"Taiwan, Province of China"

Herodotus, where do you get the pedantic authority to continue pushing such a defeatist attitude? Get some real-politik into you, man.

To all intents and purposes, the situation is just as Craig TPE describes it. The only impediments to ditching the ROC fiction completely are KMT holdouts such as Ma and Lien and their ill-born ilk, China waving its big bully stick, and propagandists and inadvertent fifth columnists such as yourself.

Taiwan being a province of China is only on paper. In daily life, I just don’t see it.[/quote]

I thought the ROC already acknowledged the fact that they do not rule the mainland of China (and most likely never will) and therefore they only govern the islands of Taiwan, the pescadores, green island, orchid island and kinmen (and maybe a few other smaller island/rocks)?

Thus in reality there is still the Peoples Rep of China which rules mainland China and purports to rule TAiwan and islands/rocks under the latters control . And there is the Rep of China, former ruling govt of China and in fact the first government of China that was not dynastic. But presently governing only the island of Taiwan and a few other smaller island/rocks.

There still exists TWO different Chinas in this world. And in this world TAiwan is a province of the Rep of China in fact and a province of PRC’s china in contention.

There does not exist a Rep of Taiwan. However The Rep of China has become synonymous with TAIWAN.

That is the reality.

Taiwan is NOT a province of the ROC in fact. It is only claimed by the ROC. “In fact” its status is undetermined. Once again, we must post:

"After signing the treaty, the ROC delegate, then ROC foreign minister George Yeh (葉公超), faced harsh questioning from legislators in a Legislative Yuan meeting regarding why the treaty between the ROC and Japan did not state unambiguously that Taiwan and Penghu were returned to the ROC.

Yeh replied that “No provision has been made either in the San Francisco Treaty or the Sino-Japanese Treaty as to the future of Taiwan and Penghu.” Yeh further explained: “In fact, we control them now, and undoubtedly they constitute a part of our territories. The delicate international situation, however, means that they do not belong to us. In these circumstances, Japan has no right to transfer Formosa (Taiwan) and the Pescadores (Penghu) to us. Nor could we accept such a transfer from Japan even if she wished to do so.”[1]

In 1972 upon establishment of diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic of China, Japanese Foreign Minister Ohira announced that the treaty had become obsolete and was therefore rescinded (as he had been requested by the PRC to do), though the legality of the move was subject to some debate. According to the Joint Communique of the Government of Japan and the Government of the People’s Republic of China, Japan understood and respected (but not necessarily recognized) the PRC position that Taiwan was part of the PRC.

the ROC Minister of Foreign Affairs George Kung-ch’ao Yeh (葉公超) told the Legislative Yuan after signing the treaty that: “The delicate international situation makes it that they [Taiwan and Penghu] do not belong to us. Under present circumstances, Japan has no right to transfer [Taiwan] to us; nor can we accept such a transfer from Japan even if she so wishes.” [5]"

Intellectual masturbation.

There is one China, and that be the PRC. Taiwan is Taiwan. From a practical, daily life point of view.

I repeat what I said. The ROC has become synonymous with TAIWAN . In fact they have become essentially inseparable in todays context.

[quote=“Vorkosigan”][quote=“tommy525”]
There still exists TWO different Chinas in this world. And in this world TAiwan is a province of the Rep of China in fact and a province of PRC’s china in contention.
[/quote]

Taiwan is NOT a province of the ROC in fact. It is only claimed by the ROC. “In fact” its status is undetermined.[/quote]
In fact, there is no such thing as the R.O.C., by all tenets of international law.

Sure, that’s one of the goals of KMT propaganda, but that’s not the same as the ROC owning Taiwan. Which was what I was responding to. I think that whenever possible the issues with that identification need to be pointed out.

No it’s not. People overseas will more than often mistake ROC for PRC.

CFase in point - my missus has a passport, where the words “Taiwan” are not printed on the cover.

People from Taiwan can get visa free access to the Schengen states currently. However, if your passport says Republic of China, odds are that they will be confused a bit - I had to point that my wife was both in Taiwan as per the passport before they let her in - or out.

So the ROC crap does not work overseas, unless you want to be mistaken for a PRC citizen.

Republic of China, Province of China: what’s the difference?

You can see why the USA and Japan do not really want to get involved in the issue of Taiwan. In some ways both of those nations would not mind much if China were to take over, so long as it was all “peaceful” . Because China has become more important to the USA as well as Japan. Although both of these nations also have a healthy trade with Taiwan. Especially Japan which enjoys and has enjoyed for decades a huge trade surplus with the island.

