The Rise and Decline of the New Party: Ideology, Resources and the Political Opportunity Structure Da dd Fell This paper analyses the growth and decline of Taiwan's first significant third party, the New Party (NP). The NP won numerous seats in the national parliaments in the mid-1990s and received extensive media attention. However, it has shown a steady electoral decline since the late 1990s. Despite its poor recent election performance, the NP should not be regarded as a failure, as it has actually been remarkably suc- cessful at achieving its original objectives. By 2004, the KMT's policy positions had become so close to those of the NP that the NP was prepared to promote a party merger and allow its politicians to stand for election under a KMT banner. I chal- lenge the most common explanation that the NP rose when united and fell when divided by bitter factional struggles. Instead a framework incorporating ideology, resources and political opportunity structure is employed to explain the rise and fall of the NP. I argue that when the NP faced a benign political environment in the mid-1990s, its moderate political message and rich human resources enabled the party to grow rapidly. However, after March 1996, the political environment became progressively more hostile, and as the NP's resources were eroded and wasted and the party moved towards a narrow and extremist political project, the party began its terminal decline, The space for the NP became even more limited after 2000, when party had to face intense competition from a powerful new KMT splinter party, the PFP, and a rejuvenated, united and orthodox KMT. Keywords: Taiwan, political parties, new parties, ideology, political resources, politi- cal opportunity structure 1. Introduction When in August 1993, seven members of a dissident KMT faction announced the formation of the New Party (NP), few expected it to have much impact on Taiwan's the political landscape. Previous attempts to challenge the established parties, the ruling Kuomintang (KMT) and opposition Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) had been electoral flops. Nevertheless, in the mid-1990s, the NP grew rapidly to become Taiwan's first significant third party. It won numerous seats in the Taipei city council and the national parliaments. However, the NP began its long decline in 1997, and EASTASIA, Spring 2006, Vol. 23, No. 1, pp. 47-67.
Transcript
The Rise and Decline of the New Party: Ideology, Resources and the
Political Opportunity Structure Da dd Fell
This paper analyses the growth and decline of Taiwan's first significant third party, the New Party (NP). The NP won numerous seats in the national parliaments in the mid-1990s and received extensive media attention. However, it has shown a steady electoral decline since the late 1990s. Despite its poor recent election performance, the NP should not be regarded as a failure, as it has actually been remarkably suc- cessful at achieving its original objectives. By 2004, the KMT's policy positions had become so close to those of the NP that the NP was prepared to promote a party merger and allow its politicians to stand for election under a KMT banner. I chal- lenge the most common explanation that the NP rose when united and fell when divided by bitter factional struggles. Instead a framework incorporating ideology, resources and political opportunity structure is employed to explain the rise and fall of the NP. I argue that when the NP faced a benign political environment in the mid-1990s, its moderate political message and rich human resources enabled the party to grow rapidly. However, after March 1996, the political environment became progressively more hostile, and as the NP's resources were eroded and wasted and the party moved towards a narrow and extremist political project, the party began its terminal decline, The space for the NP became even more limited after 2000, when party had to face intense competition from a powerful new KMT splinter party, the PFP, and a rejuvenated, united and orthodox KMT.
Keywords: Taiwan, political parties, new parties, ideology, political resources, politi- cal opportunity structure
1. Introduction
When in August 1993, seven members of a dissident K MT faction announced the formation of the New Party (NP), few expected it to have much impact on Taiwan's the political landscape. Previous attempts to challenge the established parties, the ruling Kuomintang (KMT) and opposition Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) had been electoral flops. Nevertheless, in the mid-1990s, the NP grew rapidly to become Taiwan's first significant third party. It won numerous seats in the Taipei city council and the national parliaments. However, the NP began its long decline in 1997, and
EASTASIA, Spring 2006, Vol. 23, No. 1, pp. 47-67.
