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The Power of the Ballot Box analyzes the impact on Taiwanese politics of the _Third Wave_ of democratization that swept across East Asia in the last decades of the twentieth century. ... Read more

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Written by an experienced teacher and scholar this new textbook introduces the reader to the big questions that concern change and continuity in how politics operates and how Taiwan is governed. Taking a critical approach, Dafydd Fell provides students with the essential background to the history and development of the political system as well as an explanation of the key structures, processes and institutions that have shaped Taiwan over the last few decades.

Topics covered include:

the transition to democracy, party politics, cross-strait relations, foreign policy, electoral politics and voting, political economy, national identity and social welfare.

The key benefits of this text are:

• Suggestions for further reading
• Boxed lists of key terms and figures
• End of chapter study questions
• Discussion points
• Graphs, figures and photographs
• A series of case studies highlighting the vibrancy of Taiwanese politics

Government and Politics in Taiwan is an essential text for any course on Taiwanese politics, Chinese politics and East Asian Politics. It is also important supplementary reading for courses covering the process of democratisation.

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Taiwan Government and Business Contacts Handbook ... Read more

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Taiwan Foreign Policy and Government Guide ... Read more

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Taiwan's export-led industrial development is often presented as a model of how state intervention promotes growth.Others see the same experience as a model of a private enterprise market at work.This study demonstrates that Taiwan policymakers varied their approach to development as circumstances changed. Export promotion of labor-intensive industries, which predominated in the 1960s, was supplemented by efforts to promote import-substituting heavy industries in the 1970s.In the early 1980s there was a fundamental change in the economic environment as Taiwan's government reduced its active intervention in the economy and created a foundation for development based on information and other high-technology products.Taiwan's economy continued to prosper in the 1990s because policies and systems changed along with conditions. ... Read more

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While political scientists generally see Taiwan as a success state because of its economic modernization and political democratization, this book reinterprets Taiwan's success from the Confucian and postcolonial perspectives. Democracy (Made in Taiwan) uncovers the hegemonic construction of the myth of the _success state_ and challenges political scientists to abandon both the liberal-centrism and state-centrism prevailing in the literature of democratization. ... Read more

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For centuries, various great powers have both exploited and benefited Taiwan, their designs for this island frequently clashing with the desire of local inhabitants to control their own destiny. Such conflicts have shaped Taiwan’s multiple, and frequently contradictory, identities. Denny Roy contends that Taiwan’s political history is best understood as a continuous struggle for security. Eschewing the usual emphasis on the high politics of the recent era, he offers a comprehensive narrative of the island’s political history from the first Chinese settlements to the Chen Shui-bian presidency. Roy covers the political system constructed by the KMT during the Cold War, the opposition breakthrough, the presidency of Lee Teng-hui, and the DPP presidentialvictory in March 2000.

Roy’s approach allows him to integrate his understanding of Taiwan’s domestic politics with its foreign affairs—particularly the relations with mainland China. He reveals how the interplay between political forces within and the influence of foreign countries from without has shaped Taiwan. His is a balanced account, incorporating up-to-date coverage and presenting many indigenous voices. Taiwan: A Political History illuminates the origins of the island’s often-troubled domestic and international political situation. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (11)

Very best
This book strikes me as an invaluable introductory book on Taiwan, since it is inclusive, insightful, informative, and interesting. Any expert should take pride in writing such a great book for both general readers and scholars.

decent, but a bit dull
the book prevents the basic facts, but lacks analytical depth. a good intro nonetheless for beginners. for a more detailed approach, check out "The Generalissimo's Son" though that book as well is not too engaging theoretically or analytically.

A good introduction to Taiwan's history
As the title of my review implies, this is a valuable volume for the person who is interested in developing an understanding of the complex forces that shape Taiwan today.

Roy takes up Taiwan's history from the beginnings of Chinese settlement of the island and the Japanese Occupation.However, the bulk of the book focuses on Post-World War II Taiwan.While it focuses on the political history of the country, other aspects are not ignored.My main criticism is that although this purports to be a political history, the main criticism of the legitimacy (or lack thereof) of "Chinese" sovereignty (regarding the so-called Post WWII transfer to China) over the country is ignored.Save for that ommission, this is a servicable summary of modern Taiwan political history.

