BOOK REVIEWS

Penne Wennerlung: Taiwan in Search of the Nation

Taiwan: In Search of the Nation is a reworked Master’s thesis, published in 1997 by the Department of Chinese Studies of the University of Stockholm. Its author, Pelle Wennerlund, spent more than a year in Taiwan on a Swedish International Development Cooperation Authority scholarship, under the auspices of a research programme called “Breaking away from Totalitarianism: State, Society and the Individual in Contemporary China”.

The subject chosen by the writer is definitely a fashionable one. The crushing victory last November of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) in the elections to choose the Heads of Districts and Mayors kindled the curiosity of foreign observers about this recent political grouping with only 150 000 members, which defeated the Kuomintang (KMT), one of the richest political parties in the world with a membership backing of over two million.

Before this victory, the DPP was already an interesting subject of study as, after barely ten years in existence, it was successful in very quickly presenting itself as the party of reform, renewal and above all as the only credible alternative to the KMT. The pro-independence stance of the DPP makes it a real danger for the Kuomintang and its policy of reunification with China, to which it has continued to adhere officially for over fifty years. It is precisely the Taiwanese pro-independence position that Pelle Wennerlund undertakes to analyse through a detailed study of the DPP’s development.

The writer has chosen a chronological approach for his first two chapters: the first is devoted to the pro-independence movement from 1945 to 1986, when the DPP was set up; the second chapter is a simplified description of the DPP’s development, from its underground beginnings to the glory days of the past few years. In a final chapter, Wennerlund offers a discussion of the concept of separatism with respect to mainland China, and the theorising of the pro-independence stance by the DPP and the Taiwanese Association of University Professors (TAUP).

The first two chapters set out in a rather conventional way the development of the Taiwanese independence movement from the 1920s, under Japanese occupation, to 1996, the year of the first election by universal suffrage of the President of the Republic, Lee Teng-hui. The exposition follows a classical chronological format, and faithfully describes the rise of the movement, whose members were previously condemned to exile or emprisonment, the formation of the group of “outside-the-party” independent candidates (dangwai) running against the Kuomintang in local elections, then the creation of the Democratic Progressive Party in 1986.

These chapters, which represent two-thirds of the work, are exhaustive, being based upon a well-chosen range of essentially Western sources. But the presentation of the movement’s history is in an extremely classical mould, compared to the studies which have gone before. Moreover, it is unfortunate that the part dealing with the movement in the 1920s and 1930s was not further developed by the writer. The views of Liao Wen-yi and Wang Yu-teh are set out (cf. below), but the movement that they drove for two decades in exile in Japan is only partially presented, and the mass of publications of the pro-independence movement in exile are scarcely mentioned.

The final chapter in Wennerlund’s work, by far the most interesting, presents Taiwanese nationalism as the outcome of a critique of the official history taught by the KMT, which has a strong mainland focus. In the writer’s estimation, Taiwanese nationalism is more than a racial issue, resting on the idea that Taiwan is a land of refuge, a meeting point for those excluded from the Chinese world. The DPP bases its discourse on the fact that the Taiwanese have suffered oppression ever since the Qing dynasty, at times by the Japanese, at times by the Mainlanders. Consequently, Taiwan must no longer fall back into the hands of outside forces, the People’s Republic in this case. This third part sets forth the DPP’s line against the policy of Chinese reunification advocated by both the KMT and the People’s Republic.

The DPP has taken the lead over the past few years in disputing the KMT’s interpretation of Taiwan’s history: the academic institutions have joined in the debate, and taboo questions, such as the period called White Terror and the 28th February incident have been able to be exposed in the public arena. They have given rise to the apologies of Lee Teng-hui in the name of the KMT. In this regard, the writer mentions the TAUP, an organisation of some 400 members which militates in favour of Taiwan’s independence. Its lobbying activities sometimes include severe attacks on the DPP accused of neglecting the nationalist cause in order to accommodate its electorate. Its ambition, like that of the TAIP (Taiwan Independence Party, that the writer does not mention, probably due to its being established so recently) is to build up a genuine national feeling, which has been hitherto non-existent in Taiwan. The TAUP, which is characterised by the radicalism of its discourse, is not, conversely to what is suggested by the writer, the representative of the pro-independence movement in “the upper circles of society”. It is true that it is made up of intellectuals and academics, but they are quite marginal figures with no influence in political circles whatsoever.

Wennerlund then mentions the various approaches to the question of the “Taiwanese nation”, Liao Wen-yi’s theory of métissage (hunxuelun), a rather unconvincing thesis with a heavy ethnological focus, and the position of the pro-independence Wang Yu-teh which seems more serious, since it tries to describe the Taiwanese nation as a process of modernisation subsequent to the introduction of capitalism, without any mention at all of the particular ethnic situation of the Taiwanese. Originally Chinese, they have, by dint of their emigration to Taiwan a long time ago, “become Taiwanese”, beginning to feel different from the Mainlanders under Japanese occupation. Defining the Taiwanese nation in terms of ethnicity is therefore unjustified.

Finally, the writer embarks on an analysis of Hsu Hsin-liang’s book, A New Nation (Xinxing minzu), published in 1995. Twice elected President of the DPP, Hsu Hsin-liang is a well-known figure in the pro-independence movement, living in exile in the United States for over twenty years. His work sees itself as a theorisation and intellectual backing of the Taiwanese pro-independence movement. It has at least the merit of projecting an image of an independent Taiwan into the future, based on current trends, without ever raising the ethnic issue, which is irrelevant according to him.

The presentation of this work does not bring any new factors to bear on the Taiwanese question, as Hsu Hsin-liang, after giving a very broad-brush historical interpretation of the development of civilisations, explains why Taiwan is, in his view, a nation “on the rise”. Taiwan, a melting-pot for so many immigrants, and gives, it is true, many forerunners of success. Hsu sees the maritime factor in particular as being what most distinguishes Taiwan from mainland China, traditionally an inward-looking nation. It is a pity that the author does not consider Hsu Hsin-liang’s A New Nation alongside the DPP’s other writings, giving the impression that this book is a major work, which is far from being the case. Taiwan: In Search of the Nation is an essay notable for the quality of its writing as well as the sources, both foreign and local, on which it draws. The use of pinyin, although justified by the writer as an attempt at simplification, may appear strange, as in any work on Taiwan. It is also to be regretted that the writer did not delve further into the issue of the DPP’s access to the media in its electoral quest. This problem was a decisive one at the time of the founding of the DPP, as well as in the early years of its political existence, in so far as the media were completely under the control of the KMT. It was only at the beginning of 1997 that the DPP could set up its own television station (Formosa Television, Minjian quanmin dianshi), enabling it to reach out to the broad mass of the population during election campaigns, and more generally, to increase the number of its members. This problem is mentioned but would have deserved a separate chapter devoted to it.

Overall, Taiwan: In Search of the Nation is a short general work which may be useful for students and journalists making their first attempt to understand the Taiwanese pro-independence movement.