Taiwan Today

On the Chinese mainland, the Communists can't find their way to modernization, so they look toward the Republic of China's example China's modernization is a century-old dream of not only the Chinese but many other peoples of the world. The Chinese want a standard of living to match their country's cultural richness. Others think of a modernized China as a trading partner of great potential. Thus far the dream has come true only in Tai­wan under the government of the Republic of China. It remains unfulfilled and unattainable on the Chinese mainland, which has been clamped under Communism since 1949. Communist takeover of the mainland forced China's first Republican government to move to Taiwan, an island which serves as China's last hope of democracy and modernization as well as an unwavering enemy of Chinese Communism. At the time of their separation 30 years ago, both Taiwan and the mainland were beginning to rebuild on the ruins of the eight-year war against Japanese aggression. Taiwan's population then stood at 8 million and that of the mainland at around 500 million. Per capita income was about the same — US$40 on the mainland and US$37.40 in Taiwan. Life was even harder for the Chinese in Taiwan than their countrymen on the mainland, because the island had few natural resources and had to rely heavily on imports. The mainland was rich in raw materials and had a vast reservoir of manpower. After 30 years of separate existence marked by collectivism on the mainland and free enterprise in Taiwan, differences in the quality and quantity of life have widened and sharpened. The population of each has doubled. But Taiwan's per capita income of US$2,000 is at least five times that of the mainland. The Republic of China on Taiwan is one of the richest societies in Asia and a widely admired model of modernization. Even the Chinese Communists are saying they must "learn from Taiwan." Chinese in Taiwan have found that prosperity cannot be achieved through ideology alone. Modernization requires capital, skilled manpower and advanced technology. Also important are political, economic and social systems assuring an environment in which capital can be amassed, people trained and technology acquired. Taiwan's modernization began with the land reform of 30 years ago. This was accompanied by political democratization. The Republic of China subscribes to the theory that private ownership of property and a fair distribution of wealth assure the fullest participation of the people in economic activities. Equal rights to education and other opportunities guarantee social justice and progress. Farmers own the land they till. Investors are pro­tected against fraud. Workers are assured of a fair wage. Civil liberties are respected. The Chinese government has undertaken many programs for the development of Taiwan. Among them have been the Land-to-the-Tiller program of 1953, six consecutive Four-Year Economic Development Plans (1953-76), the Ten Major Construction Projects of the 1970s, the Six­ Year Economic Plan (1979-85) and the Grass Roots Construction Program for the countryside (1979-85). As a result, Taiwan's economy grew by 7.2 per cent annually between 1952 and 1959, 10.4 per cent between 1963 and 1972 and 9 to 10 per cent since 1973. Trade registered an increase of 102 times from 1952 to 1979, rising from US$303 million to nearly US$31 billion. One of the most significant gains has been the narrowing of the income gap between the top 20 per cent and the bottom 20 per cent of the people. The ratio was 15 to 1 in the early 1950s and 4.1 to 1 in 1979, one of the best records ever achieved by a developing nation. Free elections of local councils, mayors and magistrates were introduced in 1950 and those at the central level in 1972. Compulsory education was extended from six to nine years in 1968 and soon will reach 12 years. The transition from a war devastated island to an important economic contributor to the free world has been made in three decades. The picture on the Chinese mainland is completely different. The Chinese Communists also started as agrarian reformers but by compulsion rather than persuasion. After usurping the main­land in 1949, they terminated private ownership of property. Farmers waiting for their own land had to turn it over to the regime. Five-year economic plans faithfully imitated those of the Soviet Union. The Communist leadership has been obsessed with class struggle and endless revolution, thus retaining power and removing enemies. Peasants, workers, intellectuals and youths were rallied for continuous mass movements. After the "three-anti and five-anti" campaign of 1950 came the "anti­ rightists" campaign of 1954, the "letting 100 flowers bloom and 100 schools of thought contend" campaign of the late 1950s and the "cul­tural revolution" beginning in 1965. Statistics made public this year revealed the brutal economic fact that the Communists are not capable of feeding and clothing the mainland people. Grain production increased by about 2 per cent a year from 1958 to 1978, but the people were getting less food at the end of the period than at the beginning. In 1978 the cities had to rely on imports for 40 per cent of their grain. Last April, the Communist theoretical journal Red Flag acknowledged that "our country is still plagued by a very serious food shortage." People's Daily recently reported that in six provinces of the northwest, "the productive level and living standard of the masses are lower than those of pre-liberation days." Radio broadcasts from Inner Mongolia reported famine conditions in the winter of 1979. Red China's Bureau of Statistics said that the 1979 average income of peasants, constituting 90 per cent of the population, was US$46; and that of the workers was US$412. In other words, 90 per cent of the people on the mainland