I would recommend this book for someone wishing to learn a little about Taiwan before coming to the country.For a person wishing to engage in an in depth study of the country, this would be a good volume to start with.However, if you already have a basic understanding of the major forces shaping this country (particularly post-World War II,) I would advise passing this work by for more in depth works on the subject.

A very interesting book about Taiwan history
I was born in Taiwan and completed my college education in Taiwan. The Chinese history text books focus on the story of the mainland China. I have not known too much about Taiwan. For some reasons my grandparents and parents did not talk too much about it either.

This book opens my eyes and I could not stop reading it. Even though the book is very comprehensive some of the information the author got is either manipulated, biased or missing. It is far from perfect. There is a lot of truth about Taiwan to be explored. For example Koxinga was given the credit of defeating Dutch and then occupied Formosa. But he lived
only 4 monthes after defeating the Dutch. He was a pirate and very brutal. He excuted his new born grandchild and grandchild's mother. He is more like a refugee than a hero. The main reason he came to Taiwan is he was escaping from Qing dynasty's attack.

Because of Taiwan's democracy a lot of information are more readily available and people does not afraid of being talking about the past I believe the author might want to update this
book soon.

"Even-handed, thorough, and accurate"
Review by Prof. Shelley Rigger, the top U.S. scholar on Taiwan, in TOPICS magazine, May 2003: "Nowhere else will readers find such an even-handed, thorough, and accurate account of Taiwan's recent history. What is more, the book is a pleasure to read, balancing rich historical details and anecdotes with thoughtful analysis. Roy's book provides the most complete and in-depth account of Taiwan's post-World War II political development available in English. However, much of the value of the book comes from his determination to situate the island's postwar history in the context of Taiwan's pre-war experience. As a result, Roy is able to offer satisfying answers to some of the most puzzling issues facing students of contemporary Taiwan, including islanders' complicated feelings toward Japan, China--even Taiwan itself." ... Read more

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The political transformation of Taiwan from an authoritarian regime into ademocracy is one of the great political sagas of the 20th century. Defeated on the Chinamainland, the Kuomintang established a new polity on Taiwan that allowed for four remarkablepatterns of political development.These patterns reflect a complex political process ofbehavioral and institutional change in which the key requisites for democracy now exist inTaiwan. Taiwan's history of citizen participation in direct elections, along with the politicalinstitutional changes narrated here by Chao and Myers, produced an unprecedented, peacefulpolitical turn-over of power from the KMT ruling party to the DPP, or Democratic ProgressiveParty, in March 2000. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

AXL ROX MY SOX!
WOW B4 I RED DIS PAGE I DID UNT NOW THAT AXL WAS RELEASING ANOTHER CHINESE DEMOCRACY!!

LIKE USE YOUR ILLUSION I AND II WE'LL HAVE CHINESE DEMOCRACY I & II!!

YEAY!

unanswered questions
Theme: This book attempts to outline the democratisation process of Taiwan. The authors describe Taiwan as a form of "limited democracy," i.e. the govt gives the opposition and civil society space to expand, and the inhibited center is committed to promoting full democracy without a timetable.

Review: This book raises some good questions. The Taiwanese government chose not to monopolise control, but slowly relinquished some power to the opposition and civil society at large. While the authors described the phenomenon, they failed to address the "why."

I also felt that the authors were also somewhat careless with their definitions of "Chinese." (Note that the book is entitled "The first Chinese democracy.) They interspersed the book with comparisons between Taiwan and China, and Singapore. While China and Taiwan are made up of a Han Chinese majority, Singapore's politics is deeply affected by its multiethnic flavor! Are they moving onto the grounds of an "Asian democracy?"

