One of the things I wanted to point out in my piece in the Asian Wall Street Journal was the way in which, in the minds of all True Chinese(tm) the idea of chunghwamintzu functions as a cultural claim whose automatic assumption is that all those in the chunghwamintzu belong together in one polity because they are a race-nation. One of the two letters published in response to my piece show this mentality hard at work. The first, from David Ting, notes:It is true that 60 years of separate rule across the Taiwan Strait since 1949 has produced some distinct cultural differences in the huge salad bowl of Chinese culture. But blood is thicker than water. While it is true that "the majority of Taiwan's citizens see themselves as Taiwanese," as pointed out by Mr. Turton, many of them also see themselves as Chinese, just like Texans are Americans and Scots are Britons. The Taiwanese won't forget their roots.Blood is thicker than water... he even uses the phrase "the collective heritage of the Chinese nation" to describe the way the idea of chunghwamintzu functions to mystically bind all Chinese together. Ma used a very similar phrase in his inaugural address.
Another point I made is that the current KMT strategy is to concede a degree of uniqueness to Taiwanese culture (alas, reality, so hard to make disappear) while handling the ugly reality of Taiwanese culture by locating it as a mere variant of the great stream of Chinese culture -- this is a deliberate political strategy whose purpose is to legitimate -- by the implicit assumption that all chunghwamintzu people belong in one polity -- Chinese control over Taiwan. Sure enough, Ting takes that exact approach in the last paragraph as well, noting mere cultural differences in the "huge salad bowl" of Chinese culture -- safely dealing with the annoying uniqueness of Taiwan culture by pushing it back into the great stream of Chinese culture. Ting's letter takes exactly the same stance that Ma does. Clearly wielders of the chunghwamintzu ideology are terrified by Taiwanese dissent from the idea that everyone of chunghwamintzu identity must be in the same polity. Ein volk, ein reich! And don't you forget it!
Reference: Dikotter's awesome book on the discourse of race in modern China is available in PDF.
_______________________
[Taiwan] Don't miss the comments below! And check out my blog and its sidebars for events, links to previous posts and picture posts, and scores of links to other Taiwan blogs and forums!
50 comments:
China has a bunch of minority groups that they totally exclude or worse, forget. They categorize ALL the Taiwanese aborigines as "Gao shan chu" (I don't know how to do pinyin..) meaning high mountain tribes. Talk about ignorant, right?
Another Dikotter book which I might suggest is, Teh Construction of Racial Identities in China and Taiwan. As interesting and illuminating as the Chinese part is... the latter half relating to Japanese construction is even more fascinating as it explores the ways in which the Japanese struggled to construct a distinct ethnic and national identity despite their heavy influence from Han/Confucian culture. It could be argued that Taiwanese are as much a part of the "Chinese race" as Japanese, yet Japanese ethnicity and culture is treated as an unquestionable reality.
Wait, what??? The DPP may have overly simplistic ideas of ethnicity, splitting into minnan-hakka-aboriginal-waisheng, but I don't buy that they have a nation-race view of Taiwanese. Can you point to elaborations of a DPP view of one Taiwanese people that is racial...?
The largest group of people in Taiwan that doesn't understand Mandarin are Taiwanese speakers, most of them illiterate. On the other hand, those that may not understand Taiwanese, they all understand or read Mandarin, and they won't have any problems understanding the DPP platform or news about the DPP. You know, they even do sign language translations for this stuff, I don't understand why people think it's okay to have all these Taiwanese speakers that don't understand Mandarin never get any official support for understanding what's going on, except through these rallies.
Probably the best compromise IMHO is they could make judicious use of real time Mandarin subtitles for whenever people are speaking Taiwanese.
If the problem is just a general "feeling" of exclusion and not practical matters of understanding, then all I can say is, there are lots of people that feel excluded when all you speak is Mandarin instead of their native or more familiar language.
"build an ideal of modern citizenship in a multicultural state"Disagree on the DPP having any idea of a race-nation, but agree with this very important idea. DPP is guilty for not explicitly pushing for this (but this is also a corollary of not having an immigration policy and well, Taiwan already is a crowded place).
For those of us who don't subscribe to WSJ, where can the full text of your original op-ed piece be found?
