A Tale of Two Taiwans: Discourse Gaps on Taiwan Affairs between DC and Taipei – Part I

This is Part one of a three-part series, “A Tale of Two Taiwans.”

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Taiwan is often framed in contradictory terms – from being simultaneously the most dangerous place on earth to its most friendly and hospitable, from being a critical hub for technological innovation to being a global supply chain risk, or from being a reliable democratic global leader to being a political flashpoint whose domestic expression of democracy complicates relations between world powers. Both of these “Taiwans” exist because of the evolving gaps in discourse about Taiwan affairs between and among the academic, policy, and professional communities in Washington, D.C. and Taipei, in what the author refers to as “Taiwan discourse drift.”

Taiwan discourse drift: the source of potential misunderstandings

The existence of these gaps is not a new or recent phenomenon in this author’s experience working and studying between DC and Taipei, but these gaps stood out in sharp relief at the 2024 Center for Asia-Pacific Resilience and Innovation (CAPRI) 2nd Annual Forum that took place in early May considering the content of the conference: whereas most if not all Taiwan-related conferences in DC feature – even seemingly require – panels dedicated to geostrategic and geoeconomic security, not one panel during CAPRI’s event focused on national security, arms sales, or defense strategy. Instead, the conference, featuring experts from across professional sectors in Taiwan and throughout the Asia-Pacific, emphasized Taiwan’s own governance issues and regional role regarding economic innovation, emerging technologies, public health, renewable energy and sustainability, and disaster resilience.

The conference was capped by a closing speech made by current Taiwan Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim, in which she stated that “not only can Taiwan help, but Taiwan can lead,” a fitting summation of Taiwan’s growing visibility as an international stakeholder. In this author’s view, this conference highlights the stark contrast in public policy conversations in DC and Taipei that results in two very different “Taiwans” – one that is primarily relevant for geostrategic and geoeconomic considerations, and another that is a multidomain, intersectional stakeholder. This matters because the greater the difference in Taiwan discourse between DC and Taipei, the greater the potential for crucial misunderstandings between both sides that will result in poorly crafted and uninformed policies.

Based on interviews with several Taiwan affairs experts and practitioners(1), as well as from personal work experience, this author finds that there are a number of key issues in which Taiwan discourse between Washington and Taipei are distant and in need of renewed attention. For the purpose of this article, the author will highlight two issue areas as a starting point to encourage greater public discussion: geopolitical priorities and domestic politics(2).

Geopolitical priorities: where are the discourse gaps?

Regarding geopolitics, discourse gaps arise due to differences in strategic visioning between the U.S. and Taiwan. Discussions about Taiwan in Washington largely frame Taiwan in terms of national defense, regional security, and more recently geoeconomic strategy(3). This is in large part because policy planners and researchers in Washington think globally in scope and scale, and Taiwan is only one component of that viewpoint. Two dimensions that specifically seem to be occupying the most air in Taiwan discourse in Washington recently are security and semiconductor chips.

The security debate surrounds whether or when China would invade Taiwan, how should Taiwan prepare defensively for this scenario, and how involved should the U.S. and its partners be in such a contingency. Emphasis is often placed on what Taiwan needs to do regarding defense, but as James Lee, Assistant Research Fellow at Academia Sinica, notes, “though there are some exceptions, most U.S. analysts do not fully understand the cost that Taiwan would bear from mobilizing for an imminent war,” and the defense discourse often disregards or is insensitive to the psychosocial effects that constant imminent-war-rhetoric can have on the Taiwanese public and political leaders.

The chips debate in Washington also takes a similar tone: semiconductor manufacturing is both a strategic asset and liability for Taiwan, and Taiwan appears in the debate only to the extent that it is a risk to supply chain resilience. Syaru Shirley Lin, Founder and Chair of CAPRI as well as Research Professor at the University of Virginia, remarked at the CAPRI 2nd Annual Forum that Taiwan “makes 92 percent of the most advanced chips in the world, and suddenly it has become a problem.” Geoeconomic discussions in Washington highlight on-shoring, friend-shoring, and decoupling, but at the same time there is little examination or understanding regarding costs for compliance and restructuring that are borne by allies and partners such as Taiwan.

