Local politics in Taiwan: Democratic consolidation

Asian Survey

Volumn 36, Issue 5, 1996, Pages 483-492

  Tan, Qingshan ^a   Yu, Peter Kien Hong ^b   Chen, Wen Chun ^c  

^a CLEVELAND STATE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

^b NATIONAL SUN YAT SEN UNIVERSITY   (Taiwan)

^c Sun Yat Sen Center

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

DECENTRALISATION; DEMOCRATIC CONSOLIDATION; LOCAL GOVERNMENT; POLITICAL REFORM;

TAIWAN;

EID: 0030466008     PISSN: 00044687     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.2307/2645495     Document Type: Article

References (26)

1. Two groups try to take credit for initiating the process: the ruling elites of the Kuomintang (KMT) credit the late president, Chiang Ching-kuo, for liberalizing Taiwanese politics as he lay dying. The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) claims the founding of the DPP in 1986 in defiance of martial law forced the government to change. Studies on the Taiwan democratization include: John Copper and George Chen, Taiwan's Election (Baltimore: Occasional Papers/ Reprint Series in Contemporary Asian Studies, School of Law, University of Maryland, 1985); Edwin Winckler, "Institutionalization and Participation on Taiwan: From Hard to Soft Authoritarianism?" China Quarterly, no. 99 (September 1984), pp. 481-99, Harvey J. Feldman, Constitutional Reform and the Future of the Republic of China (Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1991); Shao-chuan Leng, ed., Chiang Ching-kuo's Leadership in the Development of the Republic of China on Taiwan (Lanham: University Press of America, 1992); Hung-mao Tien, The Great Transition: Political and Social Change in the Republic of China (Stanford, Calif.: Hoover Institution Press, 1989).
2. Two groups try to take credit for initiating the process: the ruling elites of the Kuomintang (KMT) credit the late president, Chiang Ching-kuo, for liberalizing Taiwanese politics as he lay dying. The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) claims the founding of the DPP in 1986 in defiance of martial law forced the government to change. Studies on the Taiwan democratization include: John Copper and George Chen, Taiwan's Election (Baltimore: Occasional Papers/ Reprint Series in Contemporary Asian Studies, School of Law, University of Maryland, 1985); Edwin Winckler, "Institutionalization and Participation on Taiwan: From Hard to Soft Authoritarianism?" China Quarterly, no. 99 (September 1984), pp. 481-99, Harvey J. Feldman, Constitutional Reform and the Future of the Republic of China (Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1991); Shao-chuan Leng, ed., Chiang Ching-kuo's Leadership in the Development of the Republic of China on Taiwan (Lanham: University Press of America, 1992); Hung-mao Tien, The Great Transition: Political and Social Change in the Republic of China (Stanford, Calif.: Hoover Institution Press, 1989).
3. Two groups try to take credit for initiating the process: the ruling elites of the Kuomintang (KMT) credit the late president, Chiang Ching-kuo, for liberalizing Taiwanese politics as he lay dying. The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) claims the founding of the DPP in 1986 in defiance of martial law forced the government to change. Studies on the Taiwan democratization include: John Copper and George Chen, Taiwan's Election (Baltimore: Occasional Papers/ Reprint Series in Contemporary Asian Studies, School of Law, University of Maryland, 1985); Edwin Winckler, "Institutionalization and Participation on Taiwan: From Hard to Soft Authoritarianism?" China Quarterly, no. 99 (September 1984), pp. 481-99, Harvey J. Feldman, Constitutional Reform and the Future of the Republic of China (Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1991); Shao-chuan Leng, ed., Chiang Ching-kuo's Leadership in the Development of the Republic of China on Taiwan (Lanham: University Press of America, 1992); Hung-mao Tien, The Great Transition: Political and Social Change in the Republic of China (Stanford, Calif.: Hoover Institution Press, 1989).
4. Two groups try to take credit for initiating the process: the ruling elites of the Kuomintang (KMT) credit the late president, Chiang Ching-kuo, for liberalizing Taiwanese politics as he lay dying. The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) claims the founding of the DPP in 1986 in defiance of martial law forced the government to change. Studies on the Taiwan democratization include: John Copper and George Chen, Taiwan's Election (Baltimore: Occasional Papers/ Reprint Series in Contemporary Asian Studies, School of Law, University of Maryland, 1985); Edwin Winckler, "Institutionalization and Participation on Taiwan: From Hard to Soft Authoritarianism?" China Quarterly, no. 99 (September 1984), pp. 481-99, Harvey J. Feldman, Constitutional Reform and the Future of the Republic of China (Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1991); Shao-chuan Leng, ed., Chiang Ching-kuo's Leadership in the Development of the Republic of China on Taiwan (Lanham: University Press of America, 1992); Hung-mao Tien, The Great Transition: Political and Social Change in the Republic of China (Stanford, Calif.: Hoover Institution Press, 1989).
