Is Taiwan a backward country or an advanced country? Or maybe it is an in-betweener?
I do not live in Taiwan, buit have visited several times, and have my own views on this - albeit based on limited experiences.
My wife comes from Taiwan, so her views, although based on alot of experience, I think may be biased (negatively BTW). But then again, if somebody asked me to describe England, I would probably list more negatives then positives.
I would like opinions from foreign people who actually live in Taiwan, and whether, by actually living in Taiwan, do you think it is a backward country, or an advanced country?
Which things do you consider backward?
Which things do you consider advanced?
For my 2 pennys-worth, I think the tube in Taipei is the best (but then again I am comparing it to the one in London, which is a rat-infested collection of crumbling tunnels…).
Man you’ve opened a can of worms with that one. This forum is full of whiners who think Taiwan is a grotty third-world backwater and quite a few people who’d defend it to the bitter end. I smell a fight coming.
Personally I think that Taiwan is definitely a first-world country, quite advanced in some areas, such as the permeation of technology through society. Last I looked (several years ago) the average standard of living/ purchasing parity thingy was about the same as New Zealand. There is not really a lot of poverty. Literacy and education levels are high. It’s quite democratic (very democratic when compared to the rest of Asia).
On the other hand, Taiwan has basically got to this point form being a poor third-world country in only about a generation, so there is a certain amount of third-world mentality. Not much of a sense of civic pride. Quite a bit of corruption (although not a lot compared to other Asian countries). Some human rights problems (which again seem to be shared by even the most developed Asian countries). Not much ‘rule of law’ etc. And then on the ‘street-level’ a lot of things that at least appear ‘undeveloped’ to us - not much of a sense of pride in housing, betel-nut chewing, appalling traffic, some really bad manners in certian situations, not knowing how to cope with foreigners etc.
My conclusion: first world with some third-world remnants.
It’s all relative. Compare Taipei to Manila, and this place is advanced. Compare it to the capital city of almost any western country, and this place is backward.
But I am comparing the quality of life in Taipei Vs the quality of living in Shanghai (I have the opportunity to live in either, later this year), and I already have a list of “things” -
(things that everybody comes into contact with every single day when living a city - traffic, people, work, social life, - big or small - anything that can affect the way that you live)
from other people who have lived or stayed in Shanghai, and so I would like to know what it is like to live in taipei from the view of a foreigner. And based on this, would you classify the things that are in Taipei as backward or advanced?
I understand this is a very subjective question, but then again aren’t most of the topics on this forum?
That’s a pretty broad question, and my answer is “yes.” The question is what specific things are important to you. In the arts? I’d say Taiwan is backward (modern arts, that is). Food? Advanced (but I like strange things ). Transport? Compared to the U.S., this is a veritable public transit heaven. Traffic? Comperable to the U.S. west coast.
[quote]Compare it to the capital city of almost any western country, and this place is backward.
[/quote]
Depends what you’re comapring. This aspects of Tapei that are mroe advanced than aspects of Western cities.
Trapper mentioned how well the excellent Taipei MRT compares to the awful, rat-infested, dirty, dingy, stinking century-old sorry excuse for an underground in London. I am always amazed at how few people in NZ have DVD players compared to Taiwan. Easy cards are pretty advanced. 7-11s are great. Liquor laws are mcuh mroe liberal than in Victorian (can’t buy outside a bottle store and can’t buy on Sundays) NZ (although I think that changed).
So depends not only where you’re comparing it with, but what you’re comparing.
[quote=“Bu Lai En”][quote]Compare it to the capital city of almost any western country, and this place is backward.
[/quote]
Depends what you’re comapring. This aspects of Tapei that are mroe advanced than aspects of Western cities.
Trapper mentioned how well the excellent Taipei MRT compares to the awful, rat-infested, dirty, dingy, stinking century-old sorry excuse for an underground in London. I am always amazed at how few people in NZ have DVD players compared to Taiwan. Easy cards are pretty advanced. 7-11s are great. Liquor laws are mcuh mroe liberal than in Victorian (can’t buy outside a bottle store and can’t buy on Sundays) NZ (although I think that changed).
So depends not only where you’re comparing it with, but what you’re comparing.
Brian[/quote]
Okay, a question from the bumpkin of the house, what’s and Easy Card? I’ve seen 'em but never bothered to ask ?
:offtopic: but an Easycard (or is EZ Card?) is a smartcard for the MRT and buses. It’s a proximity card, so you don’t even have to take it out of you wallet as you go in and out of the MRT. It remembers your MRT ride and gives you a free bus ride within 2 hours as well. I think you can pay for carparking with them too. I think they’re pretty neat.
Taiwan is so unique in that you go from super-advanced country to squalor in the quickest of twists and turns. People in the US are still paying for 56K Internet hookup, while it is a cheap giveaway here. Then look out the window and you’ll see people washing restaurant dishes on the sidewalk with a hose.
There’s less obvious poverty than there is in North America - that’s one way in which Taiwan is more advanced than certain places in the West. There are homeless people and beggars here, but compared to almost any major city in the West, they’re few and far between. The Taiwanese act like it’s the Great Depression because the unemployment rate for the past couple of years has been an astonishing 5%. Boo fucking hoo! In the U.S.A. that’s the normal rate when times are good. In most of Europe that’s half the normal rate. But Taiwan’s coming down from a period when there was practically no unemployment…I guess they’re going to have to get used to it, cause those days when everyone had a job aren’t coming back again.