Still, one must credit the authors for their groundbreaking choice of subject, and the plethora of information that they have provided. ... Read more

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Taiwan's recent moves to democratize its political system have undermined the one China policy and demanded the redefinition of relations between Taiwan and China. Across the Taiwan Strait provides a new and timely look at the pivotal role of democracy in the fifty-year-old conflict. ... Read more

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Consolidating Taiwan's Democracy assesses the argument that political change in Taiwan, in particular the recent elections that brought a change of ruling parties in both the executive branch of government and the legislative branch, proves that Taiwan's democratization has been _finalized_ or consolidated. This insightful work explores both the positive and negative aspects of democracyOs consolidation in Taiwan. ... Read more

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An assessment of the recent unprecedented Taiwanese democratic elections, which, despite threats from Beijing, set the stage for genuine democracy in Taiwan. A firsthand account of three crucial elections in the 1990s, two of which were unprecedented: the 1994 election of the first governor of Taiwan and the 1996 presidential election. The latter marked the first direct election of a chief executive in Taiwan or any Chinese nation in 5,000 years of Chinese history. This study considers the political environment in which these elections were held, particular political issues, party strategies and campaigns, and election results. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

A Useful Study
As democratic processes solidify on Taiwan, the country will become increasingly important to US foreign policy. At the same time, there is a lot of misunderstanding about why a particular election in Taiwan has the results it does.

This book looks at local and national elections, with detailed breakdowns on campaign strategy of the parties involved.

The book has been criticized by some for its reliance on English-language papers (located in Taiwan), but anyone familiar with the Chinese-language media there will tell you that this doesn't necessarily detract from the book. The Chinese media in Taiwan is so brazenly unprofessional and so heavily influenced by one political party or another, I would honestly think less of the book if it had relied on Chinese sources. It might have benefitted from more interviews, however.

All in all, it's a useful work that belongs in the library of any Taiwan specialist.

A Useful Study
As democratic processes solidify on Taiwan, the country will become increasingly important to US foreign policy. At the same time, there is a lot of misunderstanding about why a particular election in Taiwan has the results it does.

This book looks at local and national elections, with detailed breakdowns on campaign strategy of the parties involved.

The book has been criticized by some for its reliance on English-language papers (located in Taiwan), but anyone familiar with the Chinese-language media there will tell you that this doesn't necessarily detract from the book. The Chinese media in Taiwan is so brazenly unprofessional and so heavily influenced by one political party or another, I would honestly think less of the book if it had relied on Chinese media sources.

All in all, it's a useful work that belongs in the library of any Taiwan specialist. ... Read more

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The focus of this book is on the PingPu peoples in Taiwan and their right to official recognition as "indigenous peoples" by the Taiwanese government. The result of centuries of colonization, indigenous tribes in Taiwan have faced severe cultural repression because of the government's refusal to accept ethnic, racial, and cultural diversity. The PingPu Status Recognition Movement is the result of a decade of activism by impassioned people seeking the right to self-determination, autonomy, and tribal legitimacy from the Han-Chinese-controlled Taiwanese government.

This book examines, through in-depth interviews, questionnaires, field observations, and analysis of governmental and United Nations documents, the perspectives of those directly involved in the movement, as well as those affected by "indigenous" status recognition. Study of the PingPu Indigenous movement is vitally important as it publicly declares Taiwanese Indigenous population's humanity and collective rights and provides a more comprehensive analysis of identity-based movements as a fundamental form of collective human rights claims. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (6)

An excellent survey of Taiwan's history
This is one of the most complete books on Taiwan and its history available in the English language.The reading is dense in places and is highly academic, but for anyone who has a background in Taiwan's history and wants to get in depth, this would the volume for you.

Beginning from Taiwan's physical environment, other specialists focus on aboriginal Taiwan, the encroachment of the Minnan people, from the Dutch and Cheng to incorporation by the Ching Dynasty.The late ninteenth century receives some coverage in depth.There is also a frank assessment of the Japanese occupation years.

About half of the book is devoted to post- World War II Taiwan. Political, religious, modernization and other topics of modern Taiwan are discussed in depth.Unfortunately, due to the dating of the book, recent democratic developments are not covered (the book stops shortly following President Lee Tung Hui's popular election as President).However, for anyone interested in developing a deeper understanding of Taiwan, other than actually living here, this book is one of the best options available.

