Ethnic divisions and Taiwanese politics

Politics Taiwan Politics
1

Well, as the smoke is clearing after the election and things are settling down to normal, then we might want to look a bit deeper and discuss the ethnic divisions which is a bit of a force in local politics.

I see at least 4 distinct ethnic groups here on this island.

Aborginies, who are bought and paid for by the KMT.

Hakkas, who tend to lean more KMT than DPP.

Taiwanese/ Minnan, who are mainly DPP.

Waishengren, who are overwhelmingly KMT/PFP.

It seems that there is no trust between any of the groups, with fear of being overwhelmed by the Taiwanese apparent among Hakkas and Waishengren.

Questions, which I hope someone might take up include background, recent developments, future etc. Moreover, what kind of influence those divisions have on politics here.

2

So the aborigines are not Taiwanese?

3

well mr he is using taiwanese to refer to the original mainland immigrants…which is a widely-accepted usage…it is funny isn’t it how the aborigines vote overwhelmingly KMT despite the fact they have done fuck all for them…

4

Juba is just a sore loser, no reason to pay attention to him.

The KMT has done fuck all for the aborigines, whow have been forced from everywhere good to live by the Taiwanese and the Hakkas. I would say that the government stipends specially available to them have something to do with where their loyalties lie.

5

Oh, how civil of you. The guy merely asked you why aborigines shouldn’t be considered “Taiwanese.”

6

I do think we (and the Minnanese) could be a little more sensitive about the Taiwanese issue. Hakkas don’t like it either when the Minnanese appropriate the name ‘Taiwanese’. And the main reason Hakkas for the KMT is that they are voting against the DPP, which they see as the party of the Minnanese.

Mr. He: I’m not sure about your statement that Taiwanese are mainly DPP. If this were true, the KMT would never win an election, even in Taipei.

In fact, Taiwanese, who routinely accused of being ethnic bigots, are surprisingly diverse in their voting habits. The KMT could never have gotten 50% of the vote if lots of Taiwanese didn’t vote for them.

Waishengren, in contrast, do vote on overwhelmingly ethnic lines.

7

When I first moved to Yilan county several months ago, I used to ask people whether they were benshengren or waishengren. I was told emphatically on several occassions that those distinctions weren’t important now, that everyone is Taiwanren. Now I’m wondering if that’s sort of like being told by a bunch of white people in Wyoming that race isn’t important in America.

8

You’re asking a senstive question and you’re getting the politically correct answer. Yes ethnicity does matter in Taiwan (especially around election time), but it matters less than race does in the States. Probably the most important measure of ethnic integration is intermarriage. Minnanese marry Hakkas and Wasishengren all the time. So Taiwan is ethnically integrated in socially, but not so well politically. And even politically the issue is not entirely ethnic–the core issue is the issue of whether people think they live in (the Republic of) Taiwan or in the Republic of China.

Now it also true that just 15 years ago there were many invisible barriers to Minnanese. I believe that when I first studied at Shida, there was an unspoken rule against hiring Minnanese, for example.

9

and you will still find a lot of companies have a hiring bias…my company doesn’t like hiring hakka and waishengren (but then we’re part of the TSU so no surprise there)…my old school Perfect was 90% hakka (for internal staff not teachers) cos the boss was hakka…it still amazes me the number of minnanese who come out with a load of tripe about hakka being “difficult”…

10

I think the term Hokkien is better than Minnanese. Minnan people is a much larger group than the Fujian/Hokkien people in Taiwan who are all from Zhangahou and Quanzhou. But terminology’s difficult. We’re sort of stuck with ‘Mainlanders’ for people who are no more living on the ‘mainland’ than the Hokkien or Hakkas (or ‘Waishengren’ for people born in Taiwan whose family came to Taiwan in more recent generations than the ‘benshengren’.)

Brian

11

Not really. Old pork barreler Soong was just one of a host of sugar daddies for Taiwanese aborigines. The story I’ve gotten when I’ve asked why aborigines seemingly prefer the KMT is that they were relatively benign as an invasion force relative to previous arrivals.

