Foreign Aid, Democracy Promotion, and Taiwan's Quest for Recognition

In: The Niche Diplomacy of Asian Middle Powers (Lexington Books), 2021.

This chapter looks at the scope and nature of Taiwan's changing foreign policies and discusses their success/failure in terms of their effectiveness to benefit the recipient countries as well as their contribution to Taiwan's global image and diplomatic leverage.

Link to publication 

Das Virus aus Wuhan und die gesellschaftspolitischen Implikationen: die Volksrepublik China und ihre Nachbarn

In: Schmidinger, Thomas / Weidenholzer, Josef (Hrsg.): Virenregime - Wie die Coronakrise unsere Welt verändert (Wien), 2020

My paper is not about the virus itself, not about a medical explanation or assessment of the measures taken, but about the general discourse on the socio-political consequences of the pandemic. In the first part of my anaylsis, I discuss the debate about China's role in the pandemic. In the second part, I address the lack of solidarity with China and the consequences of the pandemic in terms of democratic development. The last section of the paper deals with the question of what will remain of the critical discourse after the crisis and to what extent the pandemic has changed society in its basic democratic structures.

Link to publication

PDF of my paper

Taiwan's defensive democratization

Asian Affairs: An American Review, 2020 (Scopus)

Since the lifting of martial law in 1987, Taiwan has progressed toward one of Asia's most advanced democracies. This paper looks at the historical and socio-political circumstances and traces the global and domestic factors behind the transformation. Assuming that advanced levels of democratic governance can only be obtained through mediated social control over the state and the economy, the study explores whether democratic values and norms have become internalized and identifies the current caveats of further democratic development. More specifically, the paper argues that although Taiwan's democratization has been caused by external sovereignty-related factors, the discourse on national identity has repoliticzed the public political realm after decades of authoritarianism and led to the habitualization of democratic values and norms. The paper concludes with an assessment of the prospects for comprehensive and inclusive public participation in the shaping of Taiwan's political conditions.

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PDF of publication

Impacts of culture survival rate on culture cost and input factors: Case study of the hard clam (Meretrix meretrix) culture in Yunlin County, Taiwan

Journal of the World Aquaculture Society, 2019 (SCI, Scopus, 2018 Impact Factor: 1.386)

This study applies a translog cost function model to analyze the culture costs and the use of input factors among three groups of hard clam farmer households in Yunlin County, Taiwan, with different survival rates (low-intermediate, intermediate-high, and high). The study found that farmer household production in the three observed groups all exhibited economies of scale and could significantly expand the scale of production to lower the average cost. For farmer households with high survival rates, production cost could be reduced by 2.16% by a 10% increase in output. Moreover, the study shows that the survival rate–cost interaction values of farmer households in the intermediate-high and low-intermediate survival rate clusters were negative. Therefore, any increase in the survival rate could help lower the culture cost of farmer households. For low-intermediate farmers, the survival rate–cost interaction value was the most negative; any increase in the survival rate by 10% would decrease the cost per hectare by NT$23,424. For high survival-rate households, seeding and capital were substitutes, and seeding and feed were complements. As such, farmers would reduce the use of seeding factors when increasing the use of capital and decreasing the use of feed.

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Raising cigarette excise tax to reduce consumption in low-and middle-income countries of the Asia-Pacific region:a simulation of the anticipated health and taxation revenues impacts

BMC Public Health, 2018 (SCI, Scopus, 5-year Impact Factor: 3.039)

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), 80% of the world's smokers live in low- and middle-income countries. Moreover, more than half of the world’s smoking-addicted population resides in the Asia-Pacific region. The reduction of tobacco consumption has thus become one of the major social policies in the region. This study investigates the effects of price increases on cigarette consumption, tobacco tax revenues and reduction in smoking-caused mortality in 22 low-income as well as middle-income countries in the Asia-Pacific region.Using panel data from the 1999-2015 Euromonitor International, the World Bank and the World Health Organization, we applied fixed effects regression models of panel data to estimate the elasticity of cigarette prices and to simulate the effect of price fluctuations.

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A simulation impact evaluation of a cigarette excise tax increase on licit and illicit cigarette consumption and tax revenue in 36 European countries

Public Health, 2018 (SSCI, SCI, Scopus, 2017 Impact Factor: 1.441)

Objectives

To assess the impact of a simulated 10% tax-induced cigarette price increase on licit and illicit consumption and tax revenues in 36 European countries.

Methods

Employing panel data for licit and illicit cigarette consumption, fixed effects regression models were applied for different income clusters.