“How [does Taiwan] trust the global system,” prompted Lin, “when everything [Taiwan is doing] is complying with this structure,” but it must do so at its own cost? Taiwan feels this compliance pressure very acutely because it is, as Lin pointed out, “at the crossfire between the U.S. and China in terms of the weaponization [and] the securitization of technology.” Not understanding these pressures and effects of geoeconomic compliance is adding to the discourse drift between Taiwan and the United States.

Taiwan discourse in Taipei, on the other hand, considers other geopolitical priorities that are not always shared by the United States, a potential misunderstanding that furthers the discourse drift between both sides. John Tai, Professorial Lecturer at the George Washington University (GW), notes that, compared to U.S. global aspirations, Taiwan approaches foreign policy from “a narrower perspective due to the fact that Taiwan’s interests are not as wide-ranging as those of the United States.” Fang-Yu Chen, Assistant Professor of Political Science at Soochow University, finds that the China factor is still the most significant strategic consideration and driver of policy responses in Taiwan. Chen observes that Taiwanese society has since 2008 been developing a long-term reaction to China’s actions and behaviors through protests, democratic movements (including the 2008 Wild Strawberry and 2014 Sunflower movements), and formation of civil defense organizations such as Kuma Academy.

However, whereas the U.S. foreign policy establishment has reached a relative consensus on taking a tougher whole-of-government approach to managing relations with China following years of policy hardening in Congress and the Executive, Taiwan’s policy community has not reached any such consensus on China. “The China factor is deeply polarizing in Taiwan policy discussions,” Chen discusses, as political approaches toward China are heavily politicized and fall between two paths: downplaying the China threat and maintain “equal distance” between Washington and Beijing, or deepening strategic partnerships with the United States and “like-minded countries.” “There is not enough public discussion about how Taiwan sees its national security priorities or dilemmas,” notes JhuCin Rita Jhang, Taiwan Program Director for CET Programs. Indeed, the author finds that there is a dearth of discourse in Washington about the differences in geopolitical priorities between the United States and Taiwan.

Domestic politics: where are the discourse gaps?

Domestic politics is another area of significant discourse drift between Washington and Taipei. According to Robert Sutter, Professor of Practice of International Affairs at GW, Taiwan analysis has become “much more sophisticated over the years,” and while U.S. discourse on Taiwan is still “self-absorbed” in relations to U.S. policy, there is greater attention to topics such as social welfare, identity, and soft power.

One reason for this greater attention on Taiwan has been its increasing soft power and international visibility. “Since COVID,” notes Deepa Ollapally, Associate Director for the Sigur Center of Asian Studies at GW, “there’s been a shift to looking at Taiwan on its own, and more importance is given to Taiwan globally” on issues such as public health, democracy, and countering mis/disinformation. However, Taiwan politics is still often placed in the context of its relevance to U.S. geopolitical strategy or relations with China, such as how The Wall Street Journal characterizedTaiwan’s 2024 presidential election results as a “defiance” against Beijing rather than a continuation of Taiwan’s political history. “From the DC perspective,” says Tai, “Taiwan has always been an issue that is relevant because of it being a core issue to U.S.-China relations.”

Adrienne Chih-fang Wu, Program Manager with the Global Taiwan Institute, observed that Washington policymakers often treat Taiwan “as a proof of concept for democracy,” and make little to no attempt to understand Taiwanese culture or society. This stems from a structural deficiency in U.S. policy discussions on Taiwan that often leaves out Taiwanese domestic politics from analysis. Sutter pointed out that Taiwan politics is not well understood or examined in Washington, particularly the relationship between Taiwan’s Executive Yuan and Legislative Yuan. Considering that recently inaugurated President William Lai will have to work with a Legislative Yuan controlled by the opposition Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), it will be critical for Washington policymakers and researchers to understand what Taiwan Executive-Legislative dynamics will mean for the Taiwan government’s ability to craft and implement policies over the next four years.