5. Two groups try to take credit for initiating the process: the ruling elites of the Kuomintang (KMT) credit the late president, Chiang Ching-kuo, for liberalizing Taiwanese politics as he lay dying. The Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) claims the founding of the DPP in 1986 in defiance of martial law forced the government to change. Studies on the Taiwan democratization include: John Copper and George Chen, Taiwan's Election (Baltimore: Occasional Papers/ Reprint Series in Contemporary Asian Studies, School of Law, University of Maryland, 1985); Edwin Winckler, "Institutionalization and Participation on Taiwan: From Hard to Soft Authoritarianism?" China Quarterly, no. 99 (September 1984), pp. 481-99, Harvey J. Feldman, Constitutional Reform and the Future of the Republic of China (Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1991); Shao-chuan Leng, ed., Chiang Ching-kuo's Leadership in the Development of the Republic of China on Taiwan (Lanham: University Press of America, 1992); Hung-mao Tien, The Great Transition: Political and Social Change in the Republic of China (Stanford, Calif.: Hoover Institution Press, 1989).
6. Samuel P. Huntington, The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth Century (Norman, Okla.: University of Oklahoma Press, 1992).
7. Tun-jen Cheng and Stephan Haggard, eds., Political Change in Taiwan (Boulder, Colo.: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1992), pp. 12-18.
8. Some writers have dealt with factions and their impact on local elections during the transition, e.g., Joseph Bosco, "Taiwan Factions: Guanxi, Patronage, and the State in Local Politics," in Murray A. Rubinstein, ed., The Other Taiwan: 1945 to the Present (Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1994), pp. 114-44.
9. Gerardo L. Munch. "Democratic Transitions in Comparative Perspective," Comparative Politics, 26:3 (April 1994), p. 362.
10. Juan Linz, "Transitions to Democracy," Washington Monthly, no. 13 (Summer 1990), p. 158,
11. as cited in Doh Chull Shin, "On The Third Wave of Democratization: A Synthesis and Evaluation of Recent Theory and Research," World Politics, no. 47 (October 1994), p. 145.
12. Kao Yu-jen, Taiwan Ching Yen [Taiwan experience] (Taipei: Twenty-First Century Foundation, 1989) p. 53.
13. Interviews, Kaohsiung municipal government officials, Kaohsiung, July 15-20, 1994.
14. Martin L. Lasater, A Step Toward Democracy: The December 1989 Eleclions in Taiwan, Republic of China (Washington D.C.: AEI Press, 1990), p. 10.
15. Gary W. Cox and Emerson Niou, "Seat Bonuses Under the Single Nontransferable Vote System: Evidence From Japan and Taiwan," Comparative Politics, 26:2 (January 1994), p. 222.
16. Comparative studies show that multimember systems tend to work in favor of the majority party. See Edwin D. Reischauer, The Japanese (Cambridge, Mass.: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1977), p. 270.
17. With exceptions, perhaps, in township and village politics in which factions based on kinship, clan, and personal networks are more prominent. See Bosco, "Taiwan Factions," pp. 114-44.
18. In our interviews, Kaohsiung officials foresaw no challenge in Kaohsiung's mayoral race, as KMT Mayor Wu Den-yih was a popular figure running for re-election. The December 1994 elections upheld their prediction, which in a way supports the argument of candidate-centered local elections.
19. However, the new laws allow only the Executive Yuan the authority to remove the provincial governor and the mayors of the two municipalities. Some local officials felt that power should rest with local legislatures.
20. Interviews with officials from Kaohsiung and Taipei governments, July 20-22, 1994.
21. Shao-chuan Leng and Cheng-yi Lin, "Political Change on Taiwan: Transition to Democracy?" China Quarterly, no. 136 (December 1993), p. 809.
22. Interviews with legislators from the New Party, July 21, 1994, Taipei, Taiwan.
23. See Wu Po-hsiung, Draft Report on Provincial, County, and Special Municipal Autonomy Law, copy obtained by author from Legislative Yuan, Summer 1994.
24. Interview with Deputy Director Liu Chia-nan of the Environmental Protection Bureau of Kaohsiung Municipality, Kaohsiung, July 15, 1994.
25. Interviews revealed that some local bureaucrats indicated willingness to use available bureaucratic resources to help out campaigns they support.
26. Some top local bureaucrats expressed concerns about politicization and reservations about the changes in the laws. They pointed out that at the local level, most of the bureaucracy's work is technical, requiring professional competence more than political abilities. Interviews with officials from the Kaohsiung Municipality, July 15-20, 1994.