HG

12

Can someone point to me specifically how aborigines have benefited financially from the KMT?

Thank you.

13

I wonder if this thread wouldn’t be better off in the Culture and History Forum?

Not really, otherwise the DPP would win easily every time through share numbers. The KMT has always been the party of the elite, not (just) the party of the Waishengren.

Not at all true. They mostly vote that way, but it’s quiote different from being members. I’d also be interested in seeing how many Waishengren these days vote DPP. I think it’s not insignificant. Also in the past, independent candidates for local offices have also been supported by Waishengren.

I think Aborigine support of the KMT is more down to 1) Allying against the Hokkien and 2) Factional politics.

A really important thing about voting preferences for all groups is the role of factions. Voting in all elections, except the presidential elections (ie mayors, County heads, Township heads, legislative assemblies, village heads, farmers and fishermen’s associations etc), is not done along party lines but along factional lines. Of course that means ALL voting prior to 1996 was not along party/ideological lines.

The KMT were the source and controllers of political power, but they contained a huge number of Hokkien and Hakkas as well. They were not ‘the party of the waishengren’, but the ‘party of the elite’. In fact, at lower levels the majority of elected positions were filled by non-Waishengren. Even at the highest level (mayors and County Executives) Waishengren were in less than 75% of the posts.

The KMT exploited existing factions in local districts by choosing as their candidate, people who would be acceptable to the faction able to bring them the votes. The voters then voted according to the instructions of the leaders of their faction. Now with the rise of the DPP and other parties this behaviour continues. People vote for candidates on personal lines rather than party lines.

Of course, presidential elections are different, but I wonder how much factional voting habits influence Presidential voting. Presidential voting seems to still be largley personal. An independent (Soong) got the 2nd biggest vote last time.

The KMT suppressed, rather than exploited, ethnic divisions, trying to coopt ‘Taiwanese’ into the party, into running the country, and into keeping the KMT in power. The rise of DPP ‘Taiwanisation’, has as a side effect of stressing ethnic identity had the unfortunate consequence of exacerbating ethnic division.

I think the far better question is the reverse. What influence does politics have on ethnic divisions? Because I see ethnic divisions as being caused by politics more than the other way round. The silly division between ‘waishengren’ and ‘benshengren’ would simply have disappeared if it hadn’t been for politics.

So what can be done? Well the first step would be having the labels ‘waishgenren’ etc taken off the ID cards.

Next Taiwan has to get away from the stupid mentality of ‘I am what my father was’. How come ‘mixed’ Aborigines say “I’m an Aborigine” if their father was Aborigine, but “my mother is an Aborigine” if it’s the other way round. How come someone born in Taiwan to a ‘benshengren’ mother, with a father also born in Taiwan (but who’s grandparents came over in the 1940s) is ‘waishengren’ (and if their grandparents had come over 10 years older, he wouldn’t be? How come children of ‘Taiwanese’ men and Mainland brides aren’t ‘waishengren’ too?

This gets at the problem that Asian countries seem to have with race and nationality in general. In Western immigrant countries like NZ, if you’re a citizen, you’re a New Zealander, plain and simple and it doesn’t matter if your ancestors were English, Samoan, Indian, Chinese, Maori, German, Scottish or whatever, nor whether they came to New Zealand 1200, 200, 50 or 10 years ago. In Taiwan (and countries like Japan), it’s different. To be ‘Taiwanese’ you have to be ‘Chinese’ too (but not really Chinese). Taiwan needs to get this straight. Those who live in Taiwan, and primary allegiance is to this country are Taiwanese. That even includes some of us foreigners.

Brian[/b]

14

I would say that the divisions are not created by politics - with the former Yugoslavia being the prime example. While Milosevic did his worst to fan the flames, the embers were already glowing brightly before he entered the scene - with the only times a Yugoslavian state could function without people of different ethnicity murdering each other on a massive being under repressive regimes - with Tito’s iron rule being a prime example.

