ABSTRACT
This chapter provides an analytical overview of language policy and identity politics in Taiwan after the comeback of the Kuo Min Tang (KMT) under Ma Ying-jeou's presidency, and attempts to demonstrate that developments in culture politics. It puts a special emphasis on the Hakka Basic Law (HBL), which was introduced by the KMT executive in 2009 and adopted by the legislature in January 2010. The chapter argues that the Hakka minority has constituted a politically convenient "neutral" group whose recognition can fulfil both the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Taiwanization agenda and the KMT's re-Sinicization one. At the beginning of 2008, the Taiwanese had witnessed eight years of political deadlock. Inter-party polarization was on the increase, President Chen Shui-bian was engulfed in a corruption scandal, and his party was in disarray. The Blue camp was in a position to anticipate a relatively easy electoral victory.
