ABSTRACT
The People's Republic of China (PRC) threatens Taiwan with the use of military force if the government should declare Taiwan de jure independent of China and the Republic of China (ROC) maintains a strong and costly force of its own to deter Beijing from resorting to forceful reunification. In addition, the ROC strives to strengthen its position in the international community, while the PRC tries to enforce limits on its status. The outstanding area of cooperation has been in two-way trade and investment on the mainland by Taiwan's entrepreneurs. The PRC hopes to create a dense network of economic links that will give it political leverage in Taiwan and diminish the risk that the island might declare its independence. The growing people-to-people interaction between Taiwan and the PRC inevitably produced incidents of disagreement, friction, and misunderstanding that were difficult to resolve in the absence of official contacts at any level.
