Two-Level Games, Issue Politicization and the Disarray of Taiwan's Cross-Strait Policy after the 2000 Presidential Election Chenghong Li This study aims to illuminate the interactive relationship between domestic politics and external policy in Taiwan's mainland China policy after the 2000 presidential election. Following the logic of Putnam's two-level games, this paper demonstrates how the newly elected President Chen Shui-bian adopted an ambiguous and evasive approach as well as frequently shifted positions in his dealings with the mainland China issue due to the constraints of his pro-independence constituents and a vigilant, anti-independence Beijing, Employing Kanopf's three-tothree games as well as Puchala's issue politicization, it further shows how Taiwan's opposition parties--the KMT, the PFE and the NP--as well as Chen's political rivals, took advantage of Chen's inability to break the Strait impasse by initiating active engagement with Beijing in order to gain political advantages. Key words: Two-level games, three-to-three games, issue politicization, win-set, disarray Introduction By highlighting the interactive relationship between domestic politics and international relations through specifying the concrete interactive means and channels, Putnam's metaphorical two-level games contribute greatly to the examinations of the linkage relationship between domestic politics and international relations. Many studies have employed two-level games as an analytical framework to explore the transboundary interactive relations on a variety of topics, l However, Putnam's two-level games overlook the complexity of transnationalism by concentrating his analysis exclusively on statesmen, or COG (chief of government), whom Putnam treated more a transmission belt between domestic politics and international negotiations. In other words, in Putnam's two-level games, to a certain degree the state is still considered as a EASTASIA, Fall 2005, Vol. 22, No. 3, pp. 41-62.
42 East Asia / Fall 2005 unitary actor. As for the non-official actors, except for functioning as domestic constraints of COG through impacting the size of "win-set" as envisioned in Putnam's two-level games, there is no other role for them to play in Putnam's framework. Knopf's upgrade of Putnam's two-level games into three-to-three games helps capture the complexity of transboundary interactions by including other types of transnational interactions such as the exchanges involving non-official actors, thus helping open a window for the examinations of possibilities regarding non-official actors' direct participation in international negotiations. Nevertheless, just like Putnam's two-level games, Knopf's three-to-three games still share the same research focus by insisting on treating the results of international negotiations as the only dependent variable, while neglecting questions concerning how the international negotiations impact the domestic politics. In this regard, Gourevitch's "second image reversed" and Puchala's "issue politicization," which help reverse the research focus to the examinations of questions concerning how international negotiations and environment affect domestic politics, are very helpful in tackling the questions surrounding how domestic political groups utilize the ongoing international negotiations to gain political advantages. This paper is written for the purpose of illuminating the complex "back and forth" reverberation relations between domestic politics and international relations in two directions from the perspective of issue politicization: how the constraints of international factors and domestic politics affect the formation of a given state's foreign policy, and how the ongoing international negotiations affect the domestic political power struggle. It is composed of three subparts. The first section intends to capture the theoretical essences in Putnam's two-level games and its later development as shown in Knopf's three-to-three games, as well as Gourevitch's "second image reversed" and Puchala's "issue politicization," by which to support a central argument made here that a framework with a focus on the examinations of transnational interactions from the perspective of issue politicization is preferable in this increasingly globalized world. The second section will employ this theoretical framework to explore Taiwan's mainland China policy in the first year of Chen Shui-bian's presidency. There are two parts in this section. The first part will focus on the role of COG, that is, the newly elected president Chert Shui-bian, as stressed in Putnam's two-level games. It attempts to illuminate how a pro-independence constituency and a vigilant anti-independence Beijing caught Chen Shui-bian in a dilemma in his dealings with mainland China. It will also show how this dilemma compels Chen Shui-bian to adopt a type of ambivalent mainland China policy as well as to frequently shift his policy positions, which consequentially leads to his incapability to break the impasse in cross-strait negotiations. Following Knopf's three-to-three games as well as Puchala's issue politicization, the second part will focus on non-cog actors in transboundary interactions, particularly on Chen's political rivals from both the opposition parties--the KMT (Nationalist Party or Kuomintang), the PFP (People First
Li 43 Party), and the NP (New Party)--as well as his own DPP (Democratic Progressive Party). It aims to explain how Chen's political opponents take advantage of Chen's inability to produce a definite, consistent mainland China policy to reap political benefits by initiating active engagement with Beijing, a traditionally uncharted area in Putnam's two-level games. The result of the coexistence of the COG's inconsistent official mainland China policy and active communications between Beijing's COG and Taiwan's non-cog actors across the Taiwan Strait, is the disarray of Taiwan's mainland China policy at that time. The final section will summarize the findings of this study from both theoretical and substantial perspectives. It will also point out the direction for future studies of the transboundary interactions between domestic politics and foreign policy from the perspective of issue politicization. Two-Level Games, the Second Image Reversed, and Issue Politicization According to Putnam, all international negotiations involve both national and international game boards simultaneously. At the national level, domestic groups pursue their interests by pressuring the government to adopt favorable policies and politicians seek power by constructing coalitions among those groups. At the international level, national governments seek to maximize their own ability to satisfy domestic pressures, while minimizing the adverse consequences of foreign development. 2 What links those two games together is the "win-set," a central concept developed by Putnam. By "win-set," Putnam defines as a necessary majority among a given constituent to ratify the set of all possible level I agreements--that is, the necessary majority for an agreement to "win" the domestic support? For any international negotiation, is it possible to reach an agreement only under the condition of the existence of overlapping win-sets between the negotiators. According to Putnam, larger win-sets in Level II make Level! agreement more likely. Also the relative size of the respective Level II win-sets will affect the distribution of the joint gains from the international bargain, since the larger the perceived win-set of a negotiator, the more he would be "pushed around" by the other Level I negotiators, while a small domestic win-set can be a bargaining advantage. As for the factors that affect the size of a win-set for a given state, Putnam identifies mainly the following: power, preference and coalitions among Level II constituents; political institutions; and strategies adopted by negotiators. Essentially, in Putnam's two-level games, the statesman's choice of strategy is assumed to be a central element in international negotiations, reflecting a simultaneous "double-edged" calculation of constraints and opportunities on both the domestic and international boards. As contended by Moravicsk, what makes Putnam's two-level games distinctive from previous endeavors in tackling the mutual interactive relations between domestic politics and international relations lies in its emphasis of the statesman as a central strategic actor. 4 In other words, in Putnam's two-level games, statesmen or COG function as a transmission belt between domestic politics and international affairs. Putnam's
