Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

On Dec. 18, former premier Jiang Yi-huah (江宜樺) returned to his alma mater and former employer, National Taiwan University (NTU), to give a talk at the Department of Political Science. However, students who tool part in the 2014 Sunflower movement protested his presence and the event was abandoned. Meanwhile, a former NTU professor who opposed Jiang’s talk was attacked by a knife-wielding assailant and narrowly avoided being killed. These incidents show that there is still a serious rift in society, despite it being four years since the Sunflower movement. Students and the wider public are clearly unable to put the events of 2014 behind them.

The failure of the referendum for Taiwan to apply to participate at the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games under the name “Taiwan” stunned its supporters into silence, while some media talk about the demise of radical independence forces.

It might be true that losers should refrain from talking too loudly, but the referendum result implies an unprecedented generational shift among independence advocates, and they are still trying to absorb the impact of the shock.