignty. The recent decision by China to refer to Arunachal Pradesh as “Tsang Nan” or South Tibet, and to rename Tibet as “Xizang,” is a strategic move that extends beyond cartography into the realm of diplomatic signaling. This op-ed explores the implications of these actions and India’s potential response. Names are potent symbols in international relations, encapsulating the essence of a nation’s stance on territorial disputes. China’s choice to rename regions within Indian territory is not merely a linguistic exercise, but a symbolic assertion
More than seven months into the armed conflict in Gaza, the International Court of Justice ordered Israel to take “immediate and effective measures” to protect Palestinians in Gaza from the risk of genocide following a case brought by South Africa regarding Israel’s breaches of the 1948 Genocide Convention. The international community, including Amnesty International, called for an immediate ceasefire by all parties to prevent further loss of civilian lives and to ensure access to life-saving aid. Several protests have been organized around the world, including at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) and many other universities in the US.
Every day since Oct. 7 last year, the world has watched an unprecedented wave of violence rain down on Israel and the occupied Palestinian Territories — more than 200 days of constant suffering and death in Gaza with just a seven-day pause. Many of us in the American expatriate community in Taiwan have been watching this tragedy unfold in horror. We know we are implicated with every US-made “dumb” bomb dropped on a civilian target and by the diplomatic cover our government gives to the Israeli government, which has only gotten more extreme with such impunity. Meantime, multicultural coalitions of US