The KMT, which had ruled Taiwan for 55 years, lost in the recent presidential election on the island. The humiliating defeat was brought about by none other than Lee Teng-hui, or Mr Democracy as dubbed by the West. Having covered the election in Taiwan, the author, a senior reporter with Lianhe Zaobao, shares his observations on the event.
THE PRESIDENTIAL election in Taiwan, which ended on March 18, has opened a new chapter in the party politics on the island.
Backgrounded with the democratisation process throughout the Asian Pacific region, the outcome of the election in Taiwan has been thought-provoking.
Not only have the results reaffirmed certain universal truths, but the whole process has displayed some peculiar Taiwanese features.
First of all, the Nationalist Party of China, or Kuomintang （KMT）, which had ruled Taiwan for 55 years, was defeated in the election at last.
It is now indisputable that the in-fighting between James Soong and Lien Chan within KMT made it possible for Chen Shui-bian, presidential candidate of the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party （DPP）, to come to power with a narrow margin of majority votes.
The fiasco for KMT has a lot to do with Lee Teng-hui, who was forced to step down as chairman of KMT and is to leave his post as president of Taiwan in May.
Lee Teng-hui became the first indigenous president of Taiwan and chairman of KMT 12 years ago. To consolidate his power base, he promoted many Taiwanese to key positions in the government and KMT leadership, and supported influential but notorious native candidates in various elections.
These moves ended up isolating the cream of KMT, chiefly made up of mainlanders, and eventually forcing them to quit, thus sapping the strength of the ruling party.
Meanwhile, a large number of native Taiwanese with criminal records were able to launder themselves clean by joining the power structure, thus giving rise to the much-condemned black-gold politics.
At the same time, Lee Teng-hui orchestrated a changeover of ideology across the island so as to justify and rationalise his many political moves.
He played up the “sadness” of being a Taiwanese, and called on people to fight for a new era in which the indigenous Taiwanese would take the reign of power.
This way, taking advantage of the liberalisation of the press and legalisation of political parties other than KMT as initiated by the late President Chiang Ching-kuo in his final years, Lee Teng-hui started a wave of localisation featuring populist appeals and attempts to make the island“non-Chinese”。
True, the new changes helped to bring along unprecedented freedom of speech in Taiwanese society. Yet it also encouraged people to challenge the credibility of the original power structure and question the authority of law. Meanwhile, people got confused about their state and national identities.
As a result, the social order was disrupted and public security worsened.
The populist localisation has wrought an over-emotional mindset in Taiwanese voters. They are apt to judge political figures by simplistic moral standards.
In the past, they labelled candidates as persons who“l(fā)ove Taiwan” or “betray Taiwan”, as “fellow-travellers of the Chinese Communist Party”, or “independence advocates”。
Now, in the recent campaigning, they raised such issues as the “Chung-hsing bill scandal”, candidates' US citizenship and their properties in America.
To profit from the populist localisation , politicians and their campaigning aides resorted to war of words and demonising of rivals instead of appealing to the voters with their platforms.
Not only did such strategies make the process of campaigning highly charged but they have created difficulties for the newly-elected administration in smoothing away the political passion and restoring consensus among the divided people.
“Rotation of ruling parties is normal in democracy,”said Lee Yuan-tseh, President of Academia Sinica, Taiwan. But I believe that, in reality, the essence of democracy lies in the check and balance of power.
Lee Teng-hui, once lauded by the West as Mr Democracy, failed to carry out a democratic reform within KMT despite his success in bringing greater freedom to Taiwanese society.
Taking advantage of the Leninist structure of KMT, Lee Teng-hui ruled by his own will alone, putting himself above the whole party.
And, partly because Taiwan does not practise a system of primary elections similar to those in the US, KMT eventually lost in the election after its power and resources were consumed by in-fighting.
Chen Shui-bian will be a weak president, as DPP remains a minority both in the Legislative Yuan and the National Assembly, two sections of the law-making branch of the Taiwanese government.
Therefore, however hard the new president and DPP strive to consolidate their hard-won power, they will be subject to the strong check and balance from KMT and People First Party led by James Soong.