44 East Asia [ Fall 2005 innovative reformulation of the interconnected relations between domestic politics and international relations helps direct IR students to explore the implications of the different specifications of the principle-agent relation between the polity and the statesman, and different specifications of the statesman's interests. However, as for questions about whether other domestic actors will be involved, if so, how they will be involved into international negotiations besides acting as constraints to COG, remain unaddressed in Putnam's two-level games. More than that, how the international negotiations would affect the political and economic fortunes of other domestic political groups is also not in the consideration of Putnam's two-level games. Given the fact that more and more non-government organizations (NGO) and transnational actors are involving directly into transboundary interactions, these omissions leave some interesting questions unaddressed. Jeffrey Knopf's three-to-three games attempt to capture these neglected parts in Putnam's two-level games by including other types of transboundary interactions. In his study of the intermediate-range nuclear force negotiations between the United States and the Soviet Union, Knopf argued that Putnam's two-level games conceptualization of bargaining fails to give adequate attention to the differences among the separable forms of domestic-international interactions. 5 Knopf maintained that transboundary interactions can be differentiated into three subtypes: transgovernmental interactions, which refer to the interactions involving governmental officials, constituting the focus of Putnam's two-level games; transnational interactions, which refer to interactions involving actors outside the executive branch; and cross-levels exchanges, which refer to interactions involving two different types of actors. According to Knopf, these different cross-boundary interactions will have different impacts on interstate bargaining due to the different motivations behind them. Also, Knopf argued that in addition to the original two levels identified by Putnam, which will impact the international negotiations, alliance relationships will also affect the negotiation process and results. Thus, they should be taken into account when the interactive cross-boundary relations are examined. In this way, finally Knopf constructed a model of three-to-three games based on Putnam's original two-level games. 6 However, Knopf's upgrade of Putnam's two-level games into three-to-three games does not change the basic research focus. On the contrary, Knopf and Putnam share the same dependent variable in their frameworks. By positing two-level games and three-to-three level games to illuminate the interactive relations between domestic politics and international negotiations, both Knopf and Putnam intend to explain the results of international negotiations. What differentiate them are the independent variables they invoke for explanations. As a result, in the frameworks developed by Putnam and Knopf, the questions concerning how the domestic political actors make use of the ongoing crossborder negotiations to gain political advantages are unaddressed. In this regard, Gourevitch's "the second image reversed" provides a very good framework to explore the problems of how international system affects domestic politics. As argued by Gourevitch, in contrast with the "the second image" thesis which tends to trace the sources of international relations to the
Li 45 domestic factors, the international system might itself be a cause of domestic structure and politics. Through an extensive survey of the literature, Gourevitch identified several factors--mainly the international economic system and international state system--that might affect the domestic politics in terms of regime types, coalition patterns, and even the concrete formation of policies, v Basically in line with Gourevitch's "reversed second image," but focusing more on politics, Puchala's issue politicization approach to the study of EC's financial policy harmonization further offers us a very fascinating formula for the examination of the interactive relationship between domestic politics and international affairs from the perspective of politics. Puchala endorses the Lasswellian definition of politics, which essentially treats political behavior as game-like in that it is rational and goal-directed and evolves in moves and countermoves determined by strategies. In the political world, to maintain or enhance actors' power basis to distribute rewards within or between societies is the absolute imperative to political participants. For national politics, obviously, the chief political instinct of any ruling group is to maintain itself in office, and the primary political drive of any opposition group is to move into office. According to Puchala, in this political world, whenever issues come to be perceived as affecting the respective fortunes of different groups competing for control over government, such issues are said to be politicized and the process by which they come to be perceived is called politicization. Furthermore, Puchala argues that politicization and consequent political competition need not be limited only to interactions between governmental incumbents and outside challengers. They may occur in any situation where the handling of issues could affect the relative status, influence or power of those involved in the deliberations. According to Puchala, "the closer that issues come to affecting participants' status and power, actually or perceptibly, the more highly politicized they become and the less relevant become technical considerations. ''8 The degree of issue politicization depends on the degree of the issue's effect on participants' status and power. In some cases, positions with regard to the pure technical efficacy of alternative solutions to policy problems might be thought to affect the relative fortunes of different aspirants for leadership, thus becoming politicized. Within this highly politicized world, there is no boundary between domestic and international politics. All belong to politics. In some cases, as forcefully argued by Allison, foreign policy is neither a product of rational planning as realist would believe, nor a product of organizational standard procedure, but a product of domestic political power struggle. In some other even more extreme cases, foreign policy itself becomes a tool for domestic power struggles. Under such unusual circumstances, power, rather than anything else, becomes the sole purpose for the making of foreign policy, and concerns of power and influences dominate the generation of foreign policies. According to my understanding, there are several advantages for employing the issue politicization approach to the study of the interactive relations between domestic politics and foreign policy. First, rather than mainly focusing on the international respect, it can endow to us a new way to study the
46 East Asia / Fall 2005 transboundary interactions from the perspective of domestic politics--to answer more about the questions of how the external world affects the fortunes of political participants as well as their policy approaches to international affairs, and how political leaders play the two-level games simultaneously in a highly politicized world. Second, this approach can help us focus more on the process of domestic-international interactions instead of on the outcomes of the international interactions, which in many cases are very time-consuming and even endless. Third, in addition to the traditional focus on COG as implied in Putnam's two-level games, an issue politicization approach to the study of transboundary interactions can further help us examine the political effects of the direct involvements into international negotiations by other nonofficial actors, which are not unusual in our increasingly globalized world. Undoubtedly, in Taiwan, how to deal with mainland China has always been a highly politicized issue. Taiwan's increased democratization, which was demonstrated in the three most recent direct presidential elections (1996, 2000, 2004), makes the cross-strait relations even more sensitive in Taiwan's domestic politics. How to respond to mainland China's unification pressures-- either in the form of military threats, or rhetorical threats, as well as the increasing internal pro-independence voice, has always been a serious challenge to both incumbent and opposition parties across Taiwan's political spectrum. Actually, Taiwan's political parties can be divided roughly along the unification-independence continuum, with the KMT and the PFP being prounification and the DPP being pro-independence, while the NP is strongly pro-unification and the TAIP (Jianguodang, Nation-Building Party in Chinese, or Taiwan Independence Party in English) and TSU (Taiwan Solidarity Union) are strongly pro-independence. In the following sections, I will try to use Taiwan's mainland China policy after the March 2000 presidential election as a case to study the transboundary interactions from the perspective of issue politicization, with a focus on Chen Shui-bian's first year as Taiwan's president. First, following Putnam's original framework, I will examine the role of COG, that is, the newly elected president Chert Shui-bian, to demonstrate how he play the two-level games across the Taiwan Strait. Second, I will also examine the non-cog actors as envisioned in Knopf's three-to-three games to see how they play the cross- Strait game to their advantages. Mainly, I will explore the behaviors of Chen Shui-bian's political rivals from the opposition parties, and Chen's political opponents within his own DPP, such as DPP's president at that time Hsieh Chang-ring, in order to demonstrate how Chen's political rivals take advantage of Chen's inability to break the impasse across the Taiwan Strait to gain political benefits. Given the controversy over Taiwan's status, for discussion convenience, also taking into account the separation reality between Taiwan and mainland China, I keep all the academic terminologies intact in this paper. Obviously, as implied in the above discussion, this framework can also be used to analyze Taiwan's mainland China policy, as well as the interactive relationship between domestic politics and international relations in other areas in a more general way. Still, I choose to focus particularly on Taiwan's
