ABSTRACT
National identity issues have been on Taiwan's political agenda for decades. In the early 1980s, the opposition raised the issues in election campaigns, asking the right of self-determination to decide Taiwan's status. When the island's democracy became more consolidated in the late 1990s, national identity issues remained hot issues on agendas. A variety of political outcomes, such as factional interactions within and among political parties, constitutional reforms, voter realignment, and foreign-policy making all were related to the debate over national identity (Chu and Lin 1996; Cheng and Hsu 1996; Hughes, 1997; Wachman 1994). Needless to say, the salience of national identity issues in Taiwan's political development is evident. With an emphasis on the elite-mass linkage, this chapter mainly investigates the evolution of national identity issues in the 1990s. The study begins with the review of related literature. Second, why and how political elites raise national identity issues will be discussed. Lastly, elite-mass interactions during the surge of the issues are the focus of the third section.