No doubt, Taiwan today enjoys freedom of speech, but disorder of a certain extent is still plaguing the society because populism is weakening law and the government's authority. The democracy of Taiwan is flawed.
It would be unfair, however, to compare a democracy born less than 20 years ago with the democracy of the US which has evolved and improved over the past two centuries.
At least, in terms of its function of checking and balancing the government, the results of the recent presidential election in Taiwan have marked a new stage in the progress for the Chinese people towards democracy.
“民主先生”搞一言堂
執(zhí)政了55年的中國(guó)國(guó)民黨在臺(tái)灣總統(tǒng)選舉中慘敗,斷送了“江山”,被西方稱為“民主先生”的李登輝的所作所為是主要導(dǎo)因。作者曾實(shí)地采訪臺(tái)灣總統(tǒng)選舉,這是他的感言。
3月18日揭曉的臺(tái)灣總統(tǒng)選舉結(jié)果,為臺(tái)灣政黨政治掀開了新的一頁(yè)。放眼整個(gè)亞太區(qū)域的民主化過程,這項(xiàng)選舉的結(jié)果有其普遍意義,也有其獨(dú)特模式,發(fā)人深省。
首先,執(zhí)政了55年的中國(guó)國(guó)民黨因?yàn)辄h內(nèi)分裂,宋楚瑜和連戰(zhàn)鷸蚌相爭(zhēng),才造就民進(jìn)黨候選人陳水扁以略微多數(shù)的優(yōu)勢(shì)當(dāng)選,是公認(rèn)不爭(zhēng)的事實(shí)。
這個(gè)事實(shí)的造成,與剛辭去國(guó)民黨主席、即將卸任的臺(tái)灣總統(tǒng)李登輝有極大的關(guān)系。12年前,李登輝上臺(tái)成為第一位臺(tái)灣省籍的總統(tǒng)和國(guó)民黨主席。為了鞏固并擴(kuò)大其權(quán)力基礎(chǔ),他除了在中央政府和中央黨部大量提拔臺(tái)灣省籍人士外,在各項(xiàng)選舉中也支持地方上有實(shí)力、但評(píng)價(jià)卻極低的政治人物。
這一策略除了使得國(guó)民黨內(nèi)外省精英被孤立、排擠,以致選擇出走,一再削弱了國(guó)民黨的力量,也使得許多黑道人物得以“漂白”
（從政）,形成為人詬病的“黑金政治”。
與此同時(shí),李登輝也主導(dǎo)了意識(shí)形態(tài)的轉(zhuǎn)型,以便使他的政治動(dòng)作合理化和正當(dāng)化。從“臺(tái)灣人的悲哀”到“臺(tái)灣人出頭天”,李登輝在已故蔣經(jīng)國(guó)總統(tǒng)晚年開放“報(bào)禁”和“黨禁”的基礎(chǔ)上,啟動(dòng)了一股新的“去中國(guó)化”、民粹主義化的臺(tái)灣本土意識(shí)思潮。
這股民粹主義的思潮固然給予臺(tái)灣社會(huì)前所未有的思想言論自由,卻也使舊有政治體制的精英權(quán)威性和法律公信力受到質(zhì)疑,國(guó)家認(rèn)同和民族認(rèn)同產(chǎn)生混亂。于是,社會(huì)秩序開始出現(xiàn)各種混亂現(xiàn)象,治安極度惡化。
民粹主義的本土意識(shí)思潮,也使得臺(tái)灣選民習(xí)慣以情緒化、簡(jiǎn)單化和道德化的標(biāo)準(zhǔn)來衡量政治人物。從過去的“愛臺(tái)灣”、“賣臺(tái)集團(tuán)”、“中共同路人”、“*”等政治標(biāo)簽,到這次競(jìng)選過程中的“興票案”、候選人的美國(guó)護(hù)照和產(chǎn)業(yè)的爭(zhēng)論,都是明顯的例子。
政治人物和各競(jìng)選陣營(yíng)為了因應(yīng)這種民粹本土意識(shí),以口水戰(zhàn)和道德抹黑來攻擊對(duì)手,較少以施政理念來吸引選民。這種競(jìng)選手段不單使得選戰(zhàn)高度激烈化,在選后如何彌平整個(gè)社會(huì)的政治激情,重新凝聚共識(shí),變成新政府的一大挑戰(zhàn)。
中央研究院院長(zhǎng)李遠(yuǎn)哲說：“政黨輪替是民主政治的常態(tài)”,但筆者認(rèn)為,對(duì)權(quán)力的監(jiān)督和制衡,才是民主政治的精髓所在。
一度被西方媒體譽(yù)為“民主先生”的李登輝,雖然讓臺(tái)灣社會(huì)享有更大的言論自由,但在國(guó)民黨內(nèi)卻沒有推動(dòng)相應(yīng)的民主改革,而是利用這個(gè)列寧式政黨固有的精英體制搞一言堂,以他個(gè)人的意志為全黨的意志。財(cái)雄勢(shì)大的國(guó)民黨缺乏像美國(guó)民主、共和兩黨那樣的初選體制,終因黨員內(nèi)耗而喪失政權(quán)。
新當(dāng)選的陳水扁,在立法院和國(guó)民大會(huì)中民進(jìn)黨仍是少數(shù)黨的情況下,將成為弱勢(shì)總統(tǒng)。因此,不論他個(gè)人和民進(jìn)黨在主觀意愿上如何希望鞏固并擴(kuò)大得來不易的權(quán)力,都將受到宋楚瑜領(lǐng)導(dǎo)的親民黨和國(guó)民黨的有力制衡。
今日的臺(tái)灣社會(huì)無疑是一個(gè)思想言論自由的社會(huì),但因?yàn)榉珊凸珯?quán)力不斷受到民粹思想的沖擊,而導(dǎo)致社會(huì)秩序存在一定程度的混亂,其民主政治發(fā)展過程確有瑕疵。
