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The Taiwan Democracy Project Internship Program provides one Stanford undergraduate with funding up to $7,500 for an unpaid summer policy or research internship in Taiwan. Since a majority of internships in the fields of policy and government are unpaid, the program seeks to encourage students to pursue unpaid internships in Taiwan by making these opportunities more accessible.
Proposed internships should relate in some way to the mission of the Taiwan Democracy Project: to examine political and social change and the challenges confronting Taiwan’s continued democratic development, including the issue of cross-Strait relations.
All Stanford undergraduate students in any course of study who have independently arranged a summer internship in Taiwan are eligible to apply. We welcome students from a diversity of years, majors, and backgrounds. The internship cannot be used for formal language study; some facility in Mandarin Chinese is recommended but not required. For internships requiring applicants to speak or read some Chinese, applicants should demonstrate that their language skills are adequate for the proposed position.
The successful applicant will spend a summer in Taiwan at a government agency, NGO, academic research center, or other organization whose work relates to some aspect of democracy as it is practiced in Taiwan. Previous interns have found positions at a government-sponsored research foundation, a political party organization, and the headquarters of a major television network.
To qualify for funding, the proposed internship should be full-time (at least 35 hours per week), unpaid, and at least 9 weeks long. Applicants will be responsible for arranging their own travel and lodging.
To apply, submit the following materials via the Global Student Fellows website:
Questions about the internship or application process should be directed to Kharis Templeman. The deadline to receive all application materials is Friday, April 3, 2015.
Proposed internships should relate in some way to the mission of the Taiwan Democracy Project: to examine political and social change and the challenges confronting Taiwan’s continued democratic development, including the issue of cross-Strait relations.
All Stanford undergraduate students in any course of study who have independently arranged a summer internship in Taiwan are eligible to apply. We welcome students from a diversity of years, majors, and backgrounds. The internship cannot be used for formal language study; some facility in Mandarin Chinese is recommended but not required. For internships requiring applicants to speak or read some Chinese, applicants should demonstrate that their language skills are adequate for the proposed position.
The successful applicant will spend a summer in Taiwan at a government agency, NGO, academic research center, or other organization whose work relates to some aspect of democracy as it is practiced in Taiwan. Previous interns have found positions at a government-sponsored research foundation, a political party organization, and the headquarters of a major television network.
To qualify for funding, the proposed internship should be full-time (at least 35 hours per week), unpaid, and at least 9 weeks long. Applicants will be responsible for arranging their own travel and lodging.
To apply, submit the following materials via the Global Student Fellows website:
- A statement of purpose, including a description of (1) the applicant’s relevant background and interest in Taiwanese politics and society, and (2) the host organization and the proposed internship duties and opportunities;
- A tentative budget, including travel and lodging expenses;
- A resume;
- A confirmation of the internship opportunity from the host agency or organization;
- Two letters of recommendation, at least one from a Stanford faculty member.
Questions about the internship or application process should be directed to Kharis Templeman. The deadline to receive all application materials is Friday, April 3, 2015.
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Taiwan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs is again sponsoring a special fellowship exchange program, Mosaic Taiwan, for "emerging US leaders" aged 20-35 who are interested in spending some time learning about Taiwan firsthand. The program lasts about three weeks, June 14-July 4, and includes a wide array of activities, including meetings with Taiwanese business, cultural, and political leaders and visits to museums, national parks, and of course the ubiquitous Taiwanese night markets, pictured above.
This is a new initiative of the Ma administration to try to cultivate an interest in Taiwan among young Americans headed for careers in policy or politics. The first group of fellows visited Taiwan in June and July 2014.
Note that there currently does not appear to be information about the application process on the program website. The application materials have instead been circulated via email; they are posted below, along with the official description of the program. The deadline to apply is February 21, 2015, via email to application@mosaictaiwan.net.
Application form
Application instructions
This is a new initiative of the Ma administration to try to cultivate an interest in Taiwan among young Americans headed for careers in policy or politics. The first group of fellows visited Taiwan in June and July 2014.
Note that there currently does not appear to be information about the application process on the program website. The application materials have instead been circulated via email; they are posted below, along with the official description of the program. The deadline to apply is February 21, 2015, via email to application@mosaictaiwan.net.
Application form
Application instructions
Mosaic Taiwan is a fellowship exchange program for emerging US leaders wishing to gain firsthand experience of the Republic of China (Taiwan), a vibrant Asian democracy where traditional Chinese culture has prospered. Set up by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Mosaic Taiwan program provides young students and professionals with interest in global affairs with the opportunity to explore the beauty of Taiwan’s natural environment, and to better understand its culture and society through extensive exchanges with local leaders from various fields. It also gives young leaders from Taiwan international exposure by fostering dialogue with their overseas counterparts.
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On February 20, the Taiwan Democracy Project will host Ashley Esarey, a research associate at the China Institute at the University of Alberta. His talk is entitled, "Communication Power and Taiwan's Democratization." The full abstract is below. The talk is free and open to the public; you are encouraged to RSVP at the event page here.