IT should be said that the ROC govt on Taiwan should also get some or a lot of the credit for the success of the people of Taiwan in achieving a high standard of living currently prevailing on the island.

The people of Taiwan get credit for being industrious and their “can do” attitude in the last few decades. But they also had a govt that was able to get things done.

The ROC came to Taiwan with quite a nice stash of gold as well as the support of the United States govt. Mistakes were made (228 anyone?, white terror anyone else?). But by and large the govt does deserve credit for providing the people of Taiwan the proper tools to make a successful society.

I do believe the peoples of the phillippines for example couldve made their nation into a powerhouse as well if they had a better govt. The ROC govt does deserve a lot of credit in my book.

Politically they also brought a LOT of political garbage to the status of Taiwan. A very large unfinished business with the PRC and the PRC’s China.

Turning back the clock. Taiwan shouldve been given back to Japan after WW2. The Japanese govt wouldve had many of the tools still left in place to help Taiwan back to its feet same as on mainland Japan. There would be no Taiwan question today.

The PRC likely would have exterminated the ROC or if the latter was lucky they wouldve repeated the “Taiwan Miracle (and debacle) on Hainan”

Yes, but not international law nor in the political reality of the behavior of the Powers. That is why we continue to speak on this issue. The status of Taiwan is undetermined, period. The PRC and ROC leadership know perfectly well that Taiwan’s status is undetermined. The trick is to avoid falling into the “yeah, it sucks but that’s the way it is” trap that you have proposed in your two posts above.[/quote]

Actually, that’s not quite the tack I am trying to take. I know I am being a little provocative, but my intention is more to change the way the democratic side of the Taiwanese issue looks at it than to “give up”. First, with respect to the future of Taiwan’s status, I reject all arguments from law, international or otherwise, or history. On such a fundamental question as the self-determination of a people, law can say nothing about status because it exists at the same level as status insofar as they are both conventional constructions. As for Taiwan’s current status, however, by all credible accounts, it remains a province of China. For reasons good or bad–and there are great reasons on either side of the question to argue for prudence or for principle–the people of Taiwan have collectively chosen not to challenge that status. I am not opposed to people overturning it, nor is it my role to try to provoke the people of Taiwan to overturn it or to make other foreigners, especially private individuals or businesses, from staking a position contrary to the one the Taiwanese people have themselves acquiesced to.

The people of Taiwan have every right to change their status, and the people of the world have every duty to recognize that fact when they do so, but changing that status requires payment of a price (blood and/or treasure), and in Taiwan’s case, the price appears to be rather exorbitant. If Taiwan were to stand up for its right to self-determination, would it end up more like the Egyptian people or the Tibetans? And, is it worth paying the price the Tibetans have paid? That is for the Taiwanese to decide, and people who are sympathetic to the Taiwanese can certainly help them do that.

The way to Taiwanese independence and statehood is probably much closer within reach of the Taiwanese people than present conditions would make it otherwise appear, but there is no shortcut to it via international jurisprudence, the US Supreme Court, UN bureaucrats, academic debate, or even world opinion, which will not take notice until the Taiwanese people decide to do so themselves. My “pet peeve” is the Taiwan-as-victim approach to the question, which has intentionally or not become the default position and is both accurate and useless/enervating.

My perception is that the wholesale transformation of the democracy movement into a political party has for all intents and purposes destroyed that movement, which is why it has lost its way so completely. Just as in Egypt, it will probably not be the official opposition to find the way out, but a grassroots movement (however much I hate that expression), which does not appear to exist at the moment. Without some sort of exogenous event, like economic or geopolitical instability, it doesn’t appear any will appear soon, although the decay of the DPP may be creating a space for such a movement to appear.

As for foreign businesses, I believe they accept the “Taiwan, Province of China” designation for the exact same reasons the Taiwanese people do. Look at the passport, the uniform, the flag, the constitution, or more simply look at the name of the baseball team. It is the Taiwanese baseball players who wear that uniform, and nobody else. Now, that may very well piss the Taiwanese people off like it does you or me, but what is the solution?

I think my position is not so much “yeah, it sucks but that’s the way it is”; I think it is “It’s not really my business, but since you asked, it looks pretty f*****d up from where I stand, it is going to be damned hard to get out of it, I think there’s only one way to do that, and only you can do it”. If the Taiwanese want statehood, which is the only element of independence they lack, there is the street. I don’t know if that makes me cold-blooded or a romantic, but that’s what I think.

