Alix Lee

The Taiwan Experience Alix Lee

Over the past 30+ years, Taiwan has evolved from an inward-looking one-party state to a vibrant, multi-party democracy. This book is the first of three covering this gradual evolution, as seen through the eyes of a foreigner who is now also a Taiwan citizen. The trilogy's opening quote by a former PRC official is key: "Democracy is an unstoppable force". From only a few decades ago when most of the world consisted of one-party states, to the present day in which one-party states are critically endangered, we have seen country after country adopting multi-party political systems. The message of recent history is clear: there are only 2 choices facing totalitarian regimes: embrace reform, or have it forced upon you. Taiwan is an excellent example of the former and it has demonstrated how the ruling parties of such states can avoid bloodshed, and even go on to thrive. The first part of Book One: The Seeds of Democracy deals with Taiwan's history. This part of the book gives a brief but balanced account of Taiwan's history. Part Two of Book One deals with the early process of democratisation, beginning in the mid-1980s. I have mentioned elsewhere that the book can serve as a reference for how the world's final few remaining one-party states will democratise. As this book is a narration of my personal experiences, this may not be obvious at first. But, as an example, let's take a closer look at what I have called 'soft deportation'. This was the way Taiwan's former one-party state dealt with suspect foreign nationals who may have aired views contrary to those of the government. It's still widely in use in the PRC today, because like as not, the country, with its export-oriented economy, is heavily dependent on countries in the outside world with vastly different political systems from China's own moribund one-party system, yet at the same time it needs to ensure that political views contrary to its own are not aired to PRC nationals. The Chinese Communist Party rightly perceives that its very existence is dependent on this, which is why we have the so-called Great Firewall of China. These circumstances are almost identical with those of Taiwan in the 1980s and early 1990s, when the ruling Chinese Nationalists censored all foreign news and ensured, as much as it was able, that suspect political views were not allowed to be heard within Taiwan. Soft deportation entails allowing foreigners to leave of their own accord when their visa is up. After which, the unsuspecting foreign visitors are simply not allowed re-entry, and for this there are a range of justifications, which will usually be taken at face value by many people who know of the foreigner's fate. In recent years, since the Chinese Communists gained control of Hong Kong's immigration authority, this technique has seen increased use for keeping unwanted opinions out of the territory. Even as early as 2011, for example, I was prevented from boarding a flight to Hong Kong, even though I was once a resident of the territory for many years. Well, that's just one parallel between the PRC now and Taiwan 30 years ago, but the observant reader will find others. Part Three deals with the social changes that have taken place in Taiwan over the past 30+ years. Why deal with both political and social change? Because the political changes could not have avoided engendering social change, and the social changes could not have taken place without political change. While some of the social changes Taiwan has experienced in recent years are independent of political change, most are not. The extent of social change is much greater than in most countries because in the mid-1980s, Taiwan had barely begun opening up to the outside world, and only a very small number of foreign nationals were resident in Taiwan at the time. This trilogy is not a dry account of political change, but rather aims to give a full picture of how life in Taiwan has changed over the past 30-plus years.