Diverse Facets in Identities and Party Affiliations of Native Taiwanese Elders

Abstract

There exists a conventional stereotype about native Taiwanese elders that were born in and lived through the Japanese rule before 1945. On the one hand, some politicians and political commentators derogatorily call them the “Kominka generation,” reinforcing the image of this group of having strong affection for and even intense loyalty to the previous Japanese regime. On the other hand, although many researchers have pointed out this cohorts’ strong cultural ties to Han ethnicity — some even possessed nostalgic feelings toward China — in the colonial period, the researchers also emphasized the emergence of their strong sense of being Taiwanese when they suffered various political and cultural discrimination from the new Chinese dominant class after 1945. Therefore, both perspectives falsely imagine this cohort to be definitely identifying themselves as Taiwanese, rejecting Chinese identity, opposing the Kuomintang (KMT), and supporting the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP). This paper aims to challenge these stereotypes. By adopting the techniques of grounded theory, the paper shows rich diversity not only in this cohort’s perceptions toward the political parties but also in their identity patterns. Furthermore three themes are identified in these participants’ explanation for their political orientations: economic development, social stability and security, and the cultural hierarchy that gives the KMT elites higher symbolic values than native political elites.