had the same income last year as in 1952. Prices of farm products were increased 15 per cent in 1978-79 to raise the income of peasants. But the gain was destroyed by inflation of 30.94 per cent. Mao Tse-tung's death in 1976 and the 1977 rehabilitation of Teng Hsiao-ping raised mainland hopes of improvement. Teng and Hua Kuo-feng proclaimed the "four modernizations" in Decem­ber of 1978. Actually this was restatement of a program announced 21 years before to catch up with the Soviet Union and the West. Measures in­cluded a wage increase of 40 per cent for workers, the first in 29 years; reopening of closed colleges; and dispatch of students abroad. Once again, expectations have turned out to be unrealistic. The modernization program is already on the rocks. Teng has admitted that the Communists hope for little progress even by the year 2000 because there are too many mouths to feed. New political struggles are under way. Teng has been compelled to return to the four Maoist prin­ciples of the proletarian dictatorship, Communist party leadership, the socialist road and Marxism-Leninism-Mao thought. The "Peking Spring" was nipped in the bud and Democracy Wall papered over. The "four big" freedoms have been removed from the constitution. The Maoist slogan of "upholding proletarian ideology and eradicating bourgeois ideology" is heard again. Communists fear that a better life for the people would be their undoing. They believe with David Ricardo that the working masses should not receive more than the minimum of goods necessary for life. They hold as did the 19th century British economist that compassion for the working class is wasteful, may raise false hopes and can be expected to accelerate population growth. Communism thrives on poverty and expires in prosperity. The Chinese Communist leadership dares not allow much modernization. The problem is to feed the people without arousing greater expectations. The Communists have not yet learned that when reform from the top become impossible, revolution from the bottom becomes inevitable. As mainland modernization fails, that of the Republic of China on Taiwan becomes the lodestar of China as a whole. Communism is the only obstacle to a free, democratic and prosperous China of the 21st century. The ways and means have already been worked out in the model province of Taiwan. Meanwhile, the Republic of China has been carrying out its own modest aid program to help those who started to modernize but haven't been able to progress so rapidly. The first Free Chinese farm demonstration team went to Africa in 1960. As of 1980, a total of 72 teams had been dispatched to share knowledge and experience in agriculture, sugar processing, edible oil extraction, fishery, animal husbandry, handicrafts, highway engineering and health services. Fifty-two countries have cooperated in these projects. Forty-eight teams have completed their work and returned home. Twenty-four remain abroad in 20 countries: 18 in farming, 2 in handicrafts, 2 in fishery, 1 in seed cultivation and 1 in animal husbandry. In a related program, 854 technicians from 47 countries have come to Taiwan for 55 technical seminars lasting for only a few days or up to six months. Most have been in agriculture, but such fields as sugar processing, fish culture, pottery making, handicrafts, animal husbandry and indus­trial skills are also included. The greatest interest in the Republic of China's programs has been shown by governments and peoples of Africa, the Middle East, Southeast Asia and Latin America. Most of the demonstration teams working in Africa have completed their assignments. Projects are still under way in Ivory Coast, Malawi, Lesotho and Swaziland. An agricultural team is still working in Saudi Arabia. There is a farm team in Indonesia, an animal husbandry group in Thailand and agricultural demonstrators in Fiji. This leaves the bulk of representation in Latin America and the Caribbean with teams in these countries: Dominican Republic, Haiti, Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Ecuador, Bolivia, Paraguay and Uruguay. These programs usually are established on a basis of what the host country needs and what the Republic of China can do best. Once preliminary agreement is reached, a survey team is dispatched to determine what can be done and where. The number of personnel, the specifics of support and the identity of those to be trained are agreed. In some cases, demonstrators have moved into virgin lands and started their work from scratch: building their own quarters, planting their own vegetables, clearing the land, digging wells, improvising pipe for irrigation and experimenting with crops and seed varieties. The abiding rule has been to keep it simple. Use of heavy machinery has been avoided. In some cases, small power tillers, rice planters, threshers and the like have been sent from Taiwan. These were always machines that the farmers of the area could make or buy for themselves. Other farm assistance programs in Africa and Latin America have failed because the mentors used highly advanced methods and expensive machinery. That mistake was carefully avoided in the Chinese program. Even under extremely arid conditions, the Chinese teams were able to grow vegetable crops that delighted the hearts of peoples who had been importing fresh produce from great distances. Green rice fields sprouted on the edge of deserts. It was widely said that the Chinese teams could grow rice if they could find water-and they almost always did. Without exception, the Chinese teams have found people eager to learn new methods of grow­ing crops or making goods and more than willing to work as hard as their teachers. Out of these experiences has grown respect for technology together with awareness that progress does not come with­out effort. The Republic of China did not