但如果要把一個(gè)開展不到20年的民主體制,同美國(guó)已發(fā)展了超過200年的完善民主體從制相提并論,也有欠公平。至少?gòu)闹坪馀c監(jiān)督政府的意義上講,臺(tái)灣總統(tǒng)選舉結(jié)果確實(shí)標(biāo)志著中國(guó)民主政治發(fā)展的一個(gè)新里程碑。（作者是本報(bào)國(guó)際組高級(jí)記者）
THE PRESIDENTIAL election in Taiwan, which ended on March 18, has opened a new chapter in the party politics on the island.
Backgrounded with the democratisation process throughout the Asian Pacific region, the outcome of the election in Taiwan has been thought-provoking.
Not only have the results reaffirmed certain universal truths, but the whole process has displayed some peculiar Taiwanese features.
First of all, the Nationalist Party of China, or Kuomintang （KMT）, which had ruled Taiwan for 55 years, was defeated in the election at last.
It is now indisputable that the in-fighting between James Soong and Lien Chan within KMT made it possible for Chen Shui-bian, presidential candidate of the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party （DPP）, to come to power with a narrow margin of majority votes.
The fiasco for KMT has a lot to do with Lee Teng-hui, who was forced to step down as chairman of KMT and is to leave his post as president of Taiwan in May.
Lee Teng-hui became the first indigenous president of Taiwan and chairman of KMT 12 years ago. To consolidate his power base, he promoted many Taiwanese to key positions in the government and KMT leadership, and supported influential but notorious native candidates in various elections.
These moves ended up isolating the cream of KMT, chiefly made up of mainlanders, and eventually forcing them to quit, thus sapping the strength of the ruling party.
Meanwhile, a large number of native Taiwanese with criminal records were able to launder themselves clean by joining the power structure, thus giving rise to the much-condemned black-gold politics.
At the same time, Lee Teng-hui orchestrated a changeover of ideology across the island so as to justify and rationalise his many political moves.
He played up the “sadness” of being a Taiwanese, and called on people to fight for a new era in which the indigenous Taiwanese would take the reign of power.
This way, taking advantage of the liberalisation of the press and legalisation of political parties other than KMT as initiated by the late President Chiang Ching-kuo in his final years, Lee Teng-hui started a wave of localisation featuring populist appeals and attempts to make the island“non-Chinese”。
True, the new changes helped to bring along unprecedented freedom of speech in Taiwanese society. Yet it also encouraged people to challenge the credibility of the original power structure and question the authority of law. Meanwhile, people got confused about their state and national identities.
