Politics of alienation and polarization: Taiwan's Tangwai in the 1980s

Abstract

After a quarter-century power struggle on the Chinese mainland, in 1949 the Chinese Communists (CCP) defeated the Nationalists (the Kuomintang or KMT) and forced Chiang Kai-shek and his totally demoralized army and government to retreat to Taiwan, an island that had been returned to China in 1945 after fifty years of colonial rule by the Japanese. By 1949, the original residents of the island, the Taiwanese, most of whose ancestors had come from the mainland two or three centuries earlier, had already gone through the initial welcoming of the Nationalists and enthusiasm for going back to China in 1945, and the subsequent great shock, anger, and disappointment of the February 28, 1947 Uprising, and the suppression and massacre that followed it. The February 28 Uprising resulted from harsh and oppressive Nationalist policies that forced the generally passive Taiwanese people, particularly the intellectuals, to resort to a series of protest demonstrations, some of them violent. In response, the Nationalist army led by General Chen Yi carried out a bloody purge, a massacre of the Taiwanese sociopolitical elite. The Uprising has since been regarded by many Taiwanese as the most important historic event in contemporary Taiwanese history, a revolutionary fight against injustice and tyranny. The supporters of the Taiwan independence movement have looked upon it as the beginning, the source of inspiration and legitimacy for their movement. In 1949 the six million Taiwanese were no longer happy, and they were suspicious and resentful of the sudden influx of the one-million-strong Chinese mainlanders who had just been decimated and forced by the Communists to flee to Taiwan and were to rule over the Taiwanese as another colonial power.     

Australian Support for an Independent Taiwan Prior to the Recognition of the People's Republic of China*

Australia's efforts between 1950 and 1972 to create an independent Taiwan are an important, largely overlooked element of Australia and Taiwan's international relations. Australia saw de jure independence for Taiwan as a means to support the US while pursuing the interrelated goals of accommodating the People's Republic of China (PRC) and minimising contradictions between US China policy and the policies of the UK and other countries important to it. Initially Australia favoured the establishment of a Taiwanese majority‐controlled state. This preference later gave way to greater support for an independent Republic of China on Taiwan under Chinese Nationalist rule. Australia nevertheless consistently justified its policy via reference to the principle of self‐determination for Taiwan's people — either immediately in the case of a Taiwanese Taiwan, or postponed into the indefinite future in the case of a Chinese Nationalist Taiwan. Championing Taiwan independence lost its utility for Australia when Sino‐ US relations improved in the late‐1960s to early‐1970s, and it became possible for Australia to make the concessions over Taiwan demanded by China without damaging its relationship with the US. This shift preceded the election of a Labor government committed to building a friendly relationship with China. Australia then dropped its policy of advocating Taiwanese independence, and established official relations with China in late 1972.     

Conceptualising Party-State Governance and Rule in Laos

ABSTRACT

This article develops a framework for conceptualising authoritarian governance and rule in the Lao People’s Democratic Republic. After introducing the national and academic context, which go a significant way towards understanding the paucity of comparative political work on Laos, we propose an approach to studying post-socialist authoritarian and single-party rule that highlights the key political-institutional, cultural-historical and spatial-environmental sources of party-state power and authority. In adopting this approach, we seek to redirect attention to the centralising structures of rule under the Lao People’s Revolutionary Party, illustrating how authoritarian institutions of the “party-state” operate in and through multiple scales, from the central to the local level. At a time when the country is garnering greater attention than at any time since the Vietnam War, we argue that this examination of critical transitions in Laos under conditions of resource-intensive development, intensifying regional and global integration, and durable one-party authoritarian rule, establishes a framework for future research on the party-state system in Laos, and for understanding and contextualising the Lao People’s Revolutionary Party regime in regional comparative perspective.     

Authoritarian legitimation: assessing discourses of legitimacy in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan

ABSTRACT

What are the sources of authoritarian persistence in Central Asia? This study explores the argument that authoritarian regimes persist through effective authoritarian legitimation. Drawing on the theory and analysis of discourse, it develops an approach to authoritarian legitimation and examines discursive appeals to legitimacy by the Kazakh and Uzbek presidents. The study also assesses the effectiveness of the presidential discourses of legitimacy for public perception of the governing regimes in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. This research shows that by defining what constitutes legitimate power and presenting political rule as consistent with this definition, authoritarian governments can foster certain modes of reasoning and evaluation among citizens, and create possibilities for their acceptance of the regime as ‘right’ or ‘proper’.     

