Taiwanese Democracy

Taiwan is widely acknowledged as one of the most democratic countries in Asia. Notwithstanding, scholars and political observers remain concerned about a democratic rollback. Although the new regime’s policies have already shown evidence of negative impacts on democratic development in Taiwan, this has mostly been neglected in internationally respected surveys, such as those conducted by Freedom House. The definition of democratic governance in this chapter therefore goes well beyond the classical large-scale, state-centric, aggregate measurements of government and electoral efficiency. It endeavors to measure the quality of Taiwan’s democracy by analyzing the conceptual differences of political leaders and other intellectuals in promoting democratic development, identifying the role of the international community in shaping Taiwan’s political development, and conceptualizing the changing patterns of civic democratic activism.