Professor Explains History of China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong, Pre-2010 | The Great Courses Plus

since the onset of the dong Xiao ping era 30 years ago no single issue has signified China's drive to restore its damaged national pride more than the quest to reunify the to lost Chinese territories of Taiwan and Hong Kong for more than a hundred and fifty years Hong Kong was a symbol of imperialist aggression against China seized by Great Britain at gunpoint after the opium wars Hong Kong remained a British colonial Enclave until 1997 when sovereignty finally reverted peacefully to China in anticipation of this historic hand over a large countdown clock was erected in Beijing Zn on Mon Square ticking off the minutes until midnight July 1st 1997 on that night as 12 o'clock approached tens of thousands of people in the square began counting down the seconds and when the clock struck midnight there was wild jubilation in Tiananmen meanwhile in Hong Kong when midnight struck a government fireworks show lit up the famous waterfront harbour and Chinese President Jiang Zemin was on hand to give a patriotic speak welcoming Hong Kong back to the bosom of the motherland but outside on the street things were considerably more restrained after a hundred and fifty five years of British sovereignty came to a close no one was quite sure what to expect with the PLA come marching into Hong Kong when pro-democracy activists be arrested in anticipation of possible incidents several thousand international journalists joined crowds of local citizens and assorted others in a post midnight vigil in front of the Legislative Council building in Hong Kong's central district which was the centre of Hong Kong's politics I was among the throng of humanity that night I had brought a group of a dozen or more of my UCLA students to Hong Kong in the spring of 1997 to observe the transition to record it and to write about it my students and I waited almost three hours on the night of the handover for something to happen but nothing did know jackbooted PLA troops no political disturbances and no arrests gradually the crowds dispersed as people moved on to Hong Kong's myriad watering holes and all-night parties the handover itself was thus unexpectedly calm orderly and uneventful to mark Hong Kong's retrocession the next day July 1st was declared a national holiday in Hong Kong the shopping malls opened early that day and a new one-day record for retail sales was set thus providing further proof if such were needed to support the old adage that when the going gets tough the tough go shopping the handover impacted not just Hong Kong Island which was the original British Crown Colony dating from the 1842 Treaty of Nanjing but also two adjacent parcels of land across the harbor on the mainland the Kowloon Peninsula and the New Territories as we saw in an early lecture Kowloon had been ceded outright to Britain after the Second Opium War in 1860 well the new territories were leased to England in 1898 for a period of 99 years today's Hong Kong includes all three of these contiguous territories the 1997 return of Hong Kong from British sovereignty to a special administrative region of China took place after lengthy and often acrimonious negotiations between Beijing and London because most of Hong Kong's territory and population as well as its major industrial and agricultural resources lay in the new territories the approach of the leases expiration date June 30th 1997 was a source of growing concern to the British government as the expiration date drew nearer the government of Britain's then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher sought to secure a chinese commitment to renew the lease for another 50 years but by 1982 it was clear that dum Xiao ping was firmly opposed to such an extension this put the British government in a quandary for without the resources and population of the new territories both agriculture and industrial the rest of Hong Kong could not be sustained as a viable self-sufficient entity it would exist at Beijing pleasure a permanent hostage to Chinese political economic and military whims and pressures under these circumstances Prime Minister Thatcher decided to negotiate a package deal for the return of Hong Kong to China under the terms of the British proposal all three territorial parcels would revert to Chinese sovereignty in 1997 but in exchange China would allow Hong Kong to exercise a high degree of local autonomy after 1997 and would pledge not to interfere with Hong Kong's existing economic administrative and legal institutions for a period of 50 years at least these twin principles local autonomy and a 50-year non-intervention pledge became the cornerstones of the sino-british joint declaration on Hong Kong which was signed in 1984 soon afterwards a sino-british drafting committee began working on a new mini constitution for post 1997 Hong Kong known as the basic law that document was completed in 1990 its various provisions spelled out in some detail Hong Kong's political legal and administrative arrangements for the next 50 years under a general framework known as one country two systems the basic law granted Hong Kong substantial autonomy over its domestic affairs and its international commercial relations while reserving to Beijing sovereign authority over diplomatic and military affairs politically the basic law defined a Hong Kong government that featured a strong non elected chief executive and a weak partially elected legislature although the drafters stipulated that universal suffrage would eventually be introduced in the elections of both the chief executive and the legislature no dates were specified in the document and up to now this has remained an unfilled promise on the other hand since the 1997 handover Beijing has