And keep up the good work! If Taiwan manages to survive this current KMT re-assertion of Han Chinese, race-based, one party authoritarianism, it will have been helped by clear thinkers like yourself who seem to truly love, respect, and understand this beautiful, multi-ethnic, democratic country that many of us non-Taiwanese have adopted as our own, especially those of us with Taiwanese spouses and children.
Oops, now I see the link in the letter to the editor you linked to in today's post. My bad.
I am going to puke if I hear that 'blood is thicker than water' again. So many Chinese writers are plague by the use of proverb in place of proper reasoning. It is a practice encouraged early on in school - where proverb galore equals learnedness. This is typical of the Chnese group mentality where trite constructs are used to establish a bond of Chinese-ness with the reader and is perhaps opposite to 'Western approach', using that term loosely, where individual and original thoughts are praised while cliches are avoided.
Scots are Brits...with lots of bloody conquering...
If they would limit the observation to culture, they would have a point. Taiwan people overwhelmingly follow a version of Chinese culture.
Genetically, however, most of them seem also to be related to aborigines and...the Vietnamese?!!Oh yeah, trade ties going way back when. Guess it wasn't just trade.
How you get from that, to the notion that all these people belong in a single nation-state, requires a bit of metaphysical slight-of-hand. Especially since in point of fact, Taiwan people seem to overwhelmingly NOT want to be part of mainland China.
They do something similar with the Tibet debate too (which obviously is not helped with talk of a common minzu)--spill lots of ink over confusing historical ties (which fluctuated back and forth), but ignore the issue of what Tibetans today actually want.
I decided I was wrong, so I removed that paragraph.
Michael
Like most post-modernist liberals, Turton lives in a fantasy land. Good luck convincing the majority of the voting public in Taiwan let alone Mainlanders to deconstruct and de-legitimize Chinese identity and nationalism and rebuild a "unique" Taiwanese nationalism (Bin lang girls qualify as a unique aspect of Taiwan right?). Like the neocons you so deride for thinking that as soon as ground operations were over, Iraqies would come streaming out of the streets with garlands, you are foolish to believe that Chinese identity can magically be erased. Crap like this may fly in post-colonial studies class, but the Public at large is going to be completely lost by your Derridaesque logic. You'll have a long time waiting if you expect your betel-nut chewing compatriots to rail against their subaltern status and overthrow the Gramscian hegemony of Chinese identity.
It's ironic that you expend so much energy to mock and deride Chinese identity as artificial when the Taiwanese identity is in truth nothing more than it's pale shadow. The socio-political environmental is deeply Chinese and even the manner in which the DPP through its rectification of names campaign attempted to "Taiwanize" the island uses traditionally Chinese methods. The Taiwanese cannot exist without the Chinese, just as the shadow cannot exist without the original. The honest truth that the greenies in their heart of hearts know, but are unwilling to admit is that the singular tenent of Taiwaneseness is the rejection of Chineseness on the basis of gaining status and boosting their egos. Better to be an ersatz Japanese in the form of "Taiwanese" than to accept a lower social position by identifying as Chinese, whom as any honest self-hating Taidu race-traitor will acknowledge as poor and backwards compared to their oh so sophisticated selves.
The laughable attempt to portray Taiwanese resistance to the mainland as principaled political opposition to dictatorship and communism and support of liberalism and democracy is simply self delusion. You know as well as I do that when it comes to politics, there are no principals here on Taiwan.
Michael, I think your comments about the DPP, which you have now deleted, were reasonable. While the DPP is working to build a broader base that crosses all ethnic groups there are still elements in the party who promote a specific brand of Taiwanese nationalism. This Taiwanese nationalism is also common to many pro-Taiwan/Taiwan independence groups which are seen as being closely connected to the DPP.
It is important to recognise that the the Taiwanese people these groups talk about are a large group with distinct characteristics. They are Hoklo speaking with Chinese paternal ancestry and Pingpu maternal ancestry. They have developed a distinctive hybrid culture over 400 years in Taiwan.
This group has been marginalised by successive colonial regimes and has never truly been the "master" of its own land. They are very much the heart of the Taiwanese independence movement. They want justice and recognition.
I think times have moved on. The younger generation no longer strongly identifies with this group and perceives being Taiwanese in different terms. Demographic changes and the dominance of Mandarin underscore this. However, it is still important to recognise and listen to this group.