Professor Esarey received his Ph.D. in Political Science from Columbia University and was awarded the An Wang Postdoctoral Fellowship by Harvard University. He has held academic appointments at Middlebury College, Whitman College, and the University of Alberta, where he is an instructor in the departments of East Asian Studies and Political Science. Esarey has written on democratization and authoritarian resilience, digital media and politics, and information control and propaganda. His recent publications include My Fight for a New Taiwan: One Woman’s Journey from Prison to Power (with Lu Hsiu-lien 呂秀蓮) and The Internet in China: Cultural, Political, and Social Dimensions (with Randolph Kluver).
Professor Esarey received his Ph.D. in Political Science from Columbia University and was awarded the An Wang Postdoctoral Fellowship by Harvard University. He has held academic appointments at Middlebury College, Whitman College, and the University of Alberta, where he is an instructor in the departments of East Asian Studies and Political Science. Esarey has written on democratization and authoritarian resilience, digital media and politics, and information control and propaganda. His recent publications include My Fight for a New Taiwan: One Woman’s Journey from Prison to Power (with Lu Hsiu-lien 呂秀蓮) and The Internet in China: Cultural, Political, and Social Dimensions (with Randolph Kluver).
Communication Power and Taiwan's Democratization
In 2010-2011, the "Arab Spring" brought unexpected revolutions to many Middle Eastern and North African countries. Why did these seemingly invincible regimes fall, while China remained durably authoritarian? Many observers credited global media for the political transformations. While the hopes of Arab Spring democracy have proven to be fragile or short-lived, we can effectively explore the relationship between political communication and regime stability by turning our attention to Taiwan’s remarkable democratization, which remains under-appreciated by the international community.
This talk considers political communication in Taiwan from the martial law era to the heady days of democratic activism beginning in the late 1970s and lasting till the 1990s. Professor Esarey argues that the Chiang Ching-kuo administration’s diminishing capacity to control a small but influential opposition (dangwai) media, and even mainstream newspapers, gradually permitted reformers to reframe debates, reset the political agenda, and challenge state narratives and legitimacy claims.
When viewed in comparative perspective, Taiwan’s successful democratization suggests that seeking regime change is impracticable, and even perilous, without considerable and sustainable media freedom as well as opportunities for the public to advocate, evaluate, and internalize alternative political views. A balance of “communication power” between state and societal actors facilitates a negotiated and peaceful transition from authoritarianism.
In 2010-2011, the "Arab Spring" brought unexpected revolutions to many Middle Eastern and North African countries. Why did these seemingly invincible regimes fall, while China remained durably authoritarian? Many observers credited global media for the political transformations. While the hopes of Arab Spring democracy have proven to be fragile or short-lived, we can effectively explore the relationship between political communication and regime stability by turning our attention to Taiwan’s remarkable democratization, which remains under-appreciated by the international community.
This talk considers political communication in Taiwan from the martial law era to the heady days of democratic activism beginning in the late 1970s and lasting till the 1990s. Professor Esarey argues that the Chiang Ching-kuo administration’s diminishing capacity to control a small but influential opposition (dangwai) media, and even mainstream newspapers, gradually permitted reformers to reframe debates, reset the political agenda, and challenge state narratives and legitimacy claims.
When viewed in comparative perspective, Taiwan’s successful democratization suggests that seeking regime change is impracticable, and even perilous, without considerable and sustainable media freedom as well as opportunities for the public to advocate, evaluate, and internalize alternative political views. A balance of “communication power” between state and societal actors facilitates a negotiated and peaceful transition from authoritarianism.
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DPP presidential candidate Tsai Ying-wen at a campaign rally in November 2011; she lost the 2012 presidential election to Ma Ying-jeou, 51.6-45.6%
The local elections on November 29th in Taiwan were a resounding defeat for the ruling KMT, and a major victory for the DPP. Taiwan’s main opposition party captured seven county and city executives from the KMT, raising their total from 6 to 13 of Taiwan’s local jurisdictions. DPP mayors now lead four of Taiwan’s six special municipalities: Taoyuan, Taichung, Tainan, and Kaohsiung. In addition, the nominally independent Ko Wen-je (柯文哲) received tacit DPP support for his successful bid for Taipei mayor, booting the KMT out of the mayor’s office there for the first time in 16 years. Only in New Taipei did the KMT manage to hang on, thanks in part to the personal popularity of the incumbent mayor Eric Chu (朱立倫).
Equally striking was the swing away from the KMT at lower levels, where the party’s candidates have traditionally been more insulated from national trends: the number of KMT councilors dropped from 419 to 386 (out of 907), and KMT township heads fell from 121 to 80 (out of 204). The KMT now holds a majority on only 6 of 23 city and county councils—remarkable for a party that could once count on control of the vast majority of local offices to help it mobilize votes for national elections. The consistent swing away from the KMT across every jurisdiction in Taiwan suggests that this was a “wave” election—unhappiness with the ruling party and its chairman, President Ma Ying-jeou, drove a national slump in KMT support that showed up in vote totals nearly everywhere. Indeed, this was arguably the KMT’s worst-ever performance in a local election: only 1997 comes close, and the fact that all local offices were on the ballot this year, including the special municipalities, makes this a more consequential defeat than that election. (These figures are drawn from a presentation I gave at a Stanford roundtable on December 2; the slides from that talk are available here.)
It’s a little late for me to weigh in on the debate over why the KMT fared so badly—plenty of other people have done that already, and the impact is rapidly fading into the past as Taiwanese politics churns along. Instead, in this post I want to look forward and ask: what does the 2014 election tell us about future election outcomes in Taiwan, especially the 2016 presidential race?