enter upon its own aid program for political reasons. Some of the countries which once hosted Free Chinese teams have turned to the Communists. A few asked the demonstration groups from Taiwan to stay on anyway, and this was agreed in some cases. Not many welcomed the departure of the Republic of China's technicians and their replacement by the Communists. The experience of the Tanzam railroad has not given Africans confidence in Red China as an un­selfish purveyor of technical assistance. Nothing has been heard from the few countries that accepted mainland farm demonstration teams. That much could be expected in the light of the Chinese Communists' own call for "learning from Taiwan in agriculture and industry." Chinese demonstration teams working in the field usually follow a four-point approach. First comes experimentation. The crop varieties must be determined and the seasonal schedule worked out. Soil is studied, seeds and fertilizers chosen, pest control planned and machinery and physical facilities arranged for. This stage never ends, actually, because the accent is on scientific and not hit-or-miss farming. Demonstration is second. All steps in the farming process must be shown, from preparation of the soil to the harvest and even the marketing. Telling and showing local farmers are not enough; they have to be involved in the process and earn through doing. They must be invited to observe reaping, threshing, drying and other post-growing steps. Training involves more than observation and work in the field. The farm pupils attend classroom sessions and learn the science as well as the practice. They follow this up with field exercises. Fourth and finally is the extension program of conveying the latest agricultural findings to the farmers at their homes and in their fields. Continuing education of the farmer is the heart of Taiwan's agricultural success and has not been neglected in the Taiwan farmer's efforts overseas. While the agricultural aid programs are similar they are also different. Each assisted country has unique interests and problems. Ivory Coast may want to grow better pineapples, while Malawi is interested in upland crops. Bolivia wants to im­prove its corn and El Salvador its orchards. Nicara­gua hopes for better corn yields. Almost all the cooperating countries seek improved irrigation and have been greatly impressed by the prowess of the Chinese teams in finding and moving water. They have found that with water and hard work, any land can have its own rice and salad bowls. Friendship is a byproduct of the farm and other demonstration activities. The Chinese person­nel are not academicians. They come mostly from the countryside. All of them know what they are doing and have pride in representing their country. In the training sessions that precede trips abroad, demonstration teams are instructed to stick to their technical knitting and stay out of politics. They are glad to answer questions about life in the Republic of China but politely avoid comments on the political systems of the countries in which they find themselves. Their task is to help, not to criticize. During the heyday of the seminars conducted in Taiwan, visiting technicians were given a taste of Chinese life, including food, culture and travel around Taiwan. Instruction was conducted in English and French. An experimental farm was maintained where agricultural trainees raised their own crops. Most costs both in Taiwan and abroad have been borne by the Republic of China, although some of the cooperating countries have provided facilities for programs on their own lands. Technical cooperation programs have been renewed year after year for periods exceeding a decade. The Republic of China's bread has already come back on the waters. Although various coun­tries have chosen to recognize the Chinese Commu­nists, they have remained friendly with the people and government of Free China. As the late President Chiang Kai-shek so often said, those who are not enemies can be considered friends. Correspondents and visiting newspapermen fre­quently ask officials of the Republic of China why the government rejects negotiations and other contacts with the Chinese Communists. The ques­tion implies that they know little of the differences between the Republic of China and the Chinese Communists. They think the Chinese of Taiwan and the mainland should be able to get together and work out their differences. The conflict between Dr. Sun Yat-sen's Three Principles of the People of the free Chinese and the Marxism-Leninism-Maoism of the Chinese Communists is irreconcilable. The Three Principles of Nationalism, Democracy and Social Welfare go back to the beginnings of the Republic. They were originated by Dr. Sun, the founding father, as an expression of Chinese Confucianism combined with science and modernization. They are based on belief in the free system envisaged in Abraham Lincoln's government of the people, by the people and for the people. While still on the mainland, the government of the Republic of China provided the country with its first modern constitution and held elections in every province and autonomous region for the first popularly chosen parliamentary bodies. The Kuomintang (Nationalist Party) had competition from two other political parties. Dr. Sun maintained that the Kuomintang should be subject to challenge once the "period of tutelage" was over. When the government moved to Taiwan, it set about developing elected local government while continuing to maintain the central government institutions of National Assembly, Legislative Yuan and Control Yuan. These parliamentary bodies were preserved and maintained to represent all the people of China and prepare for the return of the legitimate government to the mainland. Chinese Communism was illicitly imported from the Soviet Union in 