In the history of the Tangwai movement, DPP and resistance to KMT colonialism it can be seen that the support has come from many sections. Some of the key people had KMT connections or were post-1945 Chinese arrivals on Taiwan. The thing they all have in common is identifying Taiwan as their home and seeking democracy and justice. This should be the basis for all Taiwan-centric political movements. They must be inclusive of all people in Taiwan regardless of their ethnic background.
I don't normally make such long comments. But I think this is an important issue.
aeh,mm if chinese want to be together, why dont we send them all byck to China? and i mean that little chinese mainland between two big river and not PRC.. just imagine that kind of idiots claiming of australians, canadians americans and europeans with chinese ancestors.. i will lol my arse when singapore will start to ask are you chinese or are you singaporian?.. i think its time to ask our chinese cositizens what exsactly they are and how we should answer on chinese claims?
Michael, you were kind of right.
During the 1980's and 1990's the DPP deployed a short route Hoklo chauvinism strategy to quickly mobilize support. I wouldn't call it "race" as racialism was not a central platform, but ethnicity was.
With the greater freedoms under the Lee administration, Taiwanese scholars were free to conduct research on topics which had been taboo under the Chiangs. The Ping-pu or Plains Aborigines became a "new" topic and was quickly adopted by Taiwanese nationalists as a symbol of "authenticity" of Taiwan as a separate ethnic nation. This was primarily done to compete with the Chinese nationalist racialist nationalism which ties all Chinese to the mythology of the Yellow Emperor.
Despite this alternative ethnic narrative, few Taiwanese attempted to adopt a Ping-pu identity.
Still, the DPP has often chosen symbols which are Hoklo-centric for their campaigns and have often neglected other cultures on Taiwan. Many Taiwanese nationalist use this type of ethnonationalism to erect artificial ethnic borders from which they can determine "one" from "other" or "authentic" from "inauthentic" or "true" from "false". These tactics operate in mirror image to those deployed by the KMT. I have often heard and read essays in which Taiwanese nationalists speak in these terms and they only serve to alienate others. This is simply an exercise to make a group feel threatened enough to unite and mobilize. The same is done with Waishengren as the KMT makes them feel threatened.
Under the Chen administration the DPP would often conflate Taiwanese culture into Hoklo culture. Of course this "culture" is never definable in time or place and is more a phantom of the imaginary, like most attempts to essentialize culture. Another revealing moment was the use of an Amis cartoon figure in the 2004 Taiwan Tourism bureau's campaign to promote Taiwan. This image served many purposes as it sought to connect Taiwan's authenticity to a "pre-Chinese" moment in time. Yet, the image of the Amis woman was another example of one nationalism colonizing the indigenous image in the interests of a non indigenous group.
For the past 30 years scholars on nationalism have shown that ideas of "race", "ethnicity" and "culture" are not the key elements from which nations arise and maintain their continuity. These are concepts which are used to manipulate people for other political purposes. Using the criteria mentioned above, groups can be continually reduced until they cease to be groups.
Someone above wrote the following:
"If they would limit the observation to culture, they would have a point. Taiwan people overwhelmingly follow a version of Chinese culture. "
I would question this point. When we come to look at culture, we see that at its most basic it is something shared and maybe, it its most Geertzian sense, but not always, shared symbols and meanings.
If we really lay down our prejudices and preconceptions of what "Chinese culture" is and what it should be, we might notice that:
a) although the symbols may look the same the meanings may differ. This has much to do with the governing structures and the emphasis the state apparatus places on certain values. These structures also influence who has access to power, how people may be rewarded or punished for their actions and a whole list of other schemas that are tied directly to the state's nationalizing project. The cultural change under the Japanese project is a wonderful example.
b) We tend to view culture as something passed from generation to generation in an un-ending chain. Although we do learn from our parents, culture is always in a state of change. Our peers often have more influence over our culture than our parents. The generation gap is testament to this phenomenon. Much to our chagrin, 12 yo. girls are the engine driving cultural change. This IS Taiwanese culture. It is what is happening within this structure as people respond to and negotiate with the structure which governs their lives. This is where we find the symbols and meanings and cultural drift. Off hand... umm.. in Taiwan we all recognize a person wearing green with a white helmet on a motorcycle is likely a postal delivery man. Our experience in this society assigns meanings to this image and we share those expectations. A person from China would not know what that meant because they are not living within the structure. We may say a temple is a great example of Chinese culture in Taiwan... yet how can we be sure the meanings are the same when the experiences and values of both Chinese and Taiwanese societies are so different. A few essays on the subject have demonstrated that Taiwan's boom in the 90's radically altered the memes of the temple as many Taiwanese felt they owed much of their wealth to the gods and thus erected home temples and poured millions of dollars into faith based enterprises. At the same time people in China were still learning to venerate Mao and Marx. The symbols and meanings of those images and figures are by no means shared.
