President Ma Ying-jeou Research Articles

Finding the trade-security nexus: Taiwan’s economic statecraft from 2009 to 2021

Over the last few decades, China has become one of the most important foreign investment destinations and centers of economic development in Asia. China’s growing economic clout and coercive measures lead to the following empirical puzzles: how has Taiwan perceived China’s increasing military capabilities and economic influence? What are the major factors that facilitate or constrain the role of a government agency of a weaker state in addressing the economic power of a stronger one? More specifically, what has been the purpose of Taiwan’s economic statecraft? Based on Taiwan’s official statements, regional trade data, and newspaper coverage in Chinese and English, this study investigates both positive and negative evaluations of China-Taiwan trade from 2009 to 2021. From 2009 to 2016, President Ma Ying-jeou adopted a desecuritization strategy in normalizing bilateral trade with China, and he actively promoted greater liberalization of Taiwan’s financial and service sectors for China’s investment. From 2016 to 2021, President Tsai Ing-wen employed a securitization strategy in light of the risks of economic reliance on China’s markets. The article proceeds as follows. First, it engages the current literature on economic statecraft, China-Taiwan relations, and Asian politics. Second, this study offers a framework of desecuritization and securitization of Taiwan’s trade toward China, and it highlights how the political leaders in Taiwan attempt to find a balance between trade and security. Third, it provides in-depth case studies on how Taiwan executed desecuritization and securitization strategies. Finally, it concludes with some initial thoughts on the studies of comparative economic statecraft, and provides policy implications for countries in the Asia Pacific region and beyond.

The Southeast Asian languages policy in Taiwan: the linguistic and nonlinguistic goals

ABSTRACT The purpose of this study is to examine the linguistic and non-linguistic goals of the Southeast Asian languages (SEAL) policy in Taiwan. It was proposed by former President Ma Ying-jeou’s administration to develop grades 1–12 students’ multilingual awareness, for there has been an increasingly significant presence of second-generation Southeast Asian immigrants at school. Since current President Tsai In-Wen’s first-term in 2016, the SEAL policy has been fuelled with an economic and sociopolitical agenda – the New Southbound Policy, the measure which is designed to advance the nation’s prospects in Southeast Asia. This study applies Cooper’s [1989. Language Planning and Social Change. New York, NY: Cambridge University Press] language policy as marketing and analyses the instrumentalist value of the SEAL. The Tsai government is conceptualised as a marketer; the SEAL are defined as the product; the Ministry of Education is assigned to the place as a hub which distributes the SEAL product to nationwide consumers; promotion piques the consumers’ interest in SEAL learning; price is set by making one’s profit gains larger than the sum of investment. The study concludes that the value of the SEAL product increases when its communication network is expanded from local immigrant communities and national school systems to an international business area.

The Race to Zero?: China's Poaching of Taiwan's Diplomatic Allies

The election of Tsai Ing-wen as President of the Republic of China (Taiwan) in 2016 reignited Beijing's quest to poach Taiwan's diplomatic allies. Between her election in January 2016 and reelection in January 2020, Taiwan has lost seven countries to China. After eight years of a “diplomatic truce” under President Ma Ying-jeou, China re-started its multi-pronged strategy to pressure Taiwan into eventual unification, and one of the key tactics is to poach all of Taiwan's now-15 remaining diplomatic allies to eliminate its international legitimacy. This article seeks to explain what, if any, benefits formal diplomatic relations provide Taiwan and the ways in which Beijing induces countries to switch ties. It concludes by providing recommendations for what actions the United States can undertake to slow the impending completion of the “race to zero.”

ECFA and Taiwan from the Perspective of International Law

The Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA) is an important milestone between the People's Republic of China and Taiwan; it is also the most critical achievement in improving the close cross-strait relations since President Ma Ying-Jeou took office in 2008. This article intends to use Guzman's rational choice theory of international law to analyze Taiwan's motivation for signing ECFA under East Asian regionalism, and to speculate whether Taiwan will abide by the relevant ECFA regulations. Signing the ECFA with China is mainly to break through the predicament of Taiwan's isolation under East Asian regionalism. As the first step in cooperation with East Asia, ECFA has a significant impact on Taiwan's credibility in East Asia. Regardless of whether there is a chance to cooperate with other East Asian countries in the future, if Taiwan gets off ECFA's relevant regulations, it will cause damage to Taiwan's credibility and may even obliterate the possibility of future cooperation with East Asian countries. Therefore, from the perspective of rational choice, in order to maintain Taiwan's good reputation and look forward to more cooperation possibilities in the future, complying with the relevant ECFA regulations is an obligation that Taiwan must fulfil.