Li 47 mainland China policy after the 2000 presidential election for several specific reasons. First, Taiwan's 2000 presidential election ousted the long-time incumbent ruling party KMT, and put a pro-independence candidate, Chen Shui-bian, from the opposition DPP into office. This is the first instance of peaceful power transfer, or "party alternation" (Zhengdang Lunti) as used by many locale Taiwanese, in the history of Taiwan's political development. Many Taiwanese and cross-strait observers consider it as a strong proof for the consolidation of Taiwan's fledgling democracy. An exclusive examination of this special transition period might help shed light on the question of how the "party alternation" adds weight to the consolidation of Taiwan's democracy. Second, more than that, given the fact that the KMT and the DPP hold diverse views with regard to Taiwan's relations with mainland China--the KMT supports unification in the long term while the DPP supports Taiwan's independence, an intensive study of the newly elected President Chen Shuibian and his political rivals on the mainland China issue in such a very special transition period will also help shed light on our main concerning puzzles: how Taiwan's political actors play the mainland China card to their advantages under such a dramatic domestic revamp. More likely, the political nature of the involved actors will be exposed under such an unusually precious transition period, despite the fact that careful examinations of other periods might also reach the same conclusion. Newly Elected President Chen Shui-bian's Dilemma and His Policy Choice During the period of Lee Teng-hui's leading Taiwan, due to the combination of two different political dispositions on Lee--he is a senior leader of the KMT and the first Taiwanese (Benshenren) elected as the president of the Republic of China in its history, Lee could enjoy both advantages and play his two-level games across the Taiwan Strait successfully most of the time in his presidency. Because Lee is from the KMT that controls Taiwan's Legislative Yuan and also favors final reunification with mainland China on the conditions of democracy, equality, and prosperity, Beijing has more confidence in him. Because Lee is a Taiwanese, he enjoys a high reputation and the respect of many Taiwanese who tend to favor Taiwan's independence. This helps Lee dilute the suspicion of the pro-independence fundamentalists and alleviate the pressure from pro-independence Taiwanese. Except in 1995 when Lee paid a trip to the United States and made a provocative speech at Cornell University, which led Beijing to conclude gradually that Lee was actually working on the promotion of Taiwan's independence, Lee Teng-hui could enjoy both advantages in playing his two-level games in Taiwan in a relatively successful way for most of his time in office. Compared with Lee Teng-hui, Taiwan's newly elected president Chen Shuibian lacks all of Lee's advantages. He only got 39% of the popular votes in the 2000 presidential election, which means the majority of Taiwanese didn't vote for him. Also, the Legislative Yuan was controlled by opposition parties at the time when Chen began his presidency. Of the 225 seats, the KMT had
48 East Asia / Fall 2005 115, Chen's DPP only had 67, James Soong's PFP, as well as the NP which all belong to the Pan-KMT line, occupied 31. According to Taiwan's Frenchstyle constitution, in this case, only by allying with the opposition parties could Chen's DPP exercise executive power smoothly. However, rather than negotiating with the opposition parties, Chen Shui-bian selected Fei Tang, an ex-defense minister, as his first premier of the Executive Yuan without getting the KMT's party endorsement. Chen also hired several ex-kmt officials to lead several departments of the Executive Yuan. Chen's refusal to share power with the opposition parties almost led to disaster in his first year as Taiwan's president in handling the domestic issues. 9 With respect to the cross-strait relations, even more catastrophically, Chen Shui-bian is intrinsically distrusted by Beijing. He comes from the DPR a party that has supported Taiwan's independence ever since its founding in 1986. The DPP's original pro-independence idea negates the state of the Republic of China, denies the KMT's treasured goal of unification with the Chinese mainland, and refutes the insistence that there is only one China (ROC), and Taiwan is part of it. The roots of the DPP's independence mentality can be mainly traced to primordial differences, Taiwan's unique historical experience, democratic reform, and Beijing's forceful stance. Under the pressure of election, the DPP gradually modified its radical pro-independence position in order to attract more moderate voters. One of the adjustments made by the DPP was the passage of the "resolution on Taiwan's future" in May 1999, where the DPP formally accepted the legitimacy of the ROC. However, the "Taiwan independence clause" still remains intact in the DPP's party charter--and unfortunately, Chen Shui-bian was one of the original drafters of this clause. To attract more moderate voters, Chen Shui-bian propounded a "new centrist road for Taiwan" in his presidential campaign for the purpose of diluting his pro-independence color. In this new suggested policy, Chen Shui-bian promised voters to build "perpetual peace cross the Taiwan Strait" by expanding exchanges, lifting restraints on investments, and opening three direct links to mainland China. 1~ However, in the eyes of Beijing, Chen Shui-bian's pro-independence color is not easy to erase just by changing rhetoric or policy suggestions. Actually, Beijing worried very much about the possible election of Chen Shui-bian as Taiwan's new president and intended perceivably to thwart Chen's presidential path right before the election. Beijing's Premier Zhu Rongji, in a news conference held just days before Taiwan's presidential election, warned Taiwan voters that they stood "at a critical historical juncture (referring to the coming presidential election)... if they voted for the wrong candidate, I am afraid that you won't have another opportunity to regret," delivering strong, bullying rhetoric. 11 Unfortunately, Beijing's worst nightmare came true when Chen Shui-bian won the election on March 18, 2000, ending the KMT's more than half a century rule of Taiwan. Chen Shui-bian's victory raised great alarm in Beijing's leadership. Beijing issued a statement after the presidential election, in which it said, "Taiwan's local election cannot change the fact that Taiwan is part of China." With regard to the newly elected president Chen Shui-bian, Beijing warned, "we will
Li 49 listen to his words, watch his actions, and observe vigilantly to which direction he will lead the cross-strait relations. ''12 In addition to the rhetorical warning, Beijing started a well-coordinated, full-scale two-pronged campaign on Taiwan. One soft prong aims at winning "the hearts of the Taiwanese people," and one hard prong seeks to force Taipei to accept Beijing's precondition on resumption of cross-strait talks, that is, to acknowledge the "one China principle" or "1992 consensus." With respect to the soft prong, Beijing toned down its stance on the "one China principle" by offering a new attractive interpretation. In a meeting with the KMT's legislators, China's vice premier, Qian Qichen, a central figure in charge of mainland China's Taiwan policy, stated that the "one China principle" can be expressed as follows: "there is only one China in this world; both mainland China and Taiwan belong to the same one China; China's sovereignty and territory cannot be divided." Qian's new statement regarding the "one China principle" departed significantly from Beijing's original "old three phrases," where Taiwan was considered as a part of PRC while the "new three phrases" consider both PRC (mainland China) and Taiwan as parts of the common one China. Qian's "new three phrases" implies that Beijing intends to treat ROC as equal as PRC in the possible future bilateral negotiations. 