Equally striking was the swing away from the KMT at lower levels, where the party’s candidates have traditionally been more insulated from national trends: the number of KMT councilors dropped from 419 to 386 (out of 907), and KMT township heads fell from 121 to 80 (out of 204). The KMT now holds a majority on only 6 of 23 city and county councils—remarkable for a party that could once count on control of the vast majority of local offices to help it mobilize votes for national elections. The consistent swing away from the KMT across every jurisdiction in Taiwan suggests that this was a “wave” election—unhappiness with the ruling party and its chairman, President Ma Ying-jeou, drove a national slump in KMT support that showed up in vote totals nearly everywhere. Indeed, this was arguably the KMT’s worst-ever performance in a local election: only 1997 comes close, and the fact that all local offices were on the ballot this year, including the special municipalities, makes this a more consequential defeat than that election. (These figures are drawn from a presentation I gave at a Stanford roundtable on December 2; the slides from that talk are available here.)
It’s a little late for me to weigh in on the debate over why the KMT fared so badly—plenty of other people have done that already, and the impact is rapidly fading into the past as Taiwanese politics churns along. Instead, in this post I want to look forward and ask: what does the 2014 election tell us about future election outcomes in Taiwan, especially the 2016 presidential race?
2014 Is Not 2016
The unquestioned assumption in most commentary in Taiwan is that the KMT’s recent electoral rout bodes poorly for its chances in the coming presidential and legislative elections, now tentatively set for January 2016. Some commentators have argued that the 2014 result indicates a fundamental electoral “breakthrough” for the DPP, rather than a temporary shift away from the KMT due to recent scandals and the unpopularity of President Ma, and that the DPP should be the favorite going into 2016.
This is not self-evident. To see why, we need only look at the last time around. In the last local elections in 2009-10, the DPP’s candidates for county and city executives actually won more total votes than did the KMT: 5,755,287 to 5,463,570. That turned out not to presage a DPP victory in the presidential race in 2012: Tsai Ying-wen lost to Ma Ying-jeou 51.6% to 45.6%.
Why the big difference? One reason is simply that they were held at different times: Taiwan was in a major recession (as was much of the world) in 2009-10, whereas by 2012 economic growth had bounced back. Another is that the relative importance of factors affecting mass voting behavior in local elections is different from national ones: ideological positioning and the state of the national economy, among other things, are likely to play a stronger role in vote choice in 2016 than they did in the local elections. The personal qualities of the candidates matter, too, and there’s always the possibility of a third candidate emerging as a serious contender, as happened in the 2000 presidential election.
So, until we know who the candidates are, what platforms they'll run on, and how the economy is likely to be doing, we should be cautious about forecasting a win for either major party. Nevertheless, might the 2014 elections at least tell us something meaningful about the relative appeal of the DPP and KMT right now? If we assume all the other factors will cancel each other out, doesn't the last election tell us the DPP will enjoy a generic partisan advantage going into 2016?
Not necessarily, and the reason is turnout. In general, it's 10-15 percent higher in presidential elections than local ones. If these extra voters who show up at the polls in presidential elections disproportionately support the KMT, then the local results are going to give an underestimate of the KMT’s expected vote share in 2016. So it would be nice to know how much of the DPP's success is due to KMT-leaning voters staying home, versus the DPP winning more votes. To figure that out, we need to dig into the raw vote totals a little more.
The unquestioned assumption in most commentary in Taiwan is that the KMT’s recent electoral rout bodes poorly for its chances in the coming presidential and legislative elections, now tentatively set for January 2016. Some commentators have argued that the 2014 result indicates a fundamental electoral “breakthrough” for the DPP, rather than a temporary shift away from the KMT due to recent scandals and the unpopularity of President Ma, and that the DPP should be the favorite going into 2016.
This is not self-evident. To see why, we need only look at the last time around. In the last local elections in 2009-10, the DPP’s candidates for county and city executives actually won more total votes than did the KMT: 5,755,287 to 5,463,570. That turned out not to presage a DPP victory in the presidential race in 2012: Tsai Ying-wen lost to Ma Ying-jeou 51.6% to 45.6%.
Why the big difference? One reason is simply that they were held at different times: Taiwan was in a major recession (as was much of the world) in 2009-10, whereas by 2012 economic growth had bounced back. Another is that the relative importance of factors affecting mass voting behavior in local elections is different from national ones: ideological positioning and the state of the national economy, among other things, are likely to play a stronger role in vote choice in 2016 than they did in the local elections. The personal qualities of the candidates matter, too, and there’s always the possibility of a third candidate emerging as a serious contender, as happened in the 2000 presidential election.
So, until we know who the candidates are, what platforms they'll run on, and how the economy is likely to be doing, we should be cautious about forecasting a win for either major party. Nevertheless, might the 2014 elections at least tell us something meaningful about the relative appeal of the DPP and KMT right now? If we assume all the other factors will cancel each other out, doesn't the last election tell us the DPP will enjoy a generic partisan advantage going into 2016?
