-image-taiwan’s economic freedom/pro-communism
One of the reasons that AsiaPundit objects to calling the Kuomintang pro-communist is that they are far less interventionist economically than the governing DPP. Sun Bin notes the island’s economic freedoms have deteriorated under the Chen Shui-Bian administration:
According to the Heritage Foundation, the economic freedom of Taiwan drops from #26 last year to #37 this year.
Meanwhile, HK stayed at #1, 8 years after reverted to PRC rule. China still ranked low, but its score has improved steadily (note high value in score means unfree).
Taiwan’s score has been in the decline since Chen Shui Bian started to rule the island (score=2.03 in 2000). The only year of improvement was right before the 2004 election (improved slightly from 2.48 to 2.34). It seems safe to expect the decline until 2008 election.
The DDP’s instincts, similar to their opponents across the Strait, have been to meddle rather than further free Taiwan’s economy. The KMT, whatever questions there may be about their foreign cross-Strait policies, are economically further removed from their Beijing counterparts. Calling them pro-communist because they hold dialogue sessions with the CCP isn’t appropriate - no more than it would be to call the Bush administration pro-communist because it dialogues with the Chinese leadership.
That said, the Foreigner has opened a debate on what the Communists should be called:
AsiaPundit favorably reviewed my previous post, but had a small quibble with my referring to Taiwan’s adversaries on the other side of the Strait as "communists". In truth, I’m not entirely happy with this description myself. AsiaPundit is right to point out that they ceased to be real communists the day they abandoned the economic model calling for state ownership of the means of production. One could refer simply to "Beijing" or "the Chinese leadership", but that glosses over the moral nature of the regime. So what word then, better designates their beliefs and policies?
"Fascist" seems too harsh, because the government in Beijing is not interested in the rigid state control over the economy that the fascists were enamored with. On the other hand, "authoritarian" is too mild, because the Chinese authorities work very hard to suppress the organizations of civil society (ie: religions) that many authoritarians are content to leave unmolested *.
For China’s CCP to continue to call themselves ‘communist’ is indeed a great a misnomer. But so is the initial adjective in the ‘Democratic’ People’s Republic of Korea. If you call the KMT ‘pro-communist’ because it has dialogue with the CCP, for consistency you would have to call the CCP ‘democratic’ because it supports North Korea.
In terms of cross-Strait politics, calling the CCP ‘pro-nationalist’ would be a better description as it more neatly sums up their own ideology and their fawning over the KMT. Mainland state media has recently taken to praising both the anti-Japanese activities of the CCP and the KMT, so it would be less of a stretch.
That said, AsiaPundit is actually not adverse to fascist. As P.J O’Rourke noted in a late 1990s visit to Shanghai:
I don’t want to disparage private enterprise. The world has political, religious, and intellectual leaders for that. But when a totalitarian government gets cozy with large financial and manufacturing concerns, it rings a 20th century historical bell. I’m thinking how a certain ‘people’s car’-ein Volkswagen-got its start. I’m thinking, ‘Made the trains run on time.’ I’m thinking, ‘Greater Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere.’ There’s a technical name for this political ideology.
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3 Responses to “taiwan’s economic freedom/pro-communism”
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January 7th, 2006 at 1:03 am
George Bush can dialogue with Beijing all he likes. But I guarantee that if he were to veto weapons appropriations for the Pacific Fleet 44 times in a row, “pro-communist” would be one of the MILDER things said about him by American conservatives.
January 8th, 2006 at 10:48 pm
One of the reasons that AsiaPundit objects to calling the Kuomintang pro-communist is that they are far less interventionist economically that the governing DDP.
This is one of the most remarkably clueless things you have ever written, Chris. The KMT is FAR, FAR more interventionist than the DPP. As Robert Wade put it nicely, Taiwan in its Miracle heyday had the highest rate of state ownership of business outside of the Soviet bloc, not to mention fixed exchange rates, etc. In Taiwan under the KMT, the phones, steel, electricity, intercity buses, sugar, tobacco, alcohol, trains, rice and other ag products, shipbuilding, arms production, and many others, were wholly owned by the State. The State/KMT also owned firms in construction, cement, and many others. Only the totally ignorant and/or totally malicious could write something as stupid as “economic openness has declined under the DPP government.”
Reality is that the Chiang gov’t never wanted to open up the economy and a fierce fight brewed between technocrats and the fascists in the KMT government over the economy when the import substitution phase ended at the end of the 1950s. Reality is that the US had to force the KMT to open up the economy in the 1960s, and that a portion of aid in 1960 was withheld because the KMT would not. Had the US not fought for capitalism, and especially Taiwanese capitalism, in the KMT’s socialist, government controlled economy, there would be no freewheeling trade sector today.
Citing the Heritage Foundation, long on the KMT payroll, as a fair source on the DPP, is frankly, shameful.
This is basically propaganda, pure and simple. I’ll definitely have to blog on this.
Michael
January 8th, 2006 at 11:31 pm
Michael,
I’ll look forward to that, I always enjoy your rebuttals, and I will accept that the KMT had been historically interventionist.
However, you are citing the KMT’s actions in the 1950s and 1960s as examples of them being interventionist now. My major argument, and SunBin’s and the Heritage Institute’s in this case, would be on the current climate and the shift in policies since CSFB took the reins.
The DDP is more restrictive on mainland investment flows, internal environmental policies and a number of other matters. Restrictions of chip fabs and petrochemical plant investment in China - for instance - cannot be justfied under ’security’ reasons if the Mainland already has such technologies from the ventures set up by Toshiba, BASF, BP etc…
If we are going to bring up the KMT’s behavior in the 50s and 60s when discussing how they should be defined today, then I don’t think Foreigner and I could be quibbling over whether ‘pro-communist’ is a suitable term for the party. (For that matter, if we were to jump back as recently as the Lee Teng-hui years, pro-communist wouldn’t be something you could tag on the KMT).
And I am hardly a pro-KMT propagandist, but calling them ‘pro-communist’ does them a disservice. (Not that you have, I note you typically use the ‘pro-China’ label - I see nothing wrong with using Blue/Green).
That said, calling the KMT crass opportunists and short-sighted on defense would in my estimation be pretty accurate.