Geopolitics of the Taiwan Strait
Project: New fluidities
Project: New fluidities
Like a disputed orphan, the ever-volleying political and legal status of the island of Taiwan is shrouded in policies of deliberate ambiguity.
Despite its former colonization by the Japanese until 1945, Taiwan was incorporated within the economic and political operations of mainland China under the Republic of China (ROC) until 1949, when the Chinese Civil War resulted in the communist party (People’s Republic of China, or PRC) displacing the defeated ROC to the Taiwanese city of Taipei. Since then the debate over the status of Taiwan has hovered somewhere between upholding the status quo (its tacit affiliation with the ROC), the case for Taiwanese independence as a sovereign territory, or Chinese reunification under the PRC.
The Taiwan Strait, a 180 kilometer aqueous zone between the eastern coast of china and the low-lying western coast of Taiwan, already the theatre for several military confrontations between the ROC and the PRC, has recently been a site for speculation into future relations between these now estranged siblings.
In 2005, as part of mainland China’s National Expressway Plan, there was discussion about the feasibility of building an extensive tunnel or bridge to connect China to Taiwan, although the plans were vehemently dismissed by Taiwanese politicians as propaganda for Beijing’s “One China” policy.
Given the Strait’s importance to the entire region (its vitality as an indispensible trade route to all Asian countries) could this zone serve as the site for a unifying water-based intervention? Could this become the tabula rasa for an interstitial, buoyant metropolis that anticipates and even welcomes the disruptions of rising sea levels as a catalyst for new forms of commerce, new modes of dwelling, and redefined geopolitical relationships?
Despite its former colonization by the Japanese until 1945, Taiwan was incorporated within the economic and political operations of mainland China under the Republic of China (ROC) until 1949, when the Chinese Civil War resulted in the communist party (People’s Republic of China, or PRC) displacing the defeated ROC to the Taiwanese city of Taipei. Since then the debate over the status of Taiwan has hovered somewhere between upholding the status quo (its tacit affiliation with the ROC), the case for Taiwanese independence as a sovereign territory, or Chinese reunification under the PRC.
The Taiwan Strait, a 180 kilometer aqueous zone between the eastern coast of china and the low-lying western coast of Taiwan, already the theatre for several military confrontations between the ROC and the PRC, has recently been a site for speculation into future relations between these now estranged siblings.
In 2005, as part of mainland China’s National Expressway Plan, there was discussion about the feasibility of building an extensive tunnel or bridge to connect China to Taiwan, although the plans were vehemently dismissed by Taiwanese politicians as propaganda for Beijing’s “One China” policy.
Given the Strait’s importance to the entire region (its vitality as an indispensible trade route to all Asian countries) could this zone serve as the site for a unifying water-based intervention? Could this become the tabula rasa for an interstitial, buoyant metropolis that anticipates and even welcomes the disruptions of rising sea levels as a catalyst for new forms of commerce, new modes of dwelling, and redefined geopolitical relationships?
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