Not at all. Taiwan’s current status is as an independent nation. Most countries of the world unofficially know that Taiwan and China are separate. For that matter, even the Chinese govt know that they don’t control Taiwan. While it may officially be undecided or a part of China or any other status people may claim, the day to day reality is that Taiwan is an independent country.

… and as soon as the Taiwanese people decide to do it themselves, it’s regarded as an act of insurrection by China and immediately becomes fully-justified grounds for invasion. That’s the Law, dammit.

even a small step in that direction, even just making steps to allow the populace to have any kind of referendum, gets the missiles flying.

[quote=“Herodotus”]
Finally, Tibet. I consider that a country. It is not a matter of passports, because those are as fictional as anything else. What matters is the will of the people, and the Taiwanese have not been willing to stake the claim to independence. [/quote]

Lets get this straight, Tibet which does not have its own government, laws, taxes and so on, you think is a country. Taiwan which does have all these things and despite the PRC never governing this country for one second is not. What do you expect the Taiwanese to do, march up and down demanding independence when they already have independence and a defacto government of it own.

Where are these credible accounts? Its already been pointed out to you USA and the vast majority of governments consider the status of Taiwan undetermined.

No they wont, we already saw what happened when Chen Shui Bian was in power and wanted to change the name of the country to Taiwan, the US immediately calls Taiwan a trouble maker and demands no side on either side of the strait unilaterally changes the status quo. The same will apply to a change of constitution and a declaration of independence. You should note, even if all those were done, Taiwan’s defacto status wouldn’t change to dejure, simply because China has too much clout and certainly would not get into the UN as China would veto that too.

I think you are so off the mark, you should really take a step back and try and understand the situation a little better, my apologies if that sounds condescending, but I suspect it will be one of the milder criticisms of your posts, which I see more as ignorant than provocative.

Taiwanese people do not accept that designation.

Herodotus, while I have to agree (to some extent) with your reasoning, I think you miss the point. First of all, the ROC (the non-existent government that claims all of China is ruled from Taiwan) is dead, except in the heads of a few taxi drivers. Yes, if it still existed, then no doubt they would say Taiwan is a province of China.

However, it’s not 1945 anymore. The vast majority of Taiwanese people call this country “台灣” in normal conversation. I guess mainland Chinese do, too. I doubt if anyone really cares which politician has such a small willy that his self-esteem depends on threatening tiny islands with death from the skies. Adding “province of China” to “Taiwan” in non-political contexts is just flamebaiting - just look at the argument raging on this thread! It’s completely superfluous. As someone else just pointed out, plain old “Taiwan” would give nobody cause for complaint. Does anyone ever feel the need to list “Haiwaii” as “Haiwaii, province of the USA”? Does Obama fly into a frothing-at-the-mouth rage if people forget to do so? I’d feel equally weird (“since when was the USA ruled by the Nazi party”?) if I saw that phrase on a website and ISO refused to modify it. Yes, I just wrote to them, and they refused.

The reason it bothers me is this. It’s not really anything to do with defending Taiwan against the red menace. It’s really not my business. What is my business is that western politicians make high-and-mighty speeches about democracy, and standing up to tyranny. Yes, we know they’re lying. But I hate seeing the proof that they’re lying, in something so trivial that it wouldn’t start a war if ISO said to China, “grow up, we’re going to list this place as Taiwan because that’s what everyone calls it”.

This is gibberish. “Self-determination” is also a conventional construction. And “self-determination” is a stance rooted in history and law – how can you define a population that has “self-determination” without recourse to law and history?

There is no credible account that makes Taiwan a province of China. And since you reject law and history as a source for arguments, what can possibly be a “credible account”?

Well, except for the vast majority who want independence, 68% in the latest TVBS poll.

I tend to agree that mass demonstrations will be necessary. That is why the KMT administration is trying to finesse the issue, making it a fait accompli. Which is why so many of us so fiercely resist that position.

Not yet.

I suppose the question as to my being ignorant or not hinges on whether or not this is a valid or critical distinction. I was certainly ignorant that this would be a point of contention. With respect, however, I think this distinction is decisive.

If I am wrong, then the “government, laws, taxes, and so on” that you take to be the very stuff of what a country is were all created by something that was certainly not Taiwan but rather the Republic of China, which the Taiwanese people have been unable to replace.

The argument that some make, that Taiwan=ROC, is hard to accept. Although that seems to be the center-ground and political consensus on this question, I think it is a (for the moment, necessary) cop-out, which is why God created the center in the first place.