On this point, the recent protests in Taiwan – one of if not the largest since the Sunflower Movement 10 years ago – responding to a number of controversial bills being pushed by the KMT and TPP in Taiwan’s Legislative Yuan that propose to expand legislative powers among other items, is an incredibly salient development that warrants close attention and analysis by researchers and practitioners in DC, precisely because it cuts across many defining political issues in Taiwan today. From this author’s own observations as an attendee of multiple days of protests, the protests encapsulate many key debates within Taiwan that are essential for those in DC to understand public policy discourse in Taiwan, such as the erosion of Taiwan’s democratic institutions and return to authoritarianism, identity politics, generational politics, and foreign (especially Chinese government) influence in public financing and infrastructure.

At the same time as these protests were occurring, China conducted large-scale military drills surrounding Taiwan, ostensibly to “punish” President Lai. In a telling manner to this author, while numerous media sources outside of Taiwan highlighted the drills, these drills virtually never came up in the speeches, debates, or images on display during the protests within Taiwan that this author attended, despite the drills happening simultaneously with the protests. This again reflects how Taiwan discourse domestically and internationally can noticeably drift apart from one another.

Similarly, Taiwan discourse in Taipei often suffers from information gaps regarding U.S. domestic politics and government processes. Commenting on her first professional visit to the United States, Chiayo Kuo, Founder and President of the Taiwan Digital Diplomacy Association with over seven years of experience in coordinating high-level international public diplomacy outreach, said: “I was surprised to learn just how disconnected Taiwan discussions in DC is from what Taiwanese society actually talks about.”

At the same time, she finds that most Taiwanese organizations and analysts are not familiar with how the U.S. government functions or how it allocates organizational resources, particularly Congress’s role in shaping foreign policy and distributing resources. As a result, policy communities in Taiwan are not well informed on how U.S. government bodies actually craft foreign policy. More pointedly, Kuo commented that “Taiwan is not doing the fundamental work of research” into understanding and examining U.S. foreign policy priorities and structures, and not enough Taiwanese stakeholders are reaching out to the U.S. Congress as they could.

This author shares this view, and finds that Taiwan’s policy analysis ecosystem is underdeveloped, especially compared to the policy research ecosystem in Washington. “There are very few professional think tanks in Taiwan producing regular policy content,” points out Fang-Yu Chen. From Chen’s perspective, there is no such thing as Taiwan discourse in Taipei, as there is no professional policy analysis community supporting that like the think tank industry in Washington. He also noted, to the author’s surprise, that there is no think tank or research institution in Taiwan that is specifically dedicated to investigating or writing on U.S. affairs, which is a significant gap considering that there are at least a dozen or more think tanks in Washington that produce analysis or host events on Taiwan affairs.

(1)The author conducted in-person and online interviews between May 2nd and May 14th, 2024. The author by no means interviewed all Taiwan affairs experts and practitioners in the field, and as such many perspectives are not represented in this reflection. However, from the author’s sense, the views gathered by the interviews represent broadly shared perspectives across the Taiwan affairs policy and research communities. The author encourages more comprehensive research and debate about this topic.

(2) Except where otherwise noted, opinions and thoughts expressed in this article are solely the author’s and do not represent any organization or platform mentioned therein.

(3) Particularly as it relates to semiconductor manufacturing and technology supply chains. Chris Miller’s *Chip War: The Fight for the World’s Most Critical Technology* (2022) is a milestone work that has since influenced geoeconomics discourse particularly in Washington.

This is Part one of a three-part series, “A Tale of Two Taiwans.” In this second part, the author delves into the factors driving the “Taiwan discourse drift.”

(Feature photo by Vas on Uplash)