Learned journals and scholarly reviewing: a correspondence

The Face of Defeat: Palestinian Refugees and Guerillas by David Pryce‐Jones. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1972. Pp. 179, 2 maps; £2.95.

Arab Socialism by Abdel Moghny Said, with a section by Samir Ahmed, Blandford Press, London, 1972, 137 pp., index.

The Making of an Arab Nationalist, Ottomanism and Arabism in the Life and thought of Sati'al‐Husri, by William I. Cleveland, Princeton University Press: London: Oxford University Press 1971, pp. xvi, 211, bibl., index, £4.00.

Bright Levant by Laurence Grafftey‐Smith. Pp. xll + 295 illustrations, index. John Murray. £3.00.

Foreign Service Farewell: My Years in the Near East by J. Rives Childs. Pp. 192, illustrations, index. The University Press of Virginia. $6.00.

Hankey Man of Secrets Volume II 1919‐1931 by Stephen Roskill. Pp. 608, illustrations, index. Collins. £5.00.     

The 2014 Thai Coup and Some Roots of Authoritarianism

ABSTRACT

Thailand is the only country currently ruled by a coup-installed military government. The 2014 coup aimed not only to abolish the influence of Thaksin Shinawatra but also to shift Thailand’s politics in an authoritarian direction. While the army authored the coup, the professional and official elite played a prominent role in engineering the coup and shaping political reforms. This article examines some historical antecedents of this authoritarian turn, first in the broad trends of Thailand’s modern political history, and second in the emergence and political evolution of the Bangkok middle class.     

The struggle for Korea's national rights

This article assesses the role played by Indonesian capitalists in the country's new democratic political system. It takes as its starting point the analysis presented by Richard Robison in his influential 1986 book, Indonesia: The Rise of Capital . Robison saw the authoritarian state as central to capitalist class formation, viewing it as midwife and protector of an emergent business class. Though democratisation was not his primary concern, this analysis made him pessimistic about the prospects of democratic change. Over the intervening years, Indonesia has not only undergone democratisation; its capitalist class has also changed significantly. The article notes elements of continuity in the nature of Indonesian capital (including the continuing weight of politically vulnerable ethnic Chinese business interests) as well as change (including the taking of political office by businesspeople and the strengthening of provincial business). Overall, there is now much greater independence of private capital vis-à-vis the state, even if business-state relations are still characterised by patterns that developed during authoritarian rule, including the clientelist and predatory behaviours that have been the subject of much analysis in post-Suharto Indonesia. A focus on the capitalist class and its enmeshment in state power, in the style pioneered by Robison, thus helps explain continuity between Indonesia's authoritarian past and its new democratic order, especially the continuing ubiquity of corruption and patronage. However, such a focus is less useful in accounting for political change, especially democratisation itself. To explain democratisation we need to broaden our class analytical optic to bring into focus the actions and interests of lower and middle class forces.     

Introduction: Understanding Thailand’s Politics

ABSTRACT

Thailand’s politics from the mid-2000s has seen considerable conflict and contestation, with seven prime ministers, two military coups, and scores of deaths from political violence. This article, as well as introducing the eight articles in the Special Issue, examines various aspects of this tumultuous period and the authoritarian turn in Thai politics. It does this by examining some of the theoretical and conceptual analysis of Thailand's politics and critiquing the basic assumptions underlying the modernisation and hybrid regimes perspectives that have tended to dominate debates on democratisation. While the concepts of bureaucratic polity and network monarchy shed light on important political actors in Thailand, they have not grappled with the persistence of authoritarianism. In theoretical terms, the article suggests that it is necessary to understand historically specific capitalist development as well as the social underpinnings that establish authoritarian trajectories and reinforce the tenacity of authoritarianism.     

Isolation,identity and Taiwanese stamps as vehicles for regime legitimation

Postage stamps issued by the government of the Republic of China (ROC) on Taiwan provide a useful tool for considering changing elite aspirations and political objectives. Stamps issued on Taiwan while under authoritarian rule frequently sought to demonstrate or bolster the legitimacy of the ruling KMT, typically through demonstrating the ROC's status in international society or through portraying the economic and developmental success of the KMT regime. The on-going democratic transition on Taiwan has seen a move away from stamps as mechanisms for domestic regime legitimation. Since the election of President Chen Shui-bian of the Democratic Progressive Party in 2000 stamps have increasingly become a medium for promoting the idea of a ‘Taiwanese’ identity distinct from that of ‘China’.     