The pollution is much worse than in most other developed countries, but it has substantially improved over the past few years, even in Kaohsiung, and will continue to improve as the shift from the heavy-industry factory economy to the service/information economy takes hold. Taiwan is in a transition state from the second to first world.
[quote=“mod lang”]There’s less obvious poverty than there is in North America - that’s one way in which Taiwan is more advanced than certain places in the West. There are homeless people and beggars here, but compared to almost any major city in the West, they’re few and far between. The Taiwanese act like it’s the Great Depression because the unemployment rate for the past couple of years has been an astonishing 5%. Boo fucking hoo! In the U.S.A. that’s the normal rate when times are good. In most of Europe that’s half the normal rate. But Taiwan’s coming down from a period when there was practically no unemployment…I guess they’re going to have to get used to it, cause those days when everyone had a job aren’t coming back again.
The pollution is much worse than in most other developed countries, but it has substantially improved over the past few years, even in Kaohsiung (Gaoxiong), and will continue to improve as the shift from the heavy-industry factory economy to the service/information economy takes hold. Taiwan is in a transition state from the second to first world.[/quote]
Like Mod Lang said, Taiwan is in a transition phase. Not a thirdworld nation, but not quite a developed nation. Things are constantly improving. (Taipei today is a cleaner place to live than in the 80s is just one example)
Even by the year 1980, Taiwan’s average GDP was still only a poultry 1,400 USD a year, while the US and Japan and most of Western Europe were well over 15,000. The amazing economic miracle that people talks about is the fact that Taiwan managed to increase that 1,400 GDP in 1980 to around 8,000 by the year 1990 without natural resources like petroleum. Rapid industrialization is the reason of the pollution, although like Mod lang mentioned above, its getting better.
The various thirdworld activities you see in Taiwan are a reminder that this was a poor country just two decades ago. Taiwan is not US of A or Japan or Western Europe in the fact that those places were industrialized over a hundred years ago. Illiteracy was also rampant on this island only a few decades ago.
Taiwan is also trying to develop things that are taken for granted in the West. Plans for MRT for all major cities on the west coast with a supporting train system is in the works. Kaohsiung’s system will be up and running in 3 years. The second major north-south expressway has opened. New baseball stadiums will be (or under construction) constructed in Taipei, Taoyuan, Taizhong, Yunlin, Kaohsiung City. Sewage systems will be more widely implemented.
[quote=“mod lang”]
The pollution is much worse than in most other developed countries, but it has substantially improved over the past few years, even in Kaohsiung (Gaoxiong), and will continue to improve as the shift from the heavy-industry factory economy to the service/information economy takes hold. Taiwan is in a transition state from the second to first world.[/quote]
The truly appalling pollution is one of the reasons I’ll never live in Taiwan again, though if things were to improve greatly I just might change my mind.
By the way, I agree that Taiwan is in transition, but get your terminology right–Taiwan was never communist.
[quote=“mod lang”] The Taiwanese act like it’s the Great Depression because the unemployment rate for the past couple of years has been an astonishing 5%. Boo fucking hoo! In the U.S.A. that’s the normal rate when times are good. In most of Europe that’s half the normal rate. But Taiwan’s coming down from a period when there was practically no unemployment…I guess they’re going to have to get used to it, cause those days when everyone had a job aren’t coming back again.
[/quote]
Taiwan’s unemployment rate is now down to 4.68% as of December 2003. The government is expecting to keep it between 4-4.5% for 2004.
Taiwanese perceive a whopping 5% unemployment rate as the Great Depression because :
For over 30 years, Taiwan’s unemployment rate was never over 3%
Most of the time around 2%.
From 2000-2003, Taiwan’s economic growth average 2.5-3% instead of the customery 6-7% Taiwan had enjoyed in the 1990s.
Tell that to the people in France and Germany and most of Eastern Europe where unemployment rates are in double digits.
Taiwan, like most of Asia, doesn’t have social security (until recently anyways), so having a job is essential. Otherwise you’re screwed. This is unlike Europe, where the socialistic system is too generous and provides no motivation to get a new job, creating a huge burden for society. This coupled with the aging population, IMHO, will be the downfall of Europe unless things change for the better.
I would say the tools and equipment of society are advanced
I would say that the mentality, laws and enforcement are backward
To call Taiwan a capitalist system is to misunderstand capitalism. Taiwan is mercantilistic country. They still very much think that the gov’t will and should do everything for them. The gov’t has a very paternalistic attitude towards this which can be seen by how each ministry or dept does exactly what it wants in clear disregard of the others. The legal till allowed attitude is slowly shifting to the legal unless legislated against.
To actually become like a liberal democratic capitalist society like where we come from. A new mindset would be needed and a different education system employed.
porcelainprincess, I was using the definitions of:
third world - still primarily agricultural, peasant economy
second world - industrialized, but still in the turn of the 19/20th century smokestack era, such as Eastern Europe, S. Korea, Turkey, a few countries in Latin America like Chile, Argentina, Mexico
first world - primarily service/information economy, fully developed like North America, Australia/NZ, Japan, most of Western Europe
It’s nitpicking ML, but I guess Porcelainprincess was using the cold war definitions where 1st world = the industrialised ‘free’ West, the 2nd world = the communist bloc, and 3rd world = the underdeveloped nations.
). Transport? Compared to the U.S., this is a veritable public transit heaven. Traffic? Comperable to the U.S. west coast.
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