13 Beijing also started to build a united front with Taiwan's opposition party leaders by inviting Taiwan's legislators, former high-ranking officials (mostly from the opposition party KMT), elected local officials (some belonging to the ruling party, the DPP), scholars, and media luminaries to visit mainland China. Beijing also restated its stance in offering protection to the preferential treatments for Taiwanese investors in the mainland. With regard to the hard prong, Beijing continued to conduct military exercises and announced these kinds of exercises through the sensationalizing Hong Kong media with the purpose of affecting Taiwanese psychology. Beijing also mobilized overseas Chinese globally to form organizations and stage conferences under the banner of "opposing independence and promoting unification." Under the pressures from both his domestic constituents and Beijing, Chen Shui-bian did try to modify his traditional attitude on the issue of independence and reunification by taking several moderate steps to manage the cross- Strait issue. For example, Chen retreated from the DPP's party activity to show his distance from the pro-independence DPP after the presidential election. Just as Yu-shan Wu observed, after being elected as president, compared with his previous stance on mainland China policy, Chen Shui-bian did display some "goodwill and friendly postures to mainland China. ''14 Unfortunately, several constraints limit Chen's space for further maneuvers. First and most importantly, most of Chen Shui-bian's political supporters are pro-independence Taiwanese. Actually, many Chen Shui-bian's cabinet members are former pro-independent movement activists. Annette Lu, his vicepresident educated in Harvard, is one of the most distinguished independent advocates. Just as a New York Times reporter observed, Lu still "sees herself as the guardian of the Taiwanese independent movement. ''I~ Ing-wen Tsai, the minister of the Mainland Affair Council, is widely believed to be one of most important contributors to ex-president Lee Teng-hui's controversial "state-to-
50 East Asia [ Fall 2005 state" statement. Fu-mei Chang, the minister of the Overseas (Chinese) Affairs Council, is also an enthusiastic activist of Taiwan's independent movement. ~6 A number of Chen's senior presidential advisors, such as Ming-min Peng, Chia-wen Yao, Mei-ling King, are all long-time advocates of building a " Republic of Taiwan. ''17 Similarly, many of the DPP's legislators, from whom Chen Shui-bian needs their coordination to enable his weak government to execute policies, are also pro-independence activists. In sum, for all those advocates of Taiwanese independence who were eagerly devoted to Chen's presidential election campaign, if Chen Shui-bian's final capture of the ROC's presidency, doesn't mean the formal realization of their fervent dream of building a "Republic of Taiwan," at least it should elevate the independent movement to a higher level. In their eyes, compared with the previous the KMT, Chen Shui-bian's any soft posture toward mainland China, for example, to accept the "one China principle," to chair the National Reunification Council (NRC) or any other concession to Beijing, are certainly intolerable. On the other hand, with the pressures coming from the opposition side, especially Beijing's stark insistence on Chen's acceptance of the "one China principle" as a precondition for any dialogue to be resumed, Chen Shui-bian doesn't have the capability to lower the tension over the Taiwan Strait. This not only makes Chen's weak domestic position even weaker, but also leads to Chen's inability to fulfill his campaign promises to his voters. Thus, under the heavy scrutiny of both sides, for the newly elected president Chen Shui-bian, how to deal with this two-level game to find a way to satisfy these two seemingly incompatible positions is really a great challenge. Generally, to skate a thin line between not angering Beijing and not alienating the pro-independence hardliners in his own party will be Chen's ideal choice at this initial stage in office. To achieve this goal, Chen Shui-bian must choose some ambiguous and evasive ways to handle the very sensitive and highly politicized cross-strait issue. That is exactly the strategy that Chen and his immediate advisors adopted. Chen Shui-bian's ambiguous approach to the mainland China policy can be best illustrated in his May 20, 2000 inauguration speech. In this inaugural address, Chen Shui-bian promised "five no's" to mainland China "as long as mainland China abstains from using force against Taiwan." Those "five no's" are: no declaration of Taiwan's independence, no change of the name of ROC, no adaptation of ex-president Lee's special "state-to-state statement" (liangguolun) into the constitution, no referendum on the issue of unification and independence, and no abolishment of the "National Reunification Guidelines" and the "National Reunification Council." He also promised that he is willing to handle the problem of "one future China" with mainland China from the established basis between two sides. However, there is no answer here with regard to the question "what is the established basis?", thus opening the door for multiple interpretations. On the other hand, though there is no word referring directly to independence, careful readers of his speech can find that Chen's address is actually permeated with Taiwanese nationalism that points to the direction of Taiwan's independence. 18
Li 51 Chen Shui-bian's address title, "Taiwan Stands up," reminds many observers of Chairman Mao's speech in 1949 on the Tiananmen Square in the celebration of PRC's foundation, where Mao declared proudly to the world that "Chinese people stand up," referring to the end of the imperial colonial rule in China. Chen's adoption of the same address title connotes the meaning that with his capture of the presidency Taiwan is finally free from the control of the outsiders (wailaitongzhi); here the outsiders include the Japanese, but mainly refer to contemporary mainland Chinese, particularly the KMT. Also in his presidential address, Chen intentionally paralleled the Taiwanese history of misery with the similar gloomy modern Chinese history, implying that the Taiwanese and Chinese do not share the same history and memory, thus they belong to different nations. Understandably, after scrutinizing Chen's address, some analysts from mainland China concluded that Chen Shui-bian's inauguration speech is actually a "declaration of Taiwanese independence" without using the word "independence. ''~9 Chen Shui-bian did in part realize his objectives through this speech. On the one hand, in spite of continuously criticizing Chen's speech's lack of "sincerity and goodwill" to improve the cross-strait relations, with Chen's "five no's" promise, Beijing has no excuse to raise the level of threats in the form of either military or rhetoric. On the other hand, DPP fundamentalists who are strongly pro-independence also are satisfied with his speech, for Chen Shuibian not only did not accept the "one China principle" in his speech, but also helped pour out their shared, strong emotional feeling for Taiwanese independence. Chen Shui-bian's another "creative but still evasive" approach to the sensitive cross-strait relations is the establishment of a special organization, the "Supra-party Task Force," to replace the National Reunification Council (NRC). He invited the president of Acedemia Sinica Yuan-tseh Lee, a highly respected scholar in Taiwan, to chair this special organization. Though Chen Shui-bian promised in his inauguration speech that he did not intend to abolish the "Guidelines for National Reunification" and National Reunification Council, to actually adhere to the guidelines would be unacceptable to his supporters. In this sense, to establish a new institution in the name of seeking a public consensus and also to evade the sensitive reunification guidelines will be another moderate but still ambiguous way of dealing with both mainland China and his political supporters. It is from these considerations that Chen decided to establish this "Supra-party Task Force" while shelving the "Guidelines for National Reunification." As some observers pointed out directly, Chen's true intention in building a "Supra-party Task Force" is to seek a shield that can protect him from the attacks of both mainland China and his political supporters, z~ However, due to the boycott of the opposition parties, most of the "Supra-party Task" members are sympathetic to the DPP, therefore limiting its representativeness. As a result of lack of representation, despite the fact that this "task force" did finally come out with several policy suggestions to Chen Shui-bian, where they recommended Chen to respond to Beijing's "one China" principle by referring to the one China according to "ROC's constitution," Beijing still criti-