Not necessarily, and the reason is turnout. In general, it's 10-15 percent higher in presidential elections than local ones. If these extra voters who show up at the polls in presidential elections disproportionately support the KMT, then the local results are going to give an underestimate of the KMT’s expected vote share in 2016. So it would be nice to know how much of the DPP's success is due to KMT-leaning voters staying home, versus the DPP winning more votes. To figure that out, we need to dig into the raw vote totals a little more.
Was the DPP's Win a Result of Blue Voters Staying Home?
Let’s start with the basic numbers. Here are the turnout figures for 2012 and 2014:
Now, how about the partisan breakdown? Here's the vote totals for each party in 2012 (presidential election) and 2014 (county/city executives):
Notably, the DPP candidates (including Ko Wen-je) together polled almost 600,000 votes more than Tsai did in the 2012 presidential race, even as turnout declined! So while the KMT had a disastrous drop from 2012 to 2014, there was also a significant increase in support for the DPP in 2014 above and beyond its support in the presidential election. Clearly, this is not just a story about asymmetric turnout of each party's base supporters, with pan-Blue voters sitting this one out. Instead, the DPP appears to have made big absolute gains as well: the party's vote total in 2014 was only about 200,000 short of what Ma Ying-jeou won in 2012, in a higher-turnout election.
(For those interested in digging further into the numbers, I've put all these data in an Excel file, which can be accessed below):
Let’s start with the basic numbers. Here are the turnout figures for 2012 and 2014:
- 2012: 13,452,016 votes cast, or 74.4 percent of all eligible voters;
- 2014: 12,512,135, or 67.6 percent.
Now, how about the partisan breakdown? Here's the vote totals for each party in 2012 (presidential election) and 2014 (county/city executives):
- 2012: Tsai Ying-wen (DPP): 6,093,578
- 2012: Ma Ying-jeou (KMT): 6,891,139
- 2014: DPP candidates: 6,684,089*
- 2014: KMT candidates: 4,990,667
Notably, the DPP candidates (including Ko Wen-je) together polled almost 600,000 votes more than Tsai did in the 2012 presidential race, even as turnout declined! So while the KMT had a disastrous drop from 2012 to 2014, there was also a significant increase in support for the DPP in 2014 above and beyond its support in the presidential election. Clearly, this is not just a story about asymmetric turnout of each party's base supporters, with pan-Blue voters sitting this one out. Instead, the DPP appears to have made big absolute gains as well: the party's vote total in 2014 was only about 200,000 short of what Ma Ying-jeou won in 2012, in a higher-turnout election.
(For those interested in digging further into the numbers, I've put all these data in an Excel file, which can be accessed below):
Adjusting for Races without a DPP Candidate
There's one caveat to this conclusion, and it's a big one: the result in Taipei was quite anomalous. Ko Wen-je in Taipei ran as an independent and deliberately avoided associating too closely with the DPP during the campaign, and the KMT's candidate Sean Lien (連勝文) was a particularly poor nominee. In 2016, the DPP is not going to be able to replicate what Ko did and carry Taipei by over 200,000 votes. Given Taipei's size, we're clearly overestimating the DPP's probable support if we count all the votes for Ko in 2014 as likely votes for the DPP in 2016. On the other hand, there were several other counties where the DPP didn't run a candidate; the party will undoubtedly add some votes in these places in 2016. Any inference about 2016 depends among other things on the net effect among these jurisdictions.
To get a better sense of the size of this effect, I took out the votes from the five "oddball" jurisdictions where the DPP did not run a candidate: Taipei, Hsinchu County, Hualien, Lienchiang, and Kinmen. The comparison of vote totals in the other, "normal" jurisdictions is below:
So in the places where it ran a candidate, the DPP bested its 2012 vote total by over 500,000. That's especially impressive because there were double-digit declines in turnout from 2012 in New Taipei, Taoyuan, Tainan, and Kaohsiung. If the DPP candidate in 2016 can repeat the performance of the party's candidates in 2014, then 5.83 million votes is a conservative estimate of its vote total in these places in the next presidential election.
But what about the oddball places? Let's imagine that the DPP had run candidates in all these jurisdictions, and then assume that they performed as well on average as DPP candidates did elsewhere. In other words, assume that the increase in votes for the DPP in the oddball places would be proportional to the increase in the other, non-oddball places. That is:
DPP's net vote increase in normal jurisdictions, 2012 to 2014: 508,290
Total votes in normal jurisdictions, 2012: 11,246,356
Fraction increase: 0.045
Net increase in oddball jurisdictions, 2012 to 2014: X
Total votes in oddball jurisdictions, 2012: 2,107,949.
X is then 0.045*2,107,949, or 95,271 votes.
The Tsai campaign in 2012 won 771,762 votes in the oddball cases, so adding these up we get an estimate for 2014 of:
771,762 + 95,271 = 867,033.
Thus,
Non-oddball 2014 vote total: 5,830,106
Oddball 2014 vote estimate: 867,033
Estimated 2014 DPP vote total if candidates ran everywhere: 6,697,139.
So, in a hypothetical scenario in which the DPP ran candidates everywhere, the party's vote total for 2014 would be 6,697,139. That is just under 200,000 votes short of what Ma Ying-jeou won but about 600,000 more than what Tsai won in 2012. It's also higher than any DPP presidential candidate has ever won in the past--Chen Shui-bian's vote total of 6,446,900 in 2004 is the previous high-water mark for the party. For a "local" election with a turnout rate well below the last presidential election, that number is eye-opening. It's a clear indication that the DPP didn't win just because pan-Blue voters stayed home while pan-Green voters all showed up; instead, if you accept the calculations above, the DPP in effect captured more votes than it has ever won before, in any election, presidential, legislative, or local.
