The weakness of a democratic system and its interplay with external political economic development － in case study of Taiwan after 1949

Abstract

Abstract

The major work of this research is to understand the characteristics and uniqueness of Taiwan’s democratic development. The weaknesses and problems of this democratic system are believed to be influential to its external political economic development especially when the Cross-Strait economic interaction is getting closer and become the most significant issue for the island’s further economic development.
In order to prove this argument, the research focuses on two major theories in the fields of democratic development and international political economy (IPE). The democratic development theories include the discussion of democratization (modernization, transition and social structural approach), democratic institutions (institutional choice and its political consequence), civil society and political culture. The IPE theories include the discussion of functional work of international economic organizations, type of trade, capital flow, and role of Multinational Corporations (MNCs). After reviewing the literatures about these two major theories, the researcher tries to apply these theoretical discussions into the case of Taiwan and createS a four-level analytical framework (democratic values, institutions choice and design and civil society) to examine and explain the interrelation between the weakness of Taiwan’s democratic system and its effects on the Cross-Strait economic interaction.
There are two parts of empirical research in this dissertation to enhance the idea mentioned above. The first part is the historical discussion in the chapters 5 and 6 which focus the sixty-one-year process (1949-2008) of the island’s gradually established democratic system under various periods of international political economy environment. The second part is the investigation on the current political situation of the island after the second party alternation and reconciliation of cross strait relations with a series of political talks and economic cooperation after 2008. In Chapter 7, the research focuses on Kuomintang (KMT) and its mainland policy; In Chapter 8, the discussion changes the focuses on the role of Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and its different perspectives on the development of further Cross-Strait interaction.
The major finding of this research is the fundamental weakness of Taiwan’s democratic system due to the long-existing Blue-Green Conflicts. The uniqueness had created the difficulties (dispute over One China Principle) for the nascent democracy to establish an efficient democratic system which is very influential to make useful economic policies especially the appropriate trade relations and commercial cooperation with China (including how to support Taishang). Nevertheless, the research of this dissertation also finds that the closer cross strait interaction after 2008 did not produce a direct, manifest and complete influence on the island’s internal social economic development, as well as the change of the democratic system.