ABSTRACT
Previous chapters have chronicled the development of commercial television and alternative media in Taiwan, and their relationship to political transition and critical security have been assessed. The discussion has centred on the twin ideas of political control and emancipation. Thus the media were central to the execution of authority by the KMT government and the political mobilisation of an opposition denied any meaningful democratic rights. The core notions of emancipation are normative and utilise such terms as 'rights', 'justice' and 'equality'. The British sociologist, Anthony Giddens (1991) has contrasted this 'emancipatory politics' with 'life politics' that are concerned more with one's relationship to the political and social system in the local, national and global spheres following emancipation. As the discussion so far has detailed the political and social struggles that demanded and, thanks partly to far-sighted elites and timely external pressures eventually secured emancipation via liberalisation, we now tum our attention to how 'life politics' have been shaped by and played out in the media. To explore this we find that it is useful to analyse Taiwan's public television system that has been broadcasting across the island since the early 1980s. This service was under total government control for the first decade of its existence. But with the deepening politicalliberalisation towards the end of the 1980s, the plan to transform this service into an independent public television station suddenly emerged as a focus of public debate at the beginning of the 1990s. Such open discussion had allowed the Taiwanese population to express its
Civil society here refers to 'a sphere of activity outside direct state control, in which the citizenry may organize to pursue their own interests and concerns in their own way ... ' (Gill, 2000), provided that the groups in question are voluntary (and not necessarily exclusive. Membership can be overlapping. Gellner, 1995). Although independent of state control (Hall, 1995; Bobbio, 1989), Gill makes the qualification that the activity of civil society must be recognised as legitimate by the state. While the routine of the expanding election culture served to empower the people during the 1970s and 1980s, issues of immediate concern to citizens (certainly more pressing than the ubiquitous cross-Strait relations) such as the environment, pollution, unemployment, housing, problems in Taiwan's agricultural sector and fears about the nuclear industry - Taiwan's own 'life politics' agenda - all grabbed attention and were played out in the media. Shiau Chyuan-jenq ( 1999) traces the origin of an active civil society in Taiwan to the journal China Tide which supported those who suffered because of the government's commitment to a capitalistic mode of production. However, while the early 1980s saw a remarkable increase in the number of civil challenges to the state's economic management, civil society could only operate in Taiwan once the political system had been liberalised to allow such autonomous activity to flourish. Thus after 1986 there was a rapid increase in the number and variety of social movements that protested the government's administration in several key areas: consumer movements; the environment; opposition to the nuclear industry; economic interests (farmers, women, education); minorities and the disadvantaged; and human rights (Shiau, 1999). Yet the first indication of the rise of a genuine civil society in Taiwan that was able to launch an effective challenge to the state's managerial capacity was the legalisation of the Democratic Progressive Party; although Taiwan's democratisation was essentially elite driven, we must be mindful that the strength of the political opposition lay in the broad societal support it enjoyed. The opposition was thus able to claim legitimacy based on its representative function. Once the regime opened the political system to permit challenges to its rule, civil society became more active in shaping the contours of the transition. However, the election of DPP President, Chen Shui-bian has not finalised the transition of the party as a leading force within civil society to its incorporation into the state structure. Throughout his election campaign Chen maintained that, if elected, he would distance himself from the DPP: 'After I am inaugurated,' he said at a final rally on the eve of the election, 'I will step out of participation in all DPP activities and become a president who can
look beyond party and ethnic lines' (Taipei Times, 18 March 2000). Hence many DPP members and supporters who defend the party's more traditional, some might say radical, platform have not been encouraged by Chen's moderate position on a number of issues. This is especially true in reference to cross-strait relations, where his critics within the party believe he has 'sold out' their commitment to Taiwan's independence.' All of this leads to the observation that the DPP remains part of civil society, detached from the state, even though Chen was elected President on a (moderate) DPP platform.