48 East Asia 1 Spring 2006
in consecutive elections its seat share dwindled to almost zero in 2001. Although the NP has had a mini revival since 2002, winning seats in Taipei city council and the legislative election, it appears to have become a marginal political actor.
Since the outset of multi-party elections in the late 1980s, Taiwan has moved from a one-party dominant system towards a multi-party system. The emergence of new challenger parties has meant that since the mid-1990s there have been three and sometimes even five significant political parties. The study of new political parties has been a growing sub-field in Western party politics literature, examin- ing the formation, success and impact of new political actors such as ecological or radical right parties. However, in Taiwan research has focused exclusively on the established parties, the DPP and KMT, with little published on these new political parties. In contrast, this paper is a case study on the sudden rise and gradual decline of the NR It has become accepted wisdom that the NP is a failed party. This paper challenges that assumption, arguing that most of the NP's original objectives have been achieved. Rather than focusing solely on the NP's limited number of seats, it must be stressed that since 2000 the NP's founders have had greater sway on the KMT's policymaking process than ever before. By 2004 KMT policy positions had become so close to those of the NP that it was prepared to promote a party merger and allow its politicians to stand for election under a KMT banner. In many respects the NP has reverted to its original form, that of a small but highly influential faction within the KMT.
Among NP politicians there is a broad consensus on explanations for the rise and fall of the NR Most agree that the NP was able to attract voters with its united team of well educated candidates and its protect the Republic of China (ROC) and anti-corruption appeals. The party's bitter inner party power struggles are viewed as the core factor in the party's fall from grace. Although these arguments cannot be totally disregarded, a more systematic approach is required.
There is much debate on how to explain new party success or failure among western political scientists. A common approach has been to stress institutional factors, particularly the election system and rules on party formation. Proportional representation systems are viewed as being more beneficial to newer parties. 1 A second argument focuses on a range of sociological factors, which may affect the new parties' fate. Green party success is often linked to high levels of prosperity and post-materialist values, while the new right is linked to high unemployment and the salience of the immigration issue. 2
Another approach is to stress the importance of the party type. Robert Harmel and John Robertson found that while centrist parties performed best, communist parties were the least successful? In 2000 Paul Lucardie proposed a comprehensive framework in which new party success or failure can be explained by three factors: (1) a political project that addresses problems considered important by much of the electorate, (2) sufficient resources, and (3) the political opportunity structure. 4 In other words, new party success depends on their ability to propagate a clear and distinct party appeal that addresses salient political issues; their human, financial, organisational, and media resources; and the ability to take advantage of their elec- toral environment.
This study follows the basic framework suggested by Lucardie to explain the electoral fortunes of the NP. It is argued that the NP was able to achieve its greatest
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growth when it mixed the save the ROC appeal with social issues and had a rich human resource base. The party was also able to take advantage of the favourable political environment of the mid-1990s, particularly the divided and changing state of the KMT and the fear of war created by the PRC's military threats. A combination of factors can also help explain the NP's decline. Firstly, the party lost its appeal by dropping social issues and becoming an extremist single-issue party. Secondly, the progressive erosion of the party's human and organisational resources contributed to its downfall after 1997. Finally, the overall electoral environment became more hostile to the existence of the NR After 1996, with Lee Teng-hui's position in the KMT and central government was consolidated, the KMT appeared strengthened. Even more devastating was post-2000 environment. The appearance of a powerful new rival party on the right of Taiwanese politics, the People First Party (PFP), and return of a revived KMT to orthodox party ideology have reduced the political space for the NR
2. The Origin and Birth of the New Party
The origin of the NP can be traced back to May 1990, when a group of KMT politicians formed the New KMT Alliance (NKMTA). Throughout this faction's three-year existence, it was highly critical of the KMT's tolerance of political corrup- tion, its overt support for Taiwan independence and lack of inner party democracy. The NKMTA was a key player on the side of the Non Mainstream KMT's intense power struggle with Lee Teng-hui's Mainstream KMT group. With the Non Main- stream Premier Hau Pei-tsun in office, a number of the faction's leaders were able to hold ministerial positions. Chao Shao-kong was Director of the Environment Protection Agency and Wang Chien-hsuan was Minister for Economic Affairs in the early 1990s.
