In light of today's official ten-year anniversary of the return of Hong Kong to the PRC, the debate surrounding the ever-potent relationship between Taiwan and China seems particularly relevant. Though, I have serious reservations about likening Hong Kong to Taiwan, whose histories diverge at key points throughout the region's recent history.
I'm looking forward to tomorrow's English-language editorials!
Taiwan looks askance at Hong Kong's handover formula
By Ralph Jennings June 24, 2007
Source: www.boston.com
TAIPEI (Reuters) - When China's late leader Deng Xiaoping dreamt up the "one country two systems" formula for Hong Kong, he had a bigger prize in mind: Taiwan.
Deng's vision had the former British colony serving as a model of how Taiwan, which Beijing considers a wayward province, would be run if it returned to the fold -- a high degree of autonomy, a separate currency, and even democratic elections. But a decade after Britain handed Hong Kong back to Beijing, most people in Taiwan are unimpressed.
Scholars and island officials say that democratically self-ruled Taiwan would suffer more politically than it would gain economically if it was reunified with Communist-ruled China under Deng's formula.
"For the Taiwan public, there's no market for 'one country, two systems'," said Liu Te-shun, vice chairman of the government's Mainland Affairs Council. Freedom and democracy have suffered in Hong Kong since the return, Liu said, and the use of "China" to label Hong Kong also detracts from its global image as an international city. "From a big-picture point of view over these past 10 years, we're still pretty worried."
Critics say that since the 1997 handover Hong Kong has seen self-censorship by media eager to please Beijing, holes in its legal system and a lack of full democracy. And, although Beijing pledged 50 years of political autonomy and a capitalist economy, the Communist Party has stepped in to interpret Hong Kong's post-handover constitution three times since 1997.
One bright spot some see is that tighter ties with the mainland have helped Hong Kong tap into China's economic boom... But Taiwan's government, run by a party advocating more distance from China and a separate Taiwan identity, is quick to point out political shortcomings in Hong Kong.
China has seen staunchly self-ruled Taiwan as part of its territory since Mao Zedong's Communists routed the Nationalist Party (KMT) in a civil war that ended in 1949.
After decades of turmoil under authoritarian rule, Taiwan evolved into a multi-party democracy starting in the 1980s. Today every adult on the island of 23 million people can vote, and the mass media have been named the freest in Asia.
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