Great powers,civil society and authoritarian diffusion in Central Asia

ABSTRACT

This article draws on the authoritarian promotion literature to assess contending pressures for democratization and authoritarianism in Central Asia. Domestic actors ultimately determine receptivity to democracy promotion, but external pressures for democratic transformation or authoritarian persistence exist in Central Asia. A brief overview of authoritarian trends in Central Asia is followed by the theoretical arguments for authoritarian persistence, with special attention to the civil society dimension in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. Western programmes supporting liberal democracy and civil society have encountered resistance from authoritarian leaders in Central Asia, though the evidence for direct influence from authoritarian external actors is limited. A process of indirect authoritarian diffusion, in combination with the region’s illiberal societies and Western democracy promotion fatigue, undermines the development of civil society and makes authoritarian persistence in Central Asia likely.     

Soft competitive authoritarianism and negative stability in Kosovo: statebuilding from UNMIK to EULEX and beyond

ABSTRACT

After 1999, democratization, normalization and Europeanization were the key processes through which Kosovo’s final political status was expected to take shape. All three processes, however, were guided by the stability paradigm. Though Kosovo cannot be categorized as a typical authoritarian state, its political leaders have openly displayed illiberal tendencies, governing in an unaccountable manner and utilizing public assets for their private gain. In the period from 1999 to 2008, while UNMIK’s approach was based on maintaining stability instead of democratization, a soft competitive authoritarianism began to emerge incrementally. In its first decade of independence, Kosovo’s statehood remained internationally disputed, whereas its governance culture was characterized by a lack of internal accountability, which is a key component of the soft competitive authoritarianism in the country. Thus, the negative trajectory of political developments did not change even after the deployment of EULEX and the 2008 declaration of independence. This article analyses the development of authoritarian and illiberal tendencies in Kosovo and suggests that the democratization and Europeanization discourses served to conceal soft competitive authoritarian practices in Kosovo.     

‘Among ministers,mavericks and mandarins’: Britain,covert action and the Yemen civil war

The Beginning and the End by Naguib Mahfouz, translated by Ramses Hanna Awad and edited by Mason Rossiter Smith. Cairo: American University in Cairo Press, 1985. Pp.379. $7.95.

The Search by Naguib Mahfouz, translated by Mohamed Islam and edited by Magdi Wahba. Cairo: American University in Cairo Press, 1987. Pp.126. $8.95.

The Beggar by Naguib Mahfouz, translated by Kristin Walker Henry and Nariman Khales Naili al‐Warraki. Cairo: American University in Cairo Press, 1986. Pp. 124. $7.95.

Banking and Oil: The History of the British Bank of the Middle East by Geoffrey Jones. Volume 2, Cambridge University Press, 1987. Pp.380. £40.

Syria and the French Mandate: The Politics of Arab Nationalism, 1920–1945 by Philip Khoury. London: I.B. Tauris and Co. 1987. Pp.698. £37.50.

Nomads and Settlers in Syria and Jordan 1800–1980 by Norman N. Lewis. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987.

Futile Diplomacy, volume two: Arab‐Zionist negotiations and the End of the Mandate by Neil Caplan. London: Frank Cass, 1986. Pp.358, including documents, bibliography and index. £27.50.

The Dynamics of Inflation in Iran: 1960–1977 by Azizollah Ikani. The Netherlands: Tilburg University Press, 1987. DFL 42.40.     

Book reviews

Graham E. Fuller, The Center of the Universe. The Geopolitics of Iran, Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1991, xv + 301pp., $35.00 hardback, $18.50 paperback.

Tim McDaniel, Autocracy, Modernization and Revolution in Russia and Iran, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1991, x + 235pp., $29.95.

Steven G. Marks, Road to Power: the Trans‐Siberian Railroad and the Colonization of Asian Russia, 1850–1917, Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1991, xxiii + 235pp., $31.95.