In the 1992 legislative election the NKMTA was already operating like a de facto party. As Lee Teng-hui had tried to block the nomination of the faction's politi- cians, many instead chose to stand unendorsed. In the election campaign NKMTA candidate propaganda stressed core themes that were repeated after the formation of the NR Li Ching-hua's newspaper ad called for the expulsion of Lee Teng-hui supporters for advocating a "One China, One Taiwan" policy. 5 While Wang and Chao were both highly critical of the KMT's nomination of corrupt politicians known as "golden oxen. ''6 Regardless of whether its candidates stood as official KMT or unendorsed rebel candidates, they had a remarkable success rate, with eleven out of the NKMTA's twelve candidates winning election. 7 Wang and Chao were two of the most popular candidates, gaining a combined total of over 350,000 votes) However, the NKMTA suffered a setback when its benefactor Premier Hau Pei-tsun was forced to resign in early 1993. Seeing little future within the KMT, seven leading figures of the NKMTA announced the formation of the NP at a press conference on August 10, 1993.
3. The Electoral Fortunes of the NP
The NP's 12-year electoral history is laid out in Tables 1-6, showing the party's results in national and local level elections. From Table 4 it appears the NP had
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Table 1 New Party Candidates Nominated and Elected in National Parliamentary Elections
Note 1: This table shows the number of candidates nominated by the NP in national level parliamentary elections. The candidates elected are shown in parenthesis. Note 2:1996 and 2005 are National Assembly elections; 1992, 1995, 1998, 2001 and 2004 are Legislative Yuan elections. Note 3: the figures for 1992 are for the New KMT Alliance candidates. Some were officially nominated by the KMT, while others ran as rebel candidates. Note 4: The figures for 2004 do not include the NP politicians that stood under the KMT banner. Three of whom were elected and have returned to the NP, so that now the NP has four legislators.
Sources: National Chengchi University Election Study Center website http://www2.nccu.edu. tw/-s00/; Dafydd Fell, Party Politics in Taiwan (Routledge: London, 2005).
Table 2 Vote and Seat Shares for Main Parties in National Parliamentary Elections
KMT
DPP
NP
PFP
TIP
TSU
1992 1995 1996 1998 2001 2004 2005
53 (59.6)
31 (31.1)
46.1 (51.8)
33.2 (32.9)
13 (12.8)
46.9 (54.8)
29.9 (29.6)
13.7 (14.7)
46.4 (54.7)
29.6 (31.1)
7.1 (4.9)
28.6 (30.2)
33.4 (38.7)
2,9 (0.4)
20.3 (20.4)
32.8 (35.1)
35.7 (39.6)
0.1 (0.4)
13.9 (15.1)
38.9 (39.4)
42.5 (42.8)
0.9 (1)
6.1 (6.1)
1.5 (0.4) 0.0 (0) 0.0 (0) 0.3 (0.3)
8.5 (5.8) 7.8 (5.3) 7.1 (7.1)
Note 1: This table shows the vote share for major political parties in national level parliamentary elections. The seat shares are shown in parenthesis. Note 2:1996 and 2005 are National Assembly elections; 1992, 1995, 1998, 2001 and 2004 are Legislative Yuan elections. Note 3: The KMT figures for 1992 also include those New KMT alliance candidates that were officially nominated. Note 4: The NP figures for 2004 do not include the NP politicians that stood under the KMT banner, they are counted in the KMT column.
Sources: National Chengchi University Election Study Center website http://www2.nccu.edu. tw/~s00/; Dafydd Fell, Party Politics in Taiwan (Routledge: London, 2005).
