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Updated Sunday, June 27, 2010 7:22 pm TWN, The China Post news staff

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What Hong Kong election reform tells Taiwan

Their views are not shared by hard-line democrats, who believed that by making a deal with the government the moderates slowed down the democratic process and legitimatized the functional constituency system.

They expressed their opinions strongly. A hard-line legislator clashed with security guards and was evicted from the Legislative Council chamber by security guards yesterday in protest of the reform. Another yelled, “Today is the darkest day for democracy in Hong Kong. Functional constituencies' seats will last forever,” the Hong Kong newspaper South China Morning Post reported.

The reform showed for the first time that the Hong Kong government, and by extension Beijing, is beginning to work with the more “moderate” pro-democratic lawmakers in election issues.

It can be read as a sign that China has begun to “cave in” to strong public opinion for fear that “the rise of radicals and the demise of moderate democrats would destabilize Hong Kong,” as the South China Morning Post described.

However, less optimistic opinions saw the move as a political maneuver to divide the democratic camp, isolate the radicals and render them as an obstacle to progress.

Taiwan should watch out for the “divide and rule” strategy China used in Hong Kong. It's conceivable that they could employ it against the pro-independence camp in Taiwan. The Democratic Progressive Party's Tainan Magistrate Su Huan-chi decided not to show up at to DPP rally against a major cross-strait economic agreement after returning from a China trip to promote Tainan's fruits. There are other members from the DPP who saw a degree of cooperation with China practical.

China will no doubt zero in on this group of DPP “moderates.” The important thing is: how should the DPP respond? Should the party decide to consolidate its anti-China rhetoric, it might cause further division and possibly isolation. Interaction with China without careful plans, on the other hand, might result in the gradual blurring of the DPP's core values.

The outcome of the compromise between Hong Kong's government and the moderate democrats is yet to be seen. It is a development Taiwan's leaders from both parties should scrutinize in order to devise a strategy that sees cooperation with China not as an exchange of sovereignty for economic survival, but as a way to push China to “cave in” and interact with Taiwan's democracy.

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