Defending Taiwan’s Democracy

A Taiwan national flag waving near the Taipei 101 building in Taipei, Taiwan. (AP)

Taiwan President Lai Ching-te attended the 75th anniversary of the Battle of Guningtou on October 25, declaring that no force can stop Taiwan’s freedom and democracy. He emphasized how the Battle of Guningtou demonstrates that democracy “[cannot] be taken for granted,” and how safeguarding the democratic system “has not changed and will remain unchanged.” 

Around the world, Taiwan is commonly viewed as the main geopolitical flashpoint between two great powers, the United States and China. While tensions between Washington and Beijing shouldn’t be ignored, this framing risks reducing Taiwan to a small pawn in a larger game. The resilience of Taiwan’s democracy, while under pressure from China’s sharp power and coercion campaigns, shows the nation's agency and determination to remain a strong, thriving democratic society against an authoritarian force.

Taiwan has faced many challenges on its path to democratization. President Chiang Ching-kuo led the Kuomintang (KMT) political party from 1978 to 1988. After the Nationalists lost the civil war to Mao Zedong’s Communist party and retreated to Taiwan, also known as the Republic of China (ROC), in the late 1940s, they held power through the KMT for decades. Under Chiang Kai-shek, Taiwan imposed martial law which banned opposition parties and restricted political rights. After the United Nations expelled Taipei in 1971 and the United States severed diplomatic ties in 1979, the KMT began liberalizing and allowed political pluralism to maintain the party’s control in Taiwan. Releasing control and allowing more political participation and competition, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) was founded in 1986 and a year after, the government lifted martial law. Despite efforts at democratization, Taiwan did not solidify as a liberal democracy until the Wild Lily Student Movement pushed for voting rights to directly elect its president and other officials. Marking a turning point in Taiwan’s transition to democracy, Taiwan held its first presidential election in 1996 where Lee Teng-hui was elected.

With a new foundation for its legitimacy, Taiwan hosts free, open, competitive, and fair elections, allowing for the peaceful transfer of power while upholding civil liberties. Freedom House ranks Taiwan as the fourth-freest place in the Asia-Pacific region, with a score of 94 out of 100. On V-Dem’s Liberal Democracy Index, Taiwan ranks 31st globally, landing between the 10-20 percentile of countries with both electoral and liberal aspects of democracy. Ranking highly in other V-Dem indexes, these studies prove how Taiwan maintains a strong, resilient government with civil society’s support. Despite positive results, Taiwan still risks falling victim to democratic backsliding. 

Democratic slippage occurs when a key pillar of contemporary legitimacy erodes. While nationalism can help strengthen a political system, it only serves as a temporary solution to the legitimation deficit. Currently, illiberal powers capitalize on Taiwan’s five democratic weaknesses: political polarization, political corruption, rule of law, institutional defects, and mass values. Although some argue that Taiwan made significant strides to address each vulnerability, issues such as polarization and mistrust remain abusable. Entrenched issues in economic growth, stagnating wages, and rising housing costs could destabilize Taiwan’s democratic system by throwing the government into gridlock, unable to effectively govern while creating opportunities for disinformation to influence elections. Divisions between the DPP and KMT widen as polarization heightens class-based differences, corruption or pro-Chinese Communist Party (CCP) allegations, and other disagreements with Taiwanese governance. Despite both parties sharing the same idea of cross-strait relations, rejecting Beijing’s “one country, two systems” framework implanted in Hong Kong and sticking with the ROC’s status quo as an independent sovereign nation, the division continues. Distrust and skepticism towards the Taiwanese government, democratic institutions, and Western powers make it easier for the CCP to infiltrate into domestic politics and make Taiwan less able to resist foreign pressure and influence.

Beijing’s sharp power operation serves five purposes: corrode and manipulate democratic institutions (including elections at every level of government), undermine the general confidence and morale of Taiwan’s people and make them feel isolated and helpless, intensify divisions and turn the Taiwanese against one another, recruit any opinion leaders and influences to share pro-CCP propaganda, and intimidate those who criticize and oppose the CCP into silence and retreat. China relies heavily on information warfare to achieve these aims. Looking to destabilize the Taiwanese government, disinformation campaigns seek to heighten polarization while undermining support for Taiwan’s officials and democratic government. Beijing portrays Taiwan’s administration and president as dangerous, which exacerbates conflicts that distract and wear down Taiwanese officials. Utilizing microblogging sites, content farms, content creators, and deepfake videos, these platforms all serve as effective avenues to spread CCP messaging throughout Taiwan. 

Behind the scenes, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) Strategic Support Force’s Unit 61716 based at 311 Base leads disinformation campaigns for political, legal, public opinion, and psychological warfare in Taiwan. State-sponsored groups like Unit 61398 and APT41 which are tied to the Chinese Ministry of State Security (MSS) have conducted espionage, disinformation, and hacking operations targeting Taiwanese government agencies, defense institutions, and critical infrastructure. China launched 1.4 billion cyberattacks against Taiwan between September 2019 to August 2020, with an estimated 2.5 million attacks daily. In 2023, these attacks intensified, increasing by 3,370 percent from the previous year, with China as the largest source of distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks. Before Taiwan’s 2024 presidential election, CCP DDoS attacks aimed to crash networks and interfere with the democratic process were launched throughout the voting and election process. 

Taiwan’s civil society organizations are essential to countering disinformation campaigns by publishing reports that fact-check claims. Since modernity is marked by two trends, increasing demand and declining legitimacy, civil society is key in addressing the legitimation deficit. Otherwise, disinformation campaigns will gain credibility and embed themselves during national decline and future redevelopment. Civil society fulfills four key functions: protection from state rule, checks and balances on state authority, schools of democracy and social capital, and establishing the public sphere as a medium for democratic self-reflection. Through these functions, civil society in Taiwan enhances democratization, pacification, and self-organization of society, leading to Taiwan’s government becoming more inclusive, effective, and democratic. Along with fostering pro-democratic values such as trust, social capital, and societal inclusion, civil society organizations provide a platform for Taiwanese citizens to voice discontent, become part of the solution, and address the legitimation deficit by decreasing demands and increasing legitimacy. This also ensures access to public power positions through open, competitive elections. 

Demonstrating civil society in Taiwan, Doublethink Lab’s report writes about how the CCP's influence operations exploit domestic disputes, attempting to disparage the DPP through many false claims of corruption and manipulation. The Taiwanese FactCheck Center countered these operations by publishing over 200 online verifications and analyses. MyGoPen, another fact-checking organization, received 1.3 million fact-check requests and debunks allegations of electoral fraud caused by vote hiding or counting discrepancies. When disinformation targeted Taiwan President Tsai Ing-wen, civic groups alerted digital platforms which led to the removal of thousands of social media pages. Taking proactive measures to counter disinformation underscores the significance civil society has when supporting the government in safeguarding democracy. Simultaneously, Taiwan’s government also established a framework focused on identifying, debunking, combatting, and punishing disinformation. With the government and civil society organizations reinforcing each other while maintaining distance, Taiwan is better equipped to find populations susceptible to disinformation and publish findings of new sharp power operations to the public.

The CCP’s efforts to undermine Taiwan’s democratic political institutions, election integrity procedures, and civic organizations show the urgency for meaningful reform that allows the government and civil society to address disinformation more effectively.  This requires the Taiwanese government, civil society, and citizens to take part when countering future Chinese operations.