52 East Asia / Fall 2005 cized those suggestions as "neither 3 nor 4"(busan bushi), referring to their ambiguity and evasiveness. However, Chen Shui-bian did not always have the ability and good luck in dealing with the inherent dilemmas with his domestic constituents and Beijing simultaneously. Conversely, there are several occasions that Chen's seemingly softening postures to mainland China provoked a grave backlash from his supporters immediately. The earliest one took place on June 27, 2000. In a meeting with Dr. Fuller, the American chairman of The Asia Foundation, Chen Shui-bian stated clearly that he was willing to accept the "1992 consensus"-- "One China, respective interpretations"--which Beijing contended was agreed upon by Beijing-based Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait (ARATS) and Taiwan's counterpart Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF) in a 1992 Hong Kong meeting and was treated as a precondition for any resumption of dialogues between Taipei and Beijing. 21 Learning of that report, the DPP and other fundamentalists condemned Chen's adjustment very severely. The Nation-Building Party TAIP (Jianguodang), charged president Chert Shui-bian in a newsletter in this way: "given the fact that 'change' is the nature of Chen Shui-bian, we can expect Chen will alter his position someday. But we still cannot anticipate that he changes so fast... Compared with Lee's 'state-to-state' theory that tried to break out of the 'one China" trammel, Chen's acceptance of 'one China, respective interpretations' retreats thousands of steps. Chen Shui-bian's change will finally lead to the disappearance of Taiwan." Hong-xi Lee, Chen's university law professor and a pro-independence fundamentalist, also published an article in a newspaper where he reprimanded Chen's adjustment very seriously. 22 Under such blunt attacks, Ing-wen Tsai, the minister of MAC, co-held an emergency press conference with the presidential office the next day to clarify Chen's position. In this conference, Tsai stressed that "President Chen's stance on mainland China policy did not change. His speech yesterday doesn't indicate that we accept mainland China's '1992 one China consensus.'" Instead, Tsai maintained that "No agreement was reached on the issue of 'one China' in 1992, if did, it was the one that both sides agreed to offer their own interpretation regarding the issue of 'one China'. In other words, no consensus was reached at that time. ''23 Another incident occurred in October 2000. In an interview with a German magazine, Der Spiegel, Chen Shui-bian was asked bluntly whether he regarded himself as Chinese or Taiwanese. In reply, Chen answered that he was "honored and proud to be Chinese." This report was later translated into Chinese and published in Taiwan's many newspapers. Again, Chen's position raised great concerns among fundamentalist, pro-independence Taiwanese, since Chen's acknowledgment of his Chinese identity will be seen as a significant dovish overture to Beijing. One of Jiang Zemin's "eight points" for reunification is "Chinese don't fight with Chinese." Chen's acknowledgement of his Chinese identity would possibly help pave the way for resumption of the discontinued negotiations. However, the fundamentalists' backlash forced Chen to retract his reconciliation. Several days after this interview, the Presidential Office issued a statement saying that an error had been made in translating President Chen's remarks. This official statement claimed that in his reply,
Li 53 President Chen used the term "Hua Ren" rather than "Zhong Guo Ren." In Chinese, the former is a term, similar to the English word "diaspora," that refers to many overseas Chinese whose ancestry can be traced back to China. The latter term can be interpreted as meaning a subject of the "Middle Kingdom," which is intrinsically associated with mainland China. 24 The presidential office's quick clarification on such a small issue reflects how sensitive the pro-independence fundamentalists are to the issues of identity and reunification. A more sensitive incident took place in August 2000. This anecdote is related to the issue of whether or not Chert should accept the chairmanship of the National Reunification Council. Probably to test the response from DPP fundamentalists, Chen Shui-bian let both his acting secretary and deputy secretary of the Presidential Office, rather than himself, declare that the president had the intention to chair NRC. This news was first disclosed by Che-nan Chen, the acting secretary general of the Presidential Office in a news conference on August 15. 22 Then, on the following day, the deputy secretary general, Eugene Chien, who was with Chen on his trip to South America, also delivered a same message in a news conference. 26 We can imagine, without Chen's permission, neither Che-nan Chen nor Eugene Chien would have the courage and authority to announce such a piece of sensitive news. The publication of this news immediately promoted critiques from the DPE Legislator Cho-shui Lin, a member of the "New Tide Line" faction of the DPP (a fundamentalist DPP faction), charged that Chen's decision was short-sighted and that he was very disappointed in Chen's decision. Legislator Tung-jung Cai, another member of the "New Tide Line," argued that according to the DPP's current party charter, Chen Shui-bian should be fired from the DPP if he wanted to accept the chairmanship of NRC. Yi-Hsiung Lin, an ex-chairman of the DPP, and one of the spiritual leaders of Taiwanese independence movement, harshly declared that Chen's decision not only violated the spirit of the DPP, but also contradicted his previous stance. Lin concluded that if Chen Shui-bian did want to chair the NRC, the DPP should deprive him of his membership. Other senior DPP spiritual leaders who were hired as presidential advisors even planned to cosign an appeal letter to President Chen Shui-bian to stop Chen's plan. 2v Finally, under such intense pressure, Chen Shui-bian immediately denied the news that he will chair the NRC as baseless. More than that, in order to appease his DPP supporters, Chen even took a hawkish position on mainland China. On August 19, two days after the disclosure of the news, still abroad, Chen Shui-bian himself came out directly in a news conference and stated that reunification was not Taiwan's only option. Chen's appeasement of his supporters placated the pro-independence fundamentalists, but infuriated Beijing. Beijing's Taiwan Affairs Office (TAO) quickly responded to Chen's remark with a warning that Chen's comments reflected a "dangerous drift toward separation.'28 To be fair, Chen Shui-bian did take some positive steps to improve the cross-strait relations. For example, the mini-three direct links (trade, mail, and shipping) were started at the beginning of 2001. Also Chen promised to re-
54 East Asia ] Fall 2005 view the "go slow, be patient" (jiejiyongren) investment policy by gradually lifting the limitations on investments in mainland China. Chen's 2001 New Year's "Integration Speech" also offered some development space for the future of cross-strait relations. However, due to the internal incompatibility of those two forces, in spite of the fact that Chen Shui-bian struggled very hard to try to find a balance between his DPP's fundamentalist supporters and a vigilant anti-independence Beijing, both sides are still not satisfied with his performance. Beijing criticized Chen for "playing games with words"--refen-ing to Chen's shifting policy rhetoric from "one future China," to "established basis," to " 1992 consensus," as well as "1992 spirit" etc.--thus lacking the "sincerity and goodwill" to accept the "one China principle" which Beijing wants most for the improvement of cross-strait relations. 29 For the pro-independence fundamentalists, the fact that Chen Shui-bian's victory weakened rather than strengthened the pro-independence voice in Taiwan after the 2000 presidential election also made them very uneasy. 3~ Under this pressure, unsurprisingly, Chen Shui-bian's "integration speech" on March 19, 2000 regarding the future development of cross-strait relations was presented in a very special way to his political supporters, which provides another example to attest what kind of dilemma Chen Shui-bian faced in his mainland China two-level games under the siege of a vigilant Beijing and his pro-independence political constituents.31 New Situation, New Strategy Beijing's two-pronged campaigns and the impasse between Chen Shui-bian and Beijing creates an unprecedented incentive for Chen's opponents from the opposition parties (KMT, PFP and NP), as well as Chen's political rivals within the DPP, to utilize this chance to reap political advantages through playing the China card. One of the examples is the KMT, which was ousted by the DPP in the March 2000 presidential election. The KMT's humiliating defeat in the presidential election ended the KMT's rule in Taiwan of over half a century. Despite the fact that the KMT still kept the control of the Legislative Yuan, for the first time, the KMT was forced to learn how to be an opposition party in a democratic society. Almost instinctively, the KMT learned very quickly that it could play a vital role in cross-strait relations, which is one of the major concerns for Taiwanese and the hardest task for Chen Shui-bian to handle under the condition of Beijing's distrust. To get a clearer picture about the KMT's new approach to the cross-strait issue, we need to illustrate the KMT's mainland China policy when it was still in office. Detailed examinations of Lee Teng-hui and the KMT's mainland China policy confirm that, besides the KMT's nominal acknowledgement of the "one China principle" in the "National Reunification Guidelines," which were actually shelved, Chen Shui-bian's mainland China policy, which was under attack by the KMT and other opposition parties at that time, was actually inherited from the KMT. For example, in terms of economic exchanges, the KMT starkly insisted putting the priority on security rather than economic