Taiwan’s Secession Against Two Hosts: the Xi-Ma Summit and its Implications for Future Cross-Strait Relations

<p>Tajwan przyciąga uwagę całego świata ze względu na znaczenie geopolityczne wyspy w regionie Azji i Pacyfiku. Demokratyzacji Tajwanu towarzyszą ruchy secesyjne, co stwarza dodatkowe komplikacje. Prowadzi to wzrostu zagrożeń w różnych obszarach, politycznym, militarnym, ekonomicznym. Pomimo, że stosunki w Cieśnienie Tajwańskiej można obecnie określić jako względnie spokojne, sytuacja nadal nosi znamiona „niestabilnego pokoju””, używając terminologii zaproponowanej przez Lund Curve. W sytuacji gdy nadrzędnym celem Chin pozostaje zjednoczenie narodowe, większość tajwańskich wyborców faworyzują zachowanie status quo. Tym bardziej na uwagę zasługuje analiza bezprecedensowego spotkania prezydenta Ma Ying-jeou (Tajwan) z Xi Jinping (Chiny), które miało miejsce w listopadzie 2015 roku. Było to pierwsze spotkania tej rangi urzędników od zakończenia wojny domowej czyli od 1949 r.</p>

Asymmetric Risk Impacts of Chinese Tourists to Taiwan

Since 2008, when Taiwan’s President Ma Ying-Jeou relaxed the Cross-Strait policy, China has become Taiwan’s largest source of international tourism. In order to understand the risk persistence of Chinese tourists, the paper investigates the short-run and long-run persistence of shocks to the change rate of Chinese tourists to Taiwan. The daily data used for the empirical analysis is from 1 January 2013 to 28 February 2018. McAleer’s (2015) fundamental equation in tourism finance is used to link the change rate of tourist arrivals and the change in tourist revenues. Three widely-used univariate conditional volatility models, namely GARCH(1,1), GJR(1,1) and EGARCH(1,1), are used to measure the short-run and long-run persistence of shocks, as well as symmetric, asymmetric and leverage effects. Three different Heterogeneous AutoRegressive (HAR) models, HAR(1), HAR(1,7) HAR(1,7,28), are considered as alternative mean equations for capturing a variety of long memory effects. The mean equations associated with GARCH(1,1), GJR(1,1) and EGARCH(1,1) are used to analyse the risk persistence of the change in Chinese tourists. The exponential smoothing process is used to adjust the seasonality around the trend in Chinese tourists. The empirical results show asymmetric impacts of positive and negative shocks on the volatility of the change in the number of Group-type and Medical-type tourists, while Individual-type tourists display a symmetric volatility pattern. Somewhat unusually, leverage effects are observed in EGARCH for Medical-type tourists, which shows a negative correlation between shocks in tourist numbers and the subsequent shocks to volatility. For both Group-type and Medical-type tourists, the asymmetric impacts on volatility show that negative shocks have larger effects than do positive shocks. The leverage effect in EGARCH for Medical-type tourists implies that larger shocks would decrease volatility in the change in the numbers of Medical-type tourists. These results suggest that Taiwan tourism authorities should act to prevent the negative shocks for the Group-type and Medical-type Chinese tourists to dampen the shocks that arise from having fewer Chinese tourists to Taiwan.

The Shadow of China over Taiwan's Democracy

Introduction to Journal of Current Chinese Affairs 1/2017: Assessing the Administration of President Ma Ying-jeou

Taiwan's Go South Policy: Déjà vu All Over Again?

The foreign policy of Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen, who was elected in 2016, will be closely watched by Beijing and countries in Southeast Asia. Before her inauguration, Tsai stated that her administration would pursue a so-called “New Go South Policy” (xin nanxiang zhengce) , i.e. a foreign policy focused on building up ties with countries in Southeast Asia as well as in South Asia. A similar policy was initiated by two former presidents of Taiwan, Lee Teng-hui and Chen Shui-bian. This article provides a framework to analyze the determinants, objectives, policy dimensions and scope of President Tsai’s New Go South Policy. It examines and compares the Go South Policies of previous administrations, together with former President Ma Ying-jeou’s policy towards Southeast Asia. Based on these discussions, a prospective policy analysis of President Tsai’s Go South Policy is provided. It is argued that Tsai’s Go South Policy will help enhance Taiwan’s soft power, increase the island’s presence in Southeast Asia but will not be used to counterbalance China–Taiwan economic integration.

