The tilt towards a new Pan-Asianism

Hu is planning a second state visit to Japan in less than a year to meet Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda on the sideline of a Group of Eight summit.

These new developments have tipped Taiwan toward pan-Asianism. The Diaoyutai crisis, triggered by the sinking of a Taiwan leisure fishing boat in a collision with a Japanese maritime safety frigate over the disputed waters off the small archipelago Japan calls the Senkakus, was solved thanks chiefly to Tokyo’s reluctance to antagonize Taipei by adhering to its wonted harsh no-compromise stand on controversy.

The Japanese apologized and promised reparations for fear their non-compromise would only work to push Taiwan to side with China in the dispute involving sovereignty over the islets which all three countries claim. Moreover, Taiwan, which is already heavily dependent on China for economic growth, has to join the ASEAN-plus-Three in order to survive as a viable economy.

The tilt toward neo-Asianism means the suppression of Taiwan’s new nationalism launched by President Lee Teng-hui and nursed by his successor Chen Shui-bian. They both called it Taiwan consciousness, insisting that the people of Taiwan are a race different from the Chinese, and therefore deserve a new national identity under the universal principle of self-determination of peoples. President Chen carried on a de-Sinicization campaign, with the proclamation of a new constitution for the country as its ultimate goal. The drive came to an abrupt end with the election of Ma Ying-jeou as president on March 22, but the opposition Democratic Progressive Party continues to rally support for Taiwan’s new nationalism.

In the end — and in the not-too-distant future — Taiwan will espouse neo-Asianism, though fully aware that its strongest supporter, the United States, does not approve of it. Washington does not want Tokyo and Taipei to get too close to Beijing in order to retain exclusive leadership by the U.S. in Asia and the Pacific.

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