Generic Conditions Favor a DPP Win in 2016
Given that, the DPP should probably be viewed as a slight favorite to win the presidency in 2016 even under generic conditions--two high-profile, appealing candidates, a neutral economic environment, moderate ideological position-taking, and the absence of serious third-party challengers. Those are big "ifs": a lot can change over the next year. But it seems more likely that they will change for the worse rather than for the better for the KMT.
For one, while the DPP seems set to nominate Tsai Ying-wen again, the KMT does not have any obvious presidential contender waiting in the wings beyond Eric Chu. If he decides not to run, whoever the KMT nominee is will start at a serious disadvantage in name recognition and personal appeal. And if Chu does decide to run, he will probably need to put considerable distance between himself and the incumbent president in order to have a serious shot at winning. President Ma's approval ratings, and those of the Executive Yuan, have been consistently under 20 percent for most of his second term, giving the DPP the opportunity to frame the election as an anti-Ma vote as much as a pro-DPP one.
So, bottom line: unless there are major surprises over the next year, the 2014 election results suggest that Taiwan's next president will likely be from the DPP. For a party that has itself been on the receiving end of several electoral drubbings over the last decade, it's a remarkable political recovery.
There's one caveat to this conclusion, and it's a big one: the result in Taipei was quite anomalous. Ko Wen-je in Taipei ran as an independent and deliberately avoided associating too closely with the DPP during the campaign, and the KMT's candidate Sean Lien (連勝文) was a particularly poor nominee. In 2016, the DPP is not going to be able to replicate what Ko did and carry Taipei by over 200,000 votes. Given Taipei's size, we're clearly overestimating the DPP's probable support if we count all the votes for Ko in 2014 as likely votes for the DPP in 2016. On the other hand, there were several other counties where the DPP didn't run a candidate; the party will undoubtedly add some votes in these places in 2016. Any inference about 2016 depends among other things on the net effect among these jurisdictions.
To get a better sense of the size of this effect, I took out the votes from the five "oddball" jurisdictions where the DPP did not run a candidate: Taipei, Hsinchu County, Hualien, Lienchiang, and Kinmen. The comparison of vote totals in the other, "normal" jurisdictions is below:
- Tsai 2012 (minus oddballs): 5,321,816
- DPP 2014 (minus oddballs): 5,830,106
So in the places where it ran a candidate, the DPP bested its 2012 vote total by over 500,000. That's especially impressive because there were double-digit declines in turnout from 2012 in New Taipei, Taoyuan, Tainan, and Kaohsiung. If the DPP candidate in 2016 can repeat the performance of the party's candidates in 2014, then 5.83 million votes is a conservative estimate of its vote total in these places in the next presidential election.
But what about the oddball places? Let's imagine that the DPP had run candidates in all these jurisdictions, and then assume that they performed as well on average as DPP candidates did elsewhere. In other words, assume that the increase in votes for the DPP in the oddball places would be proportional to the increase in the other, non-oddball places. That is:
DPP's net vote increase in normal jurisdictions, 2012 to 2014: 508,290
Total votes in normal jurisdictions, 2012: 11,246,356
Fraction increase: 0.045
Net increase in oddball jurisdictions, 2012 to 2014: X
Total votes in oddball jurisdictions, 2012: 2,107,949.
X is then 0.045*2,107,949, or 95,271 votes.
The Tsai campaign in 2012 won 771,762 votes in the oddball cases, so adding these up we get an estimate for 2014 of:
771,762 + 95,271 = 867,033.
Thus,
Non-oddball 2014 vote total: 5,830,106
Oddball 2014 vote estimate: 867,033
Estimated 2014 DPP vote total if candidates ran everywhere: 6,697,139.
So, in a hypothetical scenario in which the DPP ran candidates everywhere, the party's vote total for 2014 would be 6,697,139. That is just under 200,000 votes short of what Ma Ying-jeou won but about 600,000 more than what Tsai won in 2012. It's also higher than any DPP presidential candidate has ever won in the past--Chen Shui-bian's vote total of 6,446,900 in 2004 is the previous high-water mark for the party. For a "local" election with a turnout rate well below the last presidential election, that number is eye-opening. It's a clear indication that the DPP didn't win just because pan-Blue voters stayed home while pan-Green voters all showed up; instead, if you accept the calculations above, the DPP in effect captured more votes than it has ever won before, in any election, presidential, legislative, or local.
Generic Conditions Favor a DPP Win in 2016
Given that, the DPP should probably be viewed as a slight favorite to win the presidency in 2016 even under generic conditions--two high-profile, appealing candidates, a neutral economic environment, moderate ideological position-taking, and the absence of serious third-party challengers. Those are big "ifs": a lot can change over the next year. But it seems more likely that they will change for the worse rather than for the better for the KMT.