Lineages of Dissent: Popular and Artistic Resistance to Imperialism and Extraction on 'The Beautiful Island'

Lineages of Dissent: Popular and Artistic Resistance to Imperialism and Extraction on 'The Beautiful Island'

Taiwan in 2015

In 2015, Taipei’s relations with Washington moved forward in parallel with the improvements in cross-Strait relations initiated in 2008. Perhaps most notable was President Ma Ying-jeou’s summit meeting with China’s President Xi Jinping. Despite gains in external relations, however, the island was plagued by partisan gridlock, a stagnating economy, and political unrest. Most anticipated a Democratic Progressive Party victory over the ruling Kuomintang in the January 2016 presidential election. But few could predict what kind of fallout the election might generate.

Taiwan at a Tipping Point by John F. Copper

Reviewed by: Taiwan at a Tipping Point by John F. Copper Yi-En "Mike" Tso (bio) John F. Copper. Taiwan at a Tipping Point. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books, 2018. viii 251 pp. Hardcover $100.00, ISBN 978-1-4985-6969-9. e-Book $95.00, ISBN 978-1-4985-6970-5. As the democratic country in East Asia, the history of democratic development in Taiwan has become a critical issue in world politics. Having more citizen participation in public affairs and the rise of populism both make Taiwan a special case of political science research. In this book, the author tries to answer the following "big questions" about democracy in Taiwan: How far has Taiwan gone in the democratization process? Has the political culture been altered or not? Do party politics (and turnover) have positive impacts on Taiwanese democracy? What are the challenges and threats to Taiwanese democracy, and does Taiwan also face democracy decline as do other countries? In order to answer these questions, the author reviews the history of Taiwanese democracy briefly from 1949 to 2008, with the end of the "Chen (Shui-bian) era," as the first step. As does the title of the first chapter, "The Democratic Progressive Party Returns to Power," this book describes how the Democracy Progressive Party (DPP) returned to power in 2016 after its tremendous failure in 2008. From the author's view, several factors may help to explain the resurgence: economy, populism, identity politics, Taiwan-US-China relations, and President Ma Ying-jeou's leadership (p. 74). The economy, the United States, and China factors all played critical roles in the DPP's fall in the 2008 presidential election as well. After reviewing critical political and social events in Taiwan from 2008 (Ma Ying-jeou's administration) to 2016 (Tsai Ing-wen's winning of the presidential election), the author offers his own views on issues such as the domestic (e.g., economy and social movements) and foreign (the United States and China) factors affecting the election results in Taiwan. The author also portrays several critical Taiwanese political leaders (presidents and candidates in the general and local elections) to give a more comprehensive understanding of Taiwanese democracy. The author's opinion toward the 2016 presidential election result can be used to conclude this book: "Taiwan's democracy is alive and well . . . Taiwan may be seen as a model" (p. 154). The author offers several valuable insights on Taiwan's democratic history. In chapter 2, the author mentions that in the late Chen era, there was a generation gap between young and elderly Taiwanese. The young people cared more about job opportunities and less about KMT authoritarianism than in the past. This gap helped KMT presidential candidate (Ma) to win the young generation's support in 2008. However, the phenomenon was reversed in 2016. The young generation complained about having fewer job opportunities and the KMT's antidemocracy activities in its authoritarian era (from 1949 to 2000). [End Page 348] This change also contributed to Tsai's winning of the 2016 Taiwan Presidential Election. As the author observes, the two "elephants in the room," China and the United States, play critical roles in affecting Taiwanese politics and election results. The cross-strait and US-China-Taiwan triangular relationships deeply affected Taiwanese people's voting behavior and their confidence in the ruling party. Taiwanese political science researchers sometimes find that many Western political science theories may not help to fully analyze political phenomena in Taiwanese politics. As the author mentions in the book, some theories from the West may not help to fully explain Taiwanese politics (p. 34). For example, one theory suggests that the voters tend to vote according to their pocketbooks, however, based on the author's observation, "this theory applies differently to local elections as compared to a national election and to the present as opposed to the past" (p. 113). The author does not expand this argument in the following paragraphs but the answer can be seen in the conclusion of chapter 2. In his arguments about the 2014 election results, the author states: "The economy, as noted, was the underlying problem. It was showing many signs of improving...

