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Now is the time to forge consensus
By Steve Tsang 曾銳生
Sunday, Jun 20, 2010, Page 8
Is the “harmonious society” that Chinese President Hu Jintao
(胡錦濤) constantly proclaims being realized in China’s relations with Taiwan?
Before Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九) became Taiwan’s president in May 2008, Taiwan was
regularly portrayed in China as a “troublemaker” and was the main cause of
tension between China and the US. Now Taiwan has become something of a
diplomatic afterthought because it no longer makes trouble. At the US-China
Strategic and Economic Dialogue, indeed, Taiwan was barely mentioned, as North
Korea, Iran and the value of the Chinese yuan claimed the most attention.
It has always been unfair to demonize the Taiwanese merely for wanting what most
people around the world take for granted: To uphold their basic human rights and
way of life, including the right to decide through a democratic process their
own future.
China, however, rejects such sentiments about self-determination and, as a
rising power, China is not a force that even democratic leaders dismiss lightly.
For years, China’s ruling Communist Party has maintained that Taiwan is a “core
national interest,” despite the reality that Taiwan has existed and functioned
as a virtual state for 60 years.
China has long threatened to use force if the international community should
formally recognize Taiwan’s independence. However, the atmosphere gradually
changed in recent years and the “troublemaker” label, applied under former
president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), has
not been used for two years.
Of course, Taiwan under Ma still wants the same rights that it desired under
Chen. but Ma has taken a different approach. He has eased tensions with China by
focusing on what both sides can agree upon. China’s leaders find his language
inoffensive. He seeks to advance Taiwan’s national interests without arousing
Beijing’s threat to use force and he has sought to forge closer trade and
transport links.
Ma’s strategy suits China, whose leaders welcome being able to avoid
confrontation with Taiwan, given their current focus on engineering their
country’s “peaceful rise.” Moreover, China does not wish to see the DPP and its
aggressively pro-independence leaders return to power. When Ma’s popularity
fell dramatically as Taiwan’s economy suffered from the global financial crisis,
China’s leaders worked with Ma to pre-empt just such an outcome.
This has allowed Ma’s administration to claim credit for improving relations
with China. However, the fundamental causes underlying the threat of a
China-Taiwan war — and conflict between China and the US, which has long been
committed to supporting Taiwan should China seek to determine its status
unilaterally — have not been removed. Beijing remains committed to forcing
Taiwan to accept the idea of ultimate “reunification,” while the Taiwanese
remain determined to decide their own future.
However, each side’s interests need not be mutually exclusive. The right to
national self-determination does not imply an assertion of de jure
independence. For example, acknowledgement of Scotland’s right to choose
independence has not resulted in Scotland leaving the UK. What people in Taiwan
want is nothing more and nothing less than acknowledgement that they can decide
their own future.
Given China’s deep distrust, it will never believe that a DPP president who
insists on the Taiwanese people’s right to determine their own future will not
secretly push for independence. However, since China knows that Ma is not
advocating independence, they are able to countenance with greater equanimity
his commitment to sustain the Republic of China — the official name of the
government in Taipei — on Taiwan.
If ever there was an opportunity for China and Taiwan to find a way to ensure
that future confrontations do not escalate and drag the US into a conflict, it
is now. What Ma must do is forge a clearer consensus within Taiwan that the
independence vs unification issue is a phony one. The real issue is whether both
sides can acknowledge that Taiwan’s people have the right to determine their
future.
China’s leaders need to be persuaded that conceding this point does not imply
letting Taiwan move towards de jure independence. This may require that the
Taiwanese abandon their tendency to hold regular referendums to show that they
enjoy this right.
Beijing will need to recognize that the best way to entice Taiwanese to embrace
reunification is to make the proposition so attractive that they cannot resist.
There is no need to set a timetable for this. As a rising superpower, China
should feel confidant that time is on its side.
The whole world shares an interest in preventing disagreements between Taiwan
and China from becoming a cause for military confrontation between the US and
China. Ma has created the necessary conditions for deactivating the trigger. It
is time for the rest of the world to support him in removing it forever, so that
Taiwan will continue to fade as a global security concern.
Steve Tsang is a professorial fellow in Taiwan Studies at St
Antony’s College, Oxford University.
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