scrupulously adhered to its principal obligations under the joint declaration and the basic law China's leaders have made no attempt unilaterally to change Hong Kong's economic political legal or administrative institutions and the basic legal rights political and civil liberties of Hong Kong citizens have been retained more or less intact media freedom also remains relatively high in Hong Kong although a certain amount of pressure has been exerted on radio television and newspaper editors and programmers in Hong Kong to refrain from excessive criticism of the Chinese government still for the most part media censorship has been more self-imposed than externally coerced in general then the principle of one country two systems has worked out rather well in the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region or SAR despite early fears that the hone that the handover would spell the death of Hong Kong in most respects it has been largely business as usual since 1990 the same cannot be said however for Taiwan there a sizable majority of citizens continue to oppose the islands reunification with mainland China under almost any circumstances to entice the Taiwanese people into accepting the idea of reunification in 1981 the Chinese government announced a liberal nine-point blueprint for Taiwan's peaceful return to China a year later gong shellping incorporated this blueprint into his famous proposal for one country two systems' under the terms of Dung's proposal Taiwan would be given even more liberal terms than those offered to Hong Kong in addition to a high degree of autonomy and a promise of non-intervention in local affairs Taiwan would also be permitted to retain its own military forces and and could continue to maintain economic and cultural ties with foreign countries moreover China's pledge of non-intervention would be permanent with no 50 year time limit on PRC self-restraint but despite their many similarities the cases of Taiwan and Hong Kong were nonetheless very different most important the new territories by law internationally recognised indisputably belonged to China which meant that Beijing was legally entitled to reclaim it when the lease expired by contrast Taiwan's long separation from mainland China was a de facto situation it was based not on a binding international legal obligation but on the vicissitudes of a bitter and protracted civil war which had never ended at least in formal legal terms indeed the very bitterness of the civil war ensured that many if not most Taiwanese would reject the idea that their fate should be dictated by the communist regime across the water hence dumb shell pings one country two systems' formulation never gained much popular traction in Taiwan at the height of the Cold War from the mid 1950s to the early 1970s Taiwan received major US development assistance partly because of the Cold War as a result the island experienced a substantial economic miracle politically however John kai-shek continued to rule Taiwan with an iron fist permitting no opposition to the political monopoly enjoyed by the gloaming dong when John died in 1975 at the age of 88 the presidency passed to his son John Dingell and thereafter Taiwan gradually slowly began to open up its political system in 1987 the Republic of China began transitioning to democracy by then the islands demographic composition had shifted substantially the mainland born Roman dong elites who had monopolized political and military power in 1949 and Beyond were dying off and new generations of native-born Taiwanese were rising to middle-class economic status as they did so they began to demand access to the instruments of political participation and ultimately power by 1988 a new opposition political party the Democratic Progressive Party or DPP began to challenge the Guangdong's long established political monopoly and it also began to challenge the Guangdong's traditional insistence that the Republic of China was the sole legal government of all of China one China the DPP served as a magnet for those who had been alienated by the rigid dictatorial policies of the GMD the part also became a strong advocate for a separate and distinct Taiwanese ethnic and political identity by the early 1990s DPP candidates had gained a substantial number of seats in Taiwan's legislature the more successful the party became the more its leaders openly agitated for Taiwan's independence this put the Gallman dong in a bit of a bind they could not continue to win elections without somehow appealing to substantial numbers of ethnic Taiwanese voters one way to do this was to recruit a few Taiwanese politicians into the Guam and Dongs leadership ranks in hopes that they would attract native Taiwan followers thus it was that a native-born Taiwanese by the name of Lee dung Wei was selected as president Jiang Jing was guandong running mate in the 1984 presidential election when Zhang Jing Wu died four years later Li dun Hawaii became Taiwan's first native-born president this proved to be an important turning point in Taiwan's politics for almost as soon as Lee assumed the presidency he began to reveal a strong underlying attachment to the cause of Taiwanese independence Lee Donghae is increasingly vocal advocacy of the separatist cause soon precipitated a rebellion by the Guam and on conservative mainland faction which split off in 1996 to form a new pro yi reunification party now politics in Taiwan became increasingly polarized into Pro and anti independence camps but even as independent sentiment was growing in the early 1990s economic forces were beginning to draw the two sides of the Taiwan Strait closer together under dung shoppings open policy indirect cross straight straight commerce increased dramatically dramatically in the 1990s as new opportunities were created for Taiwanese