TAICHUNG (Taiwan News) — Following the landslide victory of the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) in 2016, giving the party control of both the executive and legislative branches for the first time, supporters of transitional justice and the families of the victims of the 228 massacre, the White Terror, and the authoritarian era had high expectations that the party would deliver.
After all, this issue had been included in the party’s and Tsai’s campaigns and the newly-elected president referenced it in her inauguration speech. While the Tsai administration has had some important accomplishments, many things that supporters hoped for never came to pass.
The first major step was to establish the Ill-gotten Party Assets Settlement Committee (IGPASC, 不當黨產處理委員會) to tackle the wealth accumulated by the Kuomintang (KMT) that had been expropriated from the Japanese colonial-era government, handed to them when the line was blurry between the party and government during the one-party authoritarian era, or expropriated by other means. Though still mired in legal challenges, the committee has been very successful.
In December 2017, the legislature passed the Act on Promoting Transitional Justice (促進轉型正義條例) that provided the legal framework to establish the Transitional Justice Commission (TJC) in May 2018. It operated for four years and had its life extended twice, but was disbanded in May 2022 and replaced by a cross-Cabinet committee named the Department of Human Rights and Transitional Justice.
The act defined the "period of authoritarian rule" from Aug. 15, 1945 to Nov. 6, 1992. That period starts with the surrender broadcast of Japan's Emperor Hirohito and ends with Temporary Provisions against the Communist Rebellion.
The TJC was specifically tasked with five goals:
1. Providing public access to political archival records
2. Removing authoritarian symbols and preserving sites where injustices were committed
3. Redressing judicial and administrative wrongs, restoring historical truth, and promoting social reconciliation
4. Settling and utilizing ill-gotten party assets
5. Handling other matters on transitional justice
TJC results
The results on goal No. 1 are mixed, though through no fault of the TJC. The government has declared that documents from 30 years ago or more can be declassified, but that government departments can still keep them hidden for up to 60 years if requested and measures are being taken to protect the privacy of people mentioned in the files.
This could be a breakthrough for families wanting to know what happened to their loved ones, and why. If they can find the right documents and are not blocked from accessing them by various government departments, this could help them find some closure.
Unfortunately, key documents and records have either been destroyed or hidden in the government, and the TCJ has sued the KMT, accusing them of concealing and destroying documents, though the KMT denies this. Probably the most prominent case is that of democracy pioneer Lin I-hsiung (林義雄), whose mother and two daughters were murdered and his third daughter was severely wounded in 1980.
Multiple investigations have linked the case to the National Security Bureau (NSB) and the Taiwan Garrison Command (TGC), but crucial evidence that would have identified who was behind the murders is missing. Lin is 82 years old, and may never find out who killed his family.
However, some valuable information has been released, such as that former dictator Chiang Kai-shek (蔣介石) personally intervened in over 4,000 political case trials.
Goal No. 2
On the second part of goal No. 2, preserving sites where injustices were committed, is happening, albeit slowly. Regarding removing authoritarian symbols, virtually nothing has been accomplished.
As of October 2020, the TJC claimed that nearly 70% of Chiang Kai-shek statues and other authoritarian symbols had been removed. As far as I can determine, that is the last public statement on the matter, suggesting not much progress has been made since.
There remain hundreds of statues of Chiang around Taiwan. The picture accompanying this column was taken the day before in a public park not far from my home in Taichung.
The most visible symbol of Chiang, the massive Chiang Kai-shek Memorial in the heart of Taipei has been the topic of much discussion and many proposals have been put forth to transform it into something else. Yet, the issue remains perpetually “under review” and no action has been taken.
Aside from the seldom-used NT$20 coin, almost all coins in circulation feature either Chiang or Sun Yat-sen (孫逸仙), as do the NT$100 and NT$200 banknotes despite the government having talked about changing them for years. That there have been commemorative coins and banknotes periodically released demonstrates that there are no significant logistical or cost considerations in changing the designs.
The national symbol of the white sun in a blue circle is ubiquitous in the insignia of the branches of the military, police, and fire departments. The KMT says that technically their logo is different than the national symbol because of the distance between the edge of the circle and the sun, but virtually no one is aware of that very minor distinction.
The KMT emblem (left) and national emblem (right)
Changing the flag would require going through the very difficult process of changing the constitution. There is no constitutional barrier to removing that insignia from everything else, however.
State-owned companies also retain their names, such as CPC Corporation Taiwan (台灣中油, "Taiwan Chinese Petroleum"), Chunghwa Telecom (中華電信, "Chinese Telecom"), Chunghwa Post (中華郵政, "Chinese Post") and most embarrassingly in diplomatic terms when Taiwan was delivering aid during the pandemic under the banner of “Taiwan can help” in front of China Airlines planes. CPC did change their name from Chinese Petroleum Corporation in English and added the "Taiwan" at the end, but after much talk, the others retain their original names today.
In other countries where transitional justice has taken place these sorts of symbols are usually removed fairly quickly, and in some cases, there are strict regulations on how they can be displayed at all, such as in Germany. When the flags of a country contained symbology associated with their former oppressors, such as South Africa and Germany, the flags were changed.
Most countries remove statues and other relics of the past, though some are faster than others. Spain banned all symbols of the Francisco Franco regime in 2007, though one final statue of him before his taking control survived until 2021.
Goal No. 3
Assessing the progress on goal No. 3 depends on how one interprets “redressing judicial and administrative wrongs, restoring historical truth, and promoting social reconciliation.” In restoring historical truth, there has been progress in both goal No. 1 and goal No. 2 via the releasing of documents and opening museums, but as noted there are still large gaps in the record.
There have been some notable successes on goal No. 3. Nearly 2000 compensation applications have been processed for 228 Massacre victims.
Additionally, last year, properties confiscated from victims during the authoritarian rule period were returned, with over NT$4 billion (US$126.33 million) in compensation disbursed. Around 6000 guilty verdicts were also reversed by the TJC for mostly political crimes.
There is one huge glaring omission in all of this. What about the perpetrators?
Countries usually follow either a retribution or a reconciliation model. While Chile’s former dictator General Augusto Pinochet died under house arrest awaiting trial, hundreds of his officers did serve jail time.
South Africa famously took a different approach and set up a Truth and Reconciliation Commission that conducted hearings that included both the perpetrators of human rights abuses on behalf of the Apartheid regime as well as victims to bring understanding and some closure to everybody. If they testified truthfully, perpetrators could be given amnesty.
Which of these two standard approaches is better has been widely debated in transitional justice circles. I have never seen anyone debate in favor of Taiwan’s approach, which so far has been to sweep it under the rug and hope the problem goes away and everyone forgets.
The privacy measures taken when releasing formerly classified documents mean no one will likely either be convicted of any crime, or be held to any sort of account, because only the TCJ and the relevant government officials know who these people are, and it does not appear they intend to release that information.
Goals No. 4 and No. 5
Goal No. 4, “Settling and utilizing ill-gotten party assets,” is still ongoing, and much of the money is still tied up in the courts, so it is still too soon to know if they will utilize those assets. Goal No. 5, “Handling other matters pertaining to transitional justice” appears to just be a catch-all for anything they forgot or could not easily categorize.
