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Taiwanese identity

I have flagged the section for neutrality, because first, although it is sourced, the sources seem to be from highly partisan sources :-) and hence their reliability is suspect. Second, regardless of the sources' accuracy, the way the section is worded sets up a conflict of "Taiwanese" versus "Chinese," with the latter portrayed as being outsiders. The alternative interpretation of Taiwanese being a subset of Chinese is not seriously addressed. So the section as it now stands is not neutral. Ngchen (talk) 14:13, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

I've initially called the section "Taiwanese identity issue" but somebody changed it. However, I think this would be the right title - the purpose of this section is indeed to explain why the Taiwanese identity is sometime an issue, and why it is often at the heart of political debates. It's certainly not a "Chinese vs. Taiwanese" section, nor it is meant to promote the independence of Taiwan (if that's what you meant by lack of neutrality). What would you suggest to make the section more neutral? Laurent (talk) 14:31, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

The edit proposed by Readin is not acceptable. In order to justfy this clearly biased POV, she quoted a statement from an article published on a pro-Taiwan independence website. An agenda pushing POV from a political organisation is still a biased POV. It doesn't matter how that information was presented. A person can quote "Taiwan is part of China" from the PRC government website and that doesn't itself make the statement unbiased.

She clearly understands that there is a major POV that ROC is not Taiwan, so it is incorrect to say that "since the ROC relocated to Taiwan". She clearly also understands that there is a major POV that Taiwanese is also Chinese, so it is unneutral to say Chiang tried to turn Taiwanese into Chinese, as they were Chinese at first place. I hope this edit war would not continue, as it is clearly unnecessary and unproductive.

Also, by presenting one side of the story, it doesn't "explain why the Taiwanese identity is sometime an issue, and why it is often at the heart of political debates". It just shows that there is one POV, and there is no "issue" nor "debate" if no opposing POVs are being presented.--pyl (talk) 03:58, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

So any suggestions on how to modify the section? Or should I remove the NPOV tag? On the Taiwan article, we can't talk about Taiwan, and on the ROC one, we apparently can't talk about subjects related to Taiwan either. So where should I put this section then? Laurent (talk) 17:37, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

Basically, there needs to be something in there explaining the Chinese POV that Taiwanese belong to them. There should also be something in there about the fact that a significant fraction of Taiwanese believed and continue to believe the KMT propaganda they were force-fed for 40 years (and continue to be fed by the KMT-owned media). There should also be something about how various groups (Hakka, Hoklo, Aborigine, Chinese) see Taiwanese Identity differently. You might not want to use my exact words, but the information should be there.

The problem isn't that the information already there is biased or incorrect. The information there is fine. But there needs to be balance.Readin (talk) 17:47, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

To be honest, I personally find the way the Taiwan and Republic of China articles confusing, in that it's not clear what material belongs where, and this lack of clarity leads to lots of POV-forking. When I have some time, I'm planning on doing a search for everything Taiwan related, and proposing a solution (with the consensus of other editors of course) of what goes where. For a presentation on Taiwanese identity to be neutral, I am thinking that it should lead with a description of the controversy over what exactly is "Taiwanese," and how it is or is not a subset of "Chinese." Then the arguments for each side can be presented. Of course, most of the material belongs on the Taiwanese identity article, with only a summary here. Ngchen (talk) 17:53, 27 May 2009 (UTC)

I've added a paragraph based on Readin's comments and yours detailing the views of the PRC and the current government. I still prefer starting the section by documenting what is meant by "Taiwanese identity" though, and then exposing the different POVs. I think the table at the end is quite neutral too, since we are just presenting the numbers and letting readers make their own mind. Laurent (talk) 14:23, 28 May 2009 (UTC)

As part of balancing the information in the Taiwan Identity section, it would make sense to say something about Japan's attempts to have Taiwanese adopt Japanese culture and become Japanese. However, it wasn't as easy as I had hoped to find documentation on this. I know that one example I've read of was the renaming of some streets to use Japanese names. But if I start using specific examples, I'll need to do the same for the Chinese sinicization attempts, and it will just get very long. Does anyone know of any good references for Japan's attempt to influence Taiwanese culture? Readin (talk) 21:01, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

According to this source, Japan didn't have a lot of influence on the culture of Taiwan, since they focussed on more practical issues like improving the infrastructure and education. On page 56, it's mentioned that they've tried to suppress religious traditions to replace them with Japanese ones. Laurent (talk) 22:14, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

The section as it stands basically contains arguements for a Taiwanese identity. In the preface of the source Laurent cited above, the first sentence says:-

"This book makes severl bold theoretical claims"

This is exactly how I feel about the section. I talked about it in User talk:Laurent1979, but this author sums up my feeling better than I can express. The section contains lots of bold theoretical claims and a lot of assumptions are apparently made to support a particuar POV or a statistical trend. For example, how did the sources know for sure that the One China Principle actually contributes to a Taiwanese identity? Did the author conduct surveys, interviews or use any scientific reasearch methods to draw such conclusions? The source simply didn't tell. It just talked a lot about what Lee did during his presidency and his promotion for a Taiwanese identity.

The section as it stands, in my view, is terribly unneutral: lots of theoretical claims are made but none are actually convincingly conclusive. Almost all of the claims are done to support a Taiwanese identity. The one about a Chinese identity is written in a critical manner.

I think Laurent proposed a good framework to make this section neutral in her discussion page, which I would reproduce here:-

....I think the section now contains a lot of weasel words, in particular we should be more specific about who argues what. Since it is within the Politics section, perhaps one way would be to have the DPP POV opposed to the KMT POV. Also maybe we could move a part of this section to the Taiwanese identity article.

There should be a section containing all arguments (or theoretical claims) from a DPP POV, one for the KMT POV and one for other POVs. The presentation should be done similar to what we have done in Legal status of Taiwan.

The Chiang and sinicisation sentence is simply unacceptable. There is no way this sentence, in its present format, would comply with the NPOV policy. It makes several biased assumptions, including one that implies the Taiwanese are not Chinese at first place, and then the background information says about 85% of the residents on Taiwan are Han Chinese. There is no explanation on the difference between Han Chinese and the "Chinese" in the view of the author. How does the author know Chiang "sinicized" the people on Taiwan just because Chiang wanted to take back the mainland? The term, sinicisation, is also an offensive term expressed by a marginal group of people. See Desinicisation. Statitically speaking these people represent about 8% of the Taiwanese population, the so-called "deep-greens". Marginal POVs can be completely ignored under Wikipedia's rules, and I think, rightly so, as we shouldn't spend this much time arguing for a POV expressed by the 8% of the population, when the remaining 92% of the population don't necessarily feel that way.--pyl (talk) 07:12, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Review of neutrality

The section has been drasticially changed since the NPOV tag was added, and I think it more or less matches the consensus now. What do you think? Should we remove the template, or is there something more you'd like to change? Laurent (talk) 20:33, 9 June 2009 (UTC)

It looks ok to me. I agree with you that the "pan-Chinese..." needs to be better worded. I hope that can be fixed in a neutral way. Perhaps changing "as opposed to a Taiwanese identity from a pan-Chinese point of view" to "as opposed to Taiwanese identity as a subset of a Chinese identity" and changing "supports a Taiwanese identity from a pan Chinese point of view[clarification needed] or a Chinese identity." to "supports a Chinese identity only or supports a Taiwanese identity as part of a Chinese identity."

It sounds clearer to me. I've also changed "Zhonghua minzu" to "Chinese nation" in the quotes, since we don't define what "Zhonghua minzu" is in the article. So the updated paragraph would look like this:

The majority, about 85%, of Taiwan's population is descended from Han Chinese from mainland China who immigrated to Taiwan between 1600 and 1900 A.D. Another significant fraction is descended from Han Chinese who immigrated from mainland China in the 1940s and 1950s. But between 1895 and the present, Taiwan and mainland China have shared a common government for only 5 years. The shared cultural origin combined with several hundred years of geographical separation, some hundred years of political separation and foreign influences, as well as hostility between the rival ROC and PRC have resulted in national identity being a contentious issue with political overtones. Since democratization and the lifting of martial law, a distinct Taiwanese identity (as opposed to a Taiwanese identity from a pan-Chinese point of view)(as opposed to Taiwanese identity as a subset of a Chinese identity) is often at the heart of political debates. Its acceptance makes the island distinct from mainland China, and therefore may be seen as a step towards forming a consensus for de jure Taiwan independence. The pan-green camp supports a distinct Taiwanese identity, while the pan-blue camp and the PRC supports a Taiwanese identity from a pan Chinese point of view or a Chinese identity.supports a Chinese identity only, or supports a Taiwanese identity as part of a Chinese identity.

Laurent (talk) 16:09, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

I don't think it's fair to write "the pan-blue camp and the PRC support a Taiwanese identity as part of a Chinese identity" (also please notice the grammatical error in the original sentence) by including PRC in here. Otherwise this could also be revised as "the pan-green camp and the right-wing groups in Japan supports a distinct Taiwanese identity". Bobbybuilder (talk) 09:35, 4 January 2010 (UTC)

Cleaning up historical sections

I think the current article is cluterred with a lot of historical information, which I think is uncessary since there is already a very detailed History of the Republic of China article. Usually, on Wikipedia, articles about states mainly cover the current status of the state, and provide historical background only in an "History" section. However, in this article, every section has several sub-sections about history, which makes the article hard to read and a bit off-topic. If I read an article about a state, I don't want to be constantly reminded about its history. If I want to know about the history, I go to the history section, not to the politics or geography section. So I would suggest to sum up the historical comments at the beginning of each section to a line or two, and move the rest to History of the Republic of China. What do you think? Laurent (talk) 15:43, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

The history can be shotened but I don't think "a line or two" is appropriate. The history between 1911 to 1949 and after 1949 is quite different and I don't think a line or two will do.

One thing to point out is that you may not want to be constantly remind about its history, but other may want do. I don't think this issue should be about that. We should just state the necessary fact and link to the 1911 to 1949 era to after the 1949 era.--pyl (talk) 04:26, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Ok I'll try to sum up these sections to a paragraph then. I just read through them again, and I think most of the "1949-today" sections don't need to be summed up anyway. Laurent (talk) 17:12, 23 May 2009 (UTC)

Wang Jingwei regime

I have removed "see also Wang Jingwei regime" because first of all, it is not a major topic warranting a "see also" on top of this ROC article. It's confusing enough to have both the ROC and PRC, we don't need another disambiguation for an entity better known as Wang Jingwei regime. Secondly, any reader wanting to read more about the puppet government would most likely go to the WW2 or the Second Sino-Japanese War article, both of whom have information on collaborationists. The main purpose is to differentiate between the PRC and ROC. This article doesn't need anymore clutter. Blueshirts (talk) 20:00, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

I agree completely with Blueshirts. Elevating that regime to the level of the ROC would be a travesty, akin to naming Vichy France "France." Ngchen (talk) 23:10, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

it is not a major topic warranting a "see also" I'm pretty sure disambiguation is for any topic, not just major ones.

akin to naming Vichy France "France." Vichy France officially called itself "French State" and French State redirects you to Vichy France. The Wang Jinwei regime was officially called "Republic of China". I'm not sure how we get around having a disambiguation for this. If you don't want it showing up on the main page, perhaps we should have something that says "For other uses, see Republic of China (disambiguation). The disambiguation page would then list the Wang Jingwei regime. It's probably not strictly in line with Wiki policies to have a disambiguation page with only one item. But I think I understand the emotions about having it on the main page and I don't think it is worth my time to argue that particular point. Readin (talk) 23:32, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Chiayi not in top 20 cities?

Chiayi must be in the top 20 cities by population, but it's not on the list in the article. Anyone know the population and can put it on the appropriate place in the list? What's the source for the list? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Fosterd2 (talk • contribs) 09:12, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

"sinicize"

After the Republic of China relocated its capital to Taipei in 1949, the intention of Chiang Kai-shek was to eventually go back to Mainland China and retake control of it. For that reason, Chiang attempted to sinicize Taiwan's inhabitants. However, the Korean War in 1950, during which the PRC fought United States soldiers, changed this situation. It indeed pushed the US to conclude a mutual security treaty with the ROC since they did not want the Communists to take over the island. Thus protected by the US, the people on Taiwan continued developing their own identity, separate from mainland China.

Pyl keeps removing this sourced information because he doesn't like it. His latest claim is that the term "sinicize" is not neutral. However, "sinicize" was an attempt to tone down the wording of the source "turning Taiwan’s inhabitants into Chinese". If Pyl knows a more neutral way to say the same thing, he should provide it. Otherwise, leave the facts alone. I note that while Pyl considers "sinicize" a "term of attack" he doesn't seem to have a problem with "Taiwanization". Readin (talk) 13:25, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

You have been told that the description of "I don't like it" is not appreciated, and you are also told the reasons why this is not appreciated. Please again read Wikipedia:I just don't like it. If this comment is made against me without proper causes in the future, I will refer you to the administrators.

I am not going to repeat myself over and over. In response, please read Sinicization, and in particular the following paragraph:-

The use of "Sinicizataion" as a political term of attack arose in response to these charges of Desinicization. Supporters of Taiwan independence and other opponents of closer economic or political ties with mainland China have sometimes labelled policies aimed at closer cultural and economic ties with the mainland (such as the Three Links, as "Sinicization". Because this usage of the term pre-supposes that Taiwan is not already "Sinicized", its usage remains marginal. The more mainstream term of attack of such policies is "tongzhan", or "United Front", a reference to the Communist Party of China's strategy of influencing other political players to join its coalition. According to opponents, policies aimed at closer economic and cultural ties with mainland China are ultimately aimed at reunification of Taiwan with mainland China, a prospect that these opponents ultimately oppose.

I am not the only person who has issues with this offensive term. I believe the majority of the Taiwanese population do.--pyl (talk) 13:52, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

I looked at the Sinicization page as you suggested. There are no references for the text you quote. There are no references for the entire section which is highly biased as it says nothing about the Sinicization that actually occurred but only talks about the term supposedly being used for political purposes. That needs to be fixed. Readin (talk) 17:19, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

It may need to be fixed, but removing the whole section by saying the section is unreferenced is not the proper practice. We can discuss it under that article. I think the Wikipedia practice would be doing a "refimprove" instead of removing the whole section and replacing it with your materials, which are currently being discussed here as being unneutral.--pyl (talk) 06:24, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

I agree that we need this fact included in the section one way or the other. As I've suggested on my talk page, if you feel this is not neutral then please provide an alternative. I've also found the same information, written by different authors, on the Hoover Institution [1]. This is nearly an established fact and it should appear in the article. (Quote: The new KMT concluded that it must “Sinicize” Taiwan if it were ever to unify mainland China. Textbooks were designed to teach young people the dialect of North China as a national language. Pupils also were taught to revere Confucian ethics, to develop Han Chinese nationalism, and to accept Taiwan as a part of China.) Laurent (talk) 13:59, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

If the neutrality is disputed like this, then I think the most reasonable thing that we can do would be refraining from adding information that can be potentially offensive and discussing here until we find a good compromise/proposal. That's my alternative, and I am acting in good faith discussing here to find a proposal.

The quote as a whole is more neutral (relatively speaking). The term "sinicise" is written in quotes (unlike the way it was presented previously). I think we can try using the quote as a whole. I think we also need to mention Taiwan during the Japanese period in order for "sinicisation" to make sense. The main text as it stands doesn't demostrate a connection between Taiwanese being ethnic Han Chinese and the need for "sinicisation". This way, maybe we can avoid the neutrality issues.

I am aware there were allegedly "Japanisation" ("皇民化") programs for the Taiwanese during the Japanese period, and this is apparently "blamed" for a Taiwanese identity by the mainland authorities. There may be some English texts on it, if anyone is interested in further research. See Japanization. Of course, this article, is marked unneutral as well, giving the similar political and cultural sensitivities.