These are all phenomena rooted in the experience within a structure and to call them "Chinese" is overlooking the core meanings of culture.
Blood may indeed be thicker than water -- but that didn't help the victims of Tiananmen Square none when the tanks started rolling.
You know as well as I do that when it comes to politics, there are no principals here on Taiwan.Ah, Jing. A troll who can mention Gramsci! A priceless rant, little one.
" i will lol my arse when singapore will start to ask are you chinese or are you singaporian?"
The renowned scholar of nationalism, Bennedict Anderson, tells a great anecdote in which he asks a room of students what they were.
He recalled three students he assumed were "Chinese" and to paraphrase their answers they responded:
1) Chinese American
2) Becoming Taiwanese as his family were Waisheng in Taiwan.
3) "Damnit! I am Singaporean... I am sick of everyone calling me a Chinese."
Anderson noted that the only "Chinese" was the American.
Jing,
Could you please explain at what point of Time "Original" Chinese culture happened. We all know ethonationalisms are equally valid as they are both constructed. You can argue they are both as strong and weak as he other. The difference is that to Taiwanese, Taiwan is a reality... Chinese culture and China exists in their imaginations.
David,
"They are Hoklo speaking with Chinese paternal ancestry and Pingpu maternal ancestry. They have developed a distinctive hybrid culture over 400 years in Taiwan."
I think this is important to understanding some of Taiwan's diversity and cultural dynamism, but it is meaningless to national or cultural integration... until it is politicized. Indonesia is a fantastic example of a national integration through social experience (structural) as the colonization by the Dutch served as the shared experience that was the predominant factor in uniting disparate peoples.
The academics will have their dry debate over the definitions and origins of zhonghua minzu... but why would the rest of us give a damn?
At the end of the day, it's those of us who self-identify as zhonghua minzu who will define what the term means, and what our nation means. Those of you in the peanut gallery are just observers, not participants.
Yes, we are participants, anon. We participate as victims: Tibetans, Taiwanese, Mongolians, Uighurs....
Ignorant Anon,
You can identify yourself as a "descendant of the dragon", but when you seek to transform the rest of us you become a colonizer and an oppressor. When you place us on scales of advancement you become a bigot. When you determine our fate due to your concept of our "race" you become a racist. When you seek to destroy our beliefs and assimilate us into your idea of "civilization" you commit an act of violence against us.
All this "dry" discussion of empirical research, field work, social theory and practice gives us some tools to protect ourselves from people like you. By understanding the processes and methodologies of the "civilizers" the bigots and racists we can strip your plans down to their bare bones and expose them for what they are... empty, shameful and disgusting blight on humanity.
p.s. I participate in my society every day. We are all part of the discussion.
"Another Dikotter book which I might suggest is, Teh Construction of Racial Identities in China and Taiwan. As interesting and illuminating as the Chinese part is..."
I meant Racial Identities in China and Japan. Sorry for any confusion.
"The laughable attempt to portray Taiwanese resistance to the mainland as principaled political opposition to dictatorship and communism and support of liberalism and democracy is simply self delusion. You know as well as I do that when it comes to politics, there are no principals here on Taiwan.
"
Look who's coming on strong with the 'uber-academic' speak. You knock Turton's explanation as to the resistance to China but fail to offer any of your own. If you claim it's just pure politics on the part of 'Greenies' as an attempt to grab some power then it seems you are the one who is smoking some indigenous herb because anyone on the ground here knows it cuts across the blue/green color spectrum.
"The academics will have their dry debate over the definitions and origins of zhonghua minzu... At the end of the day, it's those of us who self-identify as zhonghua minzu who will define what the term means, and what our nation means."
And you Children of the Yellow Emperor can squabble amongst yourselves as to what the hell you are and what your "nation" means. If you are actually in Taiwan your "nation" only has one outcome - but at least it sounds like you are on board with that.