Results

Total cigarette consumption dropped by about 3.1% as a result of the simulated tax-induced price increase. Annual illicit cigarette consumption increased by 1.52%, (95% confidence interval: 0.21, 2.83), while annual licit cigarette consumption decreased by 4.61% (95% confidence interval: -6.51, -2.72) in the observed 36 European countries. With total consumption decreasing by about 8%, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Slovakia were affected the most by the price hike. More specifically, licit consumption in these countries decreased by 18.43% (95% confidence interval: -19.91, -16.95) while illicit use increased by 10.99% (95% confidence interval: 6.01, 15.96). Moreover, the overall annual tobacco tax revenue increased by US$14.69 billion in the simulation.

Conclusion

Results of the study suggest that European policy makers continue to implement tobacco taxation policies to control smoking prevalence and national health care expenditures. At the same time, efforts to kerb contraband activities along EU Eastern borders should be intensified.

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Explaining Democratic Consolidation and Regress in East Asia:

A Multivariate Analysis

11th Congress of the Asian Political and International Studies Association, 2017

In this study my colleague and I analyzed the nature of popular support for democratic governance in East Asia. Using the latest data of the Asian Barometer Survey (ABS), we applied latent class cluster analysis and multinomial logistic regression modelling to offer a micro-level explanation of political developments in the Philippines, Thailand, Taiwan and South Korea.

The Dialectic of Nationalism and Democratic Governance in Taiwan

Asian International Studies Review, 2016 (KCI, Scopus)

In this study I argue that Taiwan's public contestation over national identity has been a crucial factor in its political development. Specifically, I demonstrate that the agonistic relationship between Taiwanese nationalists and Chinese nationalists has been a major force behind the development of democratic governance in Taiwan, thus contradicting previous studies suggesting that any contestation over national identity would undermine democratic development and destabilize security in East Asia

Link to publication (PDF)

The effects of a rise in cigarette price on cigarette consumption, tobacco taxation revenues, and of smoking-related deaths in 28 EU countries -  applying threshold regression modelling

BMC Public Health, 2017 (SCI, Scopus, 5-year Impact Factor: 3.039)

In this study my colleagues and I investigated the effects of price hikes on cigarette consumption, tobacco tax revenues and smoking-caused deaths in 28 EU countries. We employed panel data for the years 2005 to 2014 from Euromonitor International, the World Bank and the World Health Organization. Threshold regression modelling was used to estimate the elasticity of cigarette prices and to simulate the effect of price fluctuations.

Link to publication

Possible effects of raising tobacco taxes across the EU

BMC Series Blog, 2017

I discussed the results of our study in a blog.

The effect of cigarette price increases on cigarette consumption, tax revenue, and smoking-related death in Africa from 1999 to 2013

International Journal of Public Health, 2017
(SSCI, SCI, Scopus, 2017 Impact Factor: 2.617)

In this study my colleagues and I investigated the effects of price hikes on cigarette consumption, tobacco tax revenues, and reduction in smoking-caused mortality in 36 African countries. Panel data from the 1999-2013 Euromonitor International, the World Bank and the World Health Organization was used in our fixed-effects and random-effects regression models of panel data to estimate the elasticity of cigarette prices and simulate the effect of price fluctuations.

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Smoking-related changes or brand switching?

Smokers' anticipated responses to a large increase in Taiwan's Tobacco Health and Welfare Surcharge

Public Health, 2016 (SSCI, SCI, Scopus, 2017 Impact Factor: 1.441)

In this study my colleagues and I examine the impact on smokers' behaviour of a planned increase in the Health and Welfare Surcharge of Tobacco Products in Taiwan. We used a structured questionnaire to perform telephone interviews. Applying multinomial logistic regression we found that after the proposed increase in the Health and Welfare Surcharge of Tobacco Products, subsequent cigarette price increases would motivate nearly 30% of the smokers to adopt smoking-related changes and 10% to change to lower-priced brands.

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An economic analysis of hard clam (Meretrix meretrix) farmer polyculture with milkfish (Chanos chanos), silver sea bream (Rhabdosargus sarba), and shrimps at different hard clam stocking densities: a case study of Yunlin County, Taiwan

Aquaculture International, 2017 (SCI, Scopus, 2017 Impact Factor: 1.283)

In this study my colleagues and I use a translog cost function model based on two different hard clam stocking densities to estimate the cost and price elasticity of input factors to evaluate whether the hard clam polycultures in Yunlin County, Taiwan, have economies of scale and economies of scope and to assess the substitutability between inputs.

Link to publication

Democratic Governance in Northeast Asia

A Human-Centred Approach to Evaluating Democracy

Palgrave/Macmillan, 2015

Comprising case studies of Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan, this edited volume explores the key characteristics of democratic governance in Northeast Asia. Each democracy is assessed on the extent to which it enables the flourishing of social capital; prioritizes the interests of all as characterized by freedom from fear and want; and empowers all to participate in the democratic process and governance. With particular focus on the experience of minorities, this volume contends that the acid test of democratic governance is not how well the government represents the interests of the elites, or even the majority, but rather how it cares for the needs of vulnerable groups in society.

