Taiwan is the master of its own fate, yet the remnants and values of its colonial past still haunt the nation. The issue is not limited to Taiwan, but rather a phantasm that exists in all postcolonial states. The phenomenon is in apparent in several nations following their independence.
Early examples include former Central and South American colonies once ruled by Spain, Portugal and France, and more recently Asian and African nations that gained independence after World War II.
The road to democracy is not a smooth one.
Most elites in such countries were educated during colonial periods. Once their nation gains independence, they continue to hold most of the power, replacing the colonizers as the new governing class. Their positions in colonial regimes created the conditions for postcolonial privilege.
The revolutionary nature of independence movements is far more likely to be co-opted by military generals turned dictators — which has also occurred during transitions to civilian-led governments.
Taiwan is unique in this regard. It did not gain its independence directly after World War II, but became embroiled in the perplexity and confusion of an unresolved civil war between the Republic of China (ROC) and the People’s Republic of China.
Taiwan’s quiet revolution of democratization has yet to afford it a path to national normalization.
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) used a revolution to overthrow and cast out the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) ROC, and have proclaimed themselves the inheritors of the ROC-occupied Taiwan.
Taiwan entered its postcolonial era after its own quiet revolution.
However, the entanglements of the “China problem,” and the national affinity of many KMT members and politicians lies not with Taiwan, but with China.
This is why its former nemesis, the CCP, has become the bosom to which the KMT runs crying to when things get tough. The KMT’s fawning and worshiping of Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) and his son Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國) has eroded to nothing but pretense. The KMT now kowtows to Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), using the lie of belonging to “one China” to conceal their treacherous intentions.
Taiwan’s postcolonial phenomenon is not just a matter of authoritarian acolytes of KMT party-state organizations wreaking havoc within the nation or the party’s continued abuses within national organizations.
The problem of malicious actors in local factions followed the KMT when it fled to Taiwan, where it declared Taiwan’s “retrocession,” creating a governance theory that incorporated a terrible triad of a single party, government and military junta all rolled into one.
The KMT survived the reforms of the post-quiet revolution in Taiwan, but because of its obstinate Chinese nationalist creed and identity issues, it has yet to evolve into a political party of Taiwan — an internal contradiction for the country.
Like Taiwan, Joseon Dynasty Korea was also colonized by Japan. An independent Korea emerged after World War II, but almost immediately, left and right-wing political fractures split the nation into North and South Korea.
Where it differs from Taiwan is that South Korea had already started on its road toward democracy, revolving through multiple authoritarian regimes and military coups. Taiwan had long-lasting, consolidated one-party rule that sowed the present-day issues of transitional justice.
North Korea is its own thing, remaining under the yoke and fetters of its version of communism. The postcolonial experiences of the two Koreas are not the same.
Communist North Vietnam launched a war to conquer democratic South Vietnam in the 1950s. Their postcolonial experience likewise differs from Taiwan’s.
The aftermath of World War II has kept Taiwan stuck in a colonial era. Former president Lee Teng-hui’s (李登輝) use of Taiwanese identity to win the nation’s first direct presidential election of the then-newly democratized government in the 1990s, followed by the 2000’s post-quiet revolution phenomenon are historic events with unresolved threads. Taiwan’s national rebuilding and social changes must grapple with these questions, as they are not merely issues of politics, but also of culture. If we only look at political problems while neglecting cultural ones, then all reform efforts would be for naught.
Lee Min-yung is a poet.
Translated by Tim Smith
Concerns that the US might abandon Taiwan are often overstated. While US President Donald Trump’s handling of Ukraine raised unease in Taiwan, it is crucial to recognize that Taiwan is not Ukraine. Under Trump, the US views Ukraine largely as a European problem, whereas the Indo-Pacific region remains its primary geopolitical focus. Taipei holds immense strategic value for Washington and is unlikely to be treated as a bargaining chip in US-China relations. Trump’s vision of “making America great again” would be directly undermined by any move to abandon Taiwan. Despite the rhetoric of “America First,” the Trump administration understands the necessity of
US President Donald Trump’s challenge to domestic American economic-political priorities, and abroad to the global balance of power, are not a threat to the security of Taiwan. Trump’s success can go far to contain the real threat — the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) surge to hegemony — while offering expanded defensive opportunities for Taiwan. In a stunning affirmation of the CCP policy of “forceful reunification,” an obscene euphemism for the invasion of Taiwan and the destruction of its democracy, on March 13, 2024, the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) used Chinese social media platforms to show the first-time linkage of three new
If you had a vision of the future where China did not dominate the global car industry, you can kiss those dreams goodbye. That is because US President Donald Trump’s promised 25 percent tariff on auto imports takes an ax to the only bits of the emerging electric vehicle (EV) supply chain that are not already dominated by Beijing. The biggest losers when the levies take effect this week would be Japan and South Korea. They account for one-third of the cars imported into the US, and as much as two-thirds of those imported from outside North America. (Mexico and Canada, while
The military is conducting its annual Han Kuang exercises in phases. The minister of national defense recently said that this year’s scenarios would simulate defending the nation against possible actions the Chinese People’s Liberation Army (PLA) might take in an invasion of Taiwan, making the threat of a speculated Chinese invasion in 2027 a heated agenda item again. That year, also referred to as the “Davidson window,” is named after then-US Indo-Pacific Command Admiral Philip Davidson, who in 2021 warned that Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) had instructed the PLA to be ready to invade Taiwan by 2027. Xi in 2017
RSS