Don’t Call Taiwan “The Island”

In recent years, “the island” has emerged as the prevailing and often sole descriptor of Taiwan’s political existence throughout English-language news reports. Trying to not offend China, editors rely on the epithet as a crutch which falls short of referring to Taiwan as a “country” or “nation.” At first glance, “the island” looks like an innocuous nod to Taiwan’s geographical position and a welcome alternative to the demeaning and inaccurate, yet too frequent, “province” identifier China emphatically favors. But overusing the word “island” in lieu of “country” or “nation” reduces Taiwan’s sovereignty.

As “the island” appears consistently in Anglophone media despite varied attitudes towards Taiwan’s sovereignty, the curious appellation begs for an examination into its origins. Its roots could harken to “Ilha Formosa,” or “beautiful island,” which Portuguese explorers coined in 1542 and is still widely known in the West to date. Century-old British accounts of Taiwan simultaneously call it “Formosa” and “the island,” in its days of Japanese rule. In the decades following the Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) official arrival in Taiwan in 1949, English use of “Formosa” waned but “the island” persisted in the wake of escalating tensions between the KMT and “Red China,” and new titles for Taiwan proliferated.

A sampling of American news reports during this time but prior to the Carter administration’s de-recognition of Taiwan in 1978 uncovers adjectives for Taiwan like “Nationalist-held island,” “the nation,” a “country,” and “island republic.” Indubitably, the United State’s severance of official diplomatic relations with Taiwan translated to ambiguity in the news regarding Taiwan’s sovereignty. The need to appeal to the Chinese government’s position in the media has compounded the situation. From here, terms such as “island of Taiwan,” “estranged province,” “renegade province,” and the ever-so-ubiquitous “island” have repeatedly come to substitute “nation” and “country” in the news about Taiwan.

Albeit not the worst of noun for Taiwan, “the island” is problematic as a substitute for “nation” or “country” because it is a geographic fallacy, discredits Taiwan’s political existence, and often is a result of censorship.

To start, “the island” does not accurately describe the geographic reach of the nation of Taiwan. Whereas the notion of “Taiwan” in antiquity began as a single island, today’s nation of Taiwan includes not just the main island of Taiwan, but numerous outlying islands such as Quemoy (Kinmen), Matsu, and the Pescadores (Penghu) as well. Calling the country of Taiwan “the island” would be as much of a failure in textbook geography as referring to each of the island nations of Japan, Indonesia, and New Zealand as simply “the island.”

Within English-language settings, “the island” is regularly used to avert the issue of Taiwan’s sovereignty, with the effect of relegating Taiwan to an indeterminate political state. In an eye-opening 2015 piece, Professor Catherine Chou of Grinnell College comments on the ‘Crazy Rich Asians’ movie’s disconcerting use of  “the island” to describe Taiwan. She observes the differences between Singapore and Taiwan, wherein Singapore “is allowed, by the international community, to exist as an independent nation-state” and Taiwan “is treated most often as a non-entity or a deluded curiosity, despite being one of the freest and most democratic societies in all of Asia,” although both are sets of islands with their own independently-run governments. Indeed, Singapore seemingly enjoys being identified as a “nation state,” “island nation,” “nation,” or “country” far more often than Taiwan does in English-language news.

In both political and non-political arenas, China has expended enormous effort into whittling away at Taiwan’s nationhood, while bolstering its own narrative. China has long courted Taiwan’s few remaining formal diplomatic allies to switch allegiances and its influence has prevented Taiwan from donning its own name in international events such as the Olympics, where Taiwan has been obliged to compete under “Chinese Taipei” (yet another misnomer) for decades. This year, China’s endeavors have impeded Taiwan’s participation in the WHO amid the Covid-19 pandemic, and even protested in a bird conservation NGO. In the private sector, China demanded dozens of airlines to refrain from referring to Taiwan as a country and several international brands have faced pressure to apologize to China over suggestions that Taiwan is a country. This all is but a microscopic list of China’s transgressions against Taiwan.

Taking into account the precarious, complex nature of Taiwan-China relations, it is no surprise news outlets tread lightly when discussing Taiwan’s geopolitical status. This holds especially true for news companies owned by Chinese investors, such as Forbes, and those looking to recover lost business from past run-ins with the Chinese government, such as Bloomberg.

Regardless of a news source’s standing with China, using “the island” in place of “country” or “nation” subjects journalists to less risk of antagonizing China. Unfortunately in recent memory, this risk’s palpability manifested with China’s deleterious expulsion of American journalists, including those for The Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, and the Washington Post.

Yet to preserve journalistic integrity and free speech, journalists—the torchbearers of freedom— should break the shackles of censorship and self-censorship that bred the widespread use of “the island” as an euphemism for “nation” or “country.” Instilling “the island” as the single geopolitical descriptor for Taiwan perpetuates China’s fabrications that Taiwan is nothing but a mere island it owns.

More importantly, eroding Taiwan’s sovereignty as to avoid displeasing China amounts to surrendering the freedom of speech which is so fundamental to maintaining well-functioning democracies. We must not forget a loss of free speech coalesced with police brutality in Hong Kong and, worst, a Nazi-like genocide in East Turkestan (Xinjiang). As for non-journalists, we can do our part by employing “country” and “nation” more and “the island” less in our daily speech, and call out instances of “the island.” At the very least, we can begin to speak of “Taiwan” the country as simply “Taiwan,” instead of “the island.”

At best, “the island” overlooks a political map and gazes solely at a physical map. Friends of Taiwan and supporters of liberty, let’s challenge ourselves to give Taiwan the full credit it deserves as a full democratic nation and state.