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little success in its initial election, the 1993 local executive contest. These low overall figures disguise the party's impact on certain individual contests, as it only contested two executive posts in 1993. The NP revealed its potential in Taiwan's most populous constituency, Taipei County, as its candidate's 16.3 percent ensured that the KMT vote was split, allowing the DPP to retain the seat.
During the mid- 1990s, the NP reached its peak, becoming Taiwan's first significant third party. Although the NP failed to win any of the three executive posts avail- able in 1994, its candidate for Taipei mayor Chao Shao-kong ran a highly effective campaign. Chao came second, again splitting the KMT vote and allowing the DPP's Chen Shui-bian to win election. Chao's campaign had a strong coattail effect on the NP's city council candidates. From Table 5 and Table 6 we can see that the NP had its first electoral victories in the 1994 city council elections. In Taipei eleven of its 14 city council candidates won election, and the resulting hung council meant that
Table 3 Presidential Vote Share
1996 2000 2004
KMT 54 23.1 49.9
DPP 21.1 39.3 50.1
NP 14.9 0.1
PFP 36.8
Others 10 0.6
No of relevant candidates 4 3 2
Note 1: This table shows the main parties' vote shares in three presidential elections. Sources: National Chengchi University Election Study Center election database at http://www2. nccu.edu.tw/~ sOO/eng/data/dataO 1 ,htm.
Note 1: This table shows the main parties' vote shares in local executive elections. The party seat shares are shown in parenthesis.
Sources: National Chengchi University Election Study Center election database at http://www2. nccu.edu.tw/-s00/eng/data/data01.htm; Christian Schaferrer, The Power of the Ballot box, (Lanham, Lexington, 2003).
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the NP could dictate which of the established parties controlled a majority. Although the NP's candidate for the Provincial Governor race. Chu Kao-cheng came third, with only 4.3 percent o f the vote, his controversial campaign meant that for the first time the NP had a presence outside of its Taipei heartland.
It was not until the mid-1990s parliamentary elections that the NP became a national party. The NP won over 13 percent of the national vote and significant numbers of legislative and National Assembly seats. Although the party had greatest success in northern Taiwan, it also won seats in central Taichung, and in the south
Table 5 Candidates Nominated and Elected in Kaohsiung and Taipei City Council Elections
KMT
DPP
NP
TIP
PFP
TSU
Total Seats
1994 KH 1994 TP 1998 KH 1998 TP 2002 KH 2002 TP
43 (23) 50 (20) 34 (25) 32 (23) 21 (12) 22 (20)
21 (11) 29 (18) 20 (9) 27 (19) 18 (14)
5(2) 14(11) 6(1) 16(9) 1(0) 6(5)
5 (0) 4 (0)
8 (7) 17 (8)
52 52 44
7 (2)
44 44
27 (16)
7 (0)
52
Note 1: This table shows the number of candidates nominated by the by the main parties in Kaohsiung (KH) and Taipei (TP) city council elections. The candidates elected are shown in parenthesis.
Source: National Chengchi University Election Study Center election database at http://www2. nccu.edu.tw/-s00/eng/data/data01.htm.
Table 6 Vote and Seat Share for Parties in Kaohsiung and Taipei City Council Elections
Note 1: This table shows the main parties' vote shares in Kaohsiung and Taipei city council elections. The party seat shares are shown in parenthesis.
Source: National Chengchi University Election Study Center election database at http://www2. nccu.edu.tw/-s00/eng/data/data01 .htm.
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all three of its candidates were successful in Kaohsiung in 1995. This was of high symbolic value as the NP's detractors often claimed the party could not cross the Choshui River that divides north and south Taiwan. The NP was so successful in 1995 that it was viewed as the principal winner of the election, as the DPP showed little growth and KMT voters switched to the NR
The KMT majority for the 1996-1998 legislative term was so small that Taiwan effectively had a hung parliament for the first time. This meant that the NP was able to play a pivotal role in determining which of the established parties held a major- ity. The NP did not have a fixed ally; instead it altered its allegiance according to the political issue on the agenda. In 1996 the NP joined forces with the DPP in the legislative speaker election and also worked with the DPP in exposing KMT cor- ruption and opposing the Fourth Nuclear Power Station. However, on other issues such as national identity or pensions, the NP allied with the KMT.