For one, while the DPP seems set to nominate Tsai Ying-wen again, the KMT does not have any obvious presidential contender waiting in the wings beyond Eric Chu. If he decides not to run, whoever the KMT nominee is will start at a serious disadvantage in name recognition and personal appeal. And if Chu does decide to run, he will probably need to put considerable distance between himself and the incumbent president in order to have a serious shot at winning. President Ma's approval ratings, and those of the Executive Yuan, have been consistently under 20 percent for most of his second term, giving the DPP the opportunity to frame the election as an anti-Ma vote as much as a pro-DPP one.
So, bottom line: unless there are major surprises over the next year, the 2014 election results suggest that Taiwan's next president will likely be from the DPP. For a party that has itself been on the receiving end of several electoral drubbings over the last decade, it's a remarkable political recovery.
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Pathways to Democracy: Taiwan's Lessons for China
Authoritarian ruling parties are expected to resist democratization, often times at all costs. And yet some of the strongest authoritarian parties in the world have not resisted democratization, but have instead embraced it. This is because their raison d’etre is to continue ruling, though not necessarily to remain authoritarian. Put another way, democratization requires ruling parties hold free and fair elections, but not that they lose them. Authoritarian ruling parties can thus be incentivized to concede democratization from a position of exceptional strength. This alternative pathway to democracy is illustrated with Asian cases – notably Taiwan – in which ruling parties democratized from positions of considerable strength, and not weakness. The conceding-to-thrive argument has clear implications with respect to “candidate cases” in developmental Asia, where ruling parties have not yet conceded democratization despite being well-positioned to thrive were they to do so, such as the world’s most populous dictatorship, China.
Authoritarian ruling parties are expected to resist democratization, often times at all costs. And yet some of the strongest authoritarian parties in the world have not resisted democratization, but have instead embraced it. This is because their raison d’etre is to continue ruling, though not necessarily to remain authoritarian. Put another way, democratization requires ruling parties hold free and fair elections, but not that they lose them. Authoritarian ruling parties can thus be incentivized to concede democratization from a position of exceptional strength. This alternative pathway to democracy is illustrated with Asian cases – notably Taiwan – in which ruling parties democratized from positions of considerable strength, and not weakness. The conceding-to-thrive argument has clear implications with respect to “candidate cases” in developmental Asia, where ruling parties have not yet conceded democratization despite being well-positioned to thrive were they to do so, such as the world’s most populous dictatorship, China.
On January 16, the Taiwan Democracy Project will host Joseph Wong, Canada Research Chair in Democratization, Health, and Development at the University of Toronto. His talk is based on a paper published last year in the journal Perspectives on Politics, and is entitled, "Pathways to Democracy: Taiwan's Lessons for China." The full abstract is below. The talk is free and open to the public; you are encouraged to RSVP at the event page, here.
Professor Wong was the director of the Asian Institute at the Munk School at the University of Toronto from 2005 to 2014. In addition to his other work, he has published four books: Healthy Democracies: Welfare Politics in Taiwan and South Korea (2004), and Betting on Biotech: Innovation and the Limits of Asia's Developmental State (2011), as well as two edited volumes: Political Transitions in Dominant Party Systems: Learning to Lose, co-edited with Edward Friedman (2008), and Innovating for the Global Economy: Towards a New Innovation Agenda, co-edited with Dilip Soman and Janice Stein (2014). He is currently working on a book monograph with Dan Slater on Asia's development and democracy. Professor Wong received his Hons. B.A. from McGill University in 1995 and Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2001.
Professor Wong was the director of the Asian Institute at the Munk School at the University of Toronto from 2005 to 2014. In addition to his other work, he has published four books: Healthy Democracies: Welfare Politics in Taiwan and South Korea (2004), and Betting on Biotech: Innovation and the Limits of Asia's Developmental State (2011), as well as two edited volumes: Political Transitions in Dominant Party Systems: Learning to Lose, co-edited with Edward Friedman (2008), and Innovating for the Global Economy: Towards a New Innovation Agenda, co-edited with Dilip Soman and Janice Stein (2014). He is currently working on a book monograph with Dan Slater on Asia's development and democracy. Professor Wong received his Hons. B.A. from McGill University in 1995 and Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 2001.
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On December 2, the Taiwan Democracy Project will hold a special roundtable session to discuss the results of Taiwan's local elections on November 29. The event is free and open to the public, and lunch will be provided. You are encouraged to RSVP at the official event page.
Panel speakers will include Dennis Weng, visiting assistant professor of political science at Wesleyan University; Thomas Fingar, a Distinguished Fellow at the Asia-Pacific Research Center in the Freeman Spogli Institute at Stanford University; Winnie Lin, a Stanford undergraduate; and me. Some context on the elections follows.
Panel speakers will include Dennis Weng, visiting assistant professor of political science at Wesleyan University; Thomas Fingar, a Distinguished Fellow at the Asia-Pacific Research Center in the Freeman Spogli Institute at Stanford University; Winnie Lin, a Stanford undergraduate; and me. Some context on the elections follows.
On November 29, Taiwan will hold comprehensive local elections which will decide a huge number of offices, from the Taipei mayor all the way down to village and ward chiefs. These elections are also being called the "9-in-1" (九合一) elections, because they combine elections to nine separate offices. By the time Taiwan's transition to democracy finished in 1996, elections to directly administered municipalities, counties and cities, townships, village chiefs, and ward chiefs were all held at separate times. Along with separate national elections for the National Assembly (beginning in 1991), the Legislative Yuan (1992), and the presidency (1996), that meant Taiwanese voters were going to the polls about once a year. That's a lot.