For the novice on Taiwan, I recommend reading Denny Roy's "Taiwan:A Political History first."It is an excellent read and not as dense as this work.

poorly written; no organization or structure
This book was a major disappointment.Each chapter is written by a different person; the book is really just a collection of dry academic articles slapped together, with no organizing structure.The alleged editor is also one of the contributing authors, and it doesn't appear that he did much editing at all.The overall quality of the book is substandard, with amateurish and badly printed black and white photographs taken by the editor.

Worst of all, judging by the first two selections, the writing is pretty awful.Here's a sample of the obtuse academic style you will find in this volume:
"The Chinese hegemonic project of making Taiwanese aborigines part of the Chinese nation was incompatible with the developing counterhegemonic aboriginal project of affirming their distinct identity and political rights as indigenous people."(page 37)
Hard to believe that such a passage could have been written by a native English speaker, much less that it actually got published!

Instead of this volume, I recommend Denny Roy's book, which is quite well-written.

Taiwan-A new History
A must have book for Taiwan research.

The Editor/Author's Response
This is a response to Denny Roy's review. Prof. Roy is indeed a rival of sorts having recently written a political history of Taiwan that may soon be published. He and a number of others find my definition of history--or rather my broad conception of history--troubling but I will stand by it. I have called on the resources of the best people I know in the subfield of Taiwan studies and they have produced admirably researched and written chapters. The book is designed as a comprehensive single volume work that provides an introduction to Taiwan and all facets of its history. Thus literature, religion, geography, ethnography, and culture are included in the mix. Some scholars such as Prof Roy and Prof. John Copper among them are are more focused on politics but there is more to history than politics in this new and decidedly multi-cultural and post modern world. One person's comprehensiveness is another's choppiness but so be it. I think the book is well integrated and the individual authors have worked through, in good measure, the themes spelled out in the introduction. One other important point The political struggles KMT-dangwai of the 1970s and 1980s, struggles I saw first hand on Taiwan are dealt with within the context of the matrix of events and are part of a large scale political narrative. They are not however the only subject of this long chapter. In other books I have focused on this period and its actors such as Lu Hsiu-lien as well as the Presbyterian Church but this was not the time for such detail. Pro. Roys own focus on the modern period is well done indeed but then he writes a formal "poltical" history, while I do not. One final point: What I find annoying is the tone of the review at certain points, particularly the comments on the concluding section. I think they work and they sum up the book and its major themes.

I invite others who know the book such as Alan Wachman and other Taiwan hands or China hands as well as journalist and members of the public to add their voices to this discussion of a book that many recognize as an invaluable work for scholar and lay reader alike.

A hodgepoge of uneven quality
There are few recent books that attempt to cover all of Taiwan's history, making Rubinstein's effort valuable and appreciated.I found parts of it useful in writing my own book on Taiwan's history (yes, let's acknowledge that this reviewer has a potential conflict of interest).Almost all edited books, however, suffer from the difficulty of achieving unity and thoroughness while avoiding repetition with the ensemble cast of authors with their own styles and interests.Rubinstein's book is no exception.I found chapters 4 through 8, 10 and 11 excellent history.Other periods, however, were not so well covered.I found it astounding that the book does not include a chapter on the political opposition's successful campaign to force the KMT government to begin to liberalize in the 1980s, an extremely important period in Taiwan's history.Yet the book throws in chapters on Taiwan's geography, religion and literature.Rather than a "history," the book is really an assemblage of chapters on history, political science, geography, economics, and humanities--different layers made of clay, plastic and metal, with no attempt to integrate them.This book is better understood, perhaps, as a Taiwan reader.I must also mention that Rubinstein's writing at the end of the book is uncharacteristically poor and rough, as if he rushed through it to meet a deadline.Overall: worthwhile, but does not fulfill its promise.(If my book gets published, I'll be bracing for Rubinstein's retaliation.) ... Read more

Customer Reviews (3)

The Soldier and the Citizen
I am not a politician nor a soldier. In depth understanding of Taiwan and China - this book is not for everyone, it is for someone who is truly interested in understanding the political system in Taiwan - post World War II and China. Excellent!

