On 27 March, Ma Ying-Jeou, Taiwan’s former President, began his 12-day journey in mainland China. Serving the Nationalist Party(KMT), his trip seemed more cultural than political: he commemorated Sun Yat-Sen’s legacy, paid tribute to his ancestors, but was not scheduled to meet any senior Chinese officials. By reaffirming political and cultural linkages, Ma signals his willingness to engage the increasingly hawkish mainland and preserve KMT’s Yi Zhong Ge Biao principle [“one China” with different representations]. Ma’s engagement-oriented stance is in stark contrast with Tsai Ing-Wen, the current Taiwanese President from the opposing Democratic Progressive Party(DPP), who visited the United States on 19 April. During her tour, US White House Speaker Kevin McCarthy avowed to deepen cooperation with Taiwan through increased arms sales and reaffirmed the defence of democratic values. The two parallel trips reflected two opposing approaches to manoeuvring Taiwan’s strategic position.

Rapprochement and Backlash 

KMT and CCP (Chinese Communist Party) have a shared recognition of “China”– a cultural and political imagined community ignited by Chinese nationalism.  Since Ma’s administration from 2008 to 2016, the stereotypical image of the KMT has been increasingly pro-China and pro-CCP . Re-igniting the common recognition of “one China”, Ma adopted a policy of soft balancing, boosting unparalleled cross-strait exchanges, especially in economic terms. In 2010, Taipei and Beijing signed the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement to facilitate trade and commerce. By 2016, 70,000 Taiwanese companies ran businesses in China, with Chinese investment accounting for 60 percent of Taiwan’s foreign investment. 

Ma’s underlying intention might well be to lock the status quo in economic interconnectedness. However, these policies arguably rendered Taiwan financially more reliant on China and more vulnerable to coercion. China has conversely become less dependent on Taiwan, as Taiwan only shared 1.7% of China’s total trade by 2015. As China embarked on its own semiconductor industry represented by SMIC to reduce dependence on Taiwan’s TSMC, aggression towards Taiwan became increasingly less costly. Eventually, Beijing has more leverage over Taiwan and is thus more risk-tolerant. 

Indeed, since the 1979 Joint Communiqué with the US which officially acknowledges the “one China principle”, Beijing has attempted to endorse its narrative and claim Taiwan as part of its sphere of governance. Ma’s close association with the CCP intensified distrust from parts of Taiwanese populace who subscribed to a separate political identity from the cultural identity as “Chinese”, not to mention the diversity of Taiwan indigenous peoples. This tension culminated in the 2014 Sunflower Movement against the Cross-Strait Service Trade Agreement (CSTA). According to the protesters, this agreement would imperil Taiwan’s autonomy at the hands of the Mainland. Meanwhile, the DPP, positing as a fierce gainsayer, denounced Ma for sabotaging Taiwan’s sovereignty in exchange for myopic benefits from China.  Subsequently, the KMT suffered a major setback in the nine-in-one local elections that same year . 

Detachment and Feud

As for the DPP and Tsai Ing-Wen, the first elected female president of Taiwan in 2016, they reversed course to promote  a pro-independence stance. Tsai sought to reject the 1992 Consensus that recognises “one China”. Instead she equated the Republic of China with Taiwan, highlighting Taiwan’s distinct historical and developmental trajectory over the past 70 years since 1949.

Based on this thinking, Tsai prioritised expanding Taiwan’s international space and enhancing soft power. One of the strategies is the New Southbound Policy that aims for forging relations with Southeast Asia and South Asia through the provision of developmental aid. By 2017, Taiwan’s assistance reached US$310 million, spent on constructing social infrastructure and improving education and healthcare for 17 diplomatic allies. Domestically, Tsai made Taiwan the first in Asia to legalise same-sex marriage in 2019. Coined as Tongzhi Diplomacy, this domestic reform has gained world recognition in non-governmental organisations and helped to promote Tai Wan Jia Zhi [Taiwanese values], a distinctly Taiwanese identity which embraces vibrant civil societies.