industrialists and investors to operate on the Chinese mainland particularly after Dunn's 1992 southern tour South China's Fujian province and it's drew high special economic zone became focal points for a dramatic expansion of Taiwanese commercial activity by the mid-2000s up to 1 million Taiwanese citizens were residing in the coastal economic zones of southern China also in this period informal negotiations were initiated between Beijing and Taipei with the aim of establishing direct cross-strait shipping postal and commercial relations relations that came to be known as the three links or santim in the course of these unofficial negotiations which took place first in Hong Kong and then in Singapore representatives of the two sides sought to hammer out a compromise agreement that would enable them to circumvent the roadblock posed by Beijing's one China principle the Taiwanese side nominally agreed to accept Beijing's notion that there was only one China but with the important caveat that the term one China was subject to different interpretations by the two sides in Thai basil fishel interpretation one China still referred to the Republic of China rather than the People's Republic in the event however all progress toward increased cross-strait cooperation and communication came to a sudden screeching halt in the summer of 1995 when President Lee done Wei made his provocative pro-independence at Cornell University as we saw in lecture 43 this incident provoked an angry response from Beijing which then conducted large-scale military exercises in the Taiwan Strait the exercises included the test firing of several unarmed guided missiles which landed within a dozen miles of the island the mounting crisis ended only when President Clinton sent two aircraft carriers into the vicinity of the Taiwan Strait early in 1996 as a warning to Beijing angered by China's blatant attempt to intimidate them through coercive diplomacy Taiwan's voters vented their anti China feelings by defiantly electing leading way to a second four-year term in 1996 Lee responded by ratcheting up his pro-independence rhetoric and by 1999 he was loudly and proudly proclaiming that Taiwan and China were two separate and distinct national states having failed to intimidate taiwan's voters Beijing's leaders now stepped up their efforts to deter Taiwan from declaring independence on the eve of the islands 2000 presidential election Beijing issued a harshly worded national defense white paper which threatened military action against Taiwan unless the Taiwan authorities entered into early ago she ations for reunification this was followed shortly by a veiled warning from Chinese premier Jurong ji who stated that there will be no good ending for those involved in Taiwan independence once again however the attempt to intimidate Taiwan's voters had the opposite effect this time it served mainly to rally support for the opposition DPP whose presidential candidate in 2010 shui-bian was an avowed supporter of Thai on independence aided by a deep split within the Guandong between Pro unification and pro-independence factions the DPP won the election of 2000 and for the first time in its 55 year history the Republic of China on Taiwan had an on Guam and on president and a militantly pro-independence president at that relations between Beijing and Taipei remained deeply strained throughout Chen shui-bian two presidential terms during his eight years in office Chun pursued a calculated strategy of gradually pushing the envelope of Taiwan sovereignty and independence a key element in this strategy was Chen's persistent effort to revise the Republic of China's Constitution and to rename the Republic of China as the Republic of Taiwan on several occasions in the early 2000s Chun antagonized China's leaders with provocative rhetoric and in turn they denounced him in the harshest of terms meanwhile in Washington by 2003 president george w bush's foreign policy advisors had concluded that chen shui-bian was a loose cannon a provocateur who if left to his own devices could wind up dragging the united states willy-nilly into a military conflict with China in December of 2003 Bush put his foot down in a nationally televised White House photo opportunity session with visiting Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao the president stated that the United States does not support Taiwan independence nor does it support any efforts to unilaterally alter the status quo in the Taiwan Strait pro-independence groups in Taiwan including president Chun were understandably upset by the president's remarks China's leaders on the and were very pleased and why wouldn't they be for Washington had finally acknowledged the need to actively restrain Taiwan's headstrong president notwithstanding this newfound American determination to restrain Chen shui-bian Chun narrowly won re-election to a second four-year term in 2004 it came as a bit of a surprise to most observers this time his election was in fact aided by an unsuccessful assassination attempt against Chun and his vice president annette lu occurring just 24 hours before the election the botched assassination attempt created a wave of popular sympathy for the incumbent president enabling him to pull off an extremely narrow last-minute victory now in the interest of full disclosure I was in Taiwan serving as an invited election monitor during the 2004 presidential election and by sheer happenstance I was in the vicinity of President Chen's motorcade when the assassination attempt took place at the time of the shooting I was interviewing a group of DPP politicians just about a mile away from the president's motorcade almost immediately rumors began to fly that the President and vice-president had both been killed these rumors were quickly put to rest however when television