October 2005 brings another autumnal remembrance of the founding of the Republic of China. Despite legal complications both domestic and foreign, the entity whose national day is celebrated on Oct. 10 is almost universally known now as Taiwan. That mutation in nomenclature may be the most notable and pregnant outcome of the 60-year-long history of the ROC on Taiwan.

I have been studying Taiwan affairs for only part of that period but long enough to have formed and retained strong impressions of salient features of Taiwan’s development, including both continuities and discontinuities in political and other conditions. Almost 30 years ago, I was a guest for the first time at a Double Tenth celebration, and what I recall from that experience differs greatly from what I think I know about Taiwan today.

Not only has the nomenclature changed; so have the institutions and practices of politics, economics, education, health, welfare and every kind of social organization. Even more importantly, the regional and global contexts with which the people who live in Taiwan and their rulers must cope have greatly changed.

And surely, one of the greatest changes is in the relationships between people in Taiwan and people across the Taiwan Strait in what is now known as the People’s Republic of China. Travel, investment, military preparedness and other aspects of cross-strait interaction have been altered.

There was a time when the expiration of Taiwan was taken for granted by elites in the United Nations and many of the capital cities of its members, including Washington, D.C. Even while the United States maintained a relationship of codependence with the government of Taiwan, that relationship was expected to wither. Diplomatic recognitions would be withdrawn one by one, and economic interdependence would draw Taiwan into the PRC’s orbit.

These and other predictions were sometimes borne out, but their effects were not as expected: Taiwan has remained a viable, sovereign country.

What happened? This question has been answered more fully by others, and the story will be told and retold for years to come. To this observer’s eyes and ears, it is a poignant one.

As guests of the government in the 1970s, it was understandable that our group of visitors would be hosted by diplomats drawn from that portion of the populace affiliated with the ruling party. The vast majority of those who ruled were from a place that had become known as the PRC, not of the shrunken territory called the ROC. If the rulers were from China, the ruled were natives of Taiwan.

The official line, and ruling party line, ignored this anomaly. When foreign observers drew attention to it, they would be assured that all lived in harmony, that place of birth and all else associated with it were of minor concern. It was not long before they learned otherwise.

Remarkably, in the subsequent story of the gradual, if often conflicting, alterations in power politics, some of the authorities in the authoritarian ruling group were themselves instrumental in affecting the devolution of power from the control of a few to the participation of many.

While the democratization of Taiwan is not complete–every society’s democratic institutions require ongoing renewal–the transformations of the last thirty years have saved Taiwan from extermination. What of the future? Scenarios of optimism and pessimism are available. One source of concern is the view that Taiwan’s status is at the mercy of interactions between the PRC and the United States. Can the PRC’s ambition to “rise” allow recognition that Taiwan is too big and too different to be harmoniously absorbed? Will the United States maintain, or compromise, its admiration and support for Taiwan’s democratization in the face of China’s enhanced presence in Asia’s power configurations? Another source of pessimism lies in the frequently heard assertion that PRC leaders cannot afford to deviate from hard-line insistence that Taiwan come under their rule. This theory is, of course, founded on an abundance of empirical precedents: Politicians do whatever they must to stay in power. Which Chinese politician wants to be accused of “losing Taiwan”? If precedent were all there is to judge from, the outcome might be predictable. Yet, just recently, Beijing made conciliatory moves in response to simmering demands in Hong Kong for enhanced participation in government. One might point to additional instances in Asian and world politics where significant, positive changes came unexpectedly.

That such changes might be in the offing for Taiwan is not a matter of faith, but of recognition of contingency in the life and times of ambitious men and women who can be found everywhere, eager to make their mark. I, for one, believe that Double Tenth will be celebrated for many years to come.

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James Robinson is a political scientist and commentator based in the United States.

GIO ROC : Taiwan saved by democratization