Unfortunately... people who criticize tends to be always louder than those who appraises... this is often the case.I must say... unless you know the history of China and Taiwan - one needs to step back.... this is an excellent book from inside point of view.

Poor scholarship at its worst
I have to agree 100% with the above review. It is astonishing that a book like was accepted for publication in the first place. Relying only on government materials and barely at all on Chinese sources, this book cannotbe recommended, not even for the lay person with an interest in Taiwan.

Fails to provide the rich perspective such a book demands
This is probably one of the worst books ever written on Taiwan, so bad I can only touch upon a few of its offenses.Using a narrow range of sources largely confined to those representing ruling party viewpoints, Bullard produces a document which indicates almost complete unfamiliarity with the realities of life on Taiwan, the literature on Taiwan or Taiwanese history.One never learns, for example, that the "political socialization" activities of the military among Taiwan's people took place during a period known as the "white terror", in which thousands of Taiwanese were imprisoned, tortured and killed for having unapproved views.For example, Bullard says that military programs in the universities were effective in preventing student demonstrations in the '50s and 60s, but fails to add that students whose politics lacked official approval often disappeared. There are lots of organizational charts and figures on participation, but precious little information on the effectiveness of work, interdepartmental politics, factional struggles, and so forth. There is little objective outside assessment of the information presented; frequently Bullard accepts the military's reviews of its own work, or fails to provide cites at all. For example, Bullard states of the military men used as "instructors" in Taiwan's schools that "Over the years they became accepted and generally welcomed by the students and especially the parents."(p. 148).Anyone even remotely familiar with Taiwan's educational environment knows that those men are generally held in contempt by the populace for activities even the ruling-party owned English paper admitted were often seen as "thought control."They were recently declared unconstitutional by the island's highest court.Bullard's cite for his astounding claim: a military pamphlet.Similarly, Bullard gives a dry recital of the duties of Poltical Warfare officers without ever seriously noting their importance to the regime or t! he fact that American observers worked to stamp them out because they were unethical and increased the problems of Taiwan's already dysfunctional military.Bullard rarely attempts to determine if rules were followed or if policies were actually obeyed in practice. On p. 94 he says "Corporal punishment was forbidden [in the military]."The most cursory check of sources on the issue, however, would have revealed the intense controversy over the island's high death rate among recruits (several hundred annually), the widespread accusations of the routine use of savage punishments and the lawsuits from individual parents, parents organizations and other concerned groups. More important, however, is the lack of political context.Taiwanese independence is barely mentioned; one of the most crucial political dynamics on the island, the struggle between competing Taiwanese and Chinese nationalisms, is lost to the reader.Bullard makes it seem as though the ruling party was struggling with the communists for the hearts and minds of the Taiwanese, but communism was never a major issue on Taiwan, and the real battle was (and is) against Taiwanese nationalism.A much more rich and nuanced view of this is called for. Bullard plans a second volume on anti-subversion activities. ... Read more

Product Description
In 1895 Japan acquired Taiwan as its first formal colony after a resounding victory in the Sino-Japanese war. For the next fifty years, Japanese rule devastated and transformed the entire socioeconomic and political fabric of Taiwanese society. In Becoming Japanese, Leo Ching examines the formation of Taiwanese political and cultural identities under the dominant Japanese colonial discourse of assimilation (dôka) and imperialization (kôminka) from the early 1920s to the end of the Japanese Empire in 1945.
Becoming Japanese analyzes the ways in which the Taiwanese struggled, negotiated, and collaborated with Japanese colonialism during the cultural practices of assimilation and imperialization. It chronicles a historiography of colonial identity formations that delineates the shift from a collective and heterogeneous political horizon into a personal and inner struggle of "becoming Japanese." Representing Japanese colonialism in Taiwan as a topography of multiple associations and identifications made possible through the triangulation of imperialist Japan, nationalist China, and colonial Taiwan, Ching demonstrates the irreducible tension and contradiction inherent in the formations and transformations of colonial identities. Throughout the colonial period, Taiwanese elites imagined and constructed China as a discursive space where various forms of cultural identification and national affiliation were projected. Successfully bridging history and literary studies, this bold and imaginative book rethinks the history of Japanese rule in Taiwan by radically expanding its approach to colonial discourses. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (5)

Excellent text
A great book drawing on postcolonial and postmodern thought that analyzes Japanese colonial rhetoric about Taiwan as well as different stages of Taiwanese identity-formation under colonization. Includes an analysis of Japanese representations of aborigines, a group that is often glossed over or ignored in books on Taiwan.

