This study will analyze the political conditions underlying the first direct presidential elections in Taiwan, scheduled for March, 1996. The study will emphasize the process whereby these elections came to be planned, the conflicts---verbal, legal and physical---which have accompanied the effort to establish democratic practices, and the changing relationship with China which has accompanied this reform in Taiwan.
As we read in the Los Angeles Times, the elections will culminate a process which has been progressing for eight years. The elections "represent a zenith for democratic reforms in Taiwan that began with the lifting of martial law in 1987 and have also spawned a feisty brand of democracy" ("Taiwan Finally" A-30).
The final Parliamentary decision approving the rules governing the elections was achieved on July 20, 1995 ("Taiwan Finally" A-30), following the 1994 final approval by the National Assembly of the proposal for the presidential elections ("Lee Sets Bid" 706).
As A. James Gregor writes, the presidential elections are the final step in a slow but steady march toward democracy which began when the Republic of China on Taiwan was originally formed by Nationalist leader Chiang Kai-shek in 1949 after his forces were finally defeated by the communists in China. As Gregor writes,
Long lost in the shadow of mainland China, the people of Taiwan have not only created an 'economic miracle' in a [nation] . . . almost devoid of natural resources, but they have peacefully transformed . . . a stolid authoritarianism into a vibrant democracy (Gregor 5).
Important landmarks in the last decade in this progress toward democratic presidential elections include the election by the National Assembly of Chiang Ching-kuo to the presidency in 1978; the aforementioned lifting of martial law conditions in 1987; the 1989 establishment of protection for parties in opposition to the ruling party, the Kuomintang (KMT) or Nati...