If it is Han Chinese -> "Japanisation" -> "Sinicisation", then the "Sinicisation" process would make sense to me.--pyl (talk) 14:52, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

The same article cited above also has this: "As the newly available KMT archival materials at Hoover indicate, social interaction between Taiwanese and mainland Chinese gradually improved relations between the two groups of ethnic Chinese in the 1950s." I think "sinicization" really was to "re-align" Taiwanese people who had been separated for fifty years and to make them catch up to the Chinese nationalism that had developed only in the early 1900s. Blueshirts (talk) 18:05, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

That doesn't look like an extremist nationalist partisan propaganda source to me. Readin (talk) 19:00, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Your sentence seems to be missing a verb and it doesn't quite make sense to me. Would you like to clarify that please?--pyl (talk) 06:19, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

fixed, thanks Readin (talk) 12:59, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

I object to this source's (1) Dreyer as potentially being unreliable. At the very least, it is not neutral. That doesn't mean we can't use it; however, before inclusion, opposing POVs and their sources need to be found. Ngchen (talk) 14:03, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Well good luck finding these opposing POVs then. Those are historical facts, and any sources that would say otherwise would most likely not be considered reliable. Also, no offense but I find your arguments very weak. Calling something "unreliable" and "not neutral" doesn't make it so (especially when, in this instance, the website is obviously a reliable source per WP's criteria). Laurent (talk) 14:19, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

I must object to your tone of voice. Remember that we are hare to produce an encyclopedia, and extreme nationalist, religious, anti-religious, etc. rantings don't belong and should not be presented as factual. In terms of sources, the general consensus is that partisan sources (e.g. National Review, The Nation, etc.) are acceptable as sources of uncontroversial facts, but not opinions unless clearly marked as being from a point-of-view. I'll give an example. Suppose such a source states that event X happened on date D. That is an uncontroversial fact. Now suppose it says that X was an example of repression by people P on people P2. If almost all the Ps and P supporters in the world deny repressing P2s, then it would violate NPOV to state that X "was" a repression of P2s without qualifiers. As to the historical facts, what we can point out is that the dictator Chiang did impose Mandarin in schools and so forth. We cannot neutrally then claim that it was an attempt at sinicization (this is no longer a fact), at least w/o qualifiers as to who's making the claim. The counterclaim would be that Hakka, Taiwanese, etc. are already a subset of Chinese; however in the spirit of "national unity," Chiang tried to suppress their usage in a bid to reduce the regionalism that plagued much of China in the 20th century. Ngchen (talk) 14:40, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

It sounds like you're saying we can include the undisputed facts from the source - the specific examples of sinicization such as street name changes, punishments for using languages other than mandarin, and other similar facts provided in the source, but we can't use the single sentence summary. The problem is, if we include the exhaustive list of examples, then we'll be accused of POV for taking up so much space on the particular topic. Readin (talk) 15:25, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

I agree with Ngchen. Also, half told historic facts aren't really the facts either. I have a feeling that history, in this case, is half told. There are authors who extract certain facts from history to make their own "theoretical claim" in order to support a particular POV or agenda. Ngchen's counterclaim above could be the other facts that the authors have left out from the history.--pyl (talk) 15:05, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

I have a feeling that history, in this case, is half told. I often get that same feeling. The tough part is finding the documented facts to back up that feeling. For example, this information about people getting punished for using their native language at school. I've heard it many times from many different Taiwanese people. But how easy do you think it is to document something like that? Or information about the treatment of Taiwanese at the hands of the Chinese soldiers who arrived in Taiwan. Certainly you won't get much information from the ROC government, whose soldiers were doing the treating. You won't get much from the western press or government at the time which for reasons of anti-communism were generally pro-ROC. You won't get much from the PRC which while anti-ROC was even more anti-Japan and anti-Taiwan-as-separate-from-China. Who would you expect to find documentation from except the people who experienced it? - and they being under control of the ROC at the time would be severely punished if the published that kind of information. What few people care enough to try to publish something about it, since they are so few and the topic is so old, can then be dismissed as extremists, nationalists, or partisans. So look through Wikipedia. Where do you find information about how Japanese soldiers generally treated the Taiwanese better than the Chinese soldiers who replaced them? Very little is said about it because it is so hard to document with published information that at least one partisan editor won't claim is POV. So only half the story is told.

I think the comments that students getting punished or fined in school for speaking in non-Mandarin languages are actually being made in Wikipedia. I don't think this has been a contentious point. There are numerous sources documentating this kind of policy as well, and they aren't hard to find.

You see. You are saying Japanese soilders generally treating the Taiwanese better than the mainland soilders who replaced them as if it was an undisputed fact, and you are trying to find sources to back up this POV. This is the issue that we have at hand.

I think the proper thing to do would be, you should find sources for that POV and sources against that POV, then you have your own judgements. I don't want to get distracted into another subject, and this subject that you raise can of course be discussed in another article at a time convenient to you. In this case, I agree with Ngchen. The POV raised by the source is very one-sided, verging on "nationalist". It seems to only tell a side of the story. You mentioned using Chinese names for roads etc. According to a major POV that Taiwan is part of China, that would be the most natrual thing to do. Would you expect Hawaiian streets to use their local names only? Would you write about the "Americanisation" of Hawaii in a Hawaii article without taking into account of the feelings and the POVs of the mainland and other Americans? That seems to me is what you are doing in this article.--pyl (talk) 06:12, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Were I writing an article on the US annexation of Hawaii, I'm not sure what I would look for to find the American POV on renaming streets (if they did so). As for renaming streets being the "natural" thing to do, it is not. It is especially not natural if the languages can be translated easily. I am living in the United States. Many many places around me have non-English names. Some are Indian names that pre-date the European settlers. Others are French, Spanish, or German names reflecting the first Europeans who arrived in the areas. And notice the Chinese names that were given to the streets: the were either KMT/Chinese values the government was trying to promote, or names describing the geography of China.

Supposing it is "natural" to do based on a POV that Taiwan is part of China, then that simply proves the point. The "name rectification campaign" was considered part of the "Taiwanization" or "localization" movement because the names were being changed to reflect a POV. So when the names were earlier changed to reflect a POV, it was also part of a movement, in that case the "sinicization" movement. Readin (talk) 13:13, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

There are also histroic names used in Taiwan as well. Given one major POV that Taipei is the capital of the ROC, I think it is pretty natural that Taipei would have streets named after places on the mainland as well as Taiwan. I believe Washington has streets named after US state names.

Not really, if the place is already Chinese. I don't see that as "sinicization". Similarly, if a place is American, there is no such thing as "Americanisation".--pyl (talk) 16:00, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

That's how Wikipedia works. Stop complaining that a side of the story that you want told isn't being told, and go find some documentation for it. I already made an attempt to add balance. I wanted to add more balance by finding documentation to back up memories of reading about attempts to make the Taiwanese more Japanese - but it was harder to do than I had expected. Laurent produced some documentation that showed my feeling about "Japanization" perhaps wasn't easily backed up.

Perhaps this just happens to be a story where there really is more to one side than there is to the other. Perhaps not. If you think something is missing, tell us what it is and help find some documentation for it. Readin (talk) 16:30, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

No, that's not how Wikipedia works. And again, as you agreed with me in the past, an editor cannot simply just add unneutral materials and expect other editors to find the rest in order to balance the POVs. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, not an opinion piece or a place for propoganda, advocacy or recruitment for a particular political POV. Please see WP:SOAPS.--pyl (talk) 06:18, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

You don't agree that we need sources and that we can't just write stuff based on our feelings? Readin (talk) 12:47, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

I agree with Pyl. In terms of sources for various things, yes there can be a publication bias, at least with regard to the materials in English since government materials and so forth on this topic tend to be in Chinese, and "blue" leaning media tend to be that way too. But yes, in terms of sources, it's important for the "blue" POV to be properly sourced too. In the meantime, maybe a fair way to put down everything is to split the section into two sub-sections, with the "green" side in one and their opponents in another. But no, neutrality is not achieved by simply dismissing the side that has fewer sources that have already been found. Consider how an article on the US Republican Party, if it only uses Democratic Party sources, can never really be neutral. Come to think of it, the notion that the people were exposed to a sinicization campaign isn't really that far-fetched; I wouldn't be surprised if the regime tried to undo some of the Japanization that took place earlier through such a program. Perhaps the dispute revolves around whether the people were "originally" Chinese, so the issue becomes whether they were sinicized, or merely re-sinicized? Ngchen (talk) 16:25, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

I don't think what I am arguing is about personal feelings. I have demostrated above that what was written in the section wasn't particularly neutral. You really won't convince me (therefore gaining consensus) by misinterpreting what I say. In the end, this discussion will turn into a stalmate, and given that no consensus is gained, you won't get your sources inserted into the section.--pyl (talk) 16:00, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

It sounds like you're making a threat that if we don't do things your way, you'll be so disruptive that they won't be done at all. Readin (talk) 20:10, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

I was talking about perhaps you should try another approach so you can persuade people and gain consensus. I am not sure how that can be misinterpreted into making a threat. If you think that I am making a threat, perhaps you should refer me to the administrators?

I am really not sure if you derive some sort of pleasure from bickering. But I can tell you that I find this bickering quite irritating. So perhaps you should assume good faith.--pyl (talk) 20:18, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Refer yourself to the administrators if you want. You have plenty of experience referring me. I prefer to keep hoping that civil adults can work out problems without constantly trying to get other editors banned. Readin (talk) 13:32, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

I don't know where it fits, but all mainlanders were forbidden to speak their native dialect too. They spoke mandarin with very thick and unintelligible accents, just like the Taiwanese did. I don't think most people even understood Chiang Kai-shek's mandarin either. Blueshirts (talk) 16:14, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Since we currently don't say anything in the text about Taiwanese being forbidden from using their own language, there really isn't a good place to put the information about the Chinese being forbidden from using their own language too. But you bring up a good point. If we decide to include the information about the Taiwanese, we should also note that that Chinese faced a similar restriction. Readin (talk) 16:30, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Ngchen's counterclaim above could be the other facts that the authors have left out from the history.

Although Ngchen statements seem reasonable, I find it hard to believe it is so difficult to find sources for it. With the KMT currently in power, I'm sure there are lots of incentive to convince the world that Taiwan is Chinese, and any scholar trying to do so would have no trouble getting funding. So why are these papers and books not written then? I've just done a search to try to back up your claims, but all I could find was the statements you removed from the article.

Here's another one: CULTURAL, ETHNIC, AND POLITICAL NATIONALISM IN CONTEMPORARY TAIWAN. Quote: Among the first things that the Chinese government did after taking over Taiwan was first to "de-Japanize" and then to "Sinicize" Taiwanese culture. The cultural policies of Sinicizing Taiwan in the postwar period intensified when the Chinese Nationalist Party government lost the civil war against the Red Army and retreated to Taiwan in 1949.

You claim that "it's not neutral", "it's a half-told fact" but in the end it's just your opinion if you don't back this up with sources. As you know, Wikipedia is not a place to promote your opinion pieces. You've also mentioned that we shouldn't include these facts because they may be offensive to some people, but this is not a valid argument either because Wikipedia is not censored. We are bound to offend people one way or the other anyway (for example, some may find offensive that the ROC and Taiwan are two separate articles), so I don't think we should be worried about that. Laurent (talk) 12:08, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Regarding Pyl's comments above about how we can't just add stuff and then expect others to provide the balance - I note that so far Laurent, who is arguing to keep the information, is the only one who has found any source at all that talks about Japan's attempts to make Taiwanese more Japanese. I, the person who added some of the information, also made an attempt to find sources. Earlier I suggested specific kinds of balancing information to be added, and Laurent added it. I also added some balancing information myself. At this point, I'm not sure what more there is to add that would fit the topic. All I know is that some people have a "feeling" that it isn't balanced. How do I address that? Readin (talk) 12:54, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

There seems to be a misunderstanding of the Wikipeidia policies. NPOV takes precedence over not censored. I will reproduce the relevant section here:-

Obviously inappropriate content (such as an irrelevant link to a shock site, or clear vandalism) is usually removed quickly. Content that is judged to violate Wikipedia's biographies of living persons policy, or that violates other Wikipedia policies (especially neutral point of view) or the laws of the U.S. state of Florida where Wikipedia's servers are hosted, will also be removed.

I hope that would better explain Wikipeidia's policy. The matter is now at the NPOV forum. Maybe we can continue the discussion there.--pyl (talk) 07:21, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

Rather than us continuing to argue there, how about we let the editors at that forum take a crack at things first. Readin (talk) 15:39, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

After Laurent's latest edits, the section was left just saying that Taiwanese identity resulted solely from PRC threats and ROC behavior - that Taiwanese identity was simply manufactured as a response to ROC and PRC behavior. This felt biased so I removed it. Hopefully the information can be worked into the "Taiwanese Identity" article. I pasted it to the talk page there. Readin (talk) 13:38, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I think the information can be worked into the Taiwanese Identity article. The section has it currently stands now is more neutral because all the theoretical claims are removed. I believe those claims are better placed in an article where the discussion of a Taiwanese Identity is main subject.

I will change the name of the section from "Taiwanese Identity" to "National Identity", given that the section isn't really just about a Taiwanese identity. It is about how the people in the Taiwan Area of the ROC feel about their own identity (can be Taiwanese, Chinese or both)--pyl (talk) 16:11, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

I have made some small changes to the section so it is no longer just about "Taiwanese identity". I think it would be much more neutral to talk about the identity of the people on Taiwan from a national identity point of view.--pyl (talk) 16:38, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Since Readin has moved the disputed statement as well as the references to Sinicization, I guess we will have to continue the discussion there.--pyl (talk) 16:44, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Opinions within the ROC

If the new mode of operation is to just point out where you feel things are unbalanced and expect others to fix them, I would point out that the "Opinions within the ROC" feels unbalanced. It has "See also: 1992 Consensus, One-China policy, and Special non-state-to-state relations" but doesn't link to "special state-to-state relations" or "one china one Taiwan". Similarly, the text of this section and the one below it mention "One china" and "Two Chinas" but make no mention of "One China One Taiwan". It feels biased and unbalanced. Readin (talk) 13:27, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Because State-to-State relations is no longer the policy of the ROC? We can of course mention that for historic purposes, and actually I believe it is indeed mentioned in the article.--pyl (talk) 16:04, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

I just had a look at the text and realised what you meant. I added those pro Taiwan independence theories into the section. I don't think this is a contentious issue, and you could have easily done it without needing to discuss it. This is quite different from the "Taiwanese identity" discussion that we had above. It is a fact that those pro-Taiwan independence theories were proposed by the former presidents, and they were widely reported by all sources.--pyl (talk) 16:24, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

ROC constitution and Taiwan

While trying to find a reference on KMT's position on Taiwanese identity, I came across an article on the KMT website. This article talked about the history of the ROC and Taiwan, it also made a mention that the Taiwanese did participate in the ROC constitution process. I then realised that Wikipedia said the opposite when I was copyediting this article a couple of days ago. I have changed the Wikipedia statement to reflect the quote from the KMT website.

It is a political website. But I don't know if the KMT has anything to gain from lying about this on its official website, since this historic fact can be easily verified publicly from the national archives. It would only make the KMT look bad if the media or the opposition party find out if it is lying. So I guess in this case, the source can be realible. But if any editor wishes to dispute the verifiabiilty or reliability of the source, I am happy to discuss.--pyl (talk) 18:07, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

After you've added this source, I've actually looked for an alternative in English but couldn't find anything. Taiwandocument.org mentions that the constitution was drafted by the National Government in Nanking but doesn't say who exactly was involved, or how they were chosen/elected. I'm not sure it's actually important enough to be mentioned in this article though, since each section should normally only be a summary of larger articles (for example, in that case, we could mention this fact in constitution of the Republic of China). Laurent (talk) 19:34, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

I actually don't think it is important at first place. But since someone (I don't know who) thought it was important enough to mention that the Taiwanese people were not involved in the process, then I figured it must be important enough for this person to know that there is a different view backed up by a source. If you wish to move it, I have no objections.--pyl (talk) 19:54, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

How many parties were there at the time? My understanding is that for all practical purposes, the ROC was a one-party (KMT) state when the constitution was drafted. I can't imagine that anyone would reasonably dispute that the KMT was involved in the process. Readin (talk) 19:55, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

No. The ROC wasn't a single party state at that time. KMT was the governing party, that's all. I read about the constitutional history when I was conducting research on the capital issue in Taipei. I think if you look hard enough you can probably find similar information on the web in English.

