Taipei, Taiwan – Taiwan’s greater than 19 million eligible voters will solid their ballots on Saturday for the island’s subsequent leaders and lawmakers amid home financial challenges and China’s continued threats towards the self-ruled island.
There are three candidates in the running for the top job: William Lai Ching-te, Taiwan’s present vp who represents the ruling Beijing-sceptic Democratic Progressive Get together (DPP); New Taipei mayor Hou Yu-ih of the Beijing-friendly Kuomintang (KMT); and ex-Taipei mayor Ko Wen-je of the newer Taiwan Folks’s Get together (TPP).
Many in Taiwan face skyrocketing housing costs and stagnating wages, however past the financial points which might be key to elections in every single place, folks on the island should additionally take care of a extra existential query – that the Chinese language Communist Get together (CCP) needs to take management of the island, by drive if crucial.
Within the run-up to the polls, it has despatched navy plane and balloons across the island whereas its officers have urged voters to make the “proper alternative”.
Brian Hioe, founding editor of Taiwan-focused journal New Bloom, notes that whereas not the one issue, “the most important challenge in Taiwanese presidential elections historically is the choice between independence and unification”.
Beijing insists Taiwan is a part of China, however in recent times, the folks of Taiwan, a lot of whom have grown up in one among Asia’s most vibrant democracies and identified nothing else, have turn out to be more and more assertive about their very own sense of identification.
In accordance with National Chengchi University’s Election Study Center, 62.8 p.c of individuals recognized as Taiwanese as of June 2023, whereas 30.5 p.c mentioned they had been each Taiwanese and Chinese language, and solely 2.5 p.c recognized as Chinese language.
‘Our identification is being eradicated’
Aurora Chang, now 24, lengthy questioned her identification and sense of belonging as a result of “I knew that I used to be Taiwanese but in addition felt that I wasn’t solely simply Taiwanese – however didn’t know what the opposite issues had been”.
On the finish of her first yr as an undergraduate, nonetheless, she got here to a call.
“Being Taiwanese was actually a acutely aware alternative that I made,” she informed Al Jazeera, referring to her epiphany. “I needed to attach extra to my roots and to know what it meant and to really feel my reference to the land and my household and my historical past,” she mentioned.
“Our identification is actively being eradicated by an influence a lot bigger and rather more worldwide affect than us,” she added.
In accordance with Taiwan’s Central Election Fee, greater than 30 p.c of voters are aged between 20 and 39.
Hioe, who can also be a non-resident fellow on the College of Nottingham’s Taiwan research programme, notes that “identification considerations are actually a part of what units Taiwanese younger folks other than different Asian youths – in that almost all youth don’t face an existential risk to their nationwide identification”.
Chen Yi An, a 27-year-old medical employee from Taipei, can also be proud to name herself Taiwanese.
“Taiwan is the place I grew up, the land that raised me. I’m Taiwanese,” she mentioned, including that the best way she defines the place is from “shouldn’t be controversial”.
However not all younger Taiwanese are so rooted of their sense of identification, and a few do see themselves as Chinese language.
Ting-yi Zheng, a 27-year-old pupil from Tainan, Taiwan’s historic metropolis, has lived in China for seven years and is at present learning for a doctoral diploma in Beijing.
He informed Al Jazeera he had no plan to return residence to vote.
Final time round he backed KMT candidate Han Kuo-yu, however now he worries concerning the state of Taipei’s ties with Beijing and the impact on the island’s economic system. China has raised political, financial and navy stress on Taiwan ever since Tsai Ing-wen was first elected president in 2016, regardless of her early supply of talks.
Zheng says he doesn’t need the island to go to battle with Beijing.
“I hope the 2 sides of the Taiwan Strait might be peacefully unified,” he informed Al Jazeera, including that each peoples wanted to know one another extra.
Liz Li, now 27, says she discovered in school that Taiwan was an “unbiased nation” however says she got here to have doubts after doing extra of her personal studying.
“The older you get, the extra information and historical past you see, and you’ll suppose to your self: Are we actually a rustic?” Li mentioned, referring to the worldwide neighborhood’s understanding of Taiwan’s state as “a rustic however not a rustic”.
No matter her ideas on identification, nonetheless, it won’t be what motivates her resolution on the poll field.
Values to dwell by
Li goals of shopping for her own residence on the island, however costs are so excessive she is considering of working abroad – getting a job as a UX designer in Japan or the USA – so she will earn and save sufficient cash to make it a actuality.
She thinks that as Taiwan grapples with financial points equivalent to inexpensive housing, it wants new concepts and an alternative choice to the 2 events – the DPP and KMT – which have dominated politics since democratisation.
Li plans to vote for the TPP’s Ko for the sake of “who will give us a greater and extra steady life.”
Ko has attracted assist from many equally disillusioned young people who’re attracted by his outsider standing, and for whom financial points are extra of a priority than the rumbling from throughout the Taiwan Strait.
“The factor about China is that it’s an current drawback for us,” she mentioned, explaining that she didn’t suppose it was a problem the place strange folks may have a lot influence, in contrast to the economic system.
Chiaoning Su, affiliate professor within the Division of Communication, Journalism and Public Relations at Oakland College within the US, informed Al Jazeera that Taiwanese identification was “a strategy of realizing who we’re not”, which was “being outlined by our lifestyle, worth, democracy [and] freedom of speech” and the distinction with the authoritarian authorities in Beijing.
For Chang, these values, together with “gender equality” and “views on queer rights” with the island the primary in Asia to legalise same-sex marriage, underpin her identification and make her pleased with being Taiwanese.
They’re additionally why she plans to vote for Lai, a person Beijing has labelled a “separatist”.
Lai mentioned earlier this week, he needed to keep up Taiwan’s established order as de facto unbiased.
“Being anyone who believes within the upkeep of Taiwanese independence, there’s a very clear alternative right here,” Chang mentioned.