As a result, the social order was disrupted and public security worsened.
The populist localisation has wrought an over-emotional mindset in Taiwanese voters. They are apt to judge political figures by simplistic moral standards.
In the past, they labelled candidates as persons who“l(fā)ove Taiwan” or “betray Taiwan”, as “fellow-travellers of the Chinese Communist Party”, or “independence advocates”。
Now, in the recent campaigning, they raised such issues as the “Chung-hsing bill scandal”, candidates' US citizenship and their properties in America.
To profit from the populist localisation , politicians and their campaigning aides resorted to war of words and demonising of rivals instead of appealing to the voters with their platforms.
Not only did such strategies make the process of campaigning highly charged but they have created difficulties for the newly-elected administration in smoothing away the political passion and restoring consensus among the divided people.
“Rotation of ruling parties is normal in democracy,”said Lee Yuan-tseh, President of Academia Sinica, Taiwan. But I believe that, in reality, the essence of democracy lies in the check and balance of power.
Lee Teng-hui, once lauded by the West as Mr Democracy, failed to carry out a democratic reform within KMT despite his success in bringing greater freedom to Taiwanese society.
Taking advantage of the Leninist structure of KMT, Lee Teng-hui ruled by his own will alone, putting himself above the whole party.
And, partly because Taiwan does not practise a system of primary elections similar to those in the US, KMT eventually lost in the election after its power and resources were consumed by in-fighting.
Chen Shui-bian will be a weak president, as DPP remains a minority both in the Legislative Yuan and the National Assembly, two sections of the law-making branch of the Taiwanese government.
Therefore, however hard the new president and DPP strive to consolidate their hard-won power, they will be subject to the strong check and balance from KMT and People First Party led by James Soong.
No doubt, Taiwan today enjoys freedom of speech, but disorder of a certain extent is still plaguing the society because populism is weakening law and the government's authority. The democracy of Taiwan is flawed.
It would be unfair, however, to compare a democracy born less than 20 years ago with the democracy of the US which has evolved and improved over the past two centuries.