Li 55 interests by formulating a set of policies to limit investments in mainland China under its leadership. This policy was generally categorized as "go slow, be patient" or "patience over haste" (Jiejiyongren). Accordingly, the KMT even devised a set of policy to encourage Taiwanese businessmen to invest in Southeast Asia--the so-called "Southward policy." Due to the great antagonism in Taiwanese business people to the KMT's economic policy, to lift the investment limitations became one of the common policy promises for all three candidates in the 2000 presidential election. With regard to culture, education and population exchanges, Lee and the KMT declined to recognize mainland China's university-level degrees in Taiwan, thus thwarting the opportunity for young Taiwanese to receive education in mainland China. The KMT's government also forbade incumbent officials to visit mainland China. In terms of diplomacy, the KMT spent a lot of money on exploring pragmatic diplomacy, which also strained cross-strait relations. In sum, under the rule of ex-president Lee and the KMT, though the unofficial exchanges between Taiwan and mainland China were very thriving, the general relations were actually very tense. The 1996 Taiwan missile crisis and the 1999 Lee's "state-to-state" statement almost sent the two sides to the edge of war. Losing the presidential election sparked great anger in many KMT members. Under great pressure, Lee Teng-hui, who was blamed for supporting Chen Shui-bian in the critical juncture, was forced to resign the KMT's chairmanship. Lien Chan succeeded Lee as acting chairman of the KMT. In March 2000, Lien Chan formally chaired the KMT by winning a direct party chairman election. Under the new leadership, almost dramatically, the KMT and Beijing, longtime rivals, both realized that they shared a common adversary, namely, the newly elected president Chen Shui-bian and his DPP. For Beijing, due to the pro-independence disposition in Chen Shui-bian and his DPP, without Chen's acceptance of the "one China principle," there is no space to contact Chen and the DPP. On the contrary, as elaborated above, Beijing tried hard to press Chen to recognize the "one China principle." In this regard, the KMT, the PFP and the NP, as well as other groups and people favoring the "one China" policy will be naturally welcomed by Beijing. Beijing hopes that by contacting Taiwan's opposition parties it can weaken Chen's domestic position and force Chen Shui-bian to acknowledge the "one China principle." For the KMT, losing the presidential election pushes the KMT to seek new political ground to play in order to keep, or even expand, its political territory and influence in Taiwan. To try to play a critical role in the cross-strait relations will be highly desirable for the KMT. In this way, the KMT can show its capability to make meaningful communications with Beijing and bring peaceful news to Taiwanese voters, thus not only contrasting Chen's inability to handle the cross-strait issue but also improving the KMT's image in voters. In addition, by building connections with Beijing, the KMT can also consolidate its pro-reunification supporters. A more ambitious goal for the KMT is to possibly hammer out some types of formulas for the final resolution of the conflicts over the Taiwan Strait that are acceptable to both mainland China and
56 East Asia / Fall 2005 Taiwan. This was unthinkable when the KMT was in office under Lee's leadership, who insisted that any contact and negotiation with mainland China should be processed on the basis of equality between the two central governments, something Beijing always refused to accept. Now. as an opposition party, the KMT can accept Beijing's party-to-party negotiation model, since this negotiation model can secure the two sides' parity in a relatively acceptable way. 32 It is under these considerations that the KMT's mainland China policy switched to a different direction. 33 The KMT criticized the newly elected president Chert Shui-bian and his ruling party DPP for not accepting the "one China principle," which actually began to become blurred under its governance. The KMT also criticized Chen for not lifting the investment limitations that were imposed under its leadership; and for not realizing the "three direct links" that they had staunchly prohibited for many years. After his inauguration to the presidency on May 20, Chen became the target of criticisms from the opposition parties. Most of the attacks were focused on Chen Shui-bian's inability to improve relations with mainland China. On June 29, Jong-kung Chang, director of the KMT's Mainland China Research Department, criticized Chert for lacking a consistent policy toward mainland China. Chang claimed that such uncertainty will not help stabilize the situation across the Taiwan Strait. On the same day, the KMT's chairman Lien Chan also criticized Chen's mainland China policy as "inconsistent and worrisome." He described the government's mainland policy as "issuing an order in the morning and rescinding it in the evening." Lien also maintained that Chen's "goodwill" to mainland China was "merely saying words that are delightful to ears," while lacking actual policy adjustments to resolve the crisis. He emphasized the importance of returning to the "National Reunification Guidelines" if Chen did intend to improve the cross-strait relations. 34 The KMT also sent high-level party officials, ex-government officials as well as groups of legislators to visit mainland China. On July 16, a group composed of legislators from the Taiwan Union Club (TUB), a sub group in the KMT's legislative caucus, made a four-day visit to mainland China with the aim to push for resumption of dialogues and peaceful cross-strait exchanges. The KMT's delegation was hosted by China's vice premier, Qian Qichen. 35 From January 4 to 11, another group of legislators from the KMT visited mainland China to exchange views with mainland leaders on the issue of "three big direct links." This group was comprised of some 40 KMT lawmakers and specialists from several party's think-tanks, including Kung-lian Kao, a former deputy minister of the cabinet-level Mainland Affairs Council. 36 According to some statistics, just from May to October in 2000, over one-third of Taiwan's legislators paid a visit to mainland China. 37 Many ex-government officials, such as ex-ministers of Economic Affairs Pin-kun Chiang and Zhi-kang Wang, ex-minister of Foreign Affairs and general secretary of the KMT Xiao-yan Chang (John Chang), and ex-executive Committee member Shih-jian Yang, as well as other influential KMT's officials, also visited mainland China during that period. One of the most influential visits to mainland China was made by the KMT's vice chairman, Wu Po-hsiung, in late November 2000. Wu Po-hsiung became the highest-ranking KMT official to visit China since the Nationalists retreated
Li 57 to Taiwan in 1949 after losing a civil war with Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Wu met the mainland's top leaders in charge of Taiwan affairs in Beijing, such as vice Premier Qian Qichen, and Wang Daohan, mainland China's chief negotiator with Taiwan. In a meeting with mainland officials, Wu reassured Beijing by reaffirming the KMT's position on the issue of the "one China principle." Wu's formal visit to Beijing not only meant the end of long-time antagonism between the CCP and the KMT, but also sent a strong signal to the world: a possible third cooperation between the CCP and the KMT might come soon. 38 Another meaningful exchange between Beijing and the KMT occurred in February 2001. Ma Ying-jeou, the mayor of Taipei, visited Hong Kong and became the highest-ranking Taiwanese official welcomed by Tung Chee-hwa, Hong Kong's chief executive after Hong Kong's return to China in 1997. Obviously, only with Beijing's authorization could Ma make such a high profile visit to Hong Kong. More astonishingly, China Daily, Beijing's official English-language newspaper, reported perhaps mistakenly that Ma agreed that the "one country, two systems" model was applicable to Taiwan in his trip to Hong Kong. Ma denied the news and protested China Daily's report immediately after its publication. China Daily took a very quick and unusual step by delivering a public statement in which the newspaper formally acknowledged the mistake of the report, indicating the importance Beijing placed on its efforts to build constructive ties with Chen's political rivals. 39 Also in this year, city exchanges between Shanghai and Taipei were initiated. Guo-qing Feng, a vice-mayor of Shanghai, became the highest-ranking official of mainland China to visit Taiwan. A vice-mayor of Taipei also visited Shanghai. Leaders of Shanghai also invited Ma Ying-jeou to visit their city. The KMT, united with the PFP and the NR also tried to exercise the power of the Legislative Yuan to replace the administration in handling cross-strait relations. On June 12, 2000, under pressure from the KMT and the PFP, the Legislative Yuan passed a resolution urging the government to accelerate preparations for the legalization of direct trade on the offshore islands. 4~ On June 30, the opposition-dominated Legislative Yuan suggested the formation of a special committee to oversee cross-strait relations, thus downsizing the role of Chen's administration. On November 15, Taiwan's Legislative Yuan formally passed a resolution to form a special committee to cope with cross- Strait issues. This resolution stated that since "Cross-Strait affairs are highly complicated and delicate, the parliament must set up a special task force to help promote the development of relations with mainland China, and supervise the behaviors of government. ''41 Ninety opposition and independent legislators unanimously approved this proposal. The Legislative Yuan speaker and deputy speaker, both from the KMT, served as chairman and vice-chairman respectively for this special cross-strait committee. In contrast, all of the DPP's lawmakers were absent to protest the KMT's action. Not only did the opposition party make use of Chen's inability to break the impasse between Taiwan and mainland China to gain advantages, but also his political rivals within the DPP party try to utilize this chance to garner political advantage. One of the distinctive examples was Hsieh Chang-ting, mayor of Gaohsiang, who was also the chairman of the DPP at that time. Just like Chen
