What is the meaning of R.O.C.?

Politics Taiwan Politics
1

I saw an interesting article in the Chinese language press here a few days ago. The author pointed out that one of the reasons that it is so difficult to promote the appellation R.O.C. internationally is because most people are truly confused as to what it means.

As examples, the author listed a number of countries which begin with the letter C, and then gave possible renderings of their names as follows —

Republic of Cambodia
Republic of Cameroon
Republic of Canada
Republic of Cape Verde
Republic of Chad
Republic of Chile
Republic of China
Republic of Colombia
Republic of Comoros
Republic of Congo
Republic of Croatia
Republic of Cuba
Republic of Cyprus
Republic of Czech

These could all be abbreviated R.O.C.

Obviously, it is true that the correct names of many of these countries are not as given above … but to the average person in the Americas, Europe, or Africa who does not have a Ph.D. in political science, these are all valid possibilities.

The author concluded that it is currently, and in the future will also be impossible to effectively promote the abbreviation of R.O.C. for Taiwan …

Comments?

It appears to me that Taiwan was a territorial cession under the terms of the San Francisco Peace Treaty (effective as of April 28, 1952) and hence the terminology “Taiwan cession” would be a most appropriate appellation … of course in daily use this could be shortened to Taiwan.

2

Let me add to that list, in sports the ROC is often confused with the ROK (Republic of South Korea).

I have always thought that this place should be named: Republic Area of Taiwan, or Free Area of Taiwan; but in those two cases the initials don’t sound so good. Another option is FUBAR, which is an apt description for the dear island, could be formed (albeit somewhat awkwardly) into Formosa United Border Area Republic. This latter suggestion has two pluses; in addition to being an apt description it is also long. I have noted the local folks like long english names for their various organizations.

take care,
Brian
The San Chung Friends of Formosa United Renaming Committee

3

Wasn’t there a movement in SK to change ‘Korea’ to ‘Corea’ in order to remove the last vestige of Japanese colonialism which replace the C with K.

4

What, and replace it with French ?

Guess no-one talks about “Free China” and “Red China” anymore.

5

I once heard that letters sent from the us with the appellation ROC were often misrouted to Columbia.

6

The Taiwan product certification council has a lot to do with the confusion. Many products vie for the right to be awarded:

Made In Taiwan
Very Well Made In Taiwan
Taiwan
Taiwan Excellence
etc…

When was the last time you saw a product emblazoned with
Made In R.O.C.?

The campaign above actually did a lot to consolidate a world understanding of Taiwan as Taiwan and not Formosa or ROC…

7

I’ve lived in Korea for awhile. When it comes to Japan, the Koreans become totally irrational. The funny thing is that, though the Koreans can never forgive Japan for their occupation in the early 20th century, they seem perfectly willing to forgive and forget that it was China who invaded during the Korean War, and that this is the reason why their country remains divided today. When you ask a Korean whose fault it is that Korea remains divided, they inevitably say “Japan”. Go figure.

Sorry, I don’t mean to hijack this thread. As for the “ROC,” maybe we should append a “K” to the end - call this island “The ROCK”. That’s a name that people won’t forget. If they rename this place the “Republic of Taiwan”, it will get abbreviated to “The ROT”. Which do you prefer?

8

For the current era I prefer TC, which stands for “Taiwan cession.” I believe that there can be no dispute under international law that Taiwan was a territorial cession in the post-WWII peace treaty that ended the war in the Pacific.

9

Yeah, surely no one would dispute that. :unamused:

10

When writing English Taiwanese people seem to like using abbreviations. I think this is because

1 - Americans like to use abbreviations (More than other English-speakers)

2 - Chinese often makes up ‘abbreviations’ by ‘dropping characters’ to make names or descriptors for things, and the practice of abbreviating gets carried over to English.

But Chinese has thousands of characters, so abbreviations are many, many times easier to guess than they are in English.

Unless your country is a relative superpower you have no chance of having the initials of your national name gain wide currency beyond domestic or regional use. Thus ROC is only useful if you want to remind the locals that they are part of China, or the rest of the world (minus Taiwan’s 27 friends) that Taiwan is the seat of the only true and legitimate government of China. But I would have thought the latter battle was lost a while ago!

In general, people use geographical terms to describe other countries. Where a country is divided they will usually qualify the name with a ‘North’, ‘South’, ‘East’ or ‘West’ in nice neat pairs. That’s how it works in common speech. Most people far away will never take to using ‘The Kingdom of the Netherlands’, ‘The Federal Republic of Germany’, ‘The French Republic’, ‘The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea’ or ‘The Socialist People’s Libyan Arab Jamahiriya’ no matter how much you want them to.

