Why Is China Unwelcome in Taiwan? Cultural Alienation, Democratic Anxiety or Economic Loss in Explaining Taiwanese Resistance to China

Abstract

This paper explores the factors that affect Taiwanese citizens’ resistance to closer relations with China. Elements in Taiwanese society have recently exhibited a strong sense of anxiety in the face of a rising China. Distinct from the past military confrontation between China and Taiwan, more recently, Taiwanese citizens have been subject to a strengthening of cross-Strait relations and interactions, which makes their rising resistance to China puzzling. To empirically and theoretically explain why Taiwanese are resistant to closer ties with the mainland, we discuss three potential sources: cultural alienation, democratic anxiety, and economic interest. We test the effects of these three attitudinal factors on Taiwanese resistance to Chinese tourists, students, and workers using the China Impact Survey 2012 data set. The findings suggest that democratic anxiety, economic interest, and cultural alienation are all strong predictors in accounting for the public’s resistance to Chinese tourists and students, while economic interest is the most powerful factor in Taiwanese attitudes toward policies regarding Chinese workers. The findings provide important policy implications for policy makers in dealing with cross-Strait relations.

Ambivalence and perceptions of China: Two list experiments

“…Taiwan’s resistance to China—and the latter’s persistent efforts to shape the hearts and minds of its residents—is reflected in previous studies that asked the Taiwanese public direct questions concerning their perceptions of China, the leadership in Beijing, and the Chinese people. While there were indeed periods of relative calm, a large proportion of Taiwanese continue to hold unfriendly or mixed feelings toward China and on most cross-Strait issues (Gries and Su, 2013; Tzeng et al, 2017; Wang and Cheng, 2017). These unfavorable views stem to a large extent from the negative impressions created by China’s incessant saber-rattling and verbal threats against Taiwan and the authoritarian government in Beijing, and in part from public worries about China’s harmful influence on Taiwan’s full-fledged democracy given its enormous economic and military might (Lee et al, 2018).…”