In that moment, the strong man left the scene, the lid blew off the pressure cooker and mass murder ensued.

Here in Taiwan the development has been more peaceful. No ethnic tensions leading to murder, the different ethnicities able to live in the same area without trying to bump each other off, and the shift from a smaller ethnicity running the show to a bigger one doing the same has been peaceful.

It is therefore not that fair to claim that ethnic divisions are created by politics, they are basically a part of history and nature, and will surface, given the freedom for them to do so.

15

[quote=“Bu Lai En”]This gets at the problem that Asian countries seem to have with race and nationality in general. In Western immigrant countries like NZ, if you’re a citizen, you’re a New Zealander, plain and simple and it doesn’t matter if your ancestors were English, Samoan, Indian, Chinese, Maori, German, Scottish or whatever, nor whether they came to New Zealand 1200, 200, 50 or 10 years ago.
Brian[/b][/quote]

I’m no expert on New Zealand, but I seem to recall that recently there have been controversies over Maori coastal claims, as well as opposition to ‘affirmative action’ style programmes.

I know that the situation is different in Canada; native Canadians (Indians and Inuit) have certain rights and privileges simply by virtue of being the original inhabitants.

16

Very interesting discussion.

Does anybody know of figures that precisely detail the percentages of all the different ethnic groups here? Exactly what percent of the population is waishengren?

17

[quote=“Mr He”]Well, as the smoke is clearing after the election and things are settling down to normal, then we might want to look a bit deeper and discuss the ethnic divisions which is a bit of a force in local politics.

I see at least 4 distinct ethnic groups here on this island.

Aborginies, who are bought and paid for by the KMT.

[/quote]

Yeah, because of course all Abos are too simple and backward and uneducated to actually form their own opinions.

My wife is an aborigine and, alas, a James Soong supporter- though if she’s been bought I haven’t seen the money- she’s under the impression that, she’s evaluated the candidates and picked the one she feels is closest to her own position, based on issues like the economy and the fear of provoking the mainland.

I won’t deny that she’s also uneasy about the strain of ethnic Taiwanese chauvinism in the DPP- a lot of the aborigines that I know share that feeling, though I guess that just shows how bought they are- after all, what possible reason could an aborigine have for feeling mistrustful toward the Taiwanese?

18

Waishengren with descendants are some 10% of the population - and Hakkas are another 10%.

It’s entirely understandable that aboriginies are nervous of the majority here - after all they got chased out of the lowlands by them. A majority of Hakkas vote for the KMT for that very reason.

19

I’m not saying that as a rule. I’m arguing it as the case in Taiwan. Think about it. There would be no waishengren/benshengren divide in Taiwan today if it were not for the situation created by the fact that the KMT saw themselves as the government of China, wanted to retake the mainland, gave ‘waishengren’ preferential treatment etc etc. There would have still been ethnic differences between people from different regions, but these would have been Hokkien/Hakka/Chekiang/Ningpo/Shandong etc, not wiahengren/benshengren. It’s the political situation that has made for a strange ethnic situation.

[quote]I’m no expert on New Zealand, but I seem to recall that recently there have been controversies over Maori coastal claims, as well as opposition to ‘affirmative action’ style programmes.
[/quote]

Off topic but, my point was not “New Zealanders of different ethnic groups all get along with no frictions”, but “any ethnic group who lives in NZ can be considered a New Zealander”.

Brian

20

Bu lai en:

I agree that politics are driving ethnic differences in Taiwan. And if I’m following you correctly, I agree with your unstated conclusion that ethnic differences in Taiwan are not so deep that they can’t be bridged with a little effort. This is not Northen Ireland or Palestine, thank god.

However I do wonder if the benshengren/waishengren is something a bit more universal at least in the Chinese world. People in Sichuan divide the world into ‘Shangjiangren’ and ‘Xiajiangren’. I believe Beijingers have a similar distinction. Lots of other provinces talk about ‘Benshengren’ and ‘Waishengren’. Maybe ethnic/provincial differences are something Taiwan has in common with China?