And I don't think anyone is disputing whether the KMT was involved in the drafting process. The issue was whether the Taiwanese were involved. The KMT source, as I explained above, said they were.--pyl (talk) 20:00, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

Sorry, my bad. I thought you were talking about whether the KMT participated, not whether any Taiwanese participated. Readin (talk) 20:22, 6 June 2009 (UTC)

From the Chinese wiki article on the ROC constitution [2], it lists Taiwanese representatives at the 1946 National Assembly for drafting the constitution (制憲國民大會). So I believe that there was Taiwanese participation in both drafting and ratifying the constitution, albeit at the provincial level like every other province at the time. Blueshirts (talk) 16:28, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

Pyl removed the information, which I believe is the right move. We don't have a reliable source saying that the Taiwanese were not represented, but we do have a source claiming they were represented. However that source has some serious neutrality issues and we have no way of knowing what the form of the representation was. The fact that their were people present who were said to represent Taiwan does not mean that those people actually represented Taiwan in any meaningful way. Even the National People's Congress of the PRC claims to have Taiwan representation. Readin (talk) 16:55, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

I think we should include the information that Taiwanese representatives participated in drafting the constitution. The Chinese wiki article [3] is fairly detailed and states that representatives from every province, experts of different occupational background, and "sages" for a lack of better translation, participated in the drafting process. It is straightforward, in the sense that Taiwanese representatives were serving as members of some 1700 representatives in this body. Whether their participation was "meaningful" or representative of the people of Taiwan is a value judgment and simply not our call. Blueshirts (talk) 17:13, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

The problem is, we don't have a reliable source. The KMT cannot be considered reliable on this topic because of their built-in bias. When you say "whether their participation was .. representative of the people of Taiwan", well that's the whole point isn't it? We can't call them "representatives" unless they were "representative" and as you say, that's not our call. Neither is it the call of a biased source. I'm not sure I can think of a word we should call them. It would be good if we knew more about them so we could say something link "Representatives of Taiwan were elected..." or "Several people were selected by the KMT to represent Taiwan ... ". Instead we don't really know anything. We might try to word it to say that "According to the KMT, ..." and then quote the KMT statement about Taiwan being represented. Readin (talk) 17:47, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

You're missing my point. I've not visited the KMT website. I'm only pointing out that Taiwanese representatives were present in the National Assembly sessions that drafted the constitution of the ROC. Have you visited the Chinese wiki links I provided? And regarding your quoting of my statement, I was pointing out that we shouldn't exclude this information just because some parties may have value judgments on the Taiwanese participation in the process. The simple fact was that there were Taiwanese representatives, that's all, and this isn't really subject to pov pushes. Blueshirts (talk) 18:02, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

Although I don't see any point to giving space to the ROC charade and I believe we shouldn't mention this at all, I've suggested a compromise of quoting the KMT and in doing so saying where the information came from. Readin (talk) 18:43, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

I think we can leave it out. Anyway, what meaningful information would we provide by saying that "According to a potentially biased source, some Taiwanese people helped drafting the constitution"? Also this sort of in depth discussion would be more appropriate in the main Constitution of the Republic of China article than here, where we are only supposed to give a general overview of the country. Laurent (talk) 19:11, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

Honestly, I don't see what your problem is other than continuously missing and twisting my point, and I thought I've made this simple issue very clear. There were Taiwanese representatives in the almost two-thousand member-strong drafting session, and THAT'S IT! The link Laurent provided even has their pictures taken with Chiang Kai-shek. To me it was nothing more than a Philadelphia Convention that drafted the US constitution. If you don't like the way certain delegates from Virginia were chosen to be in the convention, that's YOUR problem. The "ROC charade"? This article is about the ROC, not Taiwan, so try not to get confused. And why do you guys keep on mentioning the KMT website? I don't give a crap about whether the constitution as originally drafted is applicable in Taiwan or how well the Taiwanese delegates reflected Taiwanese opinion. I was only giving credence to Pyl's topic statement that Taiwanese participated in the constitution process. This is getting utterly ridiculous. Blueshirts (talk) 20:06, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

Pyl's said his information was from the KMT website. That's why we keep mentioning it.

The Philadelphia Convention consisted of people elected by state legislatures, which had in turn been elected by the people of the states. In that sense they were representing the people of those states. Further, they were involved in the drafting, but the constitution still had to be ratified by the individual state legislatures, so the states were further involved and had a recourse if the delegates did not represent them well. There is an argument to be made about the lack of universal suffrage at the time, but you can bring that up on the relevant discussion page.

In this case, we don't know how the "representatives" were chosen. If they were personally picked by Chiang, then they represented Chiang. If they were picked by a KMT committee, they represented that committee. If they were elected by the Taiwanese people, they can be said to represent Taiwan. But at this point we have no source saying how they were selected. As far as we know, they no more reprentated Taiwan than the "Taiwan representatives" in the PRC's National People's Congress. All we know is that the KMT, which as an obvious bias in wanting to legitimize their rule, claims that Taiwan was represented in the process. We don't know how much spin is involved in that claim and whether the representation at the time was real or faked (not faked in the sense of not having real people, but faked in the sense of selected people who were called "Taiwan representatives" but who in fact did not have reason to act in Taiwan's interests). Readin (talk) 21:05, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

(outdent) According to this [4] website by the National Cheng-Chih University, 17 representatives were elected in October 1946. Also, the comparison with PRC is questionable at best, since the PRC has never had physical control of the island. Blueshirts (talk) 21:55, 10 June 2009 (UTC)

Elected by who? If the ROC were holding general elections in Taiwan in 1946, this would indeed be worth mentioning. Readin (talk) 14:27, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

They were members of the Taiwan Provincial Senate, which was elected by legislators at the hsien level. So this is an example of indirect election. Blueshirts (talk) 15:56, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

NPOV noticeboard

Wikipedia:Neutral_point_of_view/Noticeboard#Republic_of_China.2FTaiwanese_Identity

Help would be appreciated

Chinese involvement in Africa is in desperate need of help from experienced editors with a knowledge of the RoC. The creating editor has made it incredibly long and detailed. However, 99% of the page borders on illegible, as the creating editor does not speak english as a first language, or even on a professional level. The article mentions the RoC. However, it would appear that the creating editor did not have a great knowledge of RoC involvement in Africa, so its focus is on the PRC, which, in my opinion, isnt right, as RoC involvement is an important part of African economic history. Any help in copy editing, expanding some info, and moving/removing irrelevant info would be greatly appreciated. Thanks, Onopearls ^(t/c) 01:48, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

confusing citation work

Laurent recently moved "cite web|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/spl/hi/asia_pac/04/taiwan_flashpoint/html/present_status.stm%7Cpublisher=BBC News|title=Taiwan Flashpoint, China's stance|quote=Given the huge divide between these two positions, most other countries seem happy to accept the current ambiguity, whereby Taiwan has most of the characteristics of an independent state, even if its legal status remains unclear." which appeared to be a well formatted citation, from the text of the article to the "further reading" section. The citation that was left in the text of the article contained the quote and the "BBC News", but had lost the formatting. What's your thinking, Laurent? Readin (talk) 14:38, 9 June 2009 (UTC)

I've done that as I intend to use the BBC Flashpoint several times in the article. So I've added the full ref once in the "Further reading" section, and converted the other ones to short references (BBC New, Taiwan Flashpoint, "quote"). Not sure if that's the proper way to do it though, as I couldn't find much about short references on Wikipedia (most example are about books but not about web sources). Laurent (talk) 14:59, 9 June 2009 (UTC)

I don't have time right at the moment, but I'll try to help with that. I'm sure there is a better way to do it where you have a short-hand name for the reference that gets re-used, but it still ends up getting cited properly. Readin (talk) 15:11, 9 June 2009 (UTC)

All the references start with "BBC New, Taiwan Flashpoint" so it should be easy to find and replace them once we figure out how to make proper short citations. Laurent (talk) 20:28, 9 June 2009 (UTC)

Capital

I had converted the note on Nanking as the de jure capital based on the source provided by Huang Sir. The source reads as follows "南京市" (in zh-hant). 教育部重編漢語辭典修訂本. Ministry of Education, R.O.C.. http://dict.revised.moe.edu.tw/. "民國十六年，國民政府宣言定為首都，今以臺北市為我國中央政府所在地。"

The source is a dictionary produced by the Ministry of Education. Now, reading the statement, it can be translated as follows. "Nanking - In the 16th year of the republic, the National government declared it the capital. Today Taipei is where the central government is located."

So there was a proclamation that Nanking was the capital back in 1927. Moving beyond the source in question, when Nanking fell during the Second Sino-Japanese War, it was considered the fall of the capital. Unless there has been a second official proclamation stating that Nanking was not the capital de jure, it obviously is based on the sourced statement. I will point out that I believe trying to equate Nanking and Taipei would create an undue weight issue. Ngchen (talk) 16:02, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

I think when Nanking fell in 1937, it was still the "capital". Chungking was called the "accompanying capital" (陪都), not the real de jure capital. Blueshirts (talk) 16:06, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

Although the link provided takes me to a Zhuyin chart :) , I believe you that your browser shows something differeint. Given this source, I think it is ok to say that Taipei is the de facto capital and Nanjing is the de jure capital. Merriam-Webster defines "capital" as "a city serving as a seat of government". Simply saying "Nanjing" without including Taipei would be dishonest because Nanjing is not the "city serving as a seat of government" for the ROC, Taipei is (as other sources have said). Readin (talk) 16:38, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

Done. BTW, the quote comes after entering 南京市 into said online dictionary. Ngchen (talk) 17:39, 11 June 2009 (UTC)

GA Review

Article (edit | visual edit | history) · Article talk (edit | history) · Watch

Well, I would like to say good job! No recent edit wars. Good wikilinks used in appropriate places. The prose flows fairly well and shows a neutral point of view. There are no unreferenced sections that I could find in the article. No plagerism whatsoever with the sources, and the sources look quite reliable—they aren't blogs or personal websites. The article is broad while fairly specific (though not too specific) on the individual sections. All statistics are well cited. There are many images that clearly present each section of the article. The links for the references aren't dead links. A good article overall. One suggestion: try removing the space between the picture and the text. I use a widescreen monitor and I'm seeing some white spaces between a picture and the text. An example: the section Founding of the Republic of China (1911–1927). —MC10|Sign here! 02:32, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for the prompt review and the suggestion. The border of one of the images was indeed overlapping the text, so I moved it and it seems to be fine now. Laurent (talk) 14:40, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

On the topic of images, there are lots of images of KMT figures, and there is an image of KMT supporters protesting Lee's visit to the US. There are no photos of the larger group of Lee supporters who greeted Lee. Nor are there images of any DPP officials, DPP supporters, or anything that would provide balance. Readin (talk) 14:58, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

The emblem of the DPP is in the Politics section but not much else indeed. Perhaps we could add DPP related images in "Current political issues" and "National issues" since both these sections don't have any images. Or we could move the emblems of the DPP / KMT in the section above and show a picture of the current DPP leader in "Major camps". Not sure which one is best. Laurent (talk) 19:08, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure how to go about finding images that aren't restricted by copyright. Any ideas? Readin (talk) 22:20, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

The same goes for KMT. The picture in question is just an example give, tell you the truth, if it was taken off, you won't get many complaints. However, if you want to add a picture with DPP supporters on it, I'd suggest you to just add a picture and a caption, nothing else. Anything more would provoke fights. If you want to add more, I'd suggest doing it in the Pan-Green articles or the Politics of the Republic of China page. Liu Tao (talk) 01:07, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

You should be able to find some copyright-free pictures of DPP supporters and leaders on Wikimedia Commons. Laurent (talk) 08:48, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Source - Pressuring Websters Quotations

This was given as a source for saying that "Until 1945, the ROC claimed sovereignty over Greater Mongolia, but under Soviet pressure, it recognized Mongolian independence." Looking into the source we find: "Until 1945, the ROC claimed jurisdiction over Mongolia...recognized Mongolian independence in 1946. WP" The WP, as stated at the beginning of book, indicates that the entry was "adapted from articles created by contributors to Wikedia.org, the free encyclopedia...". So while Pressuring Websters Quotations may be acceptable as a source for some information, it is not acceptable for this particular information because it is a circular reference. Readin (talk) 15:56, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

That's a good point - I mistakenly thought that the book was made of extracts from the Webster's dictionary. Actually, we don't really need this source anyway as the one that comes just after it already mentions that the ROC recognized the independence of Mongolia in 1945: "In October 1945, the people of Outer Mongolia voted for independence, gaining the recognition of many countries, including the Republic of China." So I think we can leave it as is, and just remove the "fact" tag. Laurent (talk) 19:00, 16 June 2009 (UTC)

Balancing Images

This picture was shot during the Wild Strawberry student movement on 11/06/08 and shows a female student holding a sign with the words 人權 (human rights). (This image would help balance the overwhelming KMT imagery by showing there is some discontent with KMT policies.)

The Department of Ethnic Affairs of Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), the ruling political party of Taiwan, on Taiwan Pride 2005. (This image would help balance the anti-independence protesters image currently on the page.)

The current article has 5 images of KMT leaders and KMT icons. It has 1 picture of KMT protesters. It has one image of a DPP icon. This is quite unbalanced as the DPP is the other of the two major political parties of Taiwan today. It is also unbalanced as the KMT protesters position is clearly given, but there are no images of supporters for DPP positions.

At Laurent's suggestion, I searched Wiki Commons and came up with the two images, both of which I believe would add much needed balance.

I hate to drop the pictures in Laurent's lap, but he has been doing an excellent job with editing this article while avoiding offending most of the sensitivities. But on the other hand, there are a few editors who seem to automatically object to almost any substantive edits I make. Rather than encouraging their reactions by adding the material myself, I'll let Laurent decide what to do with these. Also, given the amount of editing he has been doing, he probably has a broad vision of how the whole article should be and I don't want to mess that up with a clumsy addition of material. Readin (talk) 15:21, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Okay, one thing, don't compare the stuff linearly, compare it relatively. Since the implementation of the constitution in 1947, there was only ONE DPP president. Also, those pictures were in a way highly relative to the topic speaking of. The picture of Sun, it was placed towards the end of the "founding of the nation" section. As Sun was the founding father and leader of the revolution, it would only be reasonable to put a picture of him to go with that section. As for Chiang, the section was talking about the MULTIPLE decades he was in power, it would also to be only reasonable to put him in. Now, DPP was not even in existence during that time, I don't see how any Pan-Green pictures can be fitted in those topic areas. The pictures of the KMT leaders were not added BECAUSE THEY ARE KMT LEADERS, they were added because of their relevance to the SECTION/TOPIC in question. Get it straight.

Later the protestors, okay, that I can see as an unbalanced, since it was just talking about the politics in general. If you want to add something, that would be the ideal place to add, but add ONLY ONE picture of pan-greens at a protest or something. No more unless you want people to start fighting about this.

Now for the picture of Ma, the section in question is about the government, the sub-section would be of the Executive Branch. It would only be sensible to put a picture of the CURRENT president there. If my memory hasn't failed me, the picture wasn't there BEFORE he was elected. The picture uploaded is a picture of the president, not a picture of Ma.

As for the icon, there's a DPP icon right next to it, so it doesn't matter at all. And last, the calendar with Sun on it, the section was talking about calendars. Somebody uploaded a picture of a calendar commemorating the first year of the Republic. The Calendar happened to have Sun on it. The picture uploaded is a picture of a Calendar, not a picture of Sun.

Long story short, the only imbalance I can find is the picture of the KMT protestors in the Politics section. You can either delete that picture or you can add a picture, any is fine by me, but make sure that it's JUST A PICTURE and a caption. You're supposing to be adding an example of some kind of political movement or event like the picture in question. Don't refer to the picture directly or anything. Liu Tao (talk) 19:59, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

It's true that if we don't count the historical pictures, the DPP / KMT ratio is actually well balanced with three KMT pictures and one DPP picture. So if we remove the KMT protestors as suggested by Liu Tao and replace it by a DPP one, there will be two of each party, which is quite fair.