footage revealed the president and vice president's wounds to be relatively minor seeking to maximize public sympathy Chun held a photo-op session with the mass media in his hospital room where he bravely displayed his superficial abdominal wound while the TV cameras rolled meanwhile at the headquarters of the Opposition Guandong angry people were raising allegations that the assassination attempt had been a fake a hoax a last-minute gambit devised by the Chung camp to avoid defeat in the election adding to credibility of such suspicions Taiwanese pollsters confirmed that at the time of the shooting the Gorman Don candidate Lian John enjoyed a lead over Chen shui-bian of between three and four percentage points but that lead evaporated within a few hours as a wave of last-minute sympathy for Chun enabled him to eke out the narrowest of victories in the final vote count just 1/10 of 1% separated Chun from Lian John was the assassination attempt to fake a hoax the evidence is inconclusive but the GMD camp remained irate sensing that they had been robbed in Chen shui-bian second term he came under intense American pressure to tone down his pro-independence rhetoric with the Bush administration now concentrating its attention on the war in Iraq and the Global War on Terror mr. Bush was in no mood to be dragged by China into a military showdown to be dragged by Chun into a military showdown with China meanwhile Chinese leaders sensed an opportunity to take advantage of Chun's growing difficulties by holding out an olive branch two opposition leaders the old United Front strategy in 2005 Beijing invited the defeated Guam and on presidential candidate Lee and John to visit mainland China it was a major public relations coup for China as well as for the Guam and on and the party's approval ratings began to rise sharply among Taiwan's voters in the wake of the gmds successful cross-strait peace peace initiative Chen shui-bian polling numbers declined sharply not only were the Taiwanese people growing weary of his provocative tactics but there were also serious allegations of corruption involving members of the president's own immediate family including his wife and and by the time the 2008 presidential campaign came around Chung's approval ratings had dropped to an all-time low of less than 20% in the March 2008 presidential election the DPP candidate Frank Shea was dragged down by his association with Chen shui-bian much as John McCain was dragged down by his association with George W Bush meanwhile re-energized Guandong fielded a formidable new presidential candidate the young charismatic dynamic former mayor of Taipei City Myung Joo Myung Joo campaigned on a promise to work hard to improve relations with China specifically he pledged to resume the long suspension Zhan the establishment of the three links that is direct postal commercial and shipping ties across the strait these talks initiated in 92 had been abruptly canceled in the wake of the 1995 missile crisis the election itself turned out to be something of a landslide as Taiwanese voters demonstrated their weariness with Chen shui-bian China baiting tactics my NGO defeated Frank xie by a decisive majority of 58 percent to 41 percent the magnitude of mahse victory was widely interpreted as a mandate for repairing cross-strait relations in a welcome change of tactics mainland China's leaders carefully refrained from trying to influence the outcome of the 2008 election evidently they had finally learned a lesson from their earlier heavy-handed efforts to coerce Taiwanese voters in 1996 2000 and 2004 in each of those earlier elections Beijing's bullying tactics had proved counterproductive causing Taiwan's voters to rally around the flag of pro-independence case in the aftermath of the 2008 election there were audible sighs of relief on both sides of the Taiwan Strait not to mention in Washington where my NGOs victory was greeted with barely disguised satisfaction although the Bush administration had maintained a facade of strict neutrality in the election there was little doubt that the administration strongly preferred mr. ma and in Beijing China's leaders could barely contain their glee within just a few months of Myung election the atmosphere of cross-strait relations began to improve markedly by the late summer of 2008 negotiations had resumed on the three links in December the first ever direct commercial flights between Taiwan and China were inaugurated by the spring of 2009 cross-strait relations were more relaxed than at any time since the early 1990s more than 3,000 mainland Chinese visitors were now arriving in Taiwan each day a tenfold increase over the previous year one clear sign of the improving atmosphere was Beijing's approval of Taiwan's application to gain official observer status in the World Health Assembly it was the first time China had not stood beached between Taiwan and membership in an international organization although China has for now substituted the carrot of soft power for the stick of military threat the ultimate goal of reunification remains Beijing's top priority and if soft power fails to produce visible progress towards some form of political reintegration hard power will remain an option though we cannot predict whether peace or war will ultimately prevail in the Taiwan Strait one thing does seem clear the state of play in cross-strait relations will be strongly affected by long-term evolutionary forces at work within China itself major changes are taking place in China's economy and society in the next lecture we'll take a closer look at these domestic changes and we will see how they are serving to reshape China's national identity and self-image [Music] [Music] you

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Length: 31min 13sec (1873 seconds)

Published: Thu May 28 2020