Hm. I wonder, if Tsai wins, how will that still-more-complicate relations between Taiwan, the PRC, and every country that has to deal with either?
Calling Tsai a Chinaphobe is probably not the best choice of words. Ms. Tsai represents the native Taiwanese as opposed to the “Mainlanders” that came over in 1949. Of course, it’s not quite that simple these days. Not sure what the demographics are these days for those that speak Taiwanese (meinanhua) as a native language. The culture has shifted a lot too, with many younger Taiwanese descendants speaking Taiwanese as a second language. Many younger (say under 40) are mixed Taiwanese and Mainlander couples. all this of course is a gross simplification.
That said, Ms. Tsai represents a sizeable portion of the ROC population that want to preserve their Taiwanese language and culture, and don’t think rushing more into bed with Mainland China is good nor needed. I’d say you probably won’t find many people that think they should roll back involvement with China, pull out investments, stop trade, etc. these days. Chinaphobe isn’t the right word to describe the mainstream “go slow on the next stage” with China.
Koxinga can weigh in here as the only resident Doper (I think)
Given very little knowledge, my money’s on Ma. As have his supporters. They have placed too much on a tolerance between the two nations. A world economy is starting to pay off.
Incumbent wins. The challenger, Tsai, resigns as leader of the Democratic Progressive Party.
Why haven’t the “native Taiwanese” (by which it is clear you do not mean the aborigines) assimilated the “mainlanders” by marriage by now?
Also, I thought the goal of Tsai’s party was to declare independence. And she came close to winning. Doesn’t that mean that there are “many people that think they should roll back involvement with China,” etc.?
The Chinese seem to have a unique ability to maintain diaspora that are resistant to integrating. For example, there are Malay Chinese that immigrated more than 300 years ago that still regard themselves as Chinese and speak Mandarin at home.
I suppose many Chinese-Americans speak Mandarin at home, but they still identify as Americans. And non-Chinese often marry them.
There is a lot of assimilation. And it’s really noticeable how much now versus 30 years ago. However, the ones that came over from the Mainland and their decendants are largely concentrated in Taipei, which generally speaking is the most assimilated group. Outside of Taipei, since there are less Mainlanders, there is naturally less assimilation. It’s pretty common for Taiwanese to be the preferred language in southern Taiwan, and run into even teenagers that really can’t speak mandarin.
Another contributor is that all public education is in Mandarin. Kids used to be humiliated, beaten or fined for speaking Taiwanese at elementary school at least through the 1970’s. When I first lived in Taiwan 30 years ago, IIRC Taiwanese language was limited to 3 hours of TV programming per day, all movies were in Mandarin, Mandarin was the official language of school, courts, etc. In the 1980’s I knew a lot of Taiwanese parents that wouldn’t teach their kids Taiwanese because statistically the kids did less well in school.
The seachange largely came after Chiang Kai-shek’s son Chiang Ching-kuo kicked the bucket in 1989. The fiction that the mainlanders were going to victoriously reunite and rule China was finally buried.
The DPP have moderated a lot in the past few years. The virulent independance faction has been marginalized and it’s been “don’t ask don’t tell” policy. As in, Taiwan is defacto independant so why poke as stick in China’s eye and forcing a response by declaring de jeur independance. And the vast majority of Taiwanese know that their economy is very linked with China these days, so there is not a little economic pragmatism. “Chinaphobe” is not the right word in this case.
Again, maybe Koxinga can weigh in.
If Taiwan ever does declare independence, what happens then?
Also, is there ever a possibility of actual reunification, on terms acceptable to Taiwan?
If Taiwan does that, missiles will be flying in from China before they can finish their press conference. The government of China is extremely skittish about any loss of face, especially declarations of independence from the likes of Taiwan and Tibet
Hmmm . . . I wonder what we can do, from here, to make the PRC government really lose face with its people, lose it so hard the regime is in danger?
Beat them at math and science contests?
If China democratizes, Taiwan is probably going to be a province once more. Heck, China will probably call itself “Republic of China” again and used the KMT/Taiwanese flag.
I’m glad Kuomintang has been reelected. Hopefully this presages a conservative onslaught throughout the world. 
If I was in charge of these things, I’d go all the way back to the 5-striped Beiyang flag. But, realistically, neither the flag nor the other heraldry will change in the slightest. The white-blue-red flag will be resigned to the dust of history, and Taiwan will be given some kind of new flag that didn’t previously mean anything, much like was done to Hong Kong. And whatever it looks like, the Red Flag will still fly over Taipei.
I have to rely on my unconscious agglomeration of factoids to justify this, but IAGTU that when unification occurs - and it will occur, inevitably - Beijing will simply pick somebody from the KMT to be Taiwan’s chief executive, and Taiwanese democracy will vanish. If it does continue, then it’ll be in the form of Beijing-vetted candidates who will run showy elections but have almost identical platforms.
I don’t think it’s my place to judge the motivations of the Chinese people, but to me, at least, unification seems like a terrible idea. Other than a sense of restored national destiny, I have no idea what the proverbial man in the street stands to gain from it. Is it all about cheaper goods?