Personally, of the two pictures proposed by Readin, I'd go for the "Wild Strawberry student movement" as the composition is quite good, and it's not blurry. Laurent (talk) 22:09, 17 June 2009 (UTC)

Just wondering, how do you count the 3 pictures? I only counted 2 pictures directly linking to Pan-Blue actions and stuff (the protest and KMT icon). Liu Tao (talk) 03:17, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

Including the picture of Ma (although I realize that there has to be a picture of the current president in this section, no matter which party he belongs to). Laurent (talk) 09:09, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

Then the picture is not "pro-KMT" then. It is a picture of the current head of state, not a picture of a KMT-official. If in 4 years that Ma is no longer the president, the picture would be removed and replaced with whomever the then-president would be. So technically speaking, there's only 2 "KMT" pictures, the protestors and the emblem. Liu Tao (talk) 20:20, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

Regarding the "wild strawberry" protest picture, I think it's best that we don't use it. First of all, it's more or less a joke, compared with what the Tangwai had gone through. It's mainly composed of people dissatisfied with Ma's election, in a similar vein to the "million people to down Chen" campaign, which was way larger than the "wild strawberry" no less. Plus it's twenty years after the end of martial law with two DPP presidential terms, and some college students still having a field day for "human rights"? For god's sake, Taiwanese media joked about this. For a good DPP picture, use this historical DPP march for direct presidential election, which shows three DPP heavyweights. This was something real, not a farce like the "wild strawberry". Blueshirts (talk) 23:23, 18 June 2009 (UTC)

File:President Direct Election Movement Ming-te Shih Yi-hsiung Lin and Hsin-liang Hsu.jpg

DPP marching for direct presidential election

.

Liu Tao and Blueshirts combine to raise an issue. Liu is right that when you look at the sections, and the images that should accompany each section, the article is only a little bit unbalanced. The Blueshirts mentions the Tangwai movement and points out how they had a hard time and shows an image of DPP guys demanding direct presidential elections. But the article says nothing about this. It makes no mention of Tangwai. It makes no mention of the efforts of the outlawed DPP to demand human rights and political rights. The article says nothing about the White Terror.

On my computer, the article uses 22 lines to talk about the 16 years between 1911 and 1927. It uses 10 lines for the 18 years from 1927 to 1945. It uses 6 years for the 4 years from 1945 to 1949. Thats 1.4 lines per year, 0.6 lines per year, and 1.5 lines per year, respectively. But for the 60 years from 1949 to 2009, we have 13 lines, or 0.2 lines per year.

Where is the information about the Kaohshiung Incident, the Tangwai movement, the lifting of martial law, the democratic reforms, the first Taiwanese president, the first peaceful transfer of power to an opposition party, and the constitutional reforms? Readin (talk) 02:54, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

It's not about the years, it's about the stuff that happened in between those years. Also, the History section on the ROC page just gives an overview of the History. If you want stuff that's more detailed, try History of the Republic of China. There, from the years of 1949 onward, it covers about 1/4 of the entire article. The History article does talk about the Tangwai and some movements, though I'm not sure if it covers everything you've mentioned. But anyways, it's supposed to be just an overview, plus most of the introduction of the History section of the ROC article talks about the post-1949 period. It mentions stuff about transitions to a more democratic system and all that stuff, there would be no more need to mention it later at the end of the article. Liu Tao (talk) 13:51, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

It's not about the years, it's about the stuff that happened in between those years

Between 1949 and the present, Taiwan transformed from an authoritarian one-party state (some would say "dictatorship") into a multiparty democracy. Plenty happened.

There, from the years of 1949 onward, it covers about 1/4 of the entire article.'

But the years from 1949 onward cover more than half (3/5) of ROC history.

plus most of the introduction of the History section of the ROC article talks about the post-1949 period.

The intro to the history section has 6 lines devoted to pre-1949, and 8 lines devoted to post-1949. It is actually pretty well-balanced in nearly matching the actual proportions of time periods. Just as the pre-1949 history is expanded upon, the post-1949 history should be expanded upon as well. Or perhaps rather tha providing greater details for post-1949, we remove the pre-1949 information to the History of Republic of China article. Either way, it sounds like the History of Republic of China may need some balancing. Readin (talk) 15:19, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

I tend to agree with Liu Tao on this one. Sure it needs some balancing, but way more events happened pre-1949 than the sixty plus years in Taiwan. The overthrow of the Qing dynasty, fight for supremacy among the warlords, conflict between the Kuomintang and the communists, war against Japan, complete breakdown of old social order, introduction of modern thinking, abrogation of unequal treaties, the list goes on and on. But yeah, I'd like to see more on economic policies and Kuomintang reorganization after its move to Taiwan, and some more contemporary events. Blueshirts (talk) 15:48, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

But you don't also see the need to mention the White Terror and the pro-democracy movement? Readin (talk) 16:01, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

I also think that, to be more balanced, we should mention the White Terror and the fact that Chiang has been criticized for his actions by some historians. Right now, he is portrayed as quite a reasonable leader which is a bit misleading. Also I agree that we should at least have a line or two to mention the end of the martial law, the transition to democracy, and the major events that lead to it. We don't need to document all that in details since most of it is already in History of the ROC, but we can at least mention it so as to give the full picture. Laurent (talk) 16:18, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

I see what I feel is sorely missing from the article, that is, development into a tiger economy and the rebirth of the Kuomintang. "White Terror" was a sad part of its state-building program from the utter ruins of the civil war. It might not be justifiable now but that's what they thought was necessary to hold onto whatever was left. Blueshirts (talk) 17:53, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

You don't give a "full picture", you give it a general picture. Also, this is getting way too detailed, you want to add details, add them in their respective pages. Add anymore in the article and then people'll start complaining and edit wars are gonna happen. Also, protraying Chiang as a reasonal leader or not, that's up for opinions. Everyone does something because of a particular reason... What the hell am I saying, nobody cares anyways... Anyways, long story short, you want to add stuff, do so in the respective articles. Liu Tao (talk) 18:43, 19 June 2009 (UTC)

Suggested paragraphs

Based on the discussion above, I've drafted a few paragraphs to cover 1) the White Terror 2) the transition to democracy and 3) the Taiwan Miracle. I agree with Liu Tao that we can't give too much details, however the current "1949-present" section is, for some reasons, almost only about the ROC international relations, while we also need to mention what was going on on the island at that time. Here are the paragrahs I suggest (they probably need to be copy-edited, sourced and fact-checked but it's a start). Laurent (talk) 12:17, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

Following the declaration of the martial law and the 228 incident, a White Terror took place in Taiwan as a way to suppress the political opposition. During these acts of violence, 140,000 Taiwan residents have been imprisoned or executed for being perceived as anti-KMT or pro-Communist. During the 1980s and 1990s, reforms slowly moved the Republic of China from an authoritarian state to a democracy. In 1986, President Chiang Ching-kuo allowed for the creation of new polical parties. In 1987, the martial law was lifted along with, a year later, the ban on new newspaper registration. The democratization process eventually led to the first direct presidential election by universal adult suffrage in 1996. During the latter half of the twentieth century, the Republic of China went through a rapid economical growth known as the Taiwan Miracle, which made the country to be referred to as one of the Four Asian Tigers.

It's a good start, but I like to emphasize that many "mainlanders" were victims as well. The total number is still unknown [5]. A hundred fourteen thousand is one estimate, just the same as the numbers of the 228 incident. Blueshirts (talk) 14:36, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

It says "Taiwan residents", not "Taiwanese". The Chinese immigrants were residents by that time. Perhaps we could say "ethnic Taiwanese and immigrants" rather than just "Taiwan residents" but I wouldn't go beyond that in this article unless we're going to cover the White Terror in significantly more detail here.

I do think the DPP and President Lee should be mentioned as well as Chiang Ching-guo as important leaders in the democratization. The incidents that spurred popular discontent and distrust of government were important to, such as the incident that left Chen's wife crippled and the murders of Lin I-hsiung's mother and daughters. The Kaohsiung incident seems to have been important as well.

Also, any major actions by the government that might have been important to Taiwan's economic growth should be mentioned. Land reform seems to have been a big deal.

I'm not sure how much we should worry about keeping details out at this point. We can triple the size of the post-1949 section and still only have as many lines per year as the smallest of the other period sections.

The big political stories I've heard of in Taiwan have to do with the repression by the KMT and the democratization that resulted from both KMT and DPP efforts. But we likely have room for other information as well. Were there other big post-1949 political stories? For example, was the death and succession of Chiang a big thing? Readin (talk) 17:53, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

We can mention that Chiang died and passed the torch to his son. I don't think his death was a big thing per se, since his successor was already chosen with the political apparatus firmly in place, and the country wasn't thrown into disarray. What I'd like to see like I said before is KMT reorganization and "democratic centralism" from up top. Its transformation was more important than "tangwai" efforts. Remember, the KMT was never toppled or seriously challenged and it lost the presidency only in 2000. That's why I want to see more coverage on changes from within, rather than focusing on a bunch of small events. And yes land reform was a big deal, since it first gave tenant farmers land who can use it for capital while at the same time eliminated Taiwanese big land-owning elites. And Chen's wife's paralysis was a lie perpetrated by political purposes, just to let you know. Blueshirts (talk) 23:16, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure we should give so much details regarding the organization of the KMT. We already mention that Chiang Ching-kuo allowed for the creation of opposition parties, which already implies that there have been important changes within the KMT. The Kaohsiung incident is mentioned on the BBC timeline as one of the major events in Taiwan so I also think we should integrate it. Small update below. Laurent (talk) 13:40, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

Chiang's regime, now threaten by both demands for independence within the island, and by the communists on the mainland, became increasingly dictatorial. Following the 228 incident, a White Terror took place in Taiwan as a way to suppress the political opposition. During these acts of violence, 140,000 Taiwan residents have been imprisoned or executed for being perceived as anti-KMT or pro-Communist. During the 1980s and 1990s, reforms slowly moved the Republic of China from an authoritarian state to a democracy. In 1986, Chiang Ching-kuo and Lee Teng-hui allowed for the creation of new polical parties, which led to the funding of the first opposition party, the Democratic Progressive Party. In 1987, the martial law was lifted along with, a year later, the ban on new newspaper registration. The democratization process eventually led to the first direct presidential election by universal adult suffrage in 1996. During the latter half of the twentieth century, the Republic of China went through a rapid economical growth known as the Taiwan Miracle. It was backed up, among others, by the important gold reserve of the ROC and the support of US funds and demand for Taiwanese products. The country became known as one of the Four Asian Tigers.

KMT supporters like to credit Chiang Ching-guo for Taiwan's democratization, while DPP supporters are more likely to credit Lee Teng-hui. Unless we have a good unbiased source to show why greater credit should be given to one or the other, we should mention both for npov. Readin (talk) 19:06, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

I'm fine with that although I'm not sure how to integrate it to the article. Should he be mentioned for his influence within the KMT, or for having been the first Taiwan born president? Laurent (talk) 19:47, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Dang Guo

Let's be fair, ever since the establishment of ROC, KMT had been the Boss, see Dang Guo, ROC only became a sort of democratic nation after 1986, when Chiang Ching-kuo 开放党禁, 报禁: open up for other political parties and free media; all these factors should be considered. That means from 1928-1986, ROC was under the dictatorship of one-party rule, the rule of KMT. Arilang ^talk 21:51, 22 June 2009 (UTC)

Its rule on the mainland was tenuous at best. Blueshirts (talk) 17:57, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Actually, the first elections were held in Mainland in 1947/1948. The Legislature and National Assembly was elected by the People, and the President by the National Assembly (It was more of a parliamental system then). Liu Tao (talk) 18:31, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Mediation

I am the mediator assigned to this article. If each party would make a concise statement here about what they hope to gain from mediating and their "best case" compromises, then we can get started. Andre (talk) 23:20, 20 June 2009 (UTC)

I assume this is for Wikipedia:Requests_for_mediation/Republic_of_China_2. Is that correct? Readin (talk) 01:01, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

Yes. Andre (talk) 13:42, 21 June 2009 (UTC)

17 May Taiwan mass rally

Just asking, has any wiki article being created yet?

• Taiwan protest targets Ma's pro-China policies
• Tens of thousands protest against Taiwan president By Ralph Jennings
• Mass Taiwan protest at China links
• Tsai Ing-wen
• Tens of Thousands Protest Against Taiwan President

Arilang ^talk 20:29, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Yup. 517 Protest --Cybercobra (talk) 23:14, 23 June 2009 (UTC)

Dubious

When the KMT government fled to Taiwan it brought the entire gold reserve and the foreign currency reserve of mainland China to the island which stabilized prices and reduced hyperinflation.

The idea that Taiwan's wealth is based on having "stolen" all the gold from China is a favorite talking point of many PRC supporters. But when asked, proof is rarely provide, nor even a good argument. Do we have a reliable source for the statement?

I call the statement "dubious" because usually the introduction of large amounts of money into an economy causes inflation rather than ending it. One common definition of "inflation" is "too much money chasing too few goods". According to my history teacher, the introduction of large amounts of gold from the Americas caused inflation problems in Spain, for example.

To clarify, I'm not saying the first part of the statement is dubious. I believe it is well documented that the Kuomintang brought large amounts of gold from China to Taiwan. I'm questioning the claim that the gold and currency reserves "stabilized prices and reduced hyperinflation". Readin (talk) 15:02, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

There's a source here saying that the gold reserves helped control hyper inflation but the article doesn't seem very reliable (especially because of the use of "it is said", which makes me want to add a "who?" template). If the statement is controversial, we should indeed try to find a better source. There's a long study about Taiwan inflation in the 1950s here and it doesn't mention the gold reserves as being a reason for the stabilisation. Like the BBC Timeline, it states that the US aid was one of the main reasons. Here are some extracts:

The outbreak of the Korean War in late June 1950 ensured the ultimate success of Taiwan's stabilization effort. This prompted the United States to commence a large aid program.

A much larger contribution to the stabilization effort was made by the PIR accounts since they also enabled the government to borrow from the public instead of from the central bank.

Of course, it is a fiscal overhaul that is required for the permanent success of a stabilization program. It was the fiscal regime change on Taiwan, as in the European episodes, that finally brought price stability. It was the aid program that brought the budget to near balance, and when the aid program reached its full proportions in 1952, prices stabilized.

Laurent (talk) 15:42, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

From the intro of this book [6], 國府退到台灣，在一九四九年底與次年的上半年，幸而有這批金、銀、美鈔外匯，其中八十萬兩黃金及一千萬美金就做為剛發行的新台幣的準備金，另外更大部分 （約二百多萬兩黃金）則用來支撐新台幣，就是把它換為新台幣，做為薪餉，發給七十萬大軍來保衛尚未站穩腳步的「自由中國」台灣。這一筆黃金款，換為新台幣 後，遠超出四九、五　兩 年的整個台省歲入，這些黃金就經由台灣銀行，及指定的銀樓，讓購買「黃金儲蓄」的台省民眾，只要有台幣就可兌得比市價低的金子（還可兌美金），於是就大量 流入民間，或進了國內外投機人士的口袋（見附表二及第九章第一節），但新台幣很穩定。由現已公開的《美國國家檔案紀錄局文件》，美國國務院在一九五　年三月也收到「台灣情勢趨穩定的好消息」。一個人口只有六百萬的小島，突然承擔七十萬的軍隊和一百多萬的公務員及家屬與難民，而社會經濟仍然安和平靜，這應該主要是上海國庫資金起的重要作用。等韓戰爆發（五　年六月廿五日），以後美援來了，更穩定了局勢。 Blueshirts (talk) 16:32, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

I did some cursory readings of Laurent's source and I have a feeling that we should focus on the actual programs, instead of giving credit to gold reserve and American aid categorically. Blueshirts (talk) 16:52, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

That sounds right, and I think we have space to do it. Readin (talk) 18:59, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

FWIW, I remember hearing the claim from somewhere too. My version has it that the gold reserve (since it was the only thing that was hard currency at the time that foreign companies/countries would want) was used to import the scarce things that were imported, and the items were absolute necessities like medicine and the like. But I don't have a source right off hand. As such, I will do a search for sources addressing this issue. Ngchen (talk) 02:16, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Ok I've integrated the source above, and removed the claim that the gold reserves have something to do with the Taiwan Miracle as there doesn't seem to be any reliable source for it. Laurent (talk) 10:34, 18 July 2009 (UTC)

xinhuanet.com

There has been some edit warring on the use of xinhuanet.com as a reliable source. Laurent provided a link - The World's Biggest Propaganda Agency - to provide evidence that xinhuanet.com should not be considered a reliable source. The link provides evidence for what I suspect most of use already knew, Xinhuanet is a propaganda arm of the government of China. However, I don't think this makes it unusable as a reliable source - it depends on the information it is providing.