I authored two chapters of this edited volume:

Chapter 6: Taiwanese Democracy

Chapter 7: Debating 'Unpopular' Issues in Taiwan

Post-Conflict Development in East Asia

Ashgate, 2014

East Asia is a region deeply affected by conflict. Colonial, ideological, and national wars have left their scars and legacies on regional, international, and national governance. Yet East Asian post-conflict development experiences have been viewed as remarkably successful.

In 2013, Brendan Howe asked me to contribute a chapter on Taiwan's post-conflict development and its implications on human security. The final chapter was released in 2014 by Ashgate.

Chapter 5: Human Security and Post-Conflict Development in Taiwan (PDF)

Link to publication

The Taiwan Higher Education Faculty Survey (THEFS)

Over the last decades, educational systems in many parts of the world have undergone manifold changes that have significantly affected the working environment of educators. The Taiwan Higher Education Faculty Survey (THEFS) aims at obtaining solid information about the current working conditions of teachers at institutions of higher education in Taiwan in order to evaluate the impact of recent reforms on the livelihood of teaching professionals.

Among other anticipated negative impacts of  reforms in Taiwan's higher education is the increasing prevalence of workplace bullying. For further information on THEFS and workplace bullying see my research note (PDF).

Transitional societies are confronted with the problem of how to deal with the atrocities committed by former authoritarian regimes. Despite the fact that there have been a number of regime transitions in Asia during the last two decades, transitional justice has been an issue hardly addressed in those countries.

In 2006, the 2-28 Memorial Foundation (Taiwan) asked me to do a study on how Austria, my home country, had dealt with the past. In my paper, I also looked at the Taiwanese discourse on transitional justice and concluded with several normative policy suggestions.  (Final paper in Chinese - PDF ; an extented English version was published in the Journal of Contemporary Eastern Asia, Vol. 6(1): 17-36 under the title Transitional Justice in Taiwan: An Austrian Perspective)

In 2007, the Foundation for Compensating Improper Verdicts on Sedition and Communist Espionage Cases during the Martial Law Period asked me to analyse the foreign perception of Taiwan's transitional justice initiatives. In my paper, I ascertain that global and local efforts to promote meaningful transitional justice initiatives are interdependent processes in which foreign communities have a mediating function. My study shows that the absence of a constructive dialog between local and global actors marginalized indigenous transitional justice efforts in Taiwan. I presented the results of the study at the International Symposium: The 20th Anniversary of the Lifting of Martial Law in Taiwan (Taipei). 

In 2010,  Lavinia Stan and Nadya Nedelsky asked me to author two chapters on transitional justice in Taiwan (PDF) and Austria (PDF), respectively, for the Encyclopedia of Transitional Justice (Cambridge University Press, 2013).

In 2013, John Calabrese of the Middle East Institute (Washington, DC) asked me to join the Middle East-Asia Project (MAP) series on 'Pathways to Transitional Justice in the Arab World - Reflections on the Asia Pacific Experience.' The series explores the pursuit of transitional justice in the post-Arab Spring Middle East, and how such efforts could be informed by past and ongoing justice processes in Asia-Pacific countries. My contribution was published in February 2014:

The Rise and Fall of Transitional Justice in Taiwan (PDF)

Evolution and Limitations of Modern Campaigning in East Asia:
A Case Study of Taiwan (Routledge, 2009)

The Routledge Handbook of Political Management is a comprehensive overview of a variety of research areas related to electoral campaigning. In 2007, the editor of the Handbook (Dennis W. Johnson, George Washington University) invited me to contribute a chapter on the evolution and current modus operandi of modern electoral campaigning in Taiwan, one of Asia's most vibrant new democracies.

Chapter 27: Campaigning in East Asia (PDF)

Election Campainging in East and Southeast Asia

(Ashgate, 2006)

Social changes in advanced democracies, advancements in media technologies and the global wave of democratisation in the late 1980s contributed to the global spread of US electoral campaign techniques. For over a decade, the international scientific community has endeavoured to formulate a universal theory of political campaigning that would be applicable to all democratic polities and able to explain the causes, dynamics and limitations of this new phenomenon. However, most of the relevant contemporary writing deals with different aspects of campaigning and is restricted to the European and American experience. Concerted efforts to gain a global understanding of campaigning, such as the Global Political Consultancy Survey>, have been rare and have only partially covered Asian democracies. While electoral studies in Western democracies have been strongly influenced by new scientific approaches, the study of Asian elections has seen little analysis. There is thus limited knowledge of how campaigns are run in Asia and how the modus operandi has changed as a result of democratisation. In my edited book Election Campaigning in East and Southeast Asia, I have addressed those important processes.

