The Economist - USA (2020-08-08)

20 Asia TheEconomistAugust 8th 2020

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Banyan Trojan democrat

A

s taiwanese contemplatedthe

momentous occasion, in March 1996,

of being able to choose their president

for the first time, China’s Communist

Party launched a campaign of intimida-

tion. Its leaders snarled on television.

The armed forces simulated an invasion

of Taiwan with beach-landing drills. And

missiles landed in the seas around the

island, in effect blockading it. The object

of China’s fury: the incumbent president,

Lee Teng-hui, whom they accused of

wanting to split the motherland by for-

mally declaring Taiwan’s independence.

China’s actions backfired. Taiwanese

refused to be intimidated. Election ral-

lies were huge. Children rode on parents’

shoulders, air horns lent a carnival air

and taxis raced around the capital, Tai-

pei, flying candidates’ flags out of their

windows. Never has Banyan witnessed

such a boisterous election. Mr Lee’s

stump speeches drew crowds to flatter a

rock star. Tall and with a near-permanent

toothy grin, he was the first leader of the

Kuomintang (kmt, or Nationalist) party

to address people in their native Taiwan-

ese rather than in Mandarin, the lan-

guage that kmtcarpetbaggers had

brought with them when they fled the

mainland, defeated by the Communists

in 1949. Taiwanese, he said, should not

fear China’s “state terrorism”. His victory

was emphatic, with more votes than the

three other candidates combined. Taxis

were still beeping the following day.

Mr Lee died on July 30th, aged 97. The

arc of his remarkable life traced Taiwan’s

own modern history. He was born under

Japanese colonial rule, to a farming

family. He studied in Kyoto and joined

the Japanese imperial army, though he

never saw action.

To Mr Lee, Japanese rule seemed mild

compared with that of the kmtunder

Chiang Kai-shek. The kmt existed to re-

claim the mainland from the Communists

(even today, Taiwan’s official name is the

Republic of China). It brooked no dissent.

Anti-government protests on February

28th 1947 led to more than 20,000 Taiwan-

ese—students, artists, doctors, lawyers

and intellectuals—being rounded up and

shot. It was the start of a decades-long

“White Terror”. It was only in 1987 that

Chiang’s son, Chiang Ching-kuo, finally

lifted martial law.

A young Mr Lee dabbled with commu-

nism. A more enduring inspiration was

Zen Buddhism. It taught that there is no

shame in bending like a reed, nor any

wisdom in hurrying. In 1961 Mr Lee was

baptised a Christian, and if his evangelism

hinted at a messianic streak, it was also

rooted in grassroots activism. As an agri-

cultural economist, he was at the heart of

Taiwan’s development. A leap in the out-

put of the island’s farms kick-started an

economic transformation which later led

to calls for political freedom.

For years Mr Lee kept his head down.

Still, state goons kept a dossier on him,

even filling it with titbits from kmt

informers at Cornell University, where

he received a phd. His appointment in

1972 to a ministerial portfolio under

Chiang Ching-kuo was an extraordinary

turn. Given mounting popular anger at

rule by mainlanders, Chiang turned to

Taiwan-born politicians to lend the

regime legitimacy. Sometimes, Mr Lee

later said, of his decision to join the kmt,

the safest place “is the most dangerous”.

Mr Lee, in the words of Richard Ka-

gan, his biographer, was the “ultimate

Trojan horse”. By 1978 he was mayor of

Taipei and by 1984 Chiang’s vice-presi-

dent. When Chiang died four years later,

Mr Lee assumed the presidency, despite

efforts by kmt hardliners to thwart him.

After students began calling for full-

blown democracy in 1990, he promised to

institute it, dispensing with the farcical

notion that Taiwan ruled China in the

process (China did not reciprocate).

When he stepped down in 2000, his

informal support helped propel the

independence-minded Chen Shui-bian

to victory. Soon after, the kmt kicked the

Trojan horse out.

China’s communists loathed Mr Lee, a

“deformed test-tube baby cultivated in

the political laboratory of hostile anti-

China forces”, especially for promoting a

distinct Taiwanese identity, separate

from that of China. But he, not they, won

the battle for hearts and minds: two-

thirds of the island’s citizens identify as

Taiwanese first; only 3% as Chinese first.

He also helped resist China’s efforts to

isolate Taiwan diplomatically. America’s

health secretary, Alex Azar, who will this

month become the most senior Ameri-

can official to visit Taiwan in decades,

may attend his funeral. Even on the way

to his grave, Mr Lee has a knack for nee-

dling the bullies in Beijing.

Even in death, Lee Teng-hui is helping shape Taiwan’s identity

rules on hair and attire are up to schools,

but many remain extremely strict.

Teachers often shear pupils ineptly on

purpose. Photos and videos of haphazard

or lopsided cuts administered by zealous

educators abound on social media. A stu-

dent in Yasothon province in north-east

Thailand had a Tshaved into his hair as

punishment for refusing to cut it shorter.

Another in Sisaket had half her locks

trimmed in front of the whole school. “One

side was long, while the other was short. I

was embarrassed,” she told local reporters.

Pupils argue that the issue goes beyond

fashion. “It is about having rights over our

bodies and reforming an ossified educa-

tion system. If you do not prostrate your-

self or obey the ‘elders’ you are deemed

bad,” explains Ms Benjamaporn. Netiwit

Chotiphatphaisal, a university student

who caused a stir in 2016 by refusing to

prostrate himself before the statue of a for-

mer king, describes such practices as “op-

pression resulting from decades under the

military disguised as traditions”. In 2018 an

official at the education ministry told local

papers: “It is to the benefit of the military

government and conservative members of

the ruling class that young Thais learn a

rigid system from an early age.”

Yukti Mukdawijitra of Thammasat Uni-

versity believes that public punishments

are a way to embed a culture of unquestion-

ing obedience to authority. Social media,

however, have given pupils a way to fight

back. The generals who run Thailand have

in recent years been clamping down on dis-

sent, banning nettlesome political parties

and tightening restrictions on online criti-

cism. But young Thais do not seem to like

being told what to do—and some, at least,

are not afraid to say so. 7