Friday links and comments

Fengyuan from above.

Cole writes on the staged legislative brawls.

A despairing KMT, which suffered severe losses in the January 2016 elections, now sees no alternative than to create disruptions in parliament. To be fair, when they were in a similar position, it was not beneath DPP legislators to turn to similar means to prevent the passage of bills. It is not impossible, moreover, that some of the opposition legislators who have engaged in such behaviour are doing so consciously, to discredit not only the institution itself but, more cynically, the democratic ideals that are often associated with President Tsai Ing-wen and her DPP. Whether they do this for short-term electoral gains or willingly as part of a counter-democratic narrative orchestrated by Beijing is open to question. Whatever the motivation, such antics should no longer be countenanced and ought arguably to result in fines and/or temporary suspension.

Kharis Templeman had a great series of posts on brawling.

D Fell in the Sentinel on when martial law really ended:

In a recent panel discussion one of my students suggested that by talking of a 30th anniversary we are neglecting the different experiences of Taiwan’s offshore islands (this point was made by SOAS M.A. Taiwan Studies student Matt Taylor). We should not forget that martial law was not lifted on Kinmen and Matsu until November 1992. County commissioners were only directly elected there in 1993. Although martial law was also lifted in Penghu in 1987, the military remained highly influential in the archipelago county’s governance and the KMT had an effective monopoly on its local politics until 1993.

The national security law that the KMT passed in 1987 was martial law in all but name, and Fell observes that people were still being arrested under Premier Hau's administration until 1992. Political prisoners remained in custody until 1993. That's really the year that democracy began in earnest in Taiwan.

I have often made the point that martial law lingered, but another disturbing aspect is that the structures of authoritarian control remain. For example, the neighborhood captains are still around, and in universities, classes still have a class leader and are divided into groups of 50, originally a structure set up for authoritarian control. The democratic spirit permeates all, but it is worth noting that some bones of the skeleton of the old one-party state are still there, waiting for the flesh to revive them. Brrr......

Taiwan Sentinel with a useful piece on a campaign to discredit the Tsai Administration among the nation's temples. The campaign claims the Administration is going to ban the burning of incense, which is nonsense. Temples are key political players in many localities and powerful temple organizations can influence voters.

This is why I don't trust any polls. Tsai's approval rebounds? Taiwan Next Gen Foundation, whatever that is, published a poll on Tsai and her administration's policies, with approval of Tsai at 51%. Yeah right.

Squeezing of KMT assets continues, with the government demanding the party pay US$28 million for assets seized from Japan and then sold off. No one knows what treasures were lost when the KMT took for itself what belonged to the people of Taiwan as their historical legacy. Ironically, by removing so many visible symbols of Japanese power, and then by setting up a one-party state that was even more abusive than the Japanese state, the KMT made it possible for Taiwanese to sentimentalize Japanese rule. Karma is a bitch.

POLITICIANS IN THE NEWS: Popular DPP politico Lo Chih-cheng blows his chance at New Taipei City mayor run by getting caught having an affair. But this is the most beautiful thing ever: KMT politician Alex Tsai held for embezzlement. I'll have a full workup on this in a bit.

IN CASE YOU HAVE FORGOTTEN: Lee Ming-che is still in custody in China. NYT piece on it.
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MOAR LINKZ:

• Taiwan cruise sector to grow
• Beijing's united front tactics against Taiwan. China is boycotting the university games.
• No US beef ban: a deal has been made
• The Hindu on China's expansionism
• New Southbound Policy forging links to think tanks in other Asia-Pacific countries
• Disaster prevention center at Taipei Main Station becomes political football
• Growth forecasts edging up.
• Chinese media whines that Tsai is making "Cultural Taiwan Independence" real by merging China history into E Asian history.
• A FIRST: local governments have begun issuing documents in aboriginal languages.

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