ABSTRACT
Taiwan's democratization made possible the close legislative election result and an underprivileged but united group was able to bargain with the government in order to gain significant benefits. Many Kuomintang (KMT) commentators, as well as some Western scholars, suggest that Taiwan's democratic process began with Chiang Ching-kuo. After the KMT under Chiang Kai-shek lost the mainland to the Chinese Communists in late 1949, the original members of the central parliamentary organs, who had been elected in China during 1947 and 1948, could not be re-elected by their original constituencies. Popular presidential elections in Taiwan only began in 1996, eight years after Chiang Ching-kuo passed away. Once Lee Teng-hui became president, he worked closely with sympathetic people within the KMT as well as with the opposition. Lee convened extra-constitutional meetings to create new consensuses across the political spectrum and he worked to create several sets of constitutional amendments during his 12 years of presidency.