The nature of colonialism and its contemporary consequences.
This study is an excellent examination of Japanese colonialism in Taiwan and its consequences for the contemporary formation of national identity.Through examining not only the particular circumstances of Japan in Taiwan but also the nature of colonialism in general, Ching shows how colonialism is a social transformation which produces people of mixed identities.He draws upon "The Orphan of Asia" by Wu Zhuo-Liu as an example of this understanding.Ching also sets forth an interesting critique of postmodernism's hesitancy to draw judgments across cultural boundaries.The "miracle" of postwar Japan, essentially an almost immediate turn from complete external orientation to complete internal orientation and subjectivity, was made possible by the United States' appropriation of Japan's colonies and Japan's immediate alliance with the U.S. in the Cold War.Because of these factors, Japan never had to go through the harsh but important process of decolonization, and Ching shows how this failure affects the identity crisis of Taiwan today.Ultimately the book is oriented around "the politics of identity formation" in which Taiwan must come to hold a national identity which embraces the diversity of elements (Japanese, Chinese, Taiwanese, Hakka, aboriginal, etc.) that have formed the ontology of Taiwan through history.

Taiwanesness
This is a detailed account of the Taiwanese response to colonization under the Japanese. Liu adroitly illustrates the monumental changes afoot in Taiwan of the early 20th Century and builds a strong case to support the idea of a Taiwanese identity seperate from China. Liu follows the steps colonialization drive that can later be seen in the Chinese colonization under the KMT. At times the language bogs down in anthropological terms of art, but is no less a valueable addition to the pool of information available on Taiwan.

Differences
The Taiwanese is once a part of Japanese,but now we are the Taiwanese,uneaqual to China. China is not eaqual to Japan,so how could China be eaqual to Taiwan? To say Taiwanese = Chinese is just China's excuse to occupy Taiwan,for China feel well-developed Taiwan is a BIG FAT SHEEP for them to eat.

Actually,I can say Chinese know nothing about Taiwanese traits and personailty. China would never be willing to understand it and communicate with us Taiwan,for Chinese is very self-focus arrogant people. So,to be nearset neighbor with China is the sadest fate for Taiwan. The book revealed the differences of Taiwanese and Chinese,focus on what is the life-experiecnce(historical)reasons of forming the "Taiwanese" identity. Readers can sense the logic a little from this book.

very good!
I think it's a good book.It gave us(chinese,especially taiwanese) a lot of infromation about the history of taiwan,and the relationship between the japan and taiwan(china).It let us know more,it make us understand more. ... Read more

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The 1995-1996 Taiwan Strait Crisis caused the largest naval movement by the United States in the Asia-Pacific since the Vietnam War. Using this crisis as a starting point, Across the Taiwan Strait takes an in-depth look at the relationship between mainland China and Taiwan. The contributors examine the causes of conflict and explore ways to prevent future tension from deteriorating into war. The political economy of Taiwan's mainland policy, the politics of mainland China's Taiwan policy, and the implications for U.S. security policy are also explored. ... Read more

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Taiwan faces many of the same challenges as most newly democratized nations such as the legacy of an authoritarian government, a traditional culture, ethnic division, and non-majoritarian political institutions. Each of the chapters sheds light on the democratization process. They examine questions concerning the state of political trust, ethnicity, democratic values and political institutions. In the post-Cold War era when America's foreign policy is focusing on how best to foster democratic transition throughout the world, the lessons that can be learned from Taiwan's democratization impart valuable lessons to students and scholars. ... Read more