Comparing the NP's 1993 and 1997 local executive vote share in Table 4 reveals that the NP had suffered a setback in 1997, dropping from 3.1 to 1.4 percent of the vote. The performance was even worse when it is considered that while in 1993 the NP only contested two posts, in 1997 it contested seven. The 1998 "three in one" elections revealed the severity of the NP's decline. 9 Even before the election the writing was on the wall for the NR Feuding within the NP had become so bad that the KMT Secretary General Chang Hsiao-yen described the NP as a "bubble party. ''1~ In the legislative elections its vote share and seat numbers were both almost halved to only 7 percent and 11 legislators respectively. While the NP had come a strong second in the 1994 Taipei mayoral contest, in 1998 its candidate, Wang Chien-hsuan, did not run a serious campaign. The election reflected the NP's over dependence on Taipei, as out of its seven district legislators, only two were elected outside of Taipei, and no seats were won south of the Choshui River. It was only in the Taipei city council election that the NP was able to hold its ground, with only a small loss from eleven to nine seats.
Under the leadership of Chinese nationalists such as Li Ching-hua and Hsieh Chi- ta, the NP continued its apparent terminal decline. In the 2000 presidential contest the NP Chair Li Ching-hua nominated the extremist writer Li Ao. However, the NP politicians steered clear of the official campaign, and supported either the KMT's Lien Chan or rebel KMT candidate Soong Chu-yu. The NP campaign became even more a laughing stock when on the eve of voting day NP Chair Li Ching-hua quit the party to join the Soong campaign. Unsurprisingly, Li Ao came fifth in the five horse race, with only 0.1 percent of the vote. Between March 2000 and the end of 2001 the NP suffered a gradual erosion of its legislators, as some defected to the PFP and the NP Chairman Hau Lung-bing even left to become Environment Min- ister in the DPP government. The next low point for the NP was winning just one legislative seat out of its 42 nominated candidates in 2001.
The party has been able to create a mini revival since 2002. In that year's Taipei city council elections five of its six candidates were successful. Then in the 2004 legislative election, four NP politicians were elected, including three that were able to win election by registering as KMT candidates. However, the NP appears to be reverting towards its original form, as a KMT faction rather than an independent political party.
Despite the NP's limited numerical strength, the party should not be dismissed as a failed party. In fact, since 2000, the NP has had a greater impact on party politics
54 Easl Asia 1 Spring 2006
than in the mid-1990s, Firstly, the NP's Hsieh Chi-ta led the demonstrations against Lee Teng-hui following the KMT's 2000 presidential disaster. These helped to topple Lee from his position as KMT party chair, thus achieving a long-term NP objective. Secondly, the post-Lee KMT Chairs Lien Chan and Ma Ying-jeou have been far more receptive to NP leaders and their political views. In fact, NP founders such as Chat Shao-kong and Yu Mu-ming were core members in Lien's inner circle of advisors.ll In the words of Lee Teng-hui, "They have come back to make trouble. Lien Chan has been caught by this group! ''12
The KMT's changing policy positions and propaganda messages since 2000 reflect this NP influence. Under Lien Chan the KMT has a much more pro China outlook than Lee Teng-hui. In 2001 Lien began proposing unification under a confederate model, something first proposed by the NP. Also in 2005, the KMT followed the NP's lead to hold direct talks with the CCP. This trend has continued under the lat- est KMT Chair Ma Ying-jeou. In 2006 Ma stated that the KMT's ultimate goal is unification with China, thus returning the KMT to a national identity position last held in the early 1990s before Lee had consolidated power. 13
Since 2000 the KMT has attempted to tackle a number of the NP's other com- plaints. For the first time the KNIT has seriously tried to resolve its corrupt image, passing strict regulations to prevent nomination of corrupt candidates. Another long-term NP complaint about the KMT was its lack of inner party democracy. But under Lien Chan the KMT not only introduced party primaries for candidates, but also direct member elections for the party chair. Even in the area of symbolic politics and party propaganda, the KMT looks more like the NP. In the post-2000 KMT campaigns, the party has made heavy use of ROC Chinese nationalist symbols such as Chiang Ching-kuo and Sun Yat Sen that had been discarded in Lee's second term. In the words of former KMT party spokesman Huang Hui-chen, "At present those controlling the KMT ideology are basically inclined towards the NP f o r c e . ''14