Of course, I tend to take the mainland’s side in these things, and I can absolutely understand why they want to do it. The mainland’s in a position where they can pursue things, even expensively, for the sake of ‘national destiny,’ and as an American I can absolutely see parallels between their situation and, say, trying to re-take a hypothetical Confederate outpost on Cuba that had been holding out for decades.
I consider myself a China Hand in that I know more about China Handing than I do about anything else, but I defer to the wisdom of others who know better.
The status quo will remain until there is a major change on the mainland. Economic integration has been beneficial to many in Taiwan, but political integration is something Ma won’t touch with a three hundred li pole. Accepting direct flights, tourists and students from the mainland is not a threat to de facto independence. Tsai wasn’t going to reverse this anyway, even if she wanted to.
Many people on the mainland were very interested in the election. They may be inspired to have a similar system for themselves once enough people become dissatisfied with the CCP. But even in a democratic mainland, it is still likely an independent Taiwan would be unacceptable. Barring a total collapse of the mainland into anarchy, de jure Taiwanese independence is unlikely.
A major reason why Chinese here have not “assimilated” is due to religion. If I wanted to marry a Malay woman, I would be required by law to first convert to Islam. Chinese (and Indians) have been viewed by the government as guests that have been given the privilege of citizenship, as long as they accept that Malays are the first class citizens.
Just to the north, Thai Chinese are completely integrated and only speak Thai. English is probably more common than Chinese dialects.
Its always weird when conservatives in the US tries to talk up conservatives in another country. You do know that your nationalism is often in conflict with foreign conservatism, right? Using Taiwan as an example, if Ma is conservative, then he represents things like greater ties with China, closer political relationships with a communist country, and probably less trade restrictions and business alliances. Tell me, in the US, are Republicans happy that China’s using devalued currency to beat us in trade and taking American jobs? Or are they simply seeing that China would do business with Sudan and not care about their human rights record? Or maybe the elite business side of the GOP is happy about doing business without caring about slave wages in foreign countries? Or are they mad that China’s manufacturing and worker protection laws (or lack thereof) offers cheap labor and little protection?
But I’m interested to hear you explain why you are less for the “liberal” Tsai, who apparently wants to have less to do with China and more independence and freedom from the mainland. Independence and freedom, something liberals are for and you’re against, then? :dubious:
Acedotaly, I don’t think this is true. Thailand is essentially run by the Chiu Chow Chinese and they speak Chiu Chow. I found quite a few Thai Chinese on my trips to Thailand that could speak Mandarin.
It is in China’s best interest for the world to assume they would go full mental if Taiwan declares de jeure independance. It isn’t neccessarily true that China would immediately retaliate with a scorched earth. And, despite denials, I also have to believe that Taiwan has at least a few nukes with a delivery system, and long ago made that pyrrihic threat to China. Sure, you can make Taiwan a parking lot, but we will nuke Shanghai and a few other choice cities as well.
(Yes, I know, there’s tons of stuff out there claiming that Taiwan ended their nuclear weapons program before it got to the final stage. But take the 1980’s Taiwan, with a very high concentration of PhDs, 6 nuclear power reactors, an international pariah state buddy with S Africa, and an extremely bellicose overwhelmingly large neighbor (China - remember the live missle excercises?), China has demonstrated nuclear capability, and the son of one of the most notorious dictators in modern history running Taiwan. You tell me how credible it is that Taiwan categorically never developed a few nuclear weapons and has none today?)
My wife is Chiu Chow (or Teochew and various other spellings). She agrees they’re the majority Chinese in Thailand. The younger generation knows less Chinese, but all the older folks can still speak it, such as her relatives. Certainly all the big businessmen, such as the Bangkok Bank president. And they all keep the old Chinese customs and traditions. My father-in-law, born in Thailand, or Siam, c. 1920 never did learn Thai, and her uncle struggles with Thai. In the Far North are also pockets of Hui-Chinese Muslims who emigrated from Yunnan in the late 19th century to avoid Qing Dynasty persecution, and they still largely speak Chinese only. Plus there are some KMT villages populated by refugees from 1949 who still speak it exclusively. I’m not sure there are all that many Mandarin speakers here though.
The thing about this presidential race was how relatively little it had to do with China, in comparison with past years. Of course it’s a major issue, but you could hardly characterize Saturday’s election as a black and white referendum on whether to open up economic ties to China or not. That issue is already more or less taken for granted, as far as I can see, and the real determining things in this race (and the reason Tsai was remarkably strong) were more mundane issues like the wealth gap, unaffordably high house prices, whether to phase out nuclear power, Ma’s timid and bland governing style, and so on. You know, democracy.
As far as the China issue goes, I think a majority of voters held their noses and voted Ma in for a second term for the sake of stability, but at the same time granted the opposition a much larger share of the legislature as a way of conveying, “don’t get any bright ideas.”
Not only that, the KMT years ago implemented a very successful socialized medicine program, and this time around ran on promises to make rich landowners pay more taxes.