While a lot has been made about A-Bian’s presidency as a lame duck, remember that the still held a lot of power and blocked President Chen from being as effective as people hoped he would be. And while the economy of Taiwan has been relatively stagnant, the Chinese economy has been booming. I may be biased, but I still don’t think the people of Taiwan want to be “closer to China,” but rather, they want to experience their own economic good fortune alongside China’s.

In essence, I think the Taiwanese people were voting for change and anyone who interprets the KMT’s win as a “vote toward unification” would be ignoring the complexities of the entire situation. Despite the failure of the UN referendum’s passage, it is clear the Taiwanese people want to be represented at the world table and not as a part of China, but as an entity of their own. Unfortunately, calling this entity “Taiwan” scares China, and understanding, scares many of the people of Taiwan who are all too aware of the missiles always pointing at them from their big western neighbor bully.

While a lot has been made about A-Bian’s presidency as a lame duck, remember that the still held a lot of power and blocked President Chen from being as effective as people hoped he would be. And while the economy of Taiwan has been relatively stagnant, the Chinese economy has been booming. I may be biased, but I still don’t think the people of Taiwan want to be “closer to China,” but rather, they want to experience their own economic good fortune alongside China’s.

In essence, I think the Taiwanese people were voting for change and anyone who interprets the KMT’s win as a “vote toward unification” would be ignoring the complexities of the entire situation. Despite the failure of the UN referendum’s passage, it is clear the Taiwanese people want to be represented at the world table and not as a part of China, but as an entity of their own. Unfortunately, calling this entity “Taiwan” scares China, and understanding, scares many of the people of Taiwan who are all too aware of the missiles always pointing at them from their big western neighbor bully.