
The Republic of China that retreated to Taiwan in 1949 maintains its de facto, if not de jure, in- dependence yet Beijing has consistently refused formally to abandon the idea of reunifying Taiwan with China. As well as growing military pressure, the PRC's irredentist policy is premised on encouraging cross-Straits economic integration. Responding to preferential measures, Taiwanese industrialists have invested massively in the PRC, often relocating their businesses there. Fragments of a nation torn apart by contradictory claims, these entrepreneurs are vectors of a new form of unification imposed by the main- land, promoted but postponed on the island by the Nationalist Party, and rejected by Taiwanese pro-independence parties.Within what can be described as an unfinished civil war, socio-economic dynamics remain embedded in conflicts over sovereignty. Trans- national actors have freed themselves from security constraints, thereby benefiting economically from a reformist China, and ultimately restructuring politics in Taiwan itself, and, in so doing, relations between Beijing and Taipei. A fictitious depoliticization has governed the opening of the Sino-Taiwanese border in order to postpone any resolution of the sovereignty issue. Mengin's startlingly original book highlights the competing, and fragmented, elements within one of the world's most intractable territorial disputes.
This work investigates how Taiwanese entrepreneurs navigate the unresolved sovereignty conflict between the People's Republic of China and the Republic of China through cross-Straits economic integration. Françoise Mengin, a senior research fellow at CERI-Sciences Po, utilizes extensive fieldwork and political analysis to argue that economic actors have effectively bypassed traditional security constraints. By examining the relocation of Taiwanese industry to the mainland, the author demonstrates how these business interests have fundamentally restructured the political landscape and the nature of the ongoing civil war.
What You Will Find
Scope Limits
Experts recognize this text as a foundational analysis of the intersection between transnational capital and territorial sovereignty in East Asia. Readers frequently note the academic density of the prose, which provides a rigorous framework for understanding the depoliticization of the Sino-Taiwanese border.
Page Count:
352
Publication Date:
2015-09-01
Publisher:
Oxford University Press
ISBN-10:
0190264055
ISBN-13:
9780190264055
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