Since 2000 the NP has realigned its relationship to the other political parties. While in the 1990s the NP switched allegiance between the KMT and DPP according to the issue under discussion, since 2000 the NP has become firmly in the Pan KMT camp. It has thus played a critical role in promoting unity amongst the Pan Blue parties. The first instance was when the NP's Wang Chien-hsuan stood as a joint candidate for all three Pan KMT parties in the Taipei County magistrate election in 2001. This model was again repeated for the 2004 presidential election when the NP supported the joint KMT/PFP ticket. Although both campaigns failed narrowly, we can expect further such Pan KMT co-operation in future single-member district elections. The NP has also been highly vocal in calling for a merger of the three Pan KMT parties, something that the vast majority of Pan Blue supporters are keen to see realised. The NP's decision to allow its candidates to stand under the KMT banner in the December 2004 Legislative Yuan elections was meant to prove the NP's sincerity in its push for a party merger.
4. Explaining the NP's Changing Electoral Fortunes
The most common explanations for the rise and fall of the NP are that it rose when it was a small highly united group of its party founders and fell as a result of bitter power struggles commencing around 1997. As party chairwomen Hsieh Chi-
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ta recalled, "Our best time was from our foundation until the 1994 Taipei mayoral election. ''15 According to numerous NP interviews the party's problems began with the conflict between party founders and legislator for Kaohsiung North, Chu Kao- cheng. This is how NP legislator Chien Ta described an infamous clash between Chu and party founder Chou Chuan, "Chu Kao-cheng and Chou Chuan got into an argument during a party caucus meeting, and began to attack each other. Legislator Fu Kun-cheng and I pulled them apart. But Chu Kao-cheng got three plastic bottles of oyster sauce from the table and began throwing the contents at Chou Chuan (we had begun the legislative caucus meeting early at seven o'clock, and were having a working breakfast). Oyster sauce was sprayed everywhere, on the table cloth, on the floor, even on many legislators' clothes and hair. We were all stunned. I believe it would be hard for someone not at the scene to imagine that such a learned person could behave so wildly. ''16
The current party chair Yu Mu-ming felt that the sudden rise of the new cohort of legislators was a critical factor in the party's downfall, "The reason the NP bubble burst was because the NP expanded very fast and it had too many different opinions. Everyone thought we were having power struggles all the time. ''17 Hsieh Chi-ta also was critical of the new NP politicians, but had equally harsh words for the NP's founders, "Those party founders, you can't say they are bad, but they felt they were very important. We only had seven party elders. But they managed to split into four or five factions, and each was mutually antagonistic. ''18 Among the party elders the political manipulations of Chao Shao-kong were also blamed by a number of interviewees for the serious party divisions in the run up to the 1998 legislative election. In fact, this was a central theme running through Chien Ta's book, Yellow Flag, Broken Dreams. 19 According to Chien, "Chao Shao-kong's method of saving the party was not to get the NP's democratic systems on the right track, but to completely destroy the NP's democratic system, so that in the end only his word counted. ''2~
There is no doubt that there is some validity in the power struggle argument for the NE The open factional infighting along with embarrassing incidents such as Chu's oyster sauce attack and accusations of vote buying in the NP's 1998 primaries did damage the party's election performances. However, the power struggle argument alone is insufficient. It is also unfair to solely blame Chu and Chao's antics for the party's fall from grace, as they also played a critically constructive role in build- ing up the NP support base. It should also be recalled that even in the mid-1990s golden years of NP growth there was already intense hostility among NP factions. Moreover, NP factional struggles calmed after 1999, but the NP's electoral decline actually accelerated. Instead I have adopted a framework that attempts to explain the rise and decline of the NP in terms of its policy platform, resources, and ability to exploit its political environment.