In recent years, on the other hand, the trend has been toward consolidation. A set of amendments in 2005 changed the legislative term length from three to four years to coincide with the presidential term, and starting in 2012 both elections were held on the same day, creating a single national election every four years. The National Assembly was abolished in the same reform. Then county and county-level city terms were temporarily extended to align with the election cycle of the special municipalities of Taipei and Kaohsiung, for the first time creating a single local election day:
The races to be decided in the 2014 election:
In addition, about 25 township-level jurisdictions with significant "mountain aborigine" populations hold special status as "self-governing" areas (自治區). In a nod to the special status of aborigines in Taiwan, local government laws require that the township heads in these areas be aborigine. This became a point of some contestation after several counties (Taipei County, Taichung City and County, and Kaohsiung City and County) were merged and raised to centrally-administered municipality status in 2009. As part of this reform, townships and towns in these areas became districts (區), which have appointed, not elected, leaders. As a consequence, several self-governing townships lost the right to elect their leaders--Wulai Township, a popular tourist destination a short trip south of Taipei, was one.
In December 2013 the Legislative Yuan passed an amendment to restore the right to elect the leaders and councilors of these former townships. As a consequence, two more elections were added:
So that's how they got to "9-in-1".
In recent years, on the other hand, the trend has been toward consolidation. A set of amendments in 2005 changed the legislative term length from three to four years to coincide with the presidential term, and starting in 2012 both elections were held on the same day, creating a single national election every four years. The National Assembly was abolished in the same reform. Then county and county-level city terms were temporarily extended to align with the election cycle of the special municipalities of Taipei and Kaohsiung, for the first time creating a single local election day:
The races to be decided in the 2014 election:
- (1) Mayors and (2) city councilors in centrally-administered municipalities (直轄市市長，市議員) for Taipei, Kaohsiung, New Taipei City, Taichung, and Taoyuan);
- (3) Executives and (4) councilors in counties and county-level municipalities (縣／省轄市長，縣／市議員);
- (5) Township and town heads and (6) councilors (鄉／鎮長，鄉／鎮議員);
- (7) Village and ward heads (村／里長).
In addition, about 25 township-level jurisdictions with significant "mountain aborigine" populations hold special status as "self-governing" areas (自治區). In a nod to the special status of aborigines in Taiwan, local government laws require that the township heads in these areas be aborigine. This became a point of some contestation after several counties (Taipei County, Taichung City and County, and Kaohsiung City and County) were merged and raised to centrally-administered municipality status in 2009. As part of this reform, townships and towns in these areas became districts (區), which have appointed, not elected, leaders. As a consequence, several self-governing townships lost the right to elect their leaders--Wulai Township, a popular tourist destination a short trip south of Taipei, was one.
In December 2013 the Legislative Yuan passed an amendment to restore the right to elect the leaders and councilors of these former townships. As a consequence, two more elections were added:
- (8) Self-governing district heads and (9) representatives (自治區長，區代表).
So that's how they got to "9-in-1".
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The North American Taiwan Studies Association (NATSA) will hold its next annual conference on June 12-15, 2015, on the campus of Harvard University. The call for papers has just been posted; the 2015 theme is "Motions and the Motionless: (Dis/Re-) Connecting Taiwan to the World." The deadline to submit proposals is December 31, 2014. Additional details can be found at the conference website, here. The formal announcement is below.
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On November 10, the Taiwan Democracy Project will host Dan Blumenthal of the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) for a talk on the latest developments in cross-Strait politics. Mr. Blumenthal is director of Asian Studies at AEI, where he focuses on East Asian security issues and Sino-American relations. His talk is provocatively entitled, "Time for Xi Jinping to Follow Chiang Ching-kuo's Path?" The full abstract is below. The talk is free and open to the public; you are encouraged to RSVP at the event page, here.
In addition to his duties at AEI, Mr. Blumenthal is also the John A. van Beuren Chair Distinguished Visiting Professor at the U.S. Naval War College. Blumenthal has both served in and advised the U.S. government on China issues for over a decade. From 2001 to 2004, he served as senior director for China, Taiwan, and Mongolia at the Department of Defense. Additionally, he served as a commissioner on the congressionally-mandated U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission since 2006-2012, and held the position of vice chairman in 2007. He has also served on the Academic Advisory Board of the congressional U.S.-China Working Group. Blumenthal is the co-author of An Awkward Embrace: The United States and China in the 21st Century (AEI Press, 2012), and coeditor of Strategy in Asia: The Past, Present, and Future of Regional Security (Stanford University Press, 2014).
In addition to his duties at AEI, Mr. Blumenthal is also the John A. van Beuren Chair Distinguished Visiting Professor at the U.S. Naval War College. Blumenthal has both served in and advised the U.S. government on China issues for over a decade. From 2001 to 2004, he served as senior director for China, Taiwan, and Mongolia at the Department of Defense. Additionally, he served as a commissioner on the congressionally-mandated U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission since 2006-2012, and held the position of vice chairman in 2007. He has also served on the Academic Advisory Board of the congressional U.S.-China Working Group. Blumenthal is the co-author of An Awkward Embrace: The United States and China in the 21st Century (AEI Press, 2012), and coeditor of Strategy in Asia: The Past, Present, and Future of Regional Security (Stanford University Press, 2014).