The report in the link provided by Laurent says "Journalists working in Beijing, responsible for following national news are inundated with so many releases from ministries, Party organs and companies so as to never need to go out reporting. The activities of the top leadership remain Xinhua’s highest priority. For the agency, “news fl ashes and information from the government and offi cial press conferences” remain one of the major sources of information."

Given this statement, and given that xinhuanet.com is an agency of the government, Xinhuanet has the same credibility as the government. Where we would cite the government of China, we can cite xinhuanet.com. Where we don't trust the government of China, we can't trust Xinhuanet. Readin (talk) 00:31, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

I've asked the reliable sources noticeboard last week and the consensus is similar to what you are saying. Basically, we can use Xinhua for topics on which the PRC doesn't have a strong POV. That's why I think it may not be appropriate on sensible topics like Tibet or indeed Taiwan since any information is bound to be biased in favor of the PRC. In particular, the two Xinhua sources we are using at the moment both support a pro-reunification POV and, although we know we are reading the PRC POV, other readers may not know that and take it for an unbiased source. If possible, I'll try to find some alternative sources - I'm sure other news agencies document the pro-reunification POV, but in an unbiased way. Laurent (talk) 10:23, 14 July 2009 (UTC)

We would cite Xinhua News Agency on China-related articles just like how we would cite Voice of America on US-related articles - where appropriate. Both cases are government-based. It would be wrong to say that all of Xinhua's articles are propaganda and rubbish (such a view is a form of extreme POV); however, some places are more appropriate than others as to whether Xinhua should be used. Referring to the ROC and cross-strait relations, I would use Xinhua sparingly, whereas for PRC domestic issues, Xinhua would be a major choice as there would be few alternatives. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 02:57, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

WP:3O on Talk:Republic_of_China_Air_Force#Equipment Origin

There has been a discussion on WP:3O on Talk:Republic_of_China_Air_Force#Equipment Origin and I think a WP:3O from someone familiar with the ROC/Taiwan territory would be helpful. Readin (talk) 22:10, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Name: Republic of China - Taiwan

Hi guys. Most of people know this nation by the name Taiwan instead of Republic of China. Why don't we modify the name of the voice in something like Republic of China - Taiwan or Republic of China (Taiwan)??? --Mariotto2009 (write to me) 19:47, 29 lug 2009 (CEST)

I would agree but unfortunately "Republic of China (Taiwan)" would be perceived as Pan-Green and promptly reverted. This article, like the country, is in a state of "status quo" - you can't change too much to it without threats of (edit) wars. Laurent (talk) 18:20, 29 July 2009 (UTC)

We mention it in the first sentence of the lede and there's a hatnote about it in Taiwan, so I think it's sufficiently clear. --Cybercobra (talk) 00:14, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

And there is the historical problem that The Republic of China hasn't always been associated with Taiwan. For the first 1/3 of the Republic of China's existence, Taiwan was still part of Japan. Readin (talk) 00:31, 30 July 2009 (UTC)

I could undestand your fears about the possibility to stir up some edit wars on this voice, but I think that however we should accentuate the Taiwan name instead of Republic of China. I don't know how it is in your countries, but if I went round here in Italy talkin' about the Republic of China, surely 0% of people would think about Tai Wan ^__^ --Mariotto2009 (write to me) 18:44, 10 aug 2009 (CEST)

Then it would be because they don't know anything about Taiwan and the ROC then. In the ROC itself, it's simple. Those of the Pan-Blue would refer to the nation as the ROC, those of the Pan-Green refers to it as Taiwan. Those in the middle, they go with the status quo and use both interchangeabally or just try to avoid the name issue entirely. If this is still becoming of an issue where people can't find the "Taiwan Nation" AKA ROC, then I'm still going with my proposal to make the DAB page the main Taiwan page and rename the Taiwan article as "Taiwan Island". Liu Tao (talk) 18:14, 10 August 2009 (UTC)

Image gallery

The image gallery, in its current state, detracts from the article and isn't really consistent with the policy at WP:IG. Lovely photographs, but it's just a random collection with little encyclopedic value and no theme. What is the gallery trying to accomplish, other than merely decorating the article? --Skeezix1000 (talk) 19:28, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

I think it shows a good overview of the ROC and may provide additional information to the readers (if only from the links provided below the pictures). It shows the night markets and the modern cities in Taiwan as well as some typical sceneries in the mountains, and so indirectly gives an understanding of the climate. It shows an example of the economical ties with Japan (the train) as well as the link between the Taiwanese and Chinese cultures (the temple, dragon, etc.). Laurent (talk) 19:47, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

You're stretching it. One can discern information similar to what you've suggested from any collection of random images. That doesn't make it encyclopedic. A bunch of disorganized random sentences can also contain provide information to the readers, but that doesn't mean we just insert sentences randomly into a paragraph and suggest it provides a good overview. Right now the gallery is the pictorial equivalent of a trivia list. I'm not saying get rid of it by any means - it contains some great shots. But it needs to be more that just a collection of disorganized and random pictures, which is all that it is right now. Can we find a focus for the gallery? For example, the varied regions of the ROC? --Skeezix1000 (talk) 22:21, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

I'm open to suggestions but I'm not sure how we could get the gallery more focused since it should be, like the article, about the ROC in general. Perhaps rather than having the pictures regrouped there, we could try to expand the article and integrate the pictures? For instance, so far there's nothing about the economical ties with Japan so we could add a paragraph about it and illustrate it with the train picture. Likewise, we didn't mention the night markets which are very common in the ROC and there's a picture for it. In other words, maybe we could use this gallery has a starting point to expand the article? Laurent (talk)

This article is about the government, not the country. The photos of temples, night markets, and scenery really belong on the Taiwan page. The government photos of government sponsored buildings and activities do provide information about what the image the government wants to project and its competence in doing so. For example, the high-speed rail shows that the government can afford to build and maintain a costly transportation system. The CKS Memorial Hall shows how highly the government prizes its dictators. Readin (talk) 22:47, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

The photos of temples, night markets, and scenery really belong on the Taiwan page. - Actually, I think we should at least brieftly mention the climate and geography of the territories controlled by the ROC. Without being as comprehensive as the Taiwan article, we could also have a section about the culture and traditions of the ROC citizens and write about the temples and night markets for instance. Currently, the article is disconnected from both the people and the land it is supposed to govern, which seems a bit strange for a country article. It was one of the reasons why I've created this gallery, although it may not be right way to do it. Laurent (talk) 11:12, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

It seems a bit strange because most articles on government are also articles on the country they govern. We don't have separate articles for "French Republic" and "France". We don't have separate articles for "Republic of Korea" and "South Korea". We don't have separate articles for "Kingdom of Spain" and "Spain". But we do have separate articles for "Republic of China" and "Taiwan". The "Taiwan" article talks about the government to the extent that the government effects the country. The "Republic of China" article should talk about the country to the extent that it effects the government. Noting that ROC citizens have strong religious beliefs that affect their voting patterns would be useful for this article. But showing the architecture of their temples really doesn't provide strongly relevant information about the government. Readin (talk) 14:44, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

Opening paragraph

The existence of the Republic of China as the actual government of (mainland) China before 1949 is implied, but not actually stated, in the opening paragraph. This seems like an important point, which should be clarified as early as possible. I suggest changing the opening paragraph as follows:

The Republic of China (ROC), commonly known as Taiwan, is a state in East Asia that has evolved from a single-party state with full global recognition and jurisdiction over China into a democratic state with limited international recognition and jurisdiction only over Taiwan and minor islands, though it enjoys de facto relations with many other states. Prior to 1949 it was the internationally recognized and de facto government of China, and as such was a founding member of the United Nations and one of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, until being replaced by the People's Republic of China in 1971.

I am open to alternative wording, but I think this is a key piece of information to include in the opening paragraph. john k (talk) 13:58, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

I think your new version is fine and indeed clearer than the current one. However, I would remove the "de facto" in "de facto government of China" since the ROC could probably be considered the de jure government at that time. So the modified paragraph would look like this:

The Republic of China (ROC), commonly known as Taiwan, is a state in East Asia that has evolved from a single-party state with full global recognition and jurisdiction over China into a democratic state with limited international recognition and jurisdiction only over Taiwan and minor islands, though it enjoys de facto relations with many other states. Prior to 1949 it was the internationally recognized and de facto government of China, and as such was a founding member of the United Nations and one of the five permanent members of the UN Security Council, until being replaced by the People's Republic of China in 1971.

Wording

We're having issues of whether or not to put "Taiwan" after "Taipei". Taipei is not part of the Taiwan Province, but it is on the Taiwan Island. Even so, you cannot mix the 2 together. One is a political entity, the other is a geographical entity. You can't mix the 2 systems together. It's like when doing calculations with dimensions. You have your dimensions given to you in the metric system, you don't mix in measurements of the British system. You don't mix the 2 together. If you're saying to do that, does it mean that when writing "Nanking", you can write out "Nanking, Mainland China" or "Nanking, Asia"? It's the same principle, you don't mix different systems together, it doesn't work. What if the political entity is on multiple geographical entities? For example, parts of Kaohsiung city are not on Taiwan Island, the Dongshan and Taiping Islands. They're located in the South China sea, which the Taiwan Island isn't even located in. Would you write out Kaohsiung as "Kaohsiung, Asia"? No, you would not. You either write it as <city, province> or <city, state>. Same is with in Chinese, you don't write 臺灣島臺北市, you write 中華民國臺北市. Liu Tao (talk) 15:32, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

I notice you haven't complained about the wording where we say the ROC acquired Taiwan. By your reasoning, shouldn't we be clearly stating the prefectures (Taihoku, etc.) that the ROC got from Japan?

Taipei was not declared a centrally administered municipality until 1967. So the ROC capital was in fact moved (in 1949) to "Taipei, Taiwan" even if you choose to make the highly unusual interpretation that "Taiwan" means "Taiwan Province". Readin (talk) 16:20, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

Oi, this is different with the prefectures. We're talking about governments, generally speaking, ugh, I dunno how to say this... Anyways, you got a point, but still, it is also highly unusual to state which province the city belonged to, especially if it is a capital city. But then, oh well. Liu Tao (talk) 17:39, 18 August 2009 (UTC)

de facto jurisdiction?

Browsing through the archives, I saw only one brief piece of discussion on using the term "jurisdiction," in Archive 4 I believe. Since "jurisdiction" by itself implies some sort of de jure status, I would like to suggest adding the modifier "de facto" to make clear we're talking about the actual control that the ROC has, which is limited to Taiwan, Kinmen, Matsu, the Pescadores, etc. Comments appreciated. Ngchen (talk) 14:26, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

I've never been entirely comfortable with the term "jurisdiction". I normally associate it with formally agreed to lines of policing power, but I don't know if that's the formal definition. Pyl was a big fan of the word and changed the text to use it in many places. I much prefer saying something clearer like the ROC "governs" the country or "controls" the country. These are words that describe what actually happens without the need for any de jure or de facto qualification. Readin (talk) 14:48, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

I use jurisdiction in the same way I use "govern" and "control". In my mind, they mean the same thing, the only difference is that "jurisdiction" has a more "de jure" feeling, as Ngchen has said. Though it somewhat implies the "de jure" feeling, it does NOT actually mean that it's de jure, so I'd prefer the "de facto" or "de jure" to be used for "just in case" unless there is some sort ambiguity of whether or not if it's "de facto" or "de jure". Liu Tao (talk) 16:12, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

If we throw in de facto or de jure, we have to decide which one applies. According to ROC law, the ROC is the sovereign over all of China (and by its definition that includes Taiwan). Thus Taiwan is clearly within its de jure jurisdiction as well as its de facto control. On the other hand, according to the PRC law, the ROC no longer exists as a legitimate entity and has no de jure jurisdiction anywhere. Applying de jure in this case would be either redundant or problematic. On the other hand, were we to use de facto, it could carry the implication that de jure doesn't apply - which would be taking the PRC POV. We're better off avoiding both terms when we can easily do so, and I think this is one of those cases where we can easily avoid both terms. Readin (talk) 17:09, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Then this would be the case where ambiguity exists and the terms should be avoided. Liu Tao (talk) 17:40, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Proposing Article Title Change

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

The result of the discussion is that there is no consensus for the proposed change in title. I am closing this as an uninvolved admin per the request at WP:ANI#Proposed move closure. For future reference, the proper procedure for requesting moves is explained at WP:RM.  Sandstein  11:21, 14 September 2009 (UTC)

---

I'm proposing to change the title of the article to be "Republic of China (Taiwan)", "Taiwan (Republic of China)", or just "Taiwan (state)". This way the article will be on par with Wikipedia's policies and such. Liu Tao (talk) 00:37, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

That's an intereting idea. As for me, I'll have to think on it before I respond. Readin (talk) 01:08, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

• Strong Oppose: A sizable portion of the article is about mainland China under KMT rule from 1912 to 1949. Keep in mind that ROC does not, and did not refer to Taiwan over the entirety of ROC history. Even Pan-Greeners agree with this notion. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 02:46, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

Aye, but that was back then. Now is now, then is then. Liu Tao (talk) 03:02, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

Well, you may as well rename Nazi Germany, Ming Dynasty and Third French Republic. ROC can be referred to as a historical term, as well as a present-day political entity. Also refer to the many arguments from the section above. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 03:06, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

Aye, but the main arguments back then had to do with politics. The arguments now is to do with Wiki-policy about how common names in the English world should be used. Liu Tao (talk) 03:17, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

I feel very inclined in making an Ad hominem attack and refer to the lovely page that is your talk page, but I'll try none of that for the time being. As per Talk:Republic of China/Archive 13, Talk:Republic of China/Archive 12, Talk:Republic of China/Archive 11 and Talk:Republic of China/Archive 10, there have been many similar requests just like yours to rename the article, with all failing due to a strong consensus to maintain the status quo. What makes you think that your proposal will succeed, what makes it different from the myriads of other rename proposals made? -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 03:18, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose "Republic of China (Taiwan)" & "Taiwan (Republic of China)" as being redundant and not following disambiguator conventions. Oppose "Taiwan (state)" so we can remain NPOV over whether the island is technically the PRC's or ROC's. --Cybercobra (talk) 03:30, 5 September 2009 (UTC)
• oppose the Republic of China existed in mainland China long before the Chinese civil war and their relocation to Taiwan--PCPP (talk) 03:33, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

I'm using the wiki-policy regarding common names to back my proposal up. Wiki-policy on common names is that the common name used by the English speaking world should be used to title an article. Liu Tao (talk) 03:38, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

But your proposal violates WP:NPOV, WP:MOS, WP:CONS and WP:DAB, and since WP:NPOV has a greater weighting than naming convention policies, then WP:IAR applies here, as the naming policies are at odds with WP:NPOV and thus are at odds with the general improvement of Wikipedia. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 03:46, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose There may be justification for creating the article "Republic of China (Taiwan)" or "Taiwan (Republic of China)", but these should be independent of Republic of China, which was a historical entity founded by Sun Yat-sen. There should be no question of moving the entire contents to either of those namespaces. Ohconfucius (talk) 03:43, 5 September 2009 (UTC)
• Support just because when I hear Republic of China, I will think of the PRC not of Taiwan. --HappyInGeneral (talk) 03:47, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

Association fallacy. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 03:49, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

It is not civil to call a perception as being fallacy. --HappyInGeneral (talk) 10:39, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

How is it not? A is a B, C is also a B, Therefore all As are Cs. If we let A equal ROC, B equal China and C equal PRC, how does that not relate to what you have just said? And try not to use the "civil" clause to knock back logic; next, we'll be seeing for the children (politics) coming up. I interpret this as an easy way to back out of something that you don't really like. The world is a harsh place, yes, but try to give arguments that are direct. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 10:45, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

This is a freakin' hot-button-issue, and I agree that the article's title is awkward; however...
there are several arguments for the status quo, and there are several cases which deviate from WP's naming policy:

