A by-product of Taiwan’s nearly 400 years of settler occupation, followed by the self-exile of the Republic of China from the UN for nearly a half- century, has been that Taiwanese more often ask how geopolitical events will affect them, rather than how Taiwan could and should influence the world.
Since the disastrous pride-induced walkout from the international stage in 1971, Taiwanese involvement on the world stage has been unofficially deep while officially minimal and, until 2000, generally self-pitying.