The scientific community positively appraised my work. One leading European scholar, for example, considered the publication as a "timely edited volume" that "marks one of the first attempts to study these processes [Asian electoral campaigning] systematically" (McCargo, Pacific Affairs, vol.  79, no. 4 (Winter 2006-2007): 662). In his book review, the scholar also noted the shortcomings of contemporary research and requested more concerted efforts among Asia scholars. 

Reviews

Duncan McCargo, Pacific Affairs, vol. 79, no. 4 (Winter 2006-2007) (PDF)

Arndt Graf, Asien, 109 (October 2008) (PDF)

Table of contents and sample chapters

Table of Contents (PDF)

Chapter 1: The Globalization of Political Marketing: An Introduction (PDF)

Chapter 2: Electoral Campaigning in Japan (PDF)

Chapter 3: Electoral Campaigning in Taiwan (PDF)

Chapter 6: Is There an Asian Style of Electoral Campaining? (PDF)

Content Analysis of Newspaper and TV Advertisements

Taiwan's 2004 Presidential Election 

In this study, all political advertisements placed in Taiwan’s leading newspapers and aired on Taiwan's most popular terrestrial and cable television stations during the official campaign period of 28 days (21 February - 19 March 2004) were analyzed.

Download full paper in PDF for free

In the late 1980s, a number of states in Asia entered the process of liberalisation and democratisation. Since then, I have personally witnessed key events in the democratisation processes of South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand and Mongolia.

State of Democracy in Asia

In November 2008, the Asian Political and International Studies Association invited me to participate in an international conference on the state of democracy in Asia. In my presented paper (PDF), I argue that democratic consolidation in Taiwan has mainly to do with the question of how to overcome the legacies of the former authoritarian regime. In addition, I ascertain that the growing self-dramatisation of political events has prevented any constructive political discourse for the last eight years.  I came to a similar conclusion in September 2008 when I did research on the new Thai democracy movement, which was published in New Mandala, a blog by Andrew Walker and Nicholas Farrelly of Australian National University.

Populism in East Asia's New Democracies:

An Analysis of the Taiwanese Discourse

The rise of right-wing political leaders and movements in advanced European democracies at the end of the last century has triggered numerous debates about populism, its causes, and its role in modern democracies. Through these debates and through previous studies, we have gained a profound knowledge about populism in Europe and the Americas. Nevertheless, comparatively little research has been carried out on the nature, scope and development of populism in the new democracies of Asia. In 2007, I presented a paper at the 5th International Convention of Asia Scholars (Kuala Lumpur). The paper deals with the discourse of Taiwanese intellectuals on the development and implications of populism in Taiwan. It was later published in:

M. Parvizi Amineh, State, Society and International Relations in Asia, Amsterdam University Press, 2010: pp. 133-148 (PDF)

Consolidation of democracy and historical legacies:

A case study of Taiwan

In political science there is broad interest in whether a newly established democracy succeeds in overcoming the perils of democratisation and matures into a consolidated democracy or regresses to authoritarianism. Taiwan was under martial law for almost four decades. Democratic consolidation, therefore, is primarily a question of how to overcome the legacies of the former authoritarian regime. Nationalism and dysfunctional political institutions are some of the legacies that limit Taiwan’s democratic development. The study of these destructive elements is important in the attempt to interpret Taiwan’s most recent political history and to formulate effective democracy-building policies. In September 2009, I presented a paper dealing with the aforementioned legacies and their implications for Taiwan's current and future democratic development at the University of Vienna, Austria (conference agenda).

The paper was later published in:

Journal of Contemporary Eastern Asia, Vol. 9 (2010) No. 1: 23-41

http://dx.doi.org/10.17477/jcea.2010.9.1.023

Taiwan's Nuclear Dream: An Analysis of Political and Ecological Problems and Current Discussions

In spite of the declining demand for nuclear power plants in the western world, Taiwan sees in them the key to economic growth and closer (political) ties with the USA. This paper examines the nuclear policy of the Taiwanese government, the environmental problems caused by the country's nuclear power plants, the public attitude toward the nuclear option and the current discussion on the expansion of the nuclear power generating industry.

Cathay Skripten, Heft 10 (September 1998)

Ruhr University Bochum

For the last fifteen years, I have observed elections in Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, Thailand and Mongolia. Here are some of my publications:

The Power of the Ballot Box:
Political Development and Election Campaigning in Taiwan

Lexington, 2003

In this book I look beyond regional and global causes of democratisation to pinpoint the true indigenous foundations of Taiwan's political development, and examine the pivotal importance of local elections in the island's democratisation process. Based on extensive research and in-depth interviews with leading Taiwanese politicians and political scientists, the book provides a detailed history of Taiwan's electoral experience from the Japanese colonial period, through the Kuomintang regime, to the present day.

Google Books (Browse through the entire book) >

Lexington Books (Obtain a copy of the book) >