Cyril E. Black, Louis Dupree, Elizabeth Endicott‐West, Daniel C. Matuszewski, Eden Naby and Arthur N. Waldron, The Modernization of Inner Asia, Sharpe, Armonk, 1991, xviii + 405 pp., $49.95.

Audrey L. Altstadt, The Azerbaijani Turks: Power and Identity Under Russian Rule. Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, 1992, xxiv + 331 pp., $18.95

G. A. Khidoiatov, Moia rodnaia istoriia. Oqituwchi, Tashkent, 1990, 304 pp. + colour plates.

Robert L. Canfield (ed.), Turko‐Persia in Historical Perspective. A School of American Research Book. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991, xiv + 256 pp., $54.00.     

Origins of the Arab states' involvement in Palestine

Afghanistan and the Soviet Union by Henry Bradsher. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1982. Pp. 336. $32.50; $12.75 (paper).

Afghanistan's Two Party Communism by Anthony Arnold. Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, 1983. Pp. 260. $10.95.

Revolutionary Afghanistan: A Reappraisal by Beverly Male. New York: St Martin's Press, 1982. £13.95.

Red Flag Over Afghanistan by Thomas Hammond. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1984. Pp. xvii + 261. £26.25; £11.25 (paper).

The Great Powers and the End of the Ottoman Empire edited by Marion Kent. London: George Allen and Unwin, 1984. Pp. x + 237. £18.00.

Der Islam in der Gegenwart edited by Werner Ende and Udo Steinbach, with editorial help from Michael Ursinus. Munich: C.H. Becker, 1984. Pp.774, bibliography, maps, index. DM, 138.

Workers’ Participation and Self‐Management in Turkey by Mehmet Nezir Uca. The Hague: Institute of Social Studies, Research Report Series No. 13, 1983. Pp.xiv + 254. Guilders 11

France Overseas by C. Andrew and A.S. Kanya‐Forstner. London: Thames &; Hudson, 1981. Pp.302. £12.95.     

Narratives of Islam in Uzbekistan: authoritarian myths and the Janus-state syndrome

ABSTRACT

Under the late Islom Karimov, the authoritarian regimes in Uzbekistan created dual myths of Islam. On the one hand, Islam was encompassed in the larger context of manaviyat (spirituality), and on the other, a myth of an Islamic ‘extremism’ that challenges security and stability on a regional scale was cultivated. This ‘threat’ is so pervasive and pernicious that it commands the authoritarian nature of governance that characterizes the Karimov era, leading to a Janus-state syndrome in which Islam is simultaneously cast as a sine qua non of national myth and an existential threat to state security. This article examines the mythology of political Islam in Uzbekistan and the Janus-state syndrome resulting from the duality of Islamic myth. It argues that a civil society cannot flourish in Central Asia unless moderate Islamic groups are allowed to build the very social structures that provide the foundation for interaction, peaceful coexistence, toleration and pluralism.     

Book notes

An Awakening: The Arab Campaign 1917–18 by Sir Alec Kirkbride. Pp. vi + 134, illustrations, appendices, index. University Press of Arabia, 1 West Street, Tavistock, Devon.

Revolutions and Military Rule in the Middle East: The Arab States. Part II: Egypt, The Sudan, Yemen and Libya by George M. Haddad. New York: Robert Speller and Sons, 1973, Pp. x + 454, illustrations, appendix, bibliography, index; $12.50.

Arab Culture and Society in Change: A Partially Annotated Biblography of Books and Articles in English, French, German and Italian, compiled by the Staff of The Centre d'Etudes pour le Monde Arabe Moderne, St. Joseph's University, Beirut. Beirut: Dar El‐Mashreq, Pp. xli + 318; $15.00.

The Arab Israeli Conflict: A Bibliography of Arabic Books and Publications, compiled and edited by Naim Shahrabani. Jerusalem: Mount Scopus Center for Research on the Palestinian Arabs and Arab‐Israeli Relations. Pp. 301; n.

American and British Doctoral Dissertations on Israel and Palestine in Modern Times, compiled and edited by Frank Joseph Shulman. Ann Arbor: Xerox University Microfilms. Pp. vii + 25; n.p.

Bibliotheca Cisorientalia: An Annotated Checklist of Early English Travel Books on the Near and Middle East, compiled and edited by Richard Bevis. Boston: G. K. Hall & Co. Pp. xviii + 317; U.S.: $29.50, elsewhere: $32.45.