Time for Xi Jinping to Follow Chiang Ching-kuo's Path?
Recently Ma Ying-jeou called upon Xi to finish Deng Xiaoping's revolution and begin the process of moving to a constitutional democracy. Is Taiwan a model of Chinese democracy? How would democratization in China impact the future of ROC-China ties? How would a democratized China affect US interests in the Asia-Pacific?
Recently Ma Ying-jeou called upon Xi to finish Deng Xiaoping's revolution and begin the process of moving to a constitutional democracy. Is Taiwan a model of Chinese democracy? How would democratization in China impact the future of ROC-China ties? How would a democratized China affect US interests in the Asia-Pacific?
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APSA is coming to San Francisco in 2015.
The American Political Science Association's Conference Group on Taiwan Studies (CGOTS) has posted its call for papers. CGOTS is one of APSA's "related groups" organizations. Founded in 1990, it serves to promote Taiwan studies in the broader political science community, as well as to foster connections between Taiwan-based and U.S.-based scholars with substantial research interests in Taiwan.
For applicants with a Taiwan-related proposal, submitting to CGOTS can substantially improve one's chances of acceptance to the conference. The formal call for papers is reposted below; the deadline to submit applications is December 1, 2014.
For applicants with a Taiwan-related proposal, submitting to CGOTS can substantially improve one's chances of acceptance to the conference. The formal call for papers is reposted below; the deadline to submit applications is December 1, 2014.
The 2015 American Political Science Association (APSA) Annual Meeting will be held from September 3-6 in San Francisco, CA. The conference theme is “Diversities Reconsidered: Politics, and Political Science, in the 21st Century.”
CGOTS invites paper and panel proposals on Taiwan’s domestic politics and international relations that are consistent with the conference theme of “Diversities Reconsidered: Politics, and Political Science, in the 21st Century.”
Notwithstanding the deepening of globalization and accelerating trends of cross-national socioeconomic interactions and diffusion of policies and behaviors, we continue to witness a great deal of diversity across and within regions, nations, and states. Hence, how have Taiwan’s burgeoning civil society and social institutions impacted the island’s democratic process and identity politics? How have increasing diversities in the marketplace of ideas, interests, identities, and media networks contributed to Taiwan’s socioeconomic, foreign, and cross-strait policies? In turn, how do Taiwan’s external environment and relations shape its democracy, social fabrics, and national security? Are Taiwan’s domestic and foreign policy choices experiencing greater constraints or opportunities in the 21st century? In addition, we are also interested in receiving proposals that use different theoretical paradigms and methodological approaches to tackle questions raised by social movements, communication, identity, institutions, and security studies. Our hope is to connect Taiwan Studies to the broader political science literature, use Taiwan as a case for theory development, and/or compare Taiwan with other countries.
Please send proposals through the APSA website (https://www.apsanet.org/content_21569.cfm). If the website is not accessible to you, you may send proposals to Professor Dean P. Chen (dchen@ramapo.edu), CGOTS Coordinator. The deadline for proposals is December 1, 2014. Decisions on the proposals will be communicated to you in February 2015. Travel support for CGOTS panelists is subject to the availability of external funding.
CGOTS invites paper and panel proposals on Taiwan’s domestic politics and international relations that are consistent with the conference theme of “Diversities Reconsidered: Politics, and Political Science, in the 21st Century.”
Notwithstanding the deepening of globalization and accelerating trends of cross-national socioeconomic interactions and diffusion of policies and behaviors, we continue to witness a great deal of diversity across and within regions, nations, and states. Hence, how have Taiwan’s burgeoning civil society and social institutions impacted the island’s democratic process and identity politics? How have increasing diversities in the marketplace of ideas, interests, identities, and media networks contributed to Taiwan’s socioeconomic, foreign, and cross-strait policies? In turn, how do Taiwan’s external environment and relations shape its democracy, social fabrics, and national security? Are Taiwan’s domestic and foreign policy choices experiencing greater constraints or opportunities in the 21st century? In addition, we are also interested in receiving proposals that use different theoretical paradigms and methodological approaches to tackle questions raised by social movements, communication, identity, institutions, and security studies. Our hope is to connect Taiwan Studies to the broader political science literature, use Taiwan as a case for theory development, and/or compare Taiwan with other countries.
Please send proposals through the APSA website (https://www.apsanet.org/content_21569.cfm). If the website is not accessible to you, you may send proposals to Professor Dean P. Chen (dchen@ramapo.edu), CGOTS Coordinator. The deadline for proposals is December 1, 2014. Decisions on the proposals will be communicated to you in February 2015. Travel support for CGOTS panelists is subject to the availability of external funding.
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My new column at Ketagalan Media is on electoral reform in Taiwan, and what form it should take:
Read the whole thing here.
Last week, the Taiwan Citizen Union (公民組合) announced that it would register as a political party and field candidates in the 2016 legislative elections. Its stated agenda is political reform, beginning with the electoral system. That’s the right place to start, because as currently constituted, Taiwan’s electoral rules make it nearly impossible for small political parties to win more than a couple of the legislature’s 113 seats. Unless the electoral system is changed, the TCU, like hundreds of parties before it, is probably destined to end up as a historical footnote...