You prove MT's point by disallowing any non-Han Chinese to even have a valid opinion. That's the part that is really bothersome about having kids here in Taiwan. Don't forget to tell all your friends and relatives living in the US that they are relegated to the bleacher seats and are not entitled to have any opinion about what 'America' is....
"Indonesia is a fantastic example of a national integration through social experience (structural) as the colonization by the Dutch served as the shared experience that was the predominant factor in uniting disparate peoples."
United everyone except for the Chinese diaspora in Indonesia. They hate them there. And they regularly riot and kill the Chinese descendants there.
Which I suppose in a sense means you're right--the common experience of being excluded from political and military power, of material wealth but living under the constant fear of physical and political violence--is why Chinese in Indonesia identify as Chinese. And it has nothing to do with identifying as a member of some great political entity of China.
Sorry anon, pro-China trolls only get one crack here.
Great comments.
What Michael and a few other posters are doing with their "dry" academic analysis, is ripping away the artifice of Chinese nationalism.
Keep it up. This is all very informative.
Oh my: deconstruct, delegitimize, Derridaesque, Gramscian, hegemony and subaltern all in one paragraph!
My, my, Mr. Jing - you certainly must have eaten your post-modern Wheaties this morning to regurgitate such fibrous diarrhea!
Truth be told, aren't we all rather just Modernist liberals suffering from existential angst?
the common experience of being excluded from political and military power, of material wealth but living under the constant fear of physical and political violence--is why Chinese in Indonesia identify as Chinese.As you've figured out, that's a big part of Taiwan's "we're not Chinese" culture. a) The Martial Law era KMT made a clear separation between Chinese and Taiwanese (linguistically, on ID cards, etc.) and used it to the Taiwanese peoples' disadvantage. b) The PRC has always threatened Taiwan with physical violence, whether Taiwan was being led by pro-ROC or pro-Taiwan forces. Neither experience made the Taiwanese feel the China love.
Feel free to try to convince me to identify as Chinese, it's your free speech right. But my identity is ultimately my choice. If you hold a gun to my head and make say I'm Chinese just so you don't kill me, have you really gotten what you want? If so, why does it make you happy? If not, then you'll have to make a more compelling argument to win my loyalty.
The rest of the world works fine, with culturally-linked countries coexisting as separate political entities. The cultural links often make them close allies. Isn't that more valuable than controlling a bitter vassal state?
"Indonesia is a fantastic example of a national integration through social experience (structural) as the colonization by the Dutch served as the shared experience that was the predominant factor in uniting disparate peoples."
Actually, one of the main problems for the political integration of "Chinese" in Indonesia has been active Chinese nationalism. The Hua Qiao groups established by the KMT have made an active attempt to incorporate these groups into their nationalist project, the Changhua minzu, and therefore creating a competing nationalism in Indonesia. A great example of the divisiveness of the racial/ethnic nation.
Jing said...The Taiwanese cannot exist without the Chinese, just as the shadow cannot exist without the original. The honest truth that the greenies in their heart of hearts know, but are unwilling to admit is that the singular tenent of Taiwaneseness is the rejection of Chineseness on the basis of gaining status and boosting their egos.So what your saying is, Taiwanese are Asian Canadians???
It is really funny reading the Chinese nationalists argue their case. It sounds like this:
"I can have a Chinese identity if I want... and everyone else I want to posess must have one too."
"Blood it thicker than water. Taiwanese are and always have been Chinese. They can't escape it. It is in their DNA. Therefore we must institute all sorts of programs to make them Chinese and ensure they hold an identity we claim is biological and thus shouldn't need enforcement."
FYI
The idea of "Chinese blood" came out of the 19th century and was used to give the anti-Manchuists an air of "science" to support their political agenda. I've heard of someone having politics in their blood... but it is just a colorful expression.
Blood has no memory and DNA is dumb. Racial political ideologies are just plain STUPID.
In the minds of all True Formosans (tm) the idea of TI functions as a cultural claim whose automatic assumption is that all Formosans belong together in one polity because they are a race-nation.
This is why True Formosans (tm) have constructed their Taiwanese good/Mainlander bad cosmology. Of course, this ignores the fact that most Taiwanese who oppose TI are not Mainlanders, especially the police and military, and most Taiwanese who embrace China do so out of choice rather than coercion, but this situation cannot be considered as it is contrary to the TI religion which holds, among other thins, that "all Formosans belong together in one polity."