By all means, be schizophrenic about your national name. But you can’t expect the wider world to share your schizophrenia.

I bet most people far away who write ‘Taiwan ROC’ on the envelope do so because either they think it’s the polite thing to do (being the address they were given) or because they think it denotes a connection with the mainland, rather like Hong Kong SAR.

But in the end, the futility of promoting the use of ROC has less to with politics and geography, or even the proximity and hegemony of China, than it does with a lack of awareness of how abbreviations work in English.

11

ROT would be good. (are-oh-teeeeeeee)
And then again you could be a giggly little kid, “ahahaha! rot! rot! taiwan’s gonna rot!”

12

Okay I propose that we call Taiwan “East China” from now on. EC is not a bad acronym.

13

It could catch on among a certain section of the population!:smiley:

In the late 1800s there was a fad for calling Scotland ‘North Britain’ and Ireland ‘West Britain’ to make exactly the same point!

Letters went from London to Dublin, WB and Edinburgh, NB.

Even twenty years ago, it was common in Ireland to hear those deemed insufficiently sympathetic to the ‘national cause’ disparaged as ‘West Brits’! To which the reply was ‘There’s nothing West about me, my good fellow!’ :smiley:

14

[quote=“Hartzell”]I saw an interesting article in the Chinese language press here a few days ago. The author pointed out that one of the reasons that it is so difficult to promote the appellation R.O.C. internationally is because most people are truly confused as to what it means.

As examples, the author listed a number of countries which begin with the letter C, and then gave possible renderings of their names as follows —

Republic of Cambodia
Republic of Cameroon
Republic of Canada
Republic of Cape Verde
Republic of Chad
Republic of Chile
Republic of China
Republic of Colombia
Republic of Comoros
Republic of Congo
Republic of Croatia
Republic of Cuba
Republic of Cyprus
Republic of Czech

These could all be abbreviated R.O.C.

Obviously, it is true that the correct names of many of these countries are not as given above … but to the average person in the Americas, Europe, or Africa who does not have a Ph.D. in political science, these are all valid possibilities.
[/quote]
They could be but they are not - as you point out. Also I don’t think you are correct in your assumption that to the average person in the Americas, Europe or Africa who does not have a Ph.D. in political science, these are all valid possibilities.
I think it’s more likely the author doesn’t have a real life and needs to get one. :wink: We could pick any number of abbreviations and list lots of possibilities for each one. As a high school student, I know what R.O.C. stood for and I was just a redneck kid in the hills of North Carolina.
Have a nice day. :wink:

BTW
An appellation is an identifying name or title according to my dictionary whereas abbreviation is a shortened form of a written word or phrase used in place of the whole. Therefore R.O.C. is an abbreviation not appellation. :wink:

15

The problem with “East China” is that it doesnt reflect Taiwans current legal status while Taiwan cession does.

16

[quote=“Hartzell”]I saw an interesting article in the Chinese language press here a few days ago. The author pointed out that one of the reasons that it is so difficult to promote the appellation R.O.C. internationally is because most people are truly confused as to what it means.

Comments?

It appears to me that Taiwan was a territorial cession under the terms of the San Francisco Peace Treaty (effective as of April 28, 1952) and hence the terminology “Taiwan cession” would be a most appropriate appellation … of course in daily use this could be shortened to Taiwan.[/quote]

Officially ROC means " I am dead since 1949, but I still represent the one China in the world…even I lost China."

For Taiwanese it means Republic of China. Question is just where in Taiwan is China?

I don’t know any offical with Taiwan as country name. Even the Taiwan Relations Act is made with the ROC.

And so long the PRC think they are communist with their capitalist system…we can play the said game of one China policy and arm sales.

17

Also, when you recognize the correct name of Taiwan as “Taiwan cession” it is easy to see that the ROC Constitution is not the organic law of the Taiwan cession …

Taiwan’s title – Taiwan cession

The Taiwan cession needs its own Constitution. This is easily accomplished under US administrative authority.

Taiwan’s sovereignty – held by the USA
Taiwan’s geographical limits – as specified in the Taiwan Relations Act
Taiwan’s system of government – to be specified in the new Constitution

This outlines a workable framework that the US President and Congress cannot object to. As for the PRC, if they have any objections they can submit them to the UN or to the US Secretary of State …

18

RoC
Republic off China

19

The problem with “East China” is that it doesnt reflect Taiwans current legal status while Taiwan cession does.[/quote]

Are we not geographically East of China. Or for the more patroitic lot, are we not the China occupying the eastern part of the nation.

I think East China has a good ring to it.

20

for the china lovers:

RoC
Republic (for) oversea Chinese