• First of all, there is an article People's Republic of China, even though the "common name" is simply "China." There is also an article United Kingdom even though some of the lesser-educated will say "England" (and thereby piss off a lot of Scots and Welsh).
• Secondly, "Taiwan" is one of the few cases where the name refers both to an island/place as well as a country. There have been numerous fight and even ArbCom cases and user-bans at Republic of Ireland because (mostly Irish) users want the article's name to be simply "Ireland." We shouldn't start that kinda stuff here, especially since the ROC isn't even universally recognized.
• Moreover, when there are two entities claiming the same name and/or sovereignty, it is the custom to give the official name as the article's title; Cf. Republic of the Congo and Democratic Republic of the Congo.
• Lastly, I'd be prone to support the suggestion if it wasn't for the fact that there are so many insinuations and POV-issues in this case. See the fights and outbursts at Republic of Macedonia and State of Palestine. The most neutral thing to do in such cases is to refer to the official/technical name as awkward as that might be. Seb az86556 (talk) 03:49, 5 September 2009 (UTC)
• Comment: It appears that the common argument used for renaming is that "others" may be confused with the name ROC. This indeed is an Argument from ignorance since this would merely be an assumption and a generalization on the part of an easy argument. If something cannot by systematically proven (with a strong causation, see Correlation does not imply causation), then it would be a poor thing to argue, other than to help feed the Appeal to emotion factor in non-logical reasoning within arguments. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 03:56, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

In simpler terms, consider this syllogism: Taiwan is ROC. ROC is a China. Some Chinas are PRCs. Therefore, all Taiwans are PRCs. Tell me what is wrong with this reasoning. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 04:14, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

"Some Chinas are PRCs", but not all Chinas are PRCs.--Cybercobra (talk) 04:29, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

...which appears to be the Association fallacy used in User:HappyInGeneral's comment. (Just used as an example.) -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 04:32, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

Calling the ROC, Taiwan is not an association fallacy and has nothing to do with logic - it's simply calling something by its common name which is what we should be doing on Wikipedia (See Wikipedia:Naming conventions (common names)). Also in the ROC/Taiwan arguments, I often read that if someone doesn't know that the ROC = Taiwan then he's an ignorant. Well actually we are writing for "ignorants", not experts. A reader should be able to arrive on the Taiwan article and read about the country he/she knows about. At the moment, it's not happening and the reader needs to read two articles (Taiwan and Republic of China) to get the full picture. So I would support renaming this article to "Taiwan" and merge it with the current Taiwan article. Laurent (talk) 10:02, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

I was referring to the common argument that "___China makes me think of the PRC". In essence, that is simply an association fallacy; associating "China" with "PRC" in all instances. My line of argument had nothing to do with Taiwan itself, nor calling the ROC Taiwan. Try to read the actual line itself before trying to read between the lines. As per your idea, merging with "Taiwan" would be highly difficult to achieve without starting a large controversy, as it merges the island article with the political entity article. WP:NPOV weighs more than WP:NC, my dear friend. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 10:37, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

Strictly speaking, the PRC and China are not the same things, however the fact is that PRC is comonly known as China, and even call itself that (at the UN among others). So I don't think it would be wrong to rename the PRC article to "China" although I know it's not likely to happen any time soon.

Also, you quote WP:NPOV but how do we reach a neutral POV? - By looking at third party reliable sources. And how do these sources call the PRC and the ROC? - "China" and "Taiwan". So if really we were following NPOV we would have renamed these two articles a long time ago. Laurent (talk) 17:04, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

But then again, why is it so bad to use the full official name, as with many other instances, such as the United States of America, Americas (continent), Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and whatnot? They do their jobs well to differentiate between entities with similar names, while maintaining a relatively stable POV. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 02:05, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

• Oppose: This is a very delicate issue on Wikipedia. Taiwan is, in practice, a fully-functioning independent state that is simply not recognized diplomatically by the majority of countries. To conform to WP:NPOV we cannot call "Taiwan" a state as even its current governing party does not endorse this, let alone the PRC. "Republic of China (Taiwan)" now seems like a quasi-official name employed by the Taiwanese gov't, but having this as an article name would mean that only the ROC's position on the matter is taken into account, forgoing all others. While I myself would not be opposed to the change, wiki policies speak otherwise. Colipon+(Talk) 06:14, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

Changing of the name does not violate NPOV. The manual says clearly:

"Where proper nouns such as names are concerned, disputes may arise over whether a particular name should be used. Wikipedia takes a descriptive rather than prescriptive approach in such cases, by using the common English language name as found in verifiable reliable sources; the most common name used in English-language publications is generally used; see also WP:Naming conventions (common names)."

And as for the Manual of Style, if you're talking about the inconsistencies in the names, then we'll just edit the names to be in par with the article Title. And for the DAB, the DAB is fine, there's nothing wrong with the DAB. Liu Tao (talk) 17:50, 5 September 2009 (UTC)

Common English name? Says who, that "Taiwan" should be the only common English name, and that ROC can be negated? And you are also ignoring the argument for the status quo given above. Address that before coming back to WP:CN. I don't like Mark Regev-style question dodging. Answer the latter, simple as that. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 00:48, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

Says statistics. The manual states "the most common name used in English-language publications is generally used". The most common name in English-language publications is "Taiwan", not "ROC". Liu Tao (talk) 06:32, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

And how can you tell whether they are referring to the country/government or the geographical-cultural area? --Cybercobra (talk) 06:35, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

Liu, you still aren't answering the question. (You might find a great career in the Israeli Foreign Ministry...) -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 06:40, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

Dammit, gimme time. It's been less then 1 hour. Wait time should be 24 hours at the least. My wait time for you guys are set at 2-3 days. Anyways, cause it says so either in context or directly (eg. "Taiwan Government", "Taiwanese President"). When talking about the government or president, it's an obvious dead on that it's talking about the state. Liu Tao (talk) 06:43, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

Alright, here is a list of things I would like you to address. 甲: User:Seb az86556's arguments of separation of geographic region and state, multiple countries with the name name and possible POV wars that may occur after article renaming. 乙: Official recognition of the name "ROC" by official bodies, as per User:Colipon's argument. 丙: User:Ohconfucius's statement of the ROC being founded in 1912 on the mainland by our great Guofu. 丁: what you can offer that Talk:Republic of China/Archive 13, Talk:Republic of China/Archive 12, Talk:Republic of China/Archive 11 and Talk:Republic of China/Archive 10 cannot. 戊: "Says statistics" - who the hell would name their son or daughter that? Oh wait, I suppose you are personificating something inanimate, aren't you? Well could you be more specific? Once you can refute these five points, we can then progress further into the discussion. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 06:53, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

I'm reading further into the Wiki-policy, and apparently I didn't read far in enough. Take a look at this article:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Naming_conventions_(Chinese)#Language.2Fdialect_NPOV

Apparently, based on this, the article should technically be name "Republic of China (Taiwan)" or "Taiwan (Republic of China)" because we're trying to differentiate the ROC from the PRC as well as all that other crap, take a look at it yourself. And from the article, the possibility of "Taiwan (State)" would be out of the question, so let's drop that. Liu Tao (talk) 07:15, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

何等事态？ QUOTING Wikipedia:Naming conventions (Chinese)#Republic of China, Taiwan, and variations thereof: "Republic of China - When specifying official titles; When giving the names of official state organs; When referring to the pre-1949 Republic as it existed on Mainland China; When referring to the state in article space after appropriate disambiguation has been given (Do not replace all instances of "Republic of China" with "Republic of China (Taiwan)" unless explicitly part of the official title.)" Refuted using less than 300 calories. 还有问题吗？ And as mentioned before, Four-Stage Theory of the Republic of China may be of great interest to you. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 07:26, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

Aye, but problem is that the DAB page is not the main page for China or Taiwan. China links to the Civilisation, Taiwan links to the Island, so technically speaking, in order to find the ROC page, you're gonna have to specifically look for it. So until the DAB page is set up correctly or something, we're gonna have to somehow differentiate between the ROC and the PRC or whatever else reason there is. Liu Tao (talk) 07:30, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

Just realized a point though; you also have to specifically look for People's Republic of China. China is the civilisation, Taiwan is the island, and PRC/ROC are redirects to the two states. I think both are on equal par here. As for confusion between the PRC and ROC, I don't think that it would be more likely for the situation of misconcieving PRC as ROC occurring than misconcieving the ROC for the PRC. Example? During a PRC state visit to Gabon, they played the National Anthem of the Republic of China by accident, and pissed a lot of people off. If it happens in the real world, how can we make Wikipedia foolproof? -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 07:51, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

Oh, and don't always come under the impression that the ROC was and still is restricted to Taiwan. Today, the ROC makes up Taiwan Province and Fujian Province, Republic of China - restriction to "Taiwan" is pure 脑残 in this sense, as it excludes Fujian, which is obviously not a part of Taiwan. Refer to Free Area of the Republic of China for more detail. As per historical contexts, which are of great importance regardless of your opinions expressed earlier, that 中華民國，在亞東之極，本都南京，因事失地泰半，暫遷於臺北。其東以鴨綠江界朝鮮國，隔東海望日本。其北與俄羅斯相接。其西有大山，天下至高者也。而皆失於內戰，今僅得臺灣及其周圍矣。 -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 07:32, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

I have no such impression. I am perfectly aware of the current situation, but as wiki-policy puts it, it's what we have to do.

And there is nowhere in the policy that states that if it's already specified in a DAB page or something, you don't need to add the extension. All it said was "When identifying the state". Liu Tao (talk) 08:00, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

The policy also states to use "ROC (Taiwan)" when identifying the state in general as well, this would be a biggy in the name of the ROC article. We only have to use the "(Taiwan)" extension once, then the rest is to not include the extension. Liu Tao (talk) 07:36, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

But why the article title? The LEDE already states that "The Republic of China (ROC), commonly known as Taiwan, is a state in East Asia..." which conforms enough to WP:NC. How will a title change alter anything, other than start the Virtual Second Chinese Civil War? -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 07:42, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

Okay, obviously we can't just change the article name, we're gonna have to change some wordings of the article as well. This always happens when you change an article name. Liu Tao (talk) 07:47, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

Simmer down people. Keep cool heads. --Cybercobra (talk) 08:10, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

err... but the way (*tap on shoulder*) am I using a different wiki? when I type "China" into the search-box I get China with the two links (and flags!) clearly visible in the first paragraph... even someone who's completely dumb will find both entities Choyoołʼįįhí:Seb az86556 09:53, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

We might have to wait another 72 hours until we get replies from User:Liu Tao since he has been blocked for the third time for edit warring on Chunghwa Post. Hold your thoughts until then. For the meantime, we could all sit down, have a bun and sip some tea and leave this topic for a bit, this should calm the atmosphere down a bit. Everyone can come back in three days, no need to rush. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 11:30, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

Hm. That wasn't the tea-related wikilink I was expecting. --Cybercobra (talk) 12:05, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

Ah, yes, anyone who has ever seen a Stephen Chow film would know that was my poor attempt at being funny, although WP:TEA applies here as well. Still, I don't think that people should intend on heating this argument further for the next few hours, if not days. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 13:56, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

Strongest Oppose possible. This is completely WP:NPOV and gives undue weight to the Taiwan independance POV.Teeninvestor (talk) 13:31, 6 September 2009 (UTC)

This is not POV. We are not renaming the article as "Taiwan", we're just adding a "Taiwan" in parentheses behind the ROC name. It's what the ROC government does themselves. What we're doing is not supporting Taiwanese Independence, we're doing what the policy states as well as telling people that the Republic of China is the "Taiwan State" that they're looking for or think about when they hear "Taiwan". It's only gonna start being POV if we start asserting in the article if we add the "Taiwan" extension to every single "ROC" term we see in the article. Liu Tao (talk) 22:09, 7 September 2009 (UTC)

So we going to continue this debate? Liu Tao (talk) 16:53, 10 September 2009 (UTC)

It looks like nearly everyone is opposing or strongly opposing. Readin (talk) 17:19, 10 September 2009 (UTC)

I count 5 Opposers and 2 Supporters, though these things aren't straight votes. --Cybercobra (talk) 20:22, 10 September 2009 (UTC)

Agree that !votes mean nothing, it is the discussion content that makes proper justification as to whether something is done or not. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 06:08, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

Oppose Did Taiwan fought on the side of the Allies during World War II? The ROC did. This title change will cause nothing but confusion. T-1000 (talk) 21:46, 10 September 2009 (UTC)

• Support move to Taiwan though I don't expect it to happen and I'm just throwing this out there.

• Taiwan is the name most common short form name that refers to the current territory of the RoC.
• Taiwan is used overhwhelmingly by reliable sources.
• Taiwan is what is used by most countries diplomats, because calling it RoC has one-china implications.
• Taiwan, as used globally, by non-specialist readers, refers to everything: people, places, islands, cultures, language and politics. RoC has a specialist meaning and we are only using to talk about government issues. It is a missed opportunity that political issues have to overwhelm everything in this region and moving forward on documenting anything gets mired in political presenation issues by every partisan here.
• We should be most focused on describing they dynamic 21st century democracy. Opposition because of history before 1949 - 60 years ago - belongs as history in article text, not opposition to currently used name, now, in the present.
• Do not misunderstand the NPOV policy. Not using the name used most often, and overwhelingly, by reliable sources is giving undue weight to a minority view. The current name is the NPOV problem, not changing it. When users type "Taiwan" into the search box, they expect to find the content currently at Republic of China. That is the opposite of several core Wikipedia policies on NPOV and article naming.

SchmuckyTheCat (talk)

You make a lot of good points, and I would support the change to "Taiwan" except that we would find ourselves in constant edit wars and arguments over the name. Worst case, the unified article would end up being renamed to "Republic of China" so that all the information that should be in the "Taiwan" article would be in the "Republic of China" article. I think the current division between the government article and the rest of the Taiwan information is far more stable and less likely to lead to a final worst case result. Readin (talk) 23:49, 10 September 2009 (UTC)

Yes, this has a level of stability. Even without a rename discussion a simple push to remove the "just the island" subject matter from Taiwan would be a move in the right direction while still allowing the RoC titled article to be about the politics and government. The naming problem here is not as severe, nor brought up as often, as the China/PRC discussion. I certainly care less about this one than that one. SchmuckyTheCat (talk)

QUOTE: "RoC has one-china implications" - actually quite the opposite - use of the term "ROC" is an admission that there are two Chinas, namely the PRC and ROC. This is why the United States never has the spleen to use "ROC", but rather "Taiwan" (as a location name, not state). It has nothing to do with being commonly chosen by diplomats; if a country maintains ties with the PRC, then they are forced to use "Taiwan" so that only one China, the PRC, is acknowledged. On the other hand, the Vatican openly refers to ROC in its legal documents. Although the US and many other countries use "Taiwan", such actions satisfy the government of the PRC (by noting that the ROC does not exist, albeit doing so in an ambiguous manner so that the Irredentism of both Chinas is still preserved, fait accompli), it is definitely not NPOV on the part of international relations. QUOTE: "We should be most focused on describing they dynamic 21st century democracy" - Why? What makes ROC history so much more special than that of Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union that it shouldn't be mentioned on Wikipedia properly and of a standard form? Such a proposition is somewhat laughable. QUOTE: "When users type "Taiwan" into the search box, they expect to find the content currently at Republic of China." - There is a whole purpose for disambiguation pages and "see also/you may be looking for" templates, and they're not becoming redundant anytime soon the way I see it. I can't see why there is much complaint over this tiny little thing; it doesn't take that long to click on a second link and download a 32KB page. If that really is the case, then you must really have a terrible ISP, which is not the fault of Wikipedia content. -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 06:13, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

Aye, but problem is that when you search "Taiwan", you fall upon the Island article. Many people just assume whatever about the article and stuff. To find the DAB article, you have to click the link near the top of the Taiwan article, which is currently the ONLY link I can find that leads to the DAB page. No other article links to the DAB page. So yeah... Let's just say that currently the DAB article is rarely used at all. Even though the article is there and available, it's difficult to access (only 1 link). So, to access this article, one would first get to the Taiwan article, FIND the DAB page link, then FIND again the ROC article. That's 3 clicks, which is unacceptable especially for a state article. Liu Tao (talk) 18:04, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

You say that the problem is that when you search for "Taiwan" you find the island article. Yet you have been the most vocal objector to making the article formally state that it covers more than just the physical geography of an island (and indeed there is a separate article for Geography of Taiwan). As for getting to the the Republic of China article, it should have a direct link at the top of the page. There is one in the first paragraph so some might call another link redundant. But I for one would be fine with adding a "seealso" link before the main text of the article. I think there used to be one there; I'm not sure what happened to it. You're right that users should not have to detour through the dab page to get to the ROC article from the Taiwan article. Readin (talk) 19:16, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

There isn't a link. The Hapnotes were removed because people were fighting over what should be in the Hapnotes and what shouldn't. See also links should placed at the bottom of the articles, as they've always been. And I'm not saying detour through the DAB page, personally I'm fine about the DAB, but I'm not fine about having to go through an additional Island page to find the ROC. I don't like having to read through 2 pages before finally finding the "Taiwan" I want to find. Liu Tao (talk) 20:49, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

We should put the hapnotes back in. Even if we don't, there is still a link to the "Republic of China" article in the very first paragraph of the "Taiwan" article so there is no need to detour through the dab page anyway. Readin (talk) 21:05, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

Aye, but what I don't like is that you have to read the actual article itself to find out what's going on. Most people look at the Hapnotes, they see it's an island, they click the DAB and just skip the article entirely. As for the hapnotes, we should put em back in, but there are fights about what to put and stuff. Liu Tao (talk) 21:09, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

Two points. First, we shouldn't be saying the article is just about the island. That "island" hapnote is a big part of the problem and we most likely could have fixed it if it weren't for your objections. Second, even islands have governments. It seems odd that someone would see the article and assume that it contains nothing about the government without even reading the first sentence or looking at the infobox (which also contains a link to the ROC). Readin (talk) 21:15, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

Maybe we should write clearly in the hatnote that the Taiwan article is in fact split into two. That way, people won't have to read through the Taiwan or ROC articles before realizing it's not what they were looking for. Putting a link to a disambiguation page wouldn't help as there's no confusion as to what "Taiwan" is for most people. What's confusing is the division into two articles. So I would propose something like:

Due to the political status of Taiwan, there are two main articles covering the topic: Republic of China, which is an article about the state governing the island, and which mostly deals with the political aspects of Taiwan; and Taiwan which is about the territory itself and mostly deals with the culture and geography of Taiwan.