"Chunghwamintzu" (Chinese Nation) was a concept artifically coined after the 1911 Chinese revolution, which started out with Sun Yat-Sen's slogan: "Ch'yuChu TaRu, HweiFu ChungHwa" ("Drive the Tartar/Mancu Barbarians out of China and Restore China"). It means that the Manchu/Tartars were not seen as part of the Chhinese until 1912 when the term "Chunghwamintzu" was coined and the Manchus were included in the concept (of a modern Chinese Nation). The purpose was to ensure that Manchuria remain within China.
When the concept of "Chunghwamintzu" was coined, the Taiwanese were Janapese subjects. In fact, before the end of WWII, the Chinese (including the CCP official views) treated and saw the Taiwanese as one of the "suppresed nationalities of the East" (DongFang RuoXiao Minzu"), listed by the Chinese routinely with Koreans, Vietnamese and other Asians.
So, the Taiwanese was not part of "Chunghwamintzu" to begin with.
"Chunghwamintzu" is not equivalent to Han Chinese. The Taiwanese is also not equivalent to Han Chinese.
Similarly, the British Nation is not equivalent to Anglo-Saxons. The US Nation is also not equivalent to Anglo-Saxons.
"In the minds of all True Formosans (tm) the idea of TI functions as a cultural claim whose automatic assumption is that all Formosans belong together in one polity because they are a race-nation. "
Anon,
You make some interesting points as I have seen some with an emphasis on SOME groups of Taiwanese deploy this strategy, especially in the USMG group, and I find it deeply disturbing. The tactics and methodology are a mirror reflection of the KMT/CCP ideology. Still, this is a fringe group.
A problem with your comment is that you conflate the people who call themselves "True Formosans" with Taiwanese Independence supporters. First, I think you are discussing fringe groups that may not be necessarily supporting TI and second, Sun Yat-sen ideology as discussed above is promoted in the education system. According to Sun, the role of education is to nationalize the citizens. Sun argues that the education system is a tool to promote ideology. So to assert it is not a form of coercion may be in error. Also, you imply that if people are not active in the TI groups then they "embrace China". This is false logic. I think it should be stated clearly that the majority of Taiwanese do not "embrace China". The number of Taiwanese who support dejure independence is double those who support unification. One way to read status quo is maintained independence. The support for a non-Chinese Taiwan is overwhelming.
Thanks for publishing this editorial, Michael Turton, and congratulations. I think that you tailor your style very well to the WSG's audience. But isn't there some way to avoid the awkward and off-putting locution "Chinese-ness"? I know why you do it (the same reason you sometimes put "Chinese" in quotation marks), but I think that using this ironic method of deriding the other side's claims tends to weaken your rhetoric slightly. I think that, if you write for the popular press again, you might want to eliminate anything, such as scare quotes, that could carry a whiff of academic condescension (if it is not too condescending of me to say so). Again, well done!
--A reader in Brooklyn, NY
A biased response: I'm proud that my son is a liberal. In the history of mankind, the liberals have brought the most significant changes to nations ands world events. China has the worst human rights record in the world right now, except for the Sudan.
China owns neither Tibet nor Taiwan. The latter was a gift to Chang Kai-shek by the Big Four Powers to placate him after WWII, nothing more, nothing less. Richard Nixon blessed the event in 1973.
Face it: China will "sinify" Taiwan as it is doing with Tibet and its own people along the Yangtze River.
The death of Taiwan will be another Darfur; a blot on the human race.
Larry Turton
Anon,
From what I can infer,
the use of "Chineseness" in quotes signifies the term and a subjectivity. Chienseness is undefinable and broadly used by different polities in different ways. It is a very problematic term.
Anon,
The terms and conditions of "Chineseness" are debatable and fluid. Without quotations Michael would appear to be validating this term, which is more the result of recent nationalist politics than cultural unity. He would also be validating one particular cultural construction or another with a disregard for the ethnic minorities in China who are non-Han, yet equally Chinese. Michael aptly avoids the orientalist mistake of colonizing his object through language. He in no way attempts to assign identities, symbols or behaviors based on his own fetishized belief in what is and is not "Chinese".
Smart move.
