When were you there in Taiwan? I asked my wife about sending the “Outsiders” (mainlanders) back and she said that the issue has gotten increasing more difficult. People of her parents generation were more likely to face descrimination and to not have mainlander friends, where ones in her generation are less likely to be descriminated against (for government, teaching or large corporation jobs) and more likely to have friends of – or even to get married to the grandchildren of mainlanders.
According to my wife, there are 1,000,000 Taiwanese working in China or as their families. (Lots of social issues with this, but that’s another thread.)
early 1980’s when taiwan was still under martial law and taiwanese elementary school kids were rediculed, fined and beaten in school for speaking Taiwanese.
It’s less of an issue now with less discrimination and embracing of multi culturalism (Taiwanese, hakka, mountain people). Also Chen shui-bian and DPP taking the reins of government.
Estimates vary but the consensus is between 500,000 and 2 million Taiwanese are in China at any given time.
The KMT types I was talking to these days seem to be on their heels – they specifically complain that more and more people are speaking Taiwanese (which, admittedly, these guys never really bothered to learn and which they speak of somewhat dismissively), presumably (well, in their minds) to exclude the Mandarin-only speakers.
Thanks though for your impressions of the sentiments on reunification. I kind of suspected that hard core irredentism/government-in-exile policies, even if still on the books, had much currency. I suspect they could have been, at least in a romantic reactionary sense, theoretically viable up through the '80s, when the R.O.C. economy still made the P.R.C. look puny. Now, as mentioned above, the R.O.C. is down to Antigua and the Holy See as diplomatic partners (a not coincidental effect of a newly-rich P.R.C. buying friends and influence with its export-derived dollars).
From this BBC article and reading up on Wikipedia, is Taiwan going to have a UN seat (under any guise, Taiwan, ROC etc) any time soon? It seems that the PRC will squash that idea any time it comes up.
You’re going to have to point out to me where I’ve descended to “deification” of the KMT regime and Chiang Kai-shek in particular. There’s no question that the Nationalists were corrupt, and that Chiang in particular was power-hungry and cared little for the people over which he held authority. It’s also true that the nominal Republic of China was essentially a dictatorship through the Eighties, with the tacit approval of the United States and other Western powers as a counterpoint to “Red” China. But the KMT government at least has a viable claim to being a continuous authority over China, whereas Mao’s Communist Party of China siezed control after running the native KMT regime out and immediately proceeded to govern, persecute, and eradicate millions without a shred of authority, either granted via democratic means from the populace, transfered by executive authority from the previous regime, or recognized in any way by the international community (other than the Soviet Union and client states in the interests of fostering Communism, later tempered by the Sino-Soviet split).
And regardless of any post-hoc consensus validity granted to the PRC by the United Nations, there was no rationale for unseating the Republic of China–which was up to that point considered “the” China, with normalized diplomatic relations to essentially all non-Warsaw Pact nattions–and grant its seat on the Security Council to the PRC. This was realpolitik on the international stage, and has served to validate the Maoist/neoMaoist regimes who feel–and empirically are–immune from issues regarding their human rights records, while the ROC has made strides toward democracy and purging the most corrupt and authoritarian elements.
I’m not familiar with the “Chiang Kia-shek deification website” you refer to, but I have no vested interest in venerating Chiang, and my beef with Mao and his successors isn’t that they affiliated themselves under the banner of Marxism, but in the utterly criminal way they did and continue to behave, both toward their own populace and in regard to their international obligations. His particular transgressions, however, to not invalidate the fact that the goverment of the ROC maintains a continuity of existance and authority, and should be considered at least “a” China, if not “the” legitimate government of mainland China.
I’m not clear how one can question the legitimacy of the PRC without also questioning the legitimacy of the ROC. I’m not very familiar with the political intricacies of pre-WWII China, but didn’t the ROC force out the Qing dynasty? What’s the basis of ROC’s claim, if not Right of Conquest, the same as PRC’s?
First, the legitimacy of the ROC and PRC essentially stem from the same source - the barrel of a gun. Both rose out of the aftermath of the fall of the Qing Dynasty. Both claimed legitimacy by waving the banner of Dr. Sun Yat-sen (and if you read what he actually wrote, his work was a good almost empty message that could be easily co-opted by those in power). One could claim that the PRC got the better of the claim given that Dr. Sun’s wife was a lifelong supporter of the communist party.
Fail to see how one was more “legal” “just” or held the “mandate of heaven” than the other.
Could also easily substitute “Chiang Kai-shek” for “Mao” in most of the atrocity descriptions. It is well documented that CKS was a brutal murdering thug who caused directly and indirectly untold suffering among tens of millions of Chinese, and in 30 years was rivaled only by Mao. Consensus by historians is that CKS excess set the stage for the CCP to take over China. Not trying to whitewash what happend a few short years later.
Don’t forget that it was the ROC that threw down the gauntlet and treatened to leave the UN if the PRC joined. The ROC could have given up claims to the Mainland and failed to do so.
Stranger - you make a lot of valid points but most of the China you’re describing is decades out of date.
Taiwanese should be proud of the progess they have made to a modern society in the past 20 years. But before that one should acknowlege it was a totalaterian police state.
I’ll conceed that point to you, and in general the difference in legality of the ROC over the PRC as the legitimate authority over mainland China is a fine line that probably is better suited to Great Debates. But the ROC was essentially forcibly pushed out of the UN and removed from diplomatic relations, and despite democratic reforms remains a pariah, while the PRC–which has never appologized for human rights abuses, and continues to subject not only their own people but those of other nations it has annexed to brutal repression–has been repeatedly and permanently legitimized, even granted permanent Most Favored Nation trading status by the United States, and uses that collective will to force the international community to continue ignoring the ROC, and threatening that nation with military force. The Maoist regime of the PRC, from Mao himself through Hu Jintao, despite economic reforms moving it toward an open market system, has continuously acted in a despotic, arbitrarily repressive manner that regards the rule of law and equal justice of courts as a matter of convenience to be dispensed with as seen fit by circumstances. I’d call this a criminal regime in every sense of the word.