Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) delivered a speech in Beijing on Thursday last week to commemorate the 160th birthday of Republic of China (ROC) cofounder Sun Yat-sen (孫逸仙). However, rather than talking about Sun, the speech focused on the legitimacy of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Mostly, it was about Xi and his obsession with power.
In Taiwan, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) administration decided not to mark the anniversary. The Mainland Affairs Council urged the public not to attend events in Beijing. Officials requesting permission to travel to Beijing would have their application rejected, as they would be reinforcing the CCP’s “united front” efforts the council said.
Aside from officially representing the ROC which Sun founded, the DPP has no impetus to commemorate Sun or his legacy. The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) is far more ideologically wed to the ROC, but has also largely not taken part in celebrations.
Pan-blue media expressed regret at the DPP’s willingness to minimize the importance of Sun’s legacy, saying that it encourages Taiwanese to turn their backs on the nation’s roots. However, there is a simple explanation: The pan-green and pan-blue camps define the nation, and therefore its roots, differently.
An editorial in pro-China media sought to establish a solid link between Sun’s revolutionary movement and Taiwanese history during the Japanese colonial period. It said that, on two of Sun’s trips to Taiwan, in 1913 and 1918, following the fall of the Qing Dynasty and the founding of the republic, the Japanese colonial government was concerned that his ideas would have a destabilizing effect on people in Taiwan, who could potentially identify more with China than their colonial masters.
Sun outlined the Three Principles of the People (三民主義), which are nationalism (民族主義), democracy (民權主義) and people’s welfare (民生主義). The KMT has emphasized Sun’s call for peaceful unification of the Chinese nation, while the DPP focuses on the principle of putting the people first, by which it means ROC citizens — Taiwanese — and developing democratic institutions which lead in the interests of the people. The CCP elides the centrality of democracy, self-autonomy and Sun’s blueprint for a constitutional state, and instead focuses on nationalism, national strength and the rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.
It is important not to lose sight of the interests of the Taiwanese in this ideological exercise. For one, this is not an opportunity for parties to pick and choose which principles should be prioritized. Second, these are the ideas of a revolutionary thinker looking for solutions to tumultuous conditions that existed more than a century ago, seeking a better future for a self-determined nation liberated from a corrupt imperial regime.
However, with that context in mind, we can turn back to Xi’s speech.
It has been said that the speech, compared with previous years, concentrated less on discussing Taiwan, and in terms of the word count this is true. However, the annexation of Taiwan is central to Xi’s vision of national rejuvenation and unity. In that sense, the issue of Taiwan permeates the entire speech.
Xi’s objective was to tie Sun’s legacy, as he defines it, to the CCP’s history, achievements, current policy and intended trajectory: what he would say is its “historical mission.” He urged the audience to “study, inherit, transmit and develop [Sun’s] valuable spirit” (學習、繼承、發揚?承他的寶貴精神) about eight times and identified specific ideological innovations, including “Xi Jinping thought.”
However, it was his fascination with the idea of unity that was perhaps most telling, with phrases such as “unity of love for the country, the party and socialism,” “to inspire all Chinese people at home and abroad to continually deepen their patriotic feelings and temper their resolve to build a strong country,” and “continuously consolidate and develop the great unity of all Chinese people.”
“Sun always firmly safeguarded national unity and ethnic solidarity,” Xi said.
Sun’s promotion of national unity and ethnic solidarity were the necessary preconditions for emerging peacefully from centuries under imperial rule. His ideas involved self-determination, consensus rather than coercion, and respect for ethnic diversity rather than its wilful destruction. Behind Xi’s obsession with unity lie his fear of agitation against despotic rule, and the revolutionary drive that birthed Sun’s “valuable spirit.”
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