If Taiwan is not a country, then it is a province of China, or perhaps someone would argue Japan.

If Taiwan is a country, then what is the ROC? An interloper of some kind, I take it, in which case, Taiwan is not independent, and it is definitely not a state. Its status would be “undetermined”, perhaps, except that every day that question is answered primarily by the existence of the ROC and its claim to Taiwan, secondarily by the PRC and its claim to Taiwan, thirdly by the international community, and fourthly and most contentiously, by the Taiwanese people, who have not collectively challenged it. I am arguing that this fourth point is not a consequence but a cause and even the primary cause of Taiwan’s trouble, and I take it that this is what people object to and find so ridiculous and/or offensive about my posts. Every day, the Taiwanese acquiesce to a Chinese identity–that is as much a part of the day-to-day reality as the issuance of passports, etc–and moreover it has profound consequences on the Taiwanese. Everybody knows this, but we write it off, because we believe that the alternative is too awful to contemplate: slaughter at the hands of Taiwan’s enemies and abandonment by her friends. These are all well-known facts, but the solutions are as yet, in my judgement, unknown. I don’t know them, but I do feel rather confident that the current course has been failing for a good decade, and that that requires a questioning of assumptions.

Taiwan deserves the right to become a country, but it is not yet one; every other position requires all sorts of inconsistencies and intellectual contortions and strained arguments from law and history. I argue that these contortions actually distract Taiwan from achieving what we all presume it desires–to be a free, democratic, independent, constitutional state, with (since apparently this must be stated explicitly) the ability to refer to itself by its own name. The attempt to simply wish or interpret the ROC away is not doing anyone any favors, least of all the Taiwanese.

Until the democratic side accepts this reality and accepts that the only way to bring about the desired change is to look within itself, it and Taiwan will be lost in the wilderness of the question of what it may or may not be. I do not think the Taiwanese feel confident or can feel confident about their identity until they have properly hashed it out by challenging those who presume to tell them what it is or ought to be. If it were to challenge China and the world consensus that it carries in its tow, as others have pointed out, there would likely be a huge price to pay. The Chinese have promised that there would be. On the other hand, there is a more subtle, but (equally?) devastating price to living in this limbo, and Taiwan will likely, one day, burst forth in reaction to that psychological violence as spontaneously as the Egyptian youth did.

If it were me, and I were Taiwanese, I would march in favor of democracy rather than Taiwanese independence, but for Pete’s sake, keep it out of the hands of any political party.

But, as far as your first point is concerned, if my interpretation above of what makes a country a country is wrong, then I accept that I would probably have to scratch everything I have said and start over from square one.

Why is that?

Except if the ROC and Taiwan are names used to refer to the same thing. In addition to the self governing bits I mentioned, is recognition that the governing body is legitimate by other nations, which is the only thing Taiwan does not enjoy, but not to the extent you earlier claimed.

There are something like 20 who do, there are some who recognize Chinas claim. But as pointed out, most view its status as undetermined.

You forgot undetermined.

They are names for the same thing, but Im sure the vast majority would prefer to use Taiwan and do away with the term ROC, if there were no other considerations.

I added bold, since that is all they have, a claim. It is a claim most countries carefully acknowledge is being made, but do not say recognize the claim.

Mick,

Not to be flip, but I cannot accept that the ROC=Taiwan, because it does not. Have you ever sat in a bar in Taiwan and cheered “Zhonghua Taibei”, just for laughs?

I believe words are elastic, and in given instances over time can become infinitely so, to the point that a word comes to mean the opposite of its original meaning, but I don’t think anything like that occurs here. “Taiwan, Republic of China” is just another way to refer to “Taiwan”, in that case.

I think you are failing to make an important distinction here. No countries recognize Taiwan, but a couple dozen or however many recognize the Republic of China.

Taiwan is a society with a distinct history. The Republic of China is a political entity, a state. At the political level, Taiwan is a province of China, either the Republic of or the People’s Republic of, or perhaps just China in general, and I strongly suspect, after living in Taiwan for a while and talking to Taiwanese people and looking at the polls, etc, that a large body of those people, likely a majority, would prefer Taiwan were to replace the Republic of China. But, that is not enough. Americans prefer that their country be out of debt, but they do not wish the pain that that would entail. Although Taiwan’s condition was not freely chosen the way Americans chose to go into debt, to achieve statehood, which Taiwan has not yet done, it has to make something like an existential leap, to say, we are willing to have our blood shed to speak our name and to insist that others call us by our name. Someone once said that no country is not born in blood, and the Taiwanese have either shed their blood or risked doing so for a number of noble causes, particularly the end to dictatorship and corruption and the establishment of democracy, but they have chosen not to take that final leap.