It's rather long (and can probably be reworded) but I feel it would be better than the current situation. It's not normal that the Taiwan article doesn't deal with politics, or that the ROC one barely mentions the territory and we should explain why. Laurent (talk) 22:05, 11 September 2009 (UTC)

Look, the article is about the frikin Island, stop trying to change it. It's about the Island, not about the damn state, not about the proposed state, just the island. If you wanna go politics, put it in the respective political articles (whether be it state or province). The Taiwan article is about the Island, it's about the island. You don't like it, then change the damn name of the article to "Taiwan Island" like it should be. That article is a geographical article about the island, not about the ROC state commonly known as Taiwan, nor is it about the province known as Taiwan, it's just a geographical article. If you don't like it, it's not my problem that there are no states or countries named "Taiwan". The "country" you guys commonly refer to as "Taiwan" is the ROC, you guys want to fight for a name, you do it here. Leave the island article alone. That article was created to be about the island, leave it as the island, don't try to morph it into your own imaginary country or whatever. Not to sound like a jerk, but this issue with the "changing attitudes about Taiwan" stuff really has to go. There are multiple "Taiwan"s. There is the Island, there is the ROC (Pan-Blues, bare with it for now, I don't wanna hear your protests), the Taiwan Province, the Taiwan Region, the Republic of Taiwan, etc. etc. You have to get it straight exactly which "Taiwan" you are referring to. Keep the Island article as the island, the stuff dealing with the state goes to the ROC, Provincial stuff goes to the province, regional stuff goes to the region, advance in proposed state goes in the Republic of Taiwan, etc. etc. There is no single definition of what "Taiwan" is, which is why there is a DAB page to disambiguate the different "Taiwan"s. Liu Tao (talk) 07:37, 12 September 2009 (UTC)

(edit conflict) In the hatnote I proposed, I make the distinction between the two articles - Taiwan is indeed about the territory, ROC about the state. We all know that but readers who find the article don't. If they search for "Taiwan", they expect to read about the country they heard about, but can only read about half of it and need to go to Republic of China to get the full picture. The hatnote above proposes to explain that, to allow readers to make a decision. The thing is that a simple hatnote is not enough because of the very unusual setup of Taiwan's articles. For instance, the ROC article doesn't deal with the geography or culture of the governed territories, which I think is unique for a state/country article on Wikipedia. We need to acknowledge it and make it clear to the readers. Laurent (talk) 07:59, 12 September 2009 (UTC)

What in the world are you talking about?! Taiwan Island is NOT the territory, the ROC is not comprised of ONLY the Taiwan Island. The ROC is comprised of the Taiwan Island, Penghu, Kinmen, Matsu, and other territorial Islands. That article was created to be about geographical island, not to become one of your geopolitical articles. The article is about an Island called Taiwan, it was not created to say that "Taiwan is not a country but just a rock". And the ROC article should deal with the geography and culture of the governed territories, check out the PRC's article, ROK's article, Japan, USA, Canada, UK, and every other state articles. Which one does not deal with the culture of the governed territories?! And don't gimme that crap about how each bit of the ROC has different cultures, look at the largest states' articles: Russia, Canada, USA, PRC, and Brazil. Which one of them doesn't talk about their cultures? You talk about the culture about the nation as a whole, which apparently every other state articles have been able to do. The ROC is much smaller in comparison to these other states and you are saying that to write about its "diverse cultures" is difficult? Liu Tao (talk) 18:55, 12 September 2009 (UTC)

喝点茶，吃个包，慢慢说。不用激动。 -- 李博杰  | —Talk contribs email 05:48, 13 September 2009 (UTC)

Liu Tao, you're reading more than I'm writing. When I say "the ROC article doesn't deal with the geography or culture of the governed territories", I'm just stating the facts, not giving my opinion. My point is that we should make clear that, currently, if readers want to know about the geography or culture of the ROC, they shouldn't go to the ROC article but to the Taiwan (or Penghu, or Kinmen...) articles. Well, maybe a simple hatnote on the ROC article would be enough for that. Laurent (talk) 09:58, 14 September 2009 (UTC)

Opposed--obviously. Are you a member of the Party or something? That proposal is laughable. Hilarity. Night w (talk) 04:38, 14 September 2009 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Links

Moved from the "External links" section as they are not about Taiwan in general:

• Bolton - US Should Recognize Taiwan - China Will Do Nothing
• Taipei can help Beijing take bigger global role
• Canada edges close to granting visa-free travel
• Taiwanese expected to gain EU visa-free treatment early next year--Earl of China (talk) 12:46, 29 October 2009 (UTC)

Talk page as Noticeboard

Talk:Gallery of passports has an issue on it that needs knowledgable editors that can keep a cool head. SchmuckyTheCat (talk) 21:32, 28 September 2009 (UTC)

de facto relations

The article, near the very top, says the RoC enjoys "de facto relations" with many countries. De facto relations are still relations. Surely this should read "non-diplomatic relations" with many countries. I made the change but it was reverted. Regards. Staighre (talk) 13:22, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

I think "de facto" is better than "non-diplomatic". Even if the relations are not official they are still diplomatic. Laurent (talk) 16:48, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

The relations are diplomatic (small d) even if the countries involved treat the relationship differently from other relations for the sake of diplomacy, and even if the countries involved blatantly pretend they don't exist. The fact that the countries do not name the relations "relations" is what makes the relations de facto (in fact) rather than de jure (in name). Readin (talk) 18:11, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Readin - You might think countries are somehow "pretending" something but that's your own POV. You need to back it up. Read the very definition you pointed me to:

"1 : the art and practice of conducting negotiations between nations

2 : skill in handling affairs without arousing hostility : tact"

Part 1 is what the term means in the context of countries or more properly states....The fact that the countries you claim are just pretending not to have diplomatic relations with the RoC exclude the RoC from the United Nations; do not recognise the RoC's government; and do not send ambassadors to it etc....suggests there is no pretence. I expect there is politics at play here though... Regards. Staighre (talk) 22:50, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

I think de facto is better than non-diplomatic as well, because well, there is little doubt that, in spite of using names such as "Canadian Trade Office in Taipei" and so forth, diplomacy at some level is actually conducted (meaning that things other than purely commercial/cultural/academic are discussed through these offices. Ngchen (talk) 02:00, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

You should start getting sources together for those sorts of claims....Many states are pretty emphatic that they do not maintain diplomatic relations or any official relations wit what they therm the so-called RoC...etc. You should get a list of countries you think have some sort of "de fact" diplomatic relations with the RoC. It goes back to my point above, these sorts or relations certainly are "non-diplomatic" and are not "de facto" diplomatic...Regards. Staighre (talk) 18:17, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

You mentioned Canada so i think you should start there...How are its relations "dipomatic"? Regards. Staighre (talk) 18:20, 1 November 2009 (UTC)

"Stanton, the de facto U.S. ambassador to Taiwan in the absence of formal diplomatic relations, reiterated the U.S. commitment under the TRA to provide Taiwan with defensive weapons, but said that further arms sales is a matter that is still under review."

"Despite the change of government in Taiwan, Taiwan’s representative to the United States is not exactly a regular visitor to the sprawling new mainland Chinese embassy on International Drive, located just east of Taiwan’s de facto embassy on Wisconsin Avenue."

Readin (talk) 00:00, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

I have something to add as well in case if everyone has forgotten, the RoC also has "'de jure' relations" as well. So this means we got '3' levels here, 'de jure' (relations where both nations officially recognise each other) relations, 'de facto' (relations where the nations inofficially recognises each other), and 'not at all' where the nations don't maintain any kinds of diplomatic relations at all. Liu Tao (talk) 05:53, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

Liu Tao - I think perhaps you don't know what we are talking about....No one is denying the RoC has de jure relations, what we are talking about is whether the term "de facto diplomatic relations" is appropriate as a term for relations between the "RoC" and countries that do not recognise it like Canada.

Readin, quoting a couple of newspaper headlines is no good - you need offficial statements by Canada government ministers etc....Newspapers say all sorts of nonsense, especially the sort of papers you've mentioned there (taiwan today? and military news?...). Here's an example of newspapers....World's tiniest country seeks new owners to fly the flag - The Times referring to Sealand as if it was a country etc...and thats The Times, a reputable paper....So come on. Some sources please? Regards. Staighre (talk) 06:08, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

and Readin, what about Canada, the country i asked you about....these articles seem to refer to the USA.... Regards. Staighre (talk) 06:12, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

I don't know about Canada (why Canada in particular?) but for the US, we have this in the CIA Factbook: "commercial and cultural relations with the people in the United States are maintained through an unofficial instrumentality, the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office in the United States (TECRO), a private nonprofit corporation that performs citizen and consular services similar to those at diplomatic posts". Laurent (talk) 09:53, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

See above - Another User cited Canada as a reason for using the term "de facto non-diplomatic". If the only example you or other users can come up with of a country having what you call "de facto diplomatic relations" is the USA then clearly the article should be amended to reflect that. At the moment it asserts the RoC has "de facto diplomatic relations" with lots of countries....Regards. Staighre (talk) 21:46, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

FWIW, User:Staighre has been indefinitely blocked as a sockpuppet of User:Redking7. Ngchen (talk) 18:31, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

Please do NOT take Taiwan history as ROC history

For the subsection After WWII, the content focuses on Taiwan history after WWII, but it is unreasonable. At that time, ROC still resided in Mainland. No reason to focus on Taiwan and disregard Republic of China. After all, this is history of ROC! Amphylite (talk) 01:27, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

That's a fair point, perhaps we should indeed detail a bit more what happened between 1945 and 1949. However, I disagree with the removal of the paragraph about the 228 incident as it directly concerns the ROC. There's also a POV issue with certain sentences - for instance "National Government was attempting to make a democratic constitution", and later "the first consititution of Republic of China announced the democratic epoch of ROC." A constitution doesn't make a democracy, even if the government claims that it is "attempting" to do so. This will either have to removed or significantly reworded with integration of alternative POVs. Laurent (talk) 01:50, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

There is no need to say "Taiwan independence confronts the validity of ROC's sovereign in Taiwan" because it is irrelevant of the History of ROC during 1945-1949. If you want to write it, you can write a new subsection called "Taiwan Independence" and write these words here. As for "National assembly announced the democratic epoch of ROC", please do not misunderstand it as "the first consititution of Republic of China announced the democratic epoch of ROC". The two sentences have different meaning. Do you think it has POV problem? There is no viewpoints here; it is a historical fact because National Assembly really announced the beginning of democratic constituion and new epoch that time. I just list the fact, and do not write any viewpoints here. Amphylite (talk) 01:59, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

There is no need to say "Taiwan independence confronts the validity of ROC's sovereign in Taiwan" - I don't really mind whether the statement stays or not as I'm not sure whether this is a widely held view or not, and it's not sourced anyway. I'd be interested to know what other editors think about it though.

it is a historical fact because National Assembly really announced the beginning of democratic constituion and new epoch that time. - The problem is that we're only providing the KMT POV here and it doesn't match the facts (a one-party state under martial law can hardly be called a democracy). So I'm suggesting we leave your statement but we complete it with POVs by historians. Laurent (talk) 10:19, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

I am surprised by your knowledge level. The National Assemblly is composed of several parties and ended the tutelage, how can you say it is "One-party state" ?? " we're only providing the KMT POV here " ,really? The constitution is, actually, against the wish of KMT and against the draft of constitution by KMT. (There is a long story here, if you want to listen) How can you say we are providing KMT POV? "Taiwan independence confronts the validity of ROC's sovereign in Taiwan"" has no relation with the history of ROC between 1945 and 1949. It just tells you the current viewpoints of Taiwan Independence. It is extra sentence and not necessary here. 130.126.12.109 (talk) 15:28, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

For this subsection, the sentence "The arrest of a cigarette vendor and the shooting of a bystander on 28 February 1947, triggered island-wide unrest" should be removed or be more concise. As is known, during 1945-1949, Taiwan history is a small portion of ROC history. But here, much detail is written. There is no need to write "cigarette vendor" here. Anyone who wants to know the detail can refer to 228 Incident. Perhaps, the writer is from Taiwan, so he pays much attention to Taiwan history between 1945-1949. But he should know, the Taiwan was one of the 49 provinces of ROC at that time. Do you think it is reasonable to use half of the contents to write much detail here? Amphylite (talk) 15:39, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

WikiLaurent, are you really serious in editing the article? You revise many sentences here, but these sentences are against the history and perhaps from your personal imagination. Let me point them out.

1, You write "From 1945 to 1947, the Marshall Mission initiated by the United States, the Nationalists and Communists started negotiating." This sentence is actually grammatically problematic, right? In addition, this sentence has historical problem. The negotiation between KMT and communists was initiated by General Patrick Hurley, not Marshall in Aug.1945. Do you really know this history before you editing it?

The Marshall Mission was initiated by the United States in 1945, that's all we need to write for this section. We shouldn't put in that many details here as it's only supposed to give a general overview of the history of the ROC. If you want to detail the section that much, you should really consider going to History of the ROC. Laurent (talk) 16:53, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

WikiLaurent, obviously you are wrong. Yes we should not write too much detail here, but it does not mean we should write a wrong statement. Marshall mission is not the total of the mediation from US government, then you must revise the wording to accommodate the fact. However, you pay no attention to this and shows great irresponsibility in treating history. I have to say your editing is irreponsible for readers. 130.126.12.158 (talk) 16:34, 9 November 2009 (UTC)

2,You write "However, the mission failed due to the mutual distrust and hostility and the fact that both sides used the fact that both sides used the time to further prepare themselves for the ensuing conflict." How can you say " both sides used the time to further prepare themselves for the ensuing conflict."? If communists says "KMT wanted to use time to prepare war", then you should write "Communists says that ...", but you should not guess it and express your own viewpoints because the fact is: conflict was caused by struggle for land left by Japan and Soviet.

The point was that neither the KMT nor the communists seriously believed in the negotiations. Laurent (talk) 16:53, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

3， For the figure, you revised the notation (originally 1948) and write "Government of the ROC in 1946". But it is obviously wrong, the elected government was starting from 1948, not 1946. Do you really know the difference of ROC governments between 1946 and 1948? If you do not know, please refer to the history book before editing it, right?