1921 and developed with the money and guidance of the Russian Commu­nists. It fed on China's problems and difficulties: the warlords, Japanese aggression and the postwar failure of the United States to understand Chinese realities. Although the Chinese Communists have been continuously inconsistent about their own ideolo­gy, they have steadfastly rejected freedom, democracy and elections in favor of a party elite com­manding the regime and telling the people what to do. Even after the excesses of the "cultural revolution," the Chinese Communists dared not permit even the small truths expressed in big character wall posters. They demanded that guarantees of free speech, press and public assembly be removed from their constitution. The Republic of China has had the experience of negotiating with the Communists on many oc­casions, beginning in the 1920s and coming down to the U.S.-sponsored talks conducted in the late 1940s under the eye of General George C. Marshall. Such negotiations follow a set pattern. As soon as the Communists gain a concession, they withdraw their quid pro quo and ask for more. Before General Marshall packed up and went home, the Communists were demanding that the government turn over control to them even before the coalition carne in to existence. Premier Sun Yun-suan has been the nation's spokesman in pointing out to visiting reporters that the Communists seek talks on a basis of a dominant regime dealing with a subordinate unit. To talk would be to surrender. Admission of Communist entitlement to mainland sovereignty would doom the Republic of China's cause. Red China has also proposed transportation links, postal and commercial relations, visitor exchanges and other contacts. The objective is to get something started and trap the Republic of China into admission that the Chinese Communists have the sovereign right of existence. Free China makes a distinction between the Chinese Communist regime of the CCP and the people of the mainland. Wherever they are found, the Chinese people are compatriots of the free people on Taiwan. This applies to the mainland, to places like Hongkong and to overseas Chinese residing all over the world. Now that students from the mainland are going abroad, young people of the Republic of China have been meeting them in the United States and elsewhere to offer help and the benefit of their long experience studying in foreign lands. Mainland students are not propagandized. If they ask about Taiwan, they are told the truth. Seamen from the Chinese mainland visiting Keelung port aboard a Panamanian freighter were invited to visit Taipei this year. Athletes from Taiwan and the mainland met in friendly competition at a Los Angeles area track and field meet. Scholars from Taiwan and the mainland have gotten together at various international scientific meetings. Even on the mainland, there is widespread admission that the only way to modernization requires "learning from Taiwan in economics and politics." Premier Sun has said that the Republic of China is perfectly willing to help modernize the mainland, but not while Communist tyranny prevails there. Some reporters also ask why the Republic of China should accept visitations from the main­land but object to people from Taiwan going to Red China. As with negotiation, the Communists never allow free and equal exchanges. If free Chinese go to the mainland, they may be used by the Communists as propaganda tools. In the past, returning overseas Chinese were held on the main­land as hostages. Many mainlanders in the Republic of China have relatives on the Chinese mainland. Some have kept in touch with family members over the years in letters dispatched through Hongkong and else­where. Some have managed to send money and other gifts to those in desperate need. Millions of people have escaped from the Chinese Communists. But most of these are from South China. People in the northern and central parts of the mainland and those living far inland have almost no chance of traveling to the coast and then making their way to Hongkong or Taiwan. The advice of refugees is unanimous: Don't talk to the Communists. Don't negotiate with them. Don't enter into formal relationships of any kind. Refugees point out that Taiwan is the model free province and the fount of hope for main­landers. If the Republic of China's island province were taken over, the last door would be slammed shut on expectations that the billion Chinese people will escape from tyranny within the foreseeable future. Travelers from the mainland who get to Taiwan are quietly shown a free country with eco­nomic prosperity unprecedented in Chinese history. What they have to say on their return to the mainland is their own business. Their Chinese friends in Taiwan are confident they tell the truth when and as they can. Free Chinese everywhere are confident that if the Chinese people could choose their government and way of life, the vote would overwhelmingly favor the Republic of China and the life style freely developed in Taiwan. At the same time, there is awareness that in 31 years, the Chinese Commu­nists have not allowed a free mainland election for even the smallest office. There is no need for talks with the Chinese Communists. Return of the Republic of China's government and Constitution to the mainland would quickly result in free elections for the parliamentary bodies which elect the president, pass the laws and are competent to decide China's destiny. If the people of the mainland wanted Communism, they could have voted for it, but they never did when free elections were allowed by the Republic of China. In consideration of that, the government of Free China owes them the right to make their own choice of the Kuomintang, the Chinese Communist party or any other political entity on the basis of a free and unhampered vote.