Bidwell's Guide to Government Ministers: Volume 2 : The Arab World 1900–1972, compiled and edited by Robin Bidwell. London: Frank Cass and Co., 1974. Pp. xi + 124; £9.     

Book reviews

Daniel Pipes, Greater Syria: the History of an Ambition. New York: Oxford University Press, 1990, viii, 240 pp.

Roger Zetter (Ed.), The Odyssey of the Pontic Greeks. Oxford University Press/Refugee Studies Programme, Oxford, 1991, 111 pp., Illus. Maps.

Nikki R. Keddie and Beth Baron (Eds), Women in Middle Eastern History. Shifting Boundaries in Sex and Gender. Yale University Press, New Haven and London, 1991, 343 pp., $35/£19.95.

John L. Esposito, Islam: the Straight Path. Oxford University Press, New York, 1991, xvi + 251 pp., $21.95.

Joyce N. Wiley, The Islamic Movement of Iraqi Shias. Lynne Rienner Publishers, Boulder and London 1922. ix + 193 pp., N.P.

Joel Gordon, Nasser's Blessed Movement: Egypt's Free Officers and the July Revolution, Oxford University Press: New York and Oxford, 1992, vii + 254.

Jo‐Ann Gross (Ed.), Muslims in Central Asia: Expressions of Identity and Change, Duke University Press: Durham, 1992, xiv, 224 pp, $39.95, PB $18.95.

Louise L'Estrange Fawcett, Iran and the Cold War: the Azerbaijan Crisis of 1946, Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, 1922, XII, 227 pp., $34.95.

Mark J. Gasiorowski, U.S. Foreign Policy and the Shah: Building a Client State in Iran, Cornell University Press: Ithaca, N.Y 1992, xvi, 242 pp. $35.00.

Robert A. Lewis (Ed.), Geographic Perspectives on Soviet Central Asia, Routledge: London, 1992, XVIII, 323 pp., $69.50 U.S., $87.50 Canada.     

Book reviews

Tajikistan

Muriel Atkin, The Subtlest Battle: Islam in Soviet Tajikistan. Philadelphia: Foreign Policy Research Institute, 1989, viii + 66 pp., $6.50.

Edward Allworth, Editor, Central Asia: 120 Years of Russian Rule, Durham, N.C. and London: Duke University Press, 1989, xviii + 608 pp., $57.50, HB, $22.95 PB.     

Authoritarian Statism and the New Right in Asia’s Conservative Democracies

ABSTRACT

Across Asia there has been a shift to the right in important democratic polities. This article argues that this conservative or authoritarian shift reflects the emergence of a new form of political regime that Nicos Poulantzas characterised as authoritarian statism. This article presents a theoretical framework – with illustrative case studies of Japan and Korea – to understand the emergence of a distinctive brand of Asian authoritarian statism. These new trajectories of political regimes reflect interconnected political and economic crises of conservative capitalist democracies. These crises are the result of the fracturing of modes and mechanisms of political incorporation due to the transnationalisation of capital. It is argued that the inability of current modes of state intervention or political incorporation to manage these economic and political crises or secure political legitimacy for political projects to deepen market reform has led to a “crisis of crisis management” and the further weakening of the Japanese and Korean states.     

Resisting the Fall: The Single Dominant Party,Policies and Elections in Malaysia

Before Malaysia’s 2013 general election, one of the few remaining dominant coalitions in the world was aware it would struggle to retain power. A fledgling opposition coalition had inspired public confidence of its capacity to competently rule while public discontent with the ruling party was rife due to the ubiquity of patronage that had prevented the responsible implementation of policies. However, regime change did not occur. How does the protracted rule of Malaysia’s Barisan Nasional coalition, and the hegemonic party in it, the United Malays National Organisation, relate to debates over authoritarian durability, during a period when dominant parties struggle to sustain power? Malaysian elections have been free enough that the opposition has been able to obtain and retain control of state governments, so why has Barisan Nasional not lost power? This article reviews the 2013 election examining three issues: the significance of coalition politics; how policies have shaped voting trends; and the growing monetisation of politics. These perspectives provide insights into the institutional structure of coalitions and their conduct of politics, including clientelistic practices, forms of mobilisation and governance and the outcomes of policies introduced to address socio-economic inequities and drive economic growth.