Taiwan’s Election: The View From China

What Beijing calls the “Taiwan regional elections” – in keeping with the fiction that Taiwan is a province under the control of the People’s Republic of China – were held on January 11. When the votes were counted, the result was bad news for the Chinese Communist Party (CCP): President Tsai Ing-wen not only won re-election, but she won with more votes than any previous presidential candidate in Taiwan had ever received. Since Tsai’s inauguration in 2016, Beijing has run an intense pressure campaign against her administration, which ran the gamut from cutting off cross-strait dialogues and poaching Taiwan’s diplomatic allies to hosting rival presidential candidate Han Kuo-yu and flooding the island with disinformation ahead of the election.

That campaign failed. As Tsai put it in her victory speech on January 11, “The results of this election carry an added significance, because they have shown that when our sovereignty and democracy are threatened, the Taiwanese people will shout our determination even more loudly back.”

Still, Beijing is unlikely to change tactics. Chinese leaders left themselves no room for maneuver by repeatedly declaring that the mainland would not engage with Tsai’s government unless she embraces the “1992 consensus,” a vague agreement between the CCP and National Party (KMT) that Taiwan is party of “one China.” A statement from the Taiwan Affairs Office, issued shortly after the election, showed no sign of change:

Our policy toward Taiwan is clear and consistent. We hold fast to the basic policies of peaceful reunification under “one country, two systems;” hold fast to the one-China principle; resolutely safeguard national sovereignty and territorial integrity; resolutely oppose any form of “Taiwan independence” separatist conspiracies and behavior; and resolutely promote the benefit and welfare of Taiwan compatriots.

Beijing’s bottom line – that Tsai must embrace the “1992 consensus” – remains.

Despite Tsai’s resounding victory, China’s state media was intent on finding ways to undermine her mandate. The post-election analysis from state news agency Xinhua outlined what it saw as the keys to her re-election: “buying votes” through lavish government spending; suppressing opponents (including by using a “cyber-army” to spread fake news); drumming up the “threat” from the mainland and rousing enmity toward it; and creating a “green terror.”

“According to influential academics and media within the island, this clearly wasn’t an ordinary election,” Xinhua wrote. “Tsai Ing-wen and the DPP used deception, suppression, intimidation, and other dirty tricks to fish for votes, fully exposing their selfish, greedy, and wicked nature.”

In an interesting convergence, these complaints were common KMT talking points as well in the run-up to the polls. Both the KMT and CCP accused Tsai of wielding a “green terror” to suppress opponents and thus damaging Taiwan’s democracy, but criticism that Tsai’s administration has been bad for democracy is especially rich coming from Beijing.

Xinhua also blamed Tsai’s victory on “foreign forces” – the same narrative it has spun to dismiss the grievances on display in Hong Kong. The article accused “Western foreign political forces” of “openly interfering in Taiwan’s election in order to control and contain the Chinese mainland; block close, brotherly cross-strait relations; and support Tsai Ing-wen.”

“Clearly, this round of Taiwan region elections to a great extent was manipulated by foreign dark forces,” Xinhua declared. Most analysts wouldn’t challenge that statement, except to point out that Beijing itself was the one doing the “manipulating” (albeit unsuccessfully, in this case).

Other Chinese scholars and media outlets largely echoed Xinhua’s analysis. China Daily matter-of-factly stated that “The United States and some anti-China forces in the West intervened in the election.”

“[T]he United States’ meddling in the election was clearly evident,” Chinese scholar Zhu Songling told the CCP’s English-language outlet. “The U.S. Congress passed a torrent of acts on Taiwan to boost Tsai's chances of winning the election.”

Only the Global Times came close to admitting that Taiwan’s people had freely voted for Tsai – and against the mainland. “What Tsai and the DPP advocated most in the elections were repulsion of the Chinese mainland and rejection of the reunification,” the paper wrote. “The election result shows that most people in Taiwan approve the political path based on such perceptions. In the current international context and the island’s internal environment with the DPP in power, it is very hard to change such an ideology in Taiwan.”

But in the Global Times’ argument, that reality does not necessitate any change in the mainland’s own approach. “The election result is more of a test of the mainland's ability to cope with the changes… To finally achieve cross-Straits reunification, we need the determination and endurance to bear more pressure.” In other words: Stay the course.

Xinhua came to a similar conclusion, ultimately dismissing this election as a “bubble” in the “tides of history” or a cloud passing in front of the sun.

“The basic pattern of the development of cross-strait relations cannot be changed by any administration,” Xinhua declared. Pointing to the growing power disparity between Taipei and Beijing, the article noted that the mainland “firmly grasps the leadership role in cross-strait relations” and has ample resources in its “policy toolkit” to deal with Tsai.

It seems that Beijing has resigned itself to waiting out Tsai’s administration, even knowing that she will now be in office for another four years. Expect China to continue its diplomatic pressure campaign, preventing Taiwan from engaging in international fora even while stripping away its 15 remaining diplomatic allies (both the Vatican and Haiti are perennially listed as potential contenders to drop Taiwan in China’s favor).

At the same time, expect to see Beijing warmly embrace politicians from the DPP’s rival parties, notably the KMT but also perhaps the newly-founded Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), which won five seats in the legislature. TPP founder Ko Wen-je, an independent who has served as Taipei’s mayor since 2014, has signaled his interest in working with Beijing in the past and could make an interesting partner for the CCP – especially if Ko decides to make a long-anticipated bid for the presidency in 2024.

Not that China is giving up on the KMT just yet. China Daily, citing Zhu Songling again, made the case for the party’s continued relevance: “Although Han Kuo-yu of the KMT was defeated, Zhu said Han and his voters, who emphasized improving the island's economy and its people's livelihoods, cannot be ignored.” Indeed, the KMT was neck-and-neck with the DPP in the party vote, despite Tsai’s massive individual victory. Clearly, China sees a path back to power for its preferred partner in Taiwan, and Beijing will do what it can to make the KMT’s promises of economic prosperity bear fruit.

Ultimately, the hope in Beijing is that its pressure slowly builds up to the point where Taiwan’s voters eventually embrace a pendulum swing back toward pro-China policies. That’s what happened with Chen Shui-bian, the only previous DPP president – after his second term ended, the KMT’s Ma Ying-jeou was elected with a then-record number of votes, giving him a clear mandate to pursue closer ties with China. Beijing is clearly holding out hope for history to repeat itself, resulting in a more China-friendly KMT administration in the future.

But things won’t be that simple. In both 2016 and 2020 the KMT was badly burned by nominating a strongly pro-China candidate (in fact, in 2016 the KMT even dumped its erstwhile presidential candidate, Hung Hsiu-chu, because she was polling so poorly). There are strong internal divisions within the party, and its leadership has resigned following the loss of both the presidency and the Legislative Yuan for another four years. If younger party members win control of the KMT, they may move away from the pro-China direction of past presidential candidates – leaving China scrambling to find new allies on Taiwan.

In a fit of bombast after the election, Xinhua spoke “directly to Tsai Ing-wen and the DPP,” warning that “stubbornly holding on to delusions will only speed up your disillusionment.” Beijing would be wise to heed its mouthpiece’s advice and frankly re-evaluate which way the wind is blowing in Taiwan.