Presidential approval in Taiwan: An analysis of survey data in the Ma Ying-jeou presidency

Presidential popularity is the “causal agent” of presidential effectiveness. High approval ratings mean more power and greater ability to govern. Taiwan's President Ma Ying-jeou enjoyed high approval ratings when he was elected in 2008, but his popularity declined rapidly soon after, to about 14%. How do Taiwan citizens evaluate their presidents? What factors help to explain the Ma's declining popularity during his presidency? Consistent with conventional wisdom, this study finds that the country's overall economic conditions play a vital role in the popularity of Taiwan's president. Closely following is citizens' evaluation of the president's ability in managing cross-Strait relationship, national defense, and diplomacy. Ma's staffing of key cabinet positions has also had an effect on his popularity, which is unusual in the study of presidential approval. The personal integrity of the president, a trait that Ma has emphasized strongly, has not had a positive effect on his declining popularity in Taiwan.

Policymaking in Taiwan's Semi-Presidentialism: A Case Study of the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA)

Under President Ma Ying-jeou, the government of the Republic of China (the ROC, Taiwan) tried to improve the relations with the People's Republic of China (the PRC, mainland China). After the resumption of the cross-strait talks, the exchange and cooperation between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait that were focused mainly on the economy quickly moved forward, and the cross- strait agreements, including the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA), were concluded in rapid succession. The ECFA is a de facto free trade agreement (FTA) between the governments of the PRC (mainland China) and the ROC (Taiwan). There are various studies on the ECFA, but most of them mainly analyze the economic effects of the agreement, or consider its legal position. However, little research from a political point of view has been conducted on the ECFA. Then, this article discusses the features of Taiwan's policymaking processes under its semi-presidentialism by focusing on the policy processes of the ECFA from the perspectives of congressional supervision of the cross-strait agreements. This article clarifies and confirms the complexity of policymaking in Taiwan's semi-presidentialism.

Under the Shadow of China

(ProQuest: ... denotes non-US-ASCII text omitted.)On 18 March 2014, student protesters stormed Taiwan's Legislative Yuan, kicking offto a 24-day sit-in that paralysed the island's legislature. The historic occupation, later given the name Sunflower Student Movement (taiyanghua xueyun ...), was a protest against the attempt by the ruling Kuomintang (KMT) to pass a service trade pact with China. The pact, entitled the Cross-Strait Service Trade Agreement (CSSTA), (1) was signed between China and Taiwan in June 2013 as one of two follow-up treaties to the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA) signed in 2010. (2) As a component of ECFA, CSSTA vows to substantially liberalise trade in services between the two economies. Up to 80 Chinese industries and 64 Taiwanese industries will be opened up under the pending agreement.Apart from the extraordinary vibrancy of Taiwan's civil society participation, another distinctive feature of the Sunflower Student Movement was the constant reference to Hong Kong in the protest rhetoric. The service trade pact in question, together with its parent treaty ECFA, was widely thought to be a replica of the free trade agreement signed between Hong Kong and China in June 2003, named the Mainland and Hong Kong Closer Economic Partnership Arrangement (CEPA), and framed at that time as a generous gift from Beijing to pull Hong Kong out of its economic low-tide brought by the SARS epidemic. (3)While CEPA, after over a decade of implementation, has significantly increased cross-border economic cooperation as intended and, perhaps more arguably, has achieved considerable economic results as claimed by the government and some mainland scholars, (4) it has certainly made the Hong Kong economy more dependent on China and, more crucially, has created an open platform for China's United Front strategy to co-opt local economic elites. ECFA was thus seen by observers as an agreement broadly modelled upon Hong Kong's CEPA, as both of them contain the objective of increasing cross-strait economic integration (5) - just as it is often pointed out that Hong Kong's One Country Two Systems was originally devised by Deng Xiaoping as a formula ultimately aimed at the reunification of Taiwan with China. (6) Chinese officials even explicitly proposed the concept of a Greater China Economic Circle (dazhonghua jingji quan ...) through which economic cooperation between Hong Kong, Taiwan, and China can be fostered through ECFA and CEPA. (7) Both pacts, as clearly stated, aim to normalise and facilitate inter-and-cross-territory trade relations in goods, services, and investment. Less explicitly revealed, however, is the parallel objective, which has been pointed out by observers in Hong Kong and Taiwan, to induce political integration through closer economic partnership with China.With the lessons of CEPA in mind, opinion in Taiwan was divided over the service trade pact. Supporters, including the KMT government led by President Ma Ying-jeou, argued that the pact would be economically beneficial to Taiwan while diplomatically indispensable for Taiwan to join other free trade zones such as the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) and the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP). (8) Opponents argued that the pact lacked a democratic mandate and condemned the negotiation process between the CCP and KMT governments as a black box (heixiang ...). Meanwhile, quoting a government report estimating that the trade pact would only boost GDP by 0.03%, (9) they argued that the economic benefits were not as clear as supporters claimed. Instead, they worried that opening Taiwan's service industry to Chinese companies would harm local small-business owners and create only low-skill service jobs, pointing to Hong Kong's widening poverty gap after the implementation of CEPA. (10) Beneath these reservations, however, lies a deeper existential concern. Protesters fear that the service trade pact will make the de facto independent Taiwan vulnerable to more direct forms of political intervention from Beijing, a constant threat that has pervaded Taiwanese society since the KMT retreated to the island in 1949. …