Yet, decoupling with the Mainland induced cross-strait tension. Tsai’s rejection of “one China” undoubtedly provoked Beijing. Following Tsai’s trip to the US and tours around countries which maintain diplomatic relations with Taiwan, the Mainland opted to use coercion such as live-fire exercises off the coast and economic sanctions. Under diplomatic pressure from the Mainland, Taiwan has lost five formal diplomatic allies to China and its observer status in key international governmental organisations (IGOs), including the World Health Assembly (WHA). In August 2022, US House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s trip to Taiwan, which signalled US support for Taiwan’s independence, brought the situation to a head. Taiwan faced unprecedented threats from the Mainland, including ballistic missile launches over the island and naval operations approaching Taiwan’s territorial waters. 

Taiwan at Crossroads

The divergent approaches of KMT’s and DPP’s administrations revealed the dilemma of maintaining cross-strait stability while striving for a free flourishing political space. There are also two additional complications which deter the possibility of a peaceful resolution to the matter. One is domestic opinion: between approaching or alienating the Mainland, the general Taiwanese population tends to express a certain degree of ambivalence and division. Indeed, following the 2014 Sunflower Movement, there is a growing manifestation of civic nationalism in Taiwan.  According to the Election Study Centre of National Chengchi University, by 2020, 60.8% of the surveyed public identified themselves as Taiwanese only, nearly double the ratio who see themselves as both Taiwanese and Chinese. This deteriorating view of the Mainland was especially evident after the crackdown on Hong Kong in 2019. Even so, a significant portion of the Taiwanese population do not trust the US, either. Amidst a period of heightened tensions, more than 56% of individuals surveyed did not perceive the US as a credible ally of Taiwan, while only 33% have confidence in the US’s support for Taiwanese interests. Moreover, around 50% voted for maintaining the current status of Taiwan, endorsing neither formal independence nor Beijing’s “one country, two system” as exemplified in Hong Kong or Macau. 

However, the prospect of a return to the “status quo” may be hard to stabilise. This uncertainty leads to the second complication of re-uniting Taiwan in Xi’s grand strategy . While Ma’s recent trip offered an olive branch to the Mainland, China appeared less interested in being re-engaged. In fact, China received Ma at a level reserved for provincial leaders, implying an intention to put Ma in an inferior position. With Chinese President Xi Jinping’s undeterred ascension, China has become increasingly hawkish towards national unification, attempting to disrupt the current equilibrium. Ma’s speech that contained discourse on the “Republic of China” was censored across the Mainland’s media, which implies an agenda to monopolise the “one China principle” according to the People’s Republic of China (PRC)’s interpretation. As Taiwan’s unification with the Mainland is frequently featured in propaganda of the “Chinese dream”, it is likely that Xi intends to make it his own political legacy. 

The issue of Taiwan also revolves around US-China relations. On the part of the US, the Biden administration has signalled a continuation of the  “strategic ambiguity” position to deter both Taiwan from explicit pro-independence gestures and the Mainland from aggression. The US would sustain its support to Taiwan, but ensure that the support level is aligned with the status quo without transformative impacts. It is this equivocation that has made some Taiwanese disillusioned and suspicious of the USA’s intentions. Moreover, as Biden engineers his “strategic rebalance” plan in Asia-Pacific, a consolidated alliance with Taiwan could be used as the US’s asset to pressure China. As Beijing became increasingly disquieted by the US’s use of Taiwan as a leverage point to check China in the Asia-Pacific region, the unification campaign with Taiwan gained additional legitimacy for the sake of national security. In searching for a secure equilibrium, it seems that Taiwan risks becoming a pawn in US-China competition. 

Past experiences have demonstrated that neither accommodation nor hard balancing was purely beneficial for Taiwan’s security situation. Formulating a “middle-way” takes courage and prudence as the identity discord and political reality hardly conforms to the “one China” principle that ties cross-strait peace. Additionally, how Washington plays around with “strategic ambiguity” and how Beijing will react to this policy remain crucial questions. Maintaining an equilibrium in the triangular relations between US, China and Taiwan is equally vital to cross-strait stability. Taiwanese officials should consider how to formulate their foreign policies in response to domestic expectations, as well as minimise the risks of entangling Taiwan in a great power competition.