Aren't you the guy who uploaded the picture on Commons? Well check your description then - you've put 1946, not 1948. The ROC exists since 1912 so the picture could well have been taken in 1946. And how could anyone tell the picture represents an elected government anyway? - people are barely distinguishable on it. Laurent (talk) 16:53, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

That 1946 was just from the notation of the book, just as it was. " And how could anyone tell the picture represents an elected government anyway? " That is because you do not know the history. Haven't you seen the Vice President Congren Li sitting beside Chiang? So it must be elected government, not National Government(Because Congren Li would not sit that place in National Government). I am afraid you know nothing about the history of ROC between 1945-1949, so you can only focus on Taiwan 228 Incident, right? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.126.12.109 (talk) 18:11, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

Game: find Vice-President Congren Li in this picture

That's brilliant, are you really serious? Do you really think people can recognize anybody in this picture? Laurent (talk) 00:59, 6 November 2009 (UTC)

Are you serious in editing history of ROC????? You really do not recognize the FIRST vice president of ROC and believe it is a game to recognize him???????????? You even do not know who is the first vice-president, how can you edit the history of ROC between 1945-1949????? I have to say you are FAR below the level for editing this section, even far below the level of average Wiki reader because many readers from China can easily recognize him and tell you why he was dressed in military uniform. (There is a story why he was dressed in military uniform in that picture; this story is well known in mainland China except some Wiki editors. ) Amphylite (talk) 04:15, 6 November 2009 (UTC)

WikiLaurent, can you accept my suggstion? Please stop editing the history of ROC any more. Why? Because you are not competent to do so, you know so little about the history of ROC that you just mislead readers. Here you just make a revision and says "Marshall attempted to establish a non-Communist government." It is WRONG and against history!!! In 1945-1947, nobody(even not Mao) believed that communists could overturn Government of ROC, how can Marshall aim to establish a non-Communist government??? Do you think KMT is communists?? What Marshall hoped is to stop the conflicts and establish the coalition government including both KMT and Communists. It is basics of history. I have to say you know almost nothing about this! Please stop misleading readers any more. Amphylite (talk) 04:33, 6 November 2009 (UTC)

The editor should be familiar with history before editing it, right? Amphylite (talk) 15:59, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

Do not write too much Taiwan history for history of ROC

For the period 1945-1949, there is too much information (around 60%) about Taiwan. That is quite unreasonable. For that time period, the most important thing for ROC is civil war. 228 incident is also important, but much less influential compared with civil war. However, for that section, only a few words describe civil war. That is unfair and POV problematic.

One may say we should not write too much detail here. Why do you write too much detail for 228 incident here? Do we need to write "cigarette vendor" here?

There should be a ratio here. I suggest we write 1/5 of the contents here about Taiwan, one of 49 provinces of ROC at that time. That is quite reasonable. If you like Taiwan, you can go to Taiwan and write what you want. Amphylite (talk) 23:44, 5 November 2009 (UTC)

WikiLaurent， Perhaps you are from Taiwan, so you are so interested in Taiwan 228 incident and write so much detail in the section ROC 1945-1949. Pitifully, this incident is actually a small incident compared with civil war and constitution. You ask others to be concise but you need not to be concise in 228 incident, even do not want to omit the detail such as "cigarette vendor". I am very surprised by your level in editing wiki. Amphylite (talk) 20:46, 7 November 2009 (UTC)

Events in Taiwan between 1945 and 1949 were important because they laid the groundwork for the next period of ROC history - the occupation of Taiwan. For that reason events in Taiwan should be given an larger proportion of the history than similar events in other areas controlled by the ROC at that time. That is not to say that we should ignore other important events - but we do have to give appropriate weight to events in occupied Taiwan and the 228 attacks were certainly significant. As for other events - we do need more information on those that are significant. If you can provide that information backed up by reliable sources then we should have it. The establishment of the constution was signficant because even though it was ignored for many years it eventually became the framework for democratic government in areas occupied by the ROC. Readin (talk) 05:05, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

I suggest we move the "returning of Taiwan" to the WWII subsection because that event is an integral part of WWII. The 228 incident may be mentioned in after WWII section. If someone wants to write more about 228, it is a good idea to rewrite the section "Government on Taiwan", and extend the time span to "1945 onwards" which includes 228. In this case, the section "After WWII" will no longer be occupied by 228 incident. Amphylite (talk) 16:40, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

Do not take someone's idea as wiki's idea

"the ROC was still at that time a one-party state with no regards for human rights." This is the idea. This idea must be from someone, not from Wikipedia. In this case, you should write who holds this idea, and tell readers this idea is not held by Wikipedia because Wikipedia is neutral. So you should say "Fung holds the idea that the ROC was still at that time a one-party state with no regards for human rights."

Is Fung's idea reliable? After all, we should leave this question to readers, and the readers will judge the reliability themselves. Amphylite (talk) 16:34, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

It's not just Fung, there's another source and Fung actually mentioned other critics in his book - we are not going to list them all, are we? Changing the sentence to "some people like Fung believe" is not only vague (Fung is an historian, not "some people") and a POV way to make the statement doubtful. Interestingly you present the "announcement of the democratic epoch of ROC" as a fact, but well documented facts as "beliefs". Would you agree on writing "Some historians noted that the ROC was still at that time a one-party state with no regards for human rights."? Laurent (talk) 17:33, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

I want to answer you by 3 points:

1, What is the difference between ideas and facts? Facts are objective and existent historically, but ideas are subjective and controversial. "National Assembly announced the beginning democratic epoch of ROC" is a fact, why? Because it is the truth that National Assembly annouced that ROC was beginning the democratic epoch after the constitution. That is historical fact. I never support the idea of National Assembly, but just list the fact. However, "the ROC was still at that time a one-party state with no regards for human rights." is the idea of some people. You can write "Some people holds that ....", then it is the fact.

2, As long as there exist other people opposing this idea, you should not write it as the idea of Wikipedia, but have to write it as a fact that "some peole holds the idea"

3, The history of ROC is the section that you should narrating the history, rather than review the history. Was ROC that time was democratic? That is review from modern people. You should not write it as the history in the section of history of ROC due to coherence. Even if you write "Some historians noted that the ROC was still at that time a one-party state with no regards for human rights."? , it is still off-topic. It is off topic because that paragraph just narrates the history, not narrates modern review. How do you insert a modern review to the history narration without breaking the coherence?

If you really want to write it, OK, you can begin a new section named "Review of History of ROC" and write what you want to say.

Amphylite (talk) 17:57, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

As for whether ROC is democratic, there is surely controversy. For example, communists and some historians like Fung believe it is not democratic. However, US government and KMT have different ideas(Please read the following statement by US government in 1947). Should we write "Communists believe ROC is not democratic" "Fung also agrees with Communists" and "US government and KMT have different ideas?" . In this case, the coherence is broken completely. Amphylite (talk) 18:30, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

Regarding #2, you might want to read WP:FRINGE. --Cybercobra (talk) 20:36, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

I suggest you read WP:FRINGE too. How can you tell us "ROC is democratic or non-democratic" as mainstream theory or fringe theory? The current government of ROC and KMT believes the ROC was democratic since 1947, is it FRINGE theory? Historians like Fung believes ROC was non-democratic, so it is MAINSTREAM theory? In this case, we should really sit down and discern which is mainstream theory before editing it, right? 130.126.12.158 (talk) 21:15, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

I did not mean to imply that WP:FRINGE applies in this particular situation, only that your point #2 is not entirely correct in the general case. --Cybercobra (talk) 22:42, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

No, my point #2 is correct. Perhaps you did not read it carefully. I did not say people should not write any ideas, but say "you should not write it as the idea of Wikipedia, but have to write it as a fact that "some peole holds the idea"". Even in general case, the MAINSTREAM idea should not be written as Wiki's idea. For example, Wiki cannot write "God exists" although "Most US citizens believe God exists". Considering only some historians believe ROC was not democratic, you can never write "ROC was not democratic". Amphylite (talk) 22:58, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

My point is we do sometimes state well-substantiated scientific facts "as the idea of Wikipedia". We state as fact that "the Earth is round" (rather than "Scientists say the Earth is round") despite the fringe minority of flat earth believers. Again, I'm not suggesting your comment was incorrect in this particular case. --Cybercobra (talk) 23:57, 8 November 2009 (UTC)

Amphylite, you talk about this historical fact as it was a myth. What you're asking would be like writing "some people believe Lincoln was a US president", or "it is thought the French revolution happened in 1789". Those are historical facts which don't need any disclaimer, just sources. In the case of the ROC, we can obviously find tenth of sources to support the fact it was not a democracy in 1949. On the other hand, can you find reliable secondary sources to back up your claim that the ROC was a democracy (i.e. that it had the features of a democracy)? So far your only sources are statements by Chiang or the KMT, but those are primary sources which have a very narrow use on Wikipedia (according to WP:NOR, "without a secondary source, a primary source may be used only to make descriptive claims"). Laurent (talk) 00:21, 9 November 2009 (UTC)

You still mix the Fact and Idea. Idea can be opposed, but fact can only be proven to be true or false. Whether the Earth is round or Lincoln was US president is the fact so Wiki can write it directly. The fact is different from idea in that it is so objective that nobody can deny or question it so Wiki can write it directly without hurting the reliability of Wikipedia( if you really can tell me an influential and important person, especially modern scientist, who questions the idea that "Earth is round", then Wiki has to be careful in stating "Earth is round"). However, whether ROC was a democracy in 1947-- is a large disputable and qustionable problem. Different people hold different ideas. Communists and some so called historians believe it was non-democratic; but KMT , some US government officers and many historians believe it was democratic. However, I have never said ROC was democratic but only stated the fact that National Assembly announced the democratic epoch for ROC after promulgation of constitution, you may laugh at National Assembly, but it is your freedom. Therefore, the reliable secondary sources does not apply in this case. Let us be a little off-topic now. Personally and informally, you ask me whether ROC has features of democracy, well, it has democratic constitution(still used in Taiwan now), democratic voting and elected government. Why not democratic?

For this controversial problem, it is obviously wrong to write someone's idea as Wiki's idea. Even if you really want to say it is not democratic, why not cite the criticism from Communists directly? Your citation of Fung is questionable because we do not know whether Fung criticizes the Government after 1947 or before 1947 from your citation. That dividing line 1947 is very important in the history of ROC.

In addition, the section "After WWII" is the narration of history. How do you insert a modern review into the narration of history without ruining the coherence? You are good at writing review, but Wiki is not a forum. The personal review from Wiki editor is very harmful for POV of Wiki. Don't you think so? 130.126.12.158 (talk) 16:31, 9 November 2009 (UTC)

Actually, I do agree with the distinction you're trying to draw here, which is between stating a (possibly biased) opinion as fact (e.g. The Moon is made of cheese<ref>John Quincy Doe and the Moonies, 1969</ref>) [This is BAD] vs. factually stating what a party's opinion (again possibly biased) is (e.g. John Quincy Doe and the Moonies claimed the moon was made of cheese) [This is A-OK]. We had similar problems on North Korea until this distinction was drawn and explained. So long as "Taiwan entering the democratic era" or whatever is clearly stated as an opinion and not as a fact, and the statement of opinion can be sourced, it's perfectly fine. --Cybercobra (talk) 21:55, 9 November 2009 (UTC)

There is no absolute fact in the world. For example, "The Earth is round" is a fact, but scientists may say "No, the Earth is not round exactly but have a shape of Ellipse". In this case, "The Earth is round" becomes an idea. In this context, you have to say "99% percent of people believe Earth is round although some peole find it is a shape of Ellipse" in order to be exact. In this case, there should be a standard for what we call a "fact". In my opinion, in the region of science, if nobody confronts a idea publicly in the world, then Wiki can believe it is a fact. If there is a group of people holding the different idea, then Wiki should be careful in stating something as a fact; in the region of arts or society, if there is an strong evidence for an event, then it is a fact. If many people put forward doubts or counter evidence, then Wiki should be careful in stating it. 130.126.12.158 (talk) 22:09, 9 November 2009 (UTC)

You might want to read WP:V because what you're saying leaves the door right open to massive abuses on Wikipedia. If a material has been published in a reliable source (and in our case, in more than one), it can appear in Wikipedia without the need for POV words like "some people believe". Many people hold the view that the Twin Towers fall was a controlled demolition. Does that mean we should litter the September 11 attacks article with sentences like "some people think airliners crashed into the Twin Towers"? Of course not, and thankfully there are policies in Wikipedia to prevent that.

To come back to our issue - since you haven't provided any source or quoted any policy to justify the removal of this sourced statement, I'm going to put it back. Of course, you're still welcome to bring any source to support your claims. Laurent (talk) 23:00, 9 November 2009 (UTC)

WikiLaurent 先生，我非常驚訝閣下如此不可理喻的行為，閣下堅持把自己喜歡的觀點作為事實用"In fact"這樣詞語強加給讀者使他們接受，並宣稱該觀點因有“確切”來源而放置於此，全然不顧其來源是否證明閣下之觀點（1947年之後而非之前的ROC 是否民主），也全然不顧前後文語義的連貫，甚至全然不顧其他編輯者多次勸告。筆者警告閣下，該句子因問題百出，且詞不達意，只能存在於註釋之中而不應該出 現於正文。即使出現於正文，也只能出現在其他之評論部分而非此處。若閣下堅持其錯誤觀點，發起編輯戰，筆者被迫奉陪到底。另外，筆者提醒閣下，從最近幾次 閣下的編輯來看，閣下對中華民國大陸時期的歷史可以說知之甚少，甚至不及維基讀者的水平，閣下完全不必編輯自己完全不熟悉的章節，不斷誤導讀者並不斷因低 級錯誤而被其他編輯者指出，這是極為不明智的。 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Amphylite (talk • contribs) 02:04, 12 November 2009 (UTC) Your favorite sentence "In fact, the ROC was still at that time a one-party state with no regards for human rights." is obviously a sentence that is problematic.

1, How can you prove that Fung criticizes the government that is after 1947? If not, why you put this sentence in the section here???

2, How can you insert an absurd modern review into the narration of history without ruining the coherence??

3, Why are you so interested in Fung, a so called historian? Communists also believe that ROC was not democratic, why don't you cite communists' words?

4, How can you say it is a fact? If not, why do you say "In fact"??? In this case, another sentence "Actually, ROC has been democratic and free since 1947" should follow your sentence because that is also a fact by your standard. More reliable sources can also be found.

5, You said I removed that sentence, but you are wrong because I never removed this sourced sentence but put it in the references area. That sentence should not appear during the narration of history and has only to stay where it should be.

6，What is the most important: By WP:V's standard, you sentence is "Questionable sources" because your source does not support the idea that ROC was not democratic after 1947( "still" and the position), much less it is a "fact". So "the article is not based primarily on such sources." Don't you see the policy?

7, ROC was not a one-party state that time because two other parties: Chinese Socialist Democratic Party and Chinese Youth Party have took part in the government in 1947. So one-party state is obviously not a fact.

You are obviously wrong in sticking to this sentence. I am sure to protect Wiki against your action. Do not do useless work! Amphylite (talk) 01:47, 12 November 2009 (UTC)

"It is particularly stupid in 1947. For Chiang has been busy with a project which cuts the ground from under most of the political criticisms leveled at his government. On Christmas Day the National Assembly formally presented him with a new constitution. The Communists boycotted the Assembly and do not recognize the constitution. Yet it follows closely the draft agreed to by all parties last January, and if the word "democratic" has any meaning left this constitution is democratic. The Assembly, whose 1700 odd delegates came from almost every province, party and occupation, worked on it through 41 days of free and at times rowdy debate. Based on the Five-Power system prescrived by Sun Yat-sen, it contains many adaptions of American and British parliamentary practice, guarantees personal liberties and sharply limits the presidential power. The Kuo-mintang diehards fought the liberal clauses of the new constitution by were overridden by the moderates and by Chiang Kai-shek himself. It is a fulfillment of Chiang's old pledge that despite the "tutelage" system that made him a dictator, he intends to go down in Chinese history as the founder of a modern democratic state. "-----------Statement of US government in 1947 —Preceding unsigned comment added by Amphylite (talk • contribs)