Aid in Taiwan's foreign policy: putting Ma Ying-jeou's aid reforms in historical perspective

Taiwan's foreign aid policy is largely a response to its China-imposed international isolation. Taiwan provides aid without stringent accountability conditions to countries in Africa, the Americas, and the South Pacific in order to maintain official diplomatic relations in the face of Chinese opposition. Often at odds with this is Taiwan's interest in seeking western support through being seen as a responsible aid donor. Domestic political constraints on Taiwan's aid budget accentuate the tension between these two interests. Taiwan's aid program can be seen as the product of these three competing and enduring pressures – maintaining the count of official diplomatic relationships, improving its international reputation, and containing aid spending.Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou's tacit ‘diplomatic truce’ with China – part of a wider warming of intergovernmental relations across the Taiwan Strait – has reduced significantly the squeeze between these three pressures on Taiwan's foreign aid policy. It has allowed the Ma administration to improve Taiwan's reputation, while maintaining or even reducing its aid expenditure, and still retain the same number of official diplomatic relationships. Nevertheless, the Ma administration has not wanted to alienate recipient governments while the prospects for the diplomatic truce with China remain uncertain. There remains considerable continuity with past practices, and the government's handling of aid as a foreign policy tool is still largely opaque and unaccountable.

Taiwan in 2013

The year 2013 in Taiwan was marked by a lackluster economy and stalemated politics. President Ma Ying-jeou’s approval rating hit an all-time low. Still, Taiwan’s relations with China were smooth, and Taiwan was able to make some gains in the international arena.

Embracing or Resisting the Giant Neighbour

Since 2008, President Ma Ying-jeou and his Kuomintang (KMT) government in Taiwan have adopted the policy of seeking greater economic cooperation with China in exchange of reducing confrontation across the Taiwan Strait. By endorsing the ‘One China’ principle, the KMT government successfully resumed dialogue with Beijing and signed 18 agreements, ranging from allowing Chinese tourists to visit Taiwan to establishing a closer economic partnership. Yet President Ma’s self-claimed achievements in cross-strait peace received severe criticisms from the opposition Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which accused KMT’s pro-China policy as selling out the democratic Taiwan to an authoritarian regime. This article examines the on-going debates between the ruling KMT and opposition DPP about proper strategies towards China, and how such debates make it unlikely for Taiwan to form an effective policy on cross-strait affairs. The differences between KMT and DPP on their respective China policies have led to prolonged distrust between both parties, and between DPP and Beijing. Facing an increasingly powerful China, both parties are short of better ideas to convince voters that their current policy will effectively secure Taiwan’s sovereign status or will be beneficial to enhancing Taiwan’s interests in the long term.

Taiwan in 2012

Beginning with an election triumph for incumbent President Ma Ying-jeou, 2012 proved a difficult year for both Taiwan and Ma; his second term got off to a dismal start. The island’s economy experienced stagflation, while a series of controversies created a governance crisis during which the president’s approval rating hit historic lows.

