Taiwan Tati Cultural and Educational Foundation

The PRC's Seven Axioms of Peaceful Rising

Jerome F. Keating Ph.D.

The People's Republic of China (PRC) recently celebrated its 60th anniversary with plenty of fanfare and a superb show of military power. The cost while not spelt out was undeniably large. In the previous year, Beijing hosted the 2008 Olympics and put on a US $43 billion dollar spectacle to awe the world. So, it is no wonder that even with a billion people at poverty level or below, pundits are continuing to say this is China's Century, and expound on how the PRC as the World's factory is also a world power ready to challenge anyone. What else is there to say? One can of course choose to examine the formula behind this hoopla, but do we really want to face the axioms it depends on?

A wake-up call for the Aborigines

Jerome Keating

Typhoon Morakot did more than expose the incompetence and lack of leadership in President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) administration. It highlighted another salient issue: the plight of Taiwan’s Aborigines.

Like many indigenous peoples suffering the fate of colonialism, these people are pulled in opposite directions. Tugging on one side is the wish to maintain traditional lifestyles and identities; on the other are the demands of survival and dignity in a modern, fast-paced and high-tech society.

NTDTV blackouts serve as a warning

Taipei Times

News that New Tang Dynasty TV (NTDTV, 新唐人電視台) broadcasts by carrier Chunghwa Telecom experienced a series of blackouts last month could be the most disturbing and direct effort yet on the part of Beijing to censor the flow of information in Taiwan.

The station reported a series of interruptions to its broadcasts in the run-up to the 60th anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic of China and a complete blackout on the day of the anniversary last Thursday.

Obama blinks, freedom suffers

Taipei Times

A long time ago, it was customary for representatives of states to pay tribute to the Chinese emperor, who “ruled all under heaven.” The tributary system, as it was known, “acknowledged” China’s place at the center of everything. From a Chinese perspective, everything outside China was lower in the hierarchy.

For a number of reasons, including politics and geography, China lost steam around the time that Europe, led by Britain, embarked on the Industrial Revolution. Warlordism and colonialism ensured that for the next 200 years or so, China would stay behind while the West, and then Japan, modernized.

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