58 East Asia [ Fall 2005 Shui-bian, Hsieh was a senior political leader in the DPP and has been Chen's political rival in the DPP for a long rime. In political circles the term "Changbian Complex"(changbian qingjie) was widely used to describe the competitive relationship between Chen Shui-bian and Hsieh Chang-ring in the DPP. In July 2000, before chairing the DPP, to the surprise of Chen Shui-bian and some DPP supporters, Hsieh stated publicly that "according to ROC's constitution, Taiwan and mainland China belong to the same country." In the views of Beijing, this statement means Hsieh acknowledged Beijing's "one China principle". After Hsieh's statement, the mayor of Xiamen city of mainland China, possibly under the influence of Beijing, sent a formal invitation letter to Hsieh to ask Hsieh to visit Xiamen. Hsieh's action prompted critiques from DPP fundamentalists as well as Chen Shui-bian's advisors, but it did get a lot of media attention. Without the MAC (Mainland Affairs Council)'s intervention, Hsieh's possible visit to Xiamen will certainly create a new page of exchange history between Taiwan and mainland China, thus putting Hsieh in a very good position for his future political ambitions. Similarly, when president Chen Shuibian stated that "unification is not the only option for Taiwan" to defuse the worries of the fundamentalists in response to the news that he would chair the "National Reunification Council" as analyzed above, Hsieh Chang-ting replied that "unification can also become one of the options for Taiwan," provided that the people of Taiwan would accept it democratically. Despite the fact that, in essence, Hsieh's answer shares the same meaning as Chen's, Hsieh's positive remark is in stark contrast with Chen's negative response. Hsieh's posture, in turn, demonstrates how delicately he tried to distance himself from President Chen Shui-bian in his approach to the mainland China issue. 42 The intimate communications between Beijing's COG and Taiwan's opposition parties and Chen's political rivals within the DPP seemed to have produced feasible effects on Taiwanese image about mainland China, which consequently pressed President Chen Shui-bian and his DPP to further adjust their position to a more "centrist road" in dealing with the mainland China. According to a poll conducted by Taiwan's MAC (Mainland Affairs Council) in April 2001, people in Taiwan who support Beijing's "one country, two system" formula for reunification have increased 4 points, from May 2000's 12.2% to 16.1%. At the same time, those who oppose the "one country, two system" formula decreased nearly 10 points. In addition, mainland China's image in the eyes of Taiwanese was also improved. According to this poll, Taiwanese who believe that mainland China is very unfriendly to Taiwan's government and people also were each reduced 5% and 9%. The percentage of people who think that to improve cross-strait relations is more important than to develop foreign relations also reached the highest point: 36.5% participants replied that the former is more important than the later. 43 Conclusion By employing Putnam's two-level games, Knopf's three-to-three games, as well as Puchala's issue politicization, this study illustrates a very interesting
Li 59 development in Taiwan's mainland China policy in a time period when a new pro-independence candidate was elected as Taiwan's president in March 2000: in the official COG level, there is no formal communication between Taiwan and mainland China, while in the non-cog level, exchanges between Beijing's COG and Taiwan's opposition parties have increased very quickly. The result of those two seemingly contradictory trends is the disarray of Taiwan's mainland China policy during Chen's first year in the presidential office. What contributes to the formation of disarray of Taiwan's mainland China policy can be found in two respects. On the one hand, due to the constraints of both the international level and domestic level as argued in Putnam's two-level games, Chen Shui-bian's win-set in formulating a sound and consistent mainland China policy barely exists. The strategy adopted by President Chen to compensate for the coexistence of lack of a domestic win-set and international pressure is to choose an ambivalent and evasive policy which can be open to different interpretations, as well as to frequently shift his positions, as indicated in the previous examinations. On the other hand, as pictured by Knopf's three-to-three games as well as Puchala's issue politicization, Chen Shui-bian's political rivals from both the opposition parties and his own DPP, fully make use of Chen's dilemma to gain political advantages by jettisoning their long held policy and taking a very active role in extending an olive branch to mainland China. If we myopically focus on COG as the sole actor in the interactions of domestic politics and foreign policy as implied in Putnam's two-level games without considering Knopf's non-official actors as well as Puchala's issue politicization, this very interesting development across the Taiwan Strait at that time will be either neglected or under-addressed. This study also reveals that unless the ruling DPP party revises its "independence clause" and adjusts its mainland China policy to a more "centrist road' through constructing a solid domestic coalition, thus obtaining enough domestic win-set, the polarizing condition with regard to Taiwan's mainland China policy might still remain the same in the near future. In this case, Beijing will still take pleasure in adopting a "divide and rule" strategy to try to influence Taiwan's mainland policy approaches by building a unified front with the prounification forces while freezing the official communication channels with the DPP. In this sense, the disarray of Taiwan's mainland China policy will probably still extend to the near future. This empirical study only illustrates one possibility in the question of how Taiwan's political actors play two-level games with regard to their mainland China policy. In other circumstances, Taiwan's political actors might adopt different strategies in the very interesting cross-strait interactions, even though the underlying causes might still be the same as those examined in this study, that is, concerns of power, status and influence. For example, one possibility is that both the incumbent and opposition parties would take hawkish approaches to mainland China by demonizing mainland China as "the other": backward and undemocratic in contrast with Taiwan. In this case, both sides will attempt to mobilize Taiwanese nationalism to expand their political territory by demonizing mainland China.
60 East Asia / Fall 2005 In contrast, another possibility is that both the incumbent and opposition parties will take dovish approaches to mainland China, as shown in present Taiwan--leaders of the KMT, the PFP as well as the DPP's major political figures aim to break the cross-strait ice by expressing their strong wishes to visit mainland China. 