Introduction

Introduction Travis Tanner (bio) All major Northeast Asian countries, as well as the United States, held elections or underwent leadership transitions in 2012 that will not only have an impact on their respective domestic political landscapes but also shape their foreign policy priorities in 2013 and beyond. For the Asia-Pacific as a whole, the leadership transitions of 2012 will have profound geopolitical consequences for years to come. In the United States, the re-election of President Barack Obama in November indicates that the U.S. policy of strategic rebalancing toward the Asia-Pacific will be largely sustained, despite budgetary pressures and domestic political challenges. In China, the 18th National Congress of the Chinese Communist Party convened in November and made a once-a-decade announcement of a new cohort of national leaders, with Xi Jinping and Li Keqiang being named to the highest positions on the Politburo Standing Committee. Likewise, both Japan and South Korea held major elections in December. Japan returned Shinzo Abe and the previously dominant Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) to power following a few short years of rule by the Democratic Party of Japan (DPJ), while in South Korea, Park Guen-hye of the Saenuri Party was elected president, becoming the first woman democratically chosen to lead a Northeast Asian state. Earlier in 2012, Taiwan and Russia both held national elections. In Taiwan, incumbent president Ma Ying-jeou of the Kuomintang (KMT) was re-elected in January, likely indicating his rapprochement with mainland China will continue. In Russia, a controversial election in March returned the presidency to Vladimir Putin, despite large protests in Moscow similar to those following the December 2011 legislative elections. Finally, in the wake of Kim Jong-un's formal assumption of power in late 2011, North Korean politics continued to unfold during 2012 in ways little understood by the outside world. Recognizing that all these leadership changes were occurring within a relatively short window, the National Bureau of Asian Research (NBR), in partnership with the Henry M. Jackson Foundation and the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies at the University of Washington, hosted an international conference on "Northeast Asia in Transition: [End Page 46] New Leadership, New Dynamics." The conference, which was held on November 13, 2012, at the University of Washington, featured a select group of experts who examined the political, economic, and social issues affecting Northeast Asia amid these leadership transitions. The conference was organized by NBR's Kenneth B. and Anne H.H. Pyle Center for Northeast Asian Studies. Named in honor of NBR's founding president and his wife, the Pyle Center conducts research and organizes events on Northeast Asia to advance the study of the complex dynamics and deep forces reshaping the region. The conference was also part of a series of events organized to celebrate the Henry M. Jackson centennial, the hundredth anniversary of Senator Jackson's birth. This roundtable features essays by three of the presenters, who were asked to examine the leadership transitions in Japan, China, and the Korean Peninsula and the associated implications for Northeast Asia. Yoichiro Sato (Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University) examines the shifting domestic political landscape that led to the LDP's return to power and how the new Abe government will likely address the challenges currently facing Japan. He notes that the new government is likely to adopt a more nationalistic stance, which could lead to escalating regional tensions and difficulties in managing the alliance with the United States. Ren Xiao (Fudan University) provides a lucid rundown of the outcomes of the 18th Party Congress and describes the implications of the new leadership configuration for China's relations with Japan, South Korea, and the United States. He warns leaders in China and the United States not to exaggerate each other's "unfriendly intentions" and recommends that both new governments explore areas for collaboration that will promote peace and benefit both nations. Sung-yoon Lee (Tufts University) gives an authoritative and insightful assessment of the "uniquely unique" North Korean leadership structure, pointing out its many flaws and weaknesses. He argues that Kim Jong-un's youth and inexperience make the regime vulnerable and that President Obama and President Park Geun...

Cross-Strait Relations and the Way Forward: Observations from a European Integration Perspective

The new policy platform in Taiwan of economic liberalization toward the Chinese mainland which was inaugurated by President Ma Ying-jeou (Ma Yingjiu) in 2008 has been the source of both expectation and anxiety. While some observers believe that this policy of rapprochement will usher in an era of cross-Strait prosperity and peace, others are concerned about Taiwan's de facto sovereignty as well as the negative economic impacts that the liberalization policy might entail. In particular, it has often been claimed (or feared) that the liberalization process will lead to some form of political integration between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait. In this article, I wish to offer some insights into the current state of cross-Strait interactions derived from the European integration process.