As for your insistence that the international community does not recognize anyone’s claim to Taiwan, I don’t think that is quite correct. As far as I can recall, the United States, for example, regularly recognizes that China is one and that Taiwan is a part of China, but that the current ‘internal’ dispute should be resolved by diplomatic and peaceful means.

Vorkosigan,

I would rather avoid a discussion about “conventional constructions” although I brought it up. I think that everything, my identity and yours and the meaning of words, are all conventional constructions, but I did not mean to raise a complex and troublesome philosophical issue.

So, I will try to speak in concrete terms. If we should somehow discover a piece of international jurisprudence that said Taiwan is a part of China, would that be decisive for you or anybody else likely to care about this topic? Would you say, Whoops, I guess Taiwan is a part of China? I am sure that you believe that there are such things as unjust laws that can be justly refused. Don’t we accept laws because they are a necessary evil rather than a positive good, which we challenge when we believe they no longer serve some higher purpose? I just cannot see how the fate of the people of this island can hang on clause three of paragraph A of section B of Convention X in reference to the Treaty of Y, which brought a conclusion to the bloody war between Empire Z and Dictatorship O.

As for the history of Taiwan and East Asia and what bearing it has on the question, I cannot see how we can divine whether or not Taiwan is an independent country solely or primarily from its past. If Taiwan had been ruled by China since Shun with complete acceptance by every other sovereign power on Earth and the explicit blessing of God Almighty Himself, I cannot see what bearing that has on whether Taiwan should be an independent, sovereign state today or tomorrow.

The issue is fundamentally a moral one and secondarily a practical one (e.g., how much should Taiwan risk in pursuit of statehood? how should it pursue it? what does it risk by acquiescing in a condition that it dislikes and maybe even detests?), and the legalities and train of events that led up to it are, if not inconsequential, only prologue to the fateful decision that the Taiwanese people make every day, to accept the status quo.

I do not know if the Taiwanese in their heart of hearts want independence or if they are so sick and tired of being told by the Chinese that the matter has already been settled for them. In one hundred years, if Taiwan is a part of China or Japan or the United States, or is divided into a hundred statelets, I don’t really care, as long as the question is settled democratically. Again, I don’t see how it is up to anybody else to force others to “recognize” the supposed existence of a nation of Taiwan that the Taiwanese have themselves not yet ventured to declare. I suspect that if the Taiwanese people took to the streets with a sufficient degree of intensity to demand the right to choose, the rest of the world would sit up and take notice.

Finley,

As for Western politicians and bureaucrats being hypocritical about democracy, I would suggest again that they are making the same compromises that the Taiwanese people themselves are making every single day. They do not press the matter because of the price. For anyone to expect foreign countries or other organizations to take the lead in the matter is like wishing for the lottery. It is up for the Taiwanese people to decide, and since it is not my country, I cannot tell them that they must risk all to gain full sovereignty over their lives.

Sorry if I can [edit: not] respond to everybody’s objections. My head is swimming.

The last two presidents of Taiwan before Ma both insisted that Taiwan was a separate state from China and they had wide support for this. CBS even won his second term with a tiny majority. The public in 2008 thought Ma was in the same KMT-vein as LTH and were massively shocked when he started reviving the nonsense that the ROC is anything but Taiwan. Many I know thought the constitution had already been amended. So really, what do you want? The majority of Taiwanese will and do say publically that Taiwan is their country. Until 2 years ago their leaders said the same. Their leaders also regularly tried to get Taiwan back into the UN, risked missile attacks with their statements, and acted as if they held an office that represented only the 23 million on Taiwan.

You may need blood but the people here have had enough of it in their past. As long as word games kept the Chinese at bay they are happy to play them, and who are you to say they have to go further. Its almost unfathomably unconscionable that some westerners will only accept Taiwan is independence if it is match with a suicide play.

[quote]
As for your insistence that the international community does not recognize anyone’s claim to Taiwan, I don’t think that is quite correct. As far as I can recall, the United States, for example, regularly recognizes that China is one and that Taiwan is a part of China, but that the current ‘internal’ dispute should be resolved by diplomatic and peaceful means.[/quote]

No. The US merely recognizes that it is the Chinese position that Taiwan is an inalienable part of China. But this is not the US position. You see, everyone plays word games on this issue. Should we say the US can’t have a position unless they come out firmly on one side or the other and risk blood over that position?