44 In this case, to conciliate, rather than to annoy and demonize mainland China, seems helpful for garnering political capital. Which one will become prevalent in Taiwan's political spectrum will depend on the political atmosphere as well as the international environment. A further empirical study of two-level games from the perspective of issue politicization can focus on these two possibilities. In addition, to hypothesize the conditions for the employment of concrete strategies and test it against empirical cases will certainly make another significant contribution to the theoretical development in regard to the study of two-level games from the perspective of issue politicization. Since Taiwan and mainland China are connected so tightly by economic interdependence, and historical, cultural as well as population factors, this type of two-level games from the perspective of issue politicization is a normal part of the interactive relations across the Taiwan Strait. Under other circumstances, the phenomenon of employing foreign policy as a tool to gain political advantages, as well as the opposition parties' direct involvement in the international negotiations, might not be as common as the case we have studied here, thus limiting the applicability of this framework. Nevertheless, as the world is becoming more and more globalized, and the traditional boundary between domestic politics and international relations is also increasingly interpenetrated, thus becoming more irrelevant, examining the interactive relations between domestic politics and international relations from the perspective of two-level games with a focus on issue politicization might still be able to shed light on other empirical puzzles. Acknowledgments An earlier version of this paper was presented at the 2005 Annual International Studies Association Convention, Honolulu, Hawaii, March 1-5. I appreciate the comments I received from Daniel Lake at this convention. I am also grateful for Professor Puchala for his insightful comments made on an earlier version of this paper. Notes See Peter B. Evans, Harold K. Jacobson, and Robert D. Putnam, eds., Double-EdgedDiplomacy: hzternational Bargaining and Domestic Politics (University of California Press, 1993); Leonard J. Schoppa, "Two-Level Games and Bargaining Outcomes: Why Gaiatsu Succeeds in Some Cases but not Others," International Organization 47:3 (Summer 1993), 353-386; Jeffrey Knopf, "Beyond Two-Level Games: Domestic-International Interaction in the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Negotiations," hzternational Organization 47:4 (Autumn 1993), 599-628; Robert Pahre, "Endogenous Domestic Institutions in Two-Level Games and Parliamentary Oversight of the European Union," The Journal of Conflict Resolution, 41: l (Feb., 1997), 147-174; Chien-pin Li, "Trade Negotiation between the United States and Taiwan: Interest Structures in Two-Level Games,"
Li 61 Asian Survey 34:8 (August 1994), 692-705; Peter E Trumbore, "Public Opinion as a Domestic Constraint in International Negotiations: Two-Level Games in the Anglo-Irish Peace Process," International Studies Quarterly 42:3 (September 1998), 545-565. 2. Robert D. Putnam, "Diplomacy and Domestic Politics: the Logic of Two-level Games," International Organization 42:3 (Summer 1988), 434. 3. Robert Putnam, Ibid., 437. 4. Andrew Moravcsik, "Integrating International and Domestic Theories of International Bargaining," in Peter B. Evans, Harold K. Jacobson, and Robert D. Putnam, eds., Double-Edged Diplomacy: bzternationai Bargaining and Donwstic Politics (University of California Press, 1993). 5. Jeffrey Knopf, "Beyond Two-Level games: Domestic-International Interaction in the Intermediaterange Nuclear Forces Negotiations," International Organization 47:4 (Autumn 1993), 599-628. 6. See Jeffrey Knopf, "Beyond Two-Level Games," ibid, pp. 604-612. 7. Peter Gourevitch, "The Second Image Reversed: The International Sources of Domestic Politics," bzternational Organization 32:4 (Autumn 1978), 881-912. 8. Donald Puchala, Harmonization in the European Communities: National Politics and International Cooperation (Frances Printer, 1984), p. 3. 9. For a detailed discussion on the relationship between Taiwan's political institution and Chert Shuibian's domestic dilemma at that time, see Yu-Shan Wu, "Taiwan in 2000: Managing the Aftershocks from Power Transfer," Asian Survey 41:1 (January/February 2001), 40-48. 10. For a detailed discussion on DPP's adjustment of its mainland China policy, see Yu-Shan Wu, "Taiwanese Elections and Cross-Strait Relations: Mainland China Policy in Flux," Asian Survey 39:4 (July~August 1999), 565-587. Also see T.Y. Wang, "One China, One Taiwan: An Analysis of Democratic Progressive Party's China Policy," Journal ofasian andafrican Studies 35:1 (February 2000), 159-183. 11. See FarEastern Economic Review, March 22, 2001. 12. See Xinhua News Agency, March 19, 2000. 13. Qian Qichen reiterated Beijing's new position on the "one China principle' on several occasions. The first time was at a meeting with a group of visiting KMT's legislators. Another time is on September 11, in an interview with overseas Chinese media. Finally, in an interview with an American media before his trip to the United States in March 2001, Qian repeated Beijing's "new three phrases" one more time. 14. See Yu-Shan Wu, "Taiwan in 2000: Managing the Aftershocks from Power Transfer/' Asian Survey 41:1 (January/February 2001), 40-48. 15. See "She' s fond of independence for herself and Taiwan too," The New York Times, May l 9, 2000. 16. After being nominated as chairman of OAC, Fu-mei Chang stated that she intended to treat the overseas Chinese differently based on their birthplace. This statement incurred serious concerns and critiques in the circle of overseas Chinese. 17. On March 18, 2001, in an annual meeting of the "World Taiwanese Convention," an overseas Taiwanese organization that strongly advocates Taiwan's independence, Chia-wen Yao, one of the primary organizers, shouted publicly "Long live of the Republic of Taiwan," demonstrating his strong pro-independence position. See China Times, March 19, 2001. 18. See Honolulu Star, March 28, 2000. 19. See Lianhe Zaobao (United Morning Daily, Singapore), May 21, 2000. 20. See Lianhe Zaobao (United Morning Daily), July 20, 2000 21. See Zhongguo Shibao (China Times), June 27, 2000. 22. See Lianhe Zaobao, June 29, 2000. Also see China Times, June 27, 28, 2000. 23. See Lianhe Zaobao June 29, 2000. 24. See The Financial Times, October 18, 2000, p. 14. 25. See China Times, August 15, 2000. 26. China Times, August 16, 2000. 27. China Times, August 16, 17, September 10. Also see Lianhe Zztobao (Singapore) August 17, 2000. 28. See People's Daily, September 5, 2000. 29. For example, Zhu Rongji, mainland China's premier, complained publicly, "I cannot understand what Taiwan's leader truly wanted to talk about, because he changed so much, so quickly." 30. On March 18 2001, the "World Taiwanese Convention" organized a demonstration in Taipei to raise their suppressed voice for Taiwan's independence. At this convention, Rong-guang Luo, a Chris-
62 East Asia / Fall 2005 tian pastor and a very active pro-independence fundamentalist, claimed that he was very worried for the lowering voice of pro-independence in Taiwan after Chen's inauguration of the presidency. See China Times, March 19, 2001. 31. After making his "integration speech," where Chen planned to improve the cross-strait relations by starting from economic integration, President Chen Shui-bian presented a very interesting interpretation to his political supporters regarding the sensitive term "integration." Since in Chinese, "integration" can be equal to "reunification," to defuse the anxiety of his supporters with the word "reunification," Chen told his supporters that in Chinese the word "Tong" connotes several meanings rather than the simple "reunification;" for example, he was a"tong Shuai" of Taiwan's military (a chief military leader). Chen's intention to alleviate the nervousness of his supporters is very obvious in this case. See Lianhe Zaobao. March 20, 2001. 32. Actually in several interviews, the KMT's acting chairman, Lien Chan, stated that he did not exclude the possibility of visiting mainland China. After being formally elected as the KMT's chairman, Lien again expressed his wishes to visit mainland China to discuss some critical issues with Beijing in several occasions, implying the high possibility of this direction at that time. Also see the analysis "China for KMT Again," The Economist, March 31, 2001. 33. Some analysts argue that the change of leadership from Lee Teng-hui to Lien Chan might help explain the modification of the KMT's approach to mainland China. Admittedly, this line of argument helps capture one aspect of the KMT's intra-party politics, that is, the intense conflict between Lee and his opponents in the KMT, and how this type of inside politics helps shape the direction of KMT policy on mainland China. However, it overlooks the impact of the difference between incumbency and opposition, and how this difference affects the KMT's mainland China policy-- a subject this study precisely devotes to. For a general comprehensive examination of KMT after the 2000 presidential election, see John Fuh-sheng Hsieh, "Whither the Kuomintang?" The China Quarterly 168:4 (December 2001), 930-943. 34. Zhongyangshe (Central News Agenc'r Taipei), June 30, 2000. 35. Central News Agency, July 17, 2000. 36. Central News Agency, December 29, 2000. 37. The Economist, October 25, 2000. 38. "Hands across the Water," See Far Eastern Economic Review, December 14, 2000. 39. Ma Ying-jeou defeated Chen Shui-bian in 1998 in Taipei's mayoral election. Ma is widely considered as a potential contender for the future presidential elections. See The New York Times, February I4, 2001. 40. See China Times, June 12, 2000. 41. Central News Agency, November 15, 2000. 42. China Times, September 6, 2000. 43. Lianhe Zaobao, April 7, 2001. 44. In April 2005, finally, the KMT's chairman, Lien Chan, led a large delegation and paid an eight days historical "peace journey" to mainland China. Just following Lien's steps, from May 5 to 13, PFP Chairman James Soong led his party's delegation on a nine-day visit to mainland China. Those two historical visits create great momentum for the cross-strait communications. They also bring huge domestic and international pressures on President Chen Shui-bian and the DPP for the resumption of dialogues with Beijing.