Cross-strait economic interdependence under the leadership of president Ma Ying-Jeou and strategic implications on the Taiwan issue

Abstract

Since 1949, Taiwan and Mainland China have been living in an atmosphere of political hostility, hostility that has reached its pick under President Chen Shui-bian Administration but been mitigated under the current leadership of President Ma Ying-jeou, who, instead of focusing on political independence, is strategically moving toward securing Taiwan`s economic survival. So the deteriorating political relations originally based on a `Taiwanese exceptionalism` with a strong desire for the Island`s independence is gradually giving place to a growing economic interdependence that may give rise to new concerns defined in terms of the strategic implications of such economic convergence between Mainland China and Taiwan with a particular emphasis on Taiwan`s political survival. The purpose of the present proposed research is to spell out the existing contradiction or dilemma in the cross-strait political and economic spheres. For a better operationalization, the present research paper, based upon a nomothetic causality perspective, will first and foremost try to figure out the most important factors that play in favor of the a cross-strait economic dynamism. Then it will try to identify the strategic implications of such economic interdependence on the future of cross-strait relations with an emphasis on the security matters relating to Taiwan`s political survival. Reaching out a meaningful approach of these obvious dichotomies nourished over the years by a political impasse (political coercion) and economic dynamism (economic cooptation) requires necessary a theoretical framework, and so, to explore, describe, explain, and possibly predict future outcome of cross-strait relations.