Published in Futures, the journal of forecasting, planning and policy, 1988
Experiences and impressions
In September 1988 the final report on the Taiwan 2000 study is due to be published.1 This article describes the background and reasoning behind the initiative to the study, and some aspects of the results and recommendations arising from the draft report.2 Extracts from the report are not presented, as this can only be done after publication, and preferably by experts. Instead, the article is a personal account of experiences and impressions gained through the author’s involvement in the setting up of the study.
Taiwan is an island with at present about 20 million inhabitants and an area of approximately 36,000 km2 (as a comparison, The Netherlands is 38,000km2). Taiwan was originally part of the Chinese Empire and from 1895 until 1945 was ruled by japan. In 1945 it again became part of China, where a power struggle was taking place between the Nationalist government of Chiang Kai-shek and the Communist resistance movement of Mao-Tse-tung. At the end of 1949 Chiang Kai-shek lost the struggle and fled to Taiwan with over a million of his compatriots, drawn mostly from the upper and better-educated strata of Chinese society. In Taiwan he established the national government, which he considered and which is still considered by the present régime to be the sole legitimate government of the whole of China.
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The Taiwan 2000 study