Anon -- I struggled for a long time with "Chinese-ness" but couldn't find a way to indicate its contested, problematic status to an audience completely unaware of the issues. Thanks for the kind words.
Michael
Thanks, Dad!
In the history of mankind, the liberals have brought the most significant changes to nations ands world events.Well, technically being "liberal" means your open to change as opposed to "conservatives" who try to conserve the way things are. So of course all the significant changes were made by liberals! But that includes both good and bad. Liberals in Germany decided to do away with the old status quo of tolerating Jews. Liberals in Russia decided to try an experiment involving the elimination of private property. Liberals in China decided to try the same experiment.
In today's language what is liberal in one place is conservative in another. Freedom of speech? In China that's liberal because it would be a change. In the U.S. it's conservative (because we've had it for 200 years and want to conserve it).
One interesting way of looking at the American and French revolutions is that the American revolution was conservative while the French revolution was liberal. The Americans were trying to preserve their rights as Englishmen and found the only way to do so was to revolt. But the French had never had rights so their revolution was liberal.
Remove the KMT brainwashing in the education system designed by the KMT and implemented for over 50 years and how many of the citizens of Taiwan would call themselves Chinese? A small minority.
It is remarkable how many still oppose being called Chinese in this brainwashed environment.
In the fifty years ---
You speak a language other than Mandarin in the school systems -- you get fined.
You never get a chance to learn anything about local culture or history -- but you know how many provinces a train passes through from Beijing to central Asia, and in every province what their economies are like, their products, their exports.
You memorize long lists of Chinese emperors and names of dynasties even when the largest ones were actually not ethnic Han, but were empires that conquered the Han Chinese people -- the Mongol and Manchu empires -- a.k.a. "Yuan and Qing dynasties of China".
Your parents live in fear that if they say anything about their real ethnicity, mother tongue, etc. that their families will be punished, economically disenfranchised, arrested, or even murdered by the KMT secret police headed by Chiang Ching-kuo who learned his secret police tactics from the Soviet Union. Many grow up never knowing the truth until adulthood. Only in their 20's do they begin to find out or hear from their parents that their families ancestors actually had a separate existence from China.
And all this is after a cultural conditioning by the Japanese empire's colonial rule in Taiwan that forced Formosans or Taiwanese (of all ethnicities) to take Japanese names, customs, and dress. Already the Taiwanese of whatever ethnicity were beginning to be conditioned for propaganda and brainwashing.
In this setting, it is remarkable indeed that there is any extant Taiwanese identity.
The only reason their is one, is not because of an artificial construct by DPP forces in their brief days of partial power in the executive branch, but because there really is a separate identity that could endure the pressure of 100 years of colonialist regimes which tried to eradicate it.
Aì Tâi-oân,
Your mistake is that you assert the Taiwanese identity exists apart from the experience, or that it developed in spite of the experience. That it was a definable object 100 years ago and it has been under assault ever since.
I think this is a mistake as a Taiwanese identity exists BECAUSE OF these experiences.
Some even argue that the Japanese gave people on Taiwan the tools they needed to imagine their community as Taiwanese. Before Japan arrived there were no accurate maps of the territory, literacy was low and thus people could not read about far off places in Taiwan, transportation around Taiwan was dangerous and most people stuck to their locality and did not imagine other places that they could not read about or visit, the island was not under a single government with uniform codes.
So your argument is very problematic and I hope Taiwanese independence activists will abandon such tropes and move on to a more progressive stance.
The previous post puts it rather well and I am almost inclined to leave it at that. All I am saying is that if you start ironizing nationalities or putting them in quotation marks, you will never be able to speak of Taiwan or Taiwanese society with a straight face. Perhaps just write something like this:
"Because he cannot support it openly, President Ma is trying symbolically to insinuate that a Chinese annexation of Taiwan would be justified on the basis of culture and race. His recent public performances are meant to lend respectibility to the absurd idea that because most present-day citizens of Taiwan have a Chinese ancestor, they ought to be ruled by the present-day government of China."
Or something like that. 好了好了，睡覺。
--Brooklyn (formerly Taipei)
Readin:
I would strongly suggest you distinguish between a liberal/conservative dipole and a populist/libertarian dipole. The American founding fathers were libertarian, but I don't know that they were conservative. A libertarian, for example, would be opposed to gun control but opposed to any control of the press, such as through censorship (the US still says a few words can't be said on TV).