At least, in terms of its function of checking and balancing the government, the results of the recent presidential election in Taiwan have marked a new stage in the progress for the Chinese people towards democracy.
“民主先生”搞一言堂
執(zhí)政了55年的中國(guó)國(guó)民黨在臺(tái)灣總統(tǒng)選舉中慘敗,斷送了“江山”,被西方稱為“民主先生”的李登輝的所作所為是主要導(dǎo)因。作者曾實(shí)地采訪臺(tái)灣總統(tǒng)選舉,這是他的感言。
3月18日揭曉的臺(tái)灣總統(tǒng)選舉結(jié)果,為臺(tái)灣政黨政治掀開了新的一頁(yè)。放眼整個(gè)亞太區(qū)域的民主化過程,這項(xiàng)選舉的結(jié)果有其普遍意義,也有其獨(dú)特模式,發(fā)人深省。
首先,執(zhí)政了55年的中國(guó)國(guó)民黨因?yàn)辄h內(nèi)分裂,宋楚瑜和連戰(zhàn)鷸蚌相爭(zhēng),才造就民進(jìn)黨候選人陳水扁以略微多數(shù)的優(yōu)勢(shì)當(dāng)選,是公認(rèn)不爭(zhēng)的事實(shí)。
這個(gè)事實(shí)的造成,與剛辭去國(guó)民黨主席、即將卸任的臺(tái)灣總統(tǒng)李登輝有極大的關(guān)系。12年前,李登輝上臺(tái)成為第一位臺(tái)灣省籍的總統(tǒng)和國(guó)民黨主席。為了鞏固并擴(kuò)大其權(quán)力基礎(chǔ),他除了在中央政府和中央黨部大量提拔臺(tái)灣省籍人士外,在各項(xiàng)選舉中也支持地方上有實(shí)力、但評(píng)價(jià)卻極低的政治人物。
這一策略除了使得國(guó)民黨內(nèi)外省精英被孤立、排擠,以致選擇出走,一再削弱了國(guó)民黨的力量,也使得許多黑道人物得以“漂白”
（從政）,形成為人詬病的“黑金政治”。
與此同時(shí),李登輝也主導(dǎo)了意識(shí)形態(tài)的轉(zhuǎn)型,以便使他的政治動(dòng)作合理化和正當(dāng)化。從“臺(tái)灣人的悲哀”到“臺(tái)灣人出頭天”,李登輝在已故蔣經(jīng)國(guó)總統(tǒng)晚年開放“報(bào)禁”和“黨禁”的基礎(chǔ)上,啟動(dòng)了一股新的“去中國(guó)化”、民粹主義化的臺(tái)灣本土意識(shí)思潮。
這股民粹主義的思潮固然給予臺(tái)灣社會(huì)前所未有的思想言論自由,卻也使舊有政治體制的精英權(quán)威性和法律公信力受到質(zhì)疑,國(guó)家認(rèn)同和民族認(rèn)同產(chǎn)生混亂。于是,社會(huì)秩序開始出現(xiàn)各種混亂現(xiàn)象,治安極度惡化。
民粹主義的本土意識(shí)思潮,也使得臺(tái)灣選民習(xí)慣以情緒化、簡(jiǎn)單化和道德化的標(biāo)準(zhǔn)來衡量政治人物。從過去的“愛臺(tái)灣”、“賣臺(tái)集團(tuán)”、“中共同路人”、“*”等政治標(biāo)簽,到這次競(jìng)選過程中的“興票案”、候選人的美國(guó)護(hù)照和產(chǎn)業(yè)的爭(zhēng)論,都是明顯的例子。
政治人物和各競(jìng)選陣營(yíng)為了因應(yīng)這種民粹本土意識(shí),以口水戰(zhàn)和道德抹黑來攻擊對(duì)手,較少以施政理念來吸引選民。這種競(jìng)選手段不單使得選戰(zhàn)高度激烈化,在選后如何彌平整個(gè)社會(huì)的政治激情,重新凝聚共識(shí),變成新政府的一大挑戰(zhàn)。
中央研究院院長(zhǎng)李遠(yuǎn)哲說：“政黨輪替是民主政治的常態(tài)”,但筆者認(rèn)為,對(duì)權(quán)力的監(jiān)督和制衡,才是民主政治的精髓所在。
一度被西方媒體譽(yù)為“民主先生”的李登輝,雖然讓臺(tái)灣社會(huì)享有更大的言論自由,但在國(guó)民黨內(nèi)卻沒有推動(dòng)相應(yīng)的民主改革,而是利用這個(gè)列寧式政黨固有的精英體制搞一言堂,以他個(gè)人的意志為全黨的意志。財(cái)雄勢(shì)大的國(guó)民黨缺乏像美國(guó)民主、共和兩黨那樣的初選體制,終因黨員內(nèi)耗而喪失政權(quán)。
新當(dāng)選的陳水扁,在立法院和國(guó)民大會(huì)中民進(jìn)黨仍是少數(shù)黨的情況下,將成為弱勢(shì)總統(tǒng)。因此,不論他個(gè)人和民進(jìn)黨在主觀意愿上如何希望鞏固并擴(kuò)大得來不易的權(quán)力,都將受到宋楚瑜領(lǐng)導(dǎo)的親民黨和國(guó)民黨的有力制衡。
今日的臺(tái)灣社會(huì)無疑是一個(gè)思想言論自由的社會(huì),但因?yàn)榉珊凸珯?quán)力不斷受到民粹思想的沖擊,而導(dǎo)致社會(huì)秩序存在一定程度的混亂,其民主政治發(fā)展過程確有瑕疵。
但如果要把一個(gè)開展不到20年的民主體制,同美國(guó)已發(fā)展了超過200年的完善民主體從制相提并論,也有欠公平。至少?gòu)闹坪馀c監(jiān)督政府的意義上講,臺(tái)灣總統(tǒng)選舉結(jié)果確實(shí)標(biāo)志著中國(guó)民主政治發(fā)展的一個(gè)新里程碑。（作者是本報(bào)國(guó)際組高級(jí)記者）