Applied to this part of the world, both the CCP and the KMT can be correctly described as authoritarian (and authoritarian-leaning these days for the KMT), though the CCP used to be "liberal" economically and the KMT could be described in some ways as conservative economically.
Readin':
A fat no to your comment on liberal/conservative. Classical liberalism sanctifies property rights and all liberalaism maintains that indivdual rights should be protected from the power of the state, so calling the Nazi regime or the French Revolution liberal is a complete perversion of the meaning of the word.
I don't know exactly when or where the Republican right hatched the strategy of perverting, to serve its own purposes, the meaning of liberalism, but it's quite clear what the strategy aimed to do: it sought to separate classical liberalism from "welfare liberalism," which grew out of the Enlightenment's emphasis on tolerance and on opposition to prejudice -- all so that "liberal" could then be conflated with "radical." The strategy to a large extent succeeded. And so we end up with the absurdity of your placing two non-liberal assumptions of power (Nazis, French revolution) under the rubric "liberal" and removing the truly liberal (both classical and egalitarian [for white males]) American revolution from its proper category. The French Revolution had some elements of librealism but was definitely lacking in respect for property, due process, and other rights. And the non-universalist Nazi regime featured almost no liberal elements.
You're a victim of Republican double-speak, Readin'. My own awareness of this Orwellian move transpiring was George Bush braying the term "L-word" in the 1988 election. And the reversal of meaning only got worse after that. In fact, non-religious right Republicans are basically classical liberals, while Democrats are basically welfare liberals. And both types of liberals generally acknowledge at least some need for the other's strain of liberalism within an overall liberal political framwork.
The U.S. was the first modern liberal state, and it remains a liberal state. And conservatives are liberals, as are Democrats who advocate more state regulation and a limited redistribution of resources. Equating state regulation and a limited redistribution of resources with believing in the supremacy of the state is a scare-tactic designed to fool and herd uncritical thinkers.
The Republicans did a great job of doing exactly that in a political landscape full of uncritical thinkers.
And look where America is now.
My thanks to many on this thread for truly informative, insightful and thought-provoking stuff. Thanks especially to Michael for the article, the post, and the link to Dikotter's book (what fantastic reading!). And Anon 8:24 a.m., you did a beautiful job of pointing out the stunning-but-semi-clever lapses in logic in 4:39 a.m.'s comment. Many other great comments, too.
Han chauvinism has numbers and growing power on its side -- and it has the facts of its racism, ahistorical nature, and glaring illogic going begging to be highlighted. I think HC will trip over itself once these facts get more attention. It's encouraging to me that the Dali Lama is finally hitting on the key point: that China is "acting like a child," because I think the most important element in the hatred and violence at the core of HC is vast-scale defense mechanisms inculcated by historical processes and by state media. HC's seem to believe that it is "moral" to twist arguments, employ bad analogies, eschew apt analogies, omit inconvenient facts, and selectively interpret. My guess is that, at bottom, they would feel themselves to be nothing (or too little) without their HC -- that they are sorely lacking in self-esteem and that HC is their compensation mode of choice (or by default).
A fixed compensation mode or idea that serves to inflate one's self-image/mask poor self-esteem at the expense of others is the defining characteristic of narcissistic personality disorder. And NPDs are, at heart, emotionally stunted and deformed children. So while the Dalai Lama's comment won't, by itself, have much impact, I think it's significant in that it touches on the core problem.
It is not my impression at all that most Chinese have NPD. I would say, rather, that most have been brainwashed, but are not so far gone that logic and "truth" are too much of a threat to their sense of selves.
Spreading logic and more accurate information among Chinese may be a huge job, but the HCs face a huge job, too, in preventing China's many non-NPD people from ever becoming aware of the fallacies surrounding HC.
NPDs rarely change, so I doubt it's much use using logic to argue with them. Blow away one ridiculous argument of theirs and their minds will shift to some other means of maintaining the narcissistic compensatory idea. And when all that's left is the "might makes right" fallacy, they will cling to that one to the bitter end.
I'm not sure that Taiwan will avoid being swallowed up by China, and surely China will wreak further violence and destruction on Tibetans and other groups of people before any real change in the dominant Chinese mentality obtains. But I believe the majority of Chinese people, despite all, are open to reason, win-win decency, and universalist principles.
Post a Comment