Policy Line
Among the vast majority of NP politicians interviewed there was a consensus that there was no connection between the party's decline and its policy demands. As party chairman Yu Mu-ming claimed, "The NP's problems do not lie in these demands. Everyone agrees with our demands."u In contrast, this paper argues that the
56 East Asia / Spring 2006
changes in the breadth and content of the NP's electoral policy message did have a significant impact on its electoral success and failure. When the NP took distinctive but moderate stances on a range of core issues, it was able to expand its support, but once the NP became a single-issue extremist party its days were numbered.
By pledging to stay true to the ideals of Sun Yat Sen, the NP staked its claim to be an orthodox or purifier party that focused on ideology that has been abandoned or neglected by an established party. It was claiming to be the only legitimate KMT. This is apparent by the comments of the former NP legislator Chien Ta in response to an audience question on the difference between the NP and KMT, "The NP's declared ideals and objectives are the same as the KMT. There is almost no differ- ence. The only difference between us is that they are false and we are real. The real KMT's name is the NP; the party called the KMT is a false KMT. ''22
During the NP's first two election campaigns, it concentrated on attracting the KMT's traditional iron voters, such as veterans, Mainlanders, and people with strong Chinese identity. The NP was able to create a core support base among such voters with a strong defend the ROC message and heavy emphasis on Chinese nationalist symbols. As Yang Tai-shun explained, "When the NP began it called for protecting the ROC, taking an even more right wing position than the KMT on the spectrum to attract core supporters. In my view this was just an instrumental move. ''23 In the party's first election in 1993 one of its ads likened the election to a battle between the defenders of Sun Yat Sen against Lee Teng-hui. 24
The NP's Chinese nationalist rhetoric was even stronger in the Taipei mayoral election of 1994 when NP candidate Chao Shao-kong accused Lee Teng-hui of having a Taiwan independence timetable. 25 He also was able to question DPP can- didate Chen Shui-bian's loyalty to the ROC during the televised debate, when he challenged Chen, "I shout 'long live the ROC,' do you dare to shout 'long live the ROC?' Long live the ROC! Love live the ROC !" The DPP's propaganda chief Chen Fang-ming recalled how Chao attacked both established parties, "On the one hand he reduced the KMT to an illegitimate party, as he is legitimate, and on the other he can attack Taiwan independence, because he is the genuine KMT. So this kind of strategy is a two way attack. ''26
Although the KMT and DPP tried to paint the NP as an extreme unification party, this was an inaccurate label. At that point during the mid-1990s, the NP's official position was actually quite moderate, as its newspaper ad explained, "The NP advocates that both sides of the straits accept a confederate system."27 Similarly former NP politician Yang Tai-shun recalled, "In the early period the party rarely touched upon this issue (unification). So in the summer of 1995 I could definitely say that the NP was not a unification party ... as protecting the ROC and unification are two separate matters. ''28 In short, the NP's protect the ROC message was highly effective in attracting a core support base of voters that had grown disillusioned with the KMT for disowning Chinese nationalist ideology under Lee Teng-hui.
If the NP had kept its appeal exclusively focused on such identity issues, it is unlikely that the party's support would have exceeded its core base of about five to seven percent of the national vote. Nevertheless the party was able to broaden its support base by stressing issues that appealed to urban middle class voters. The sec- tion of the middle class the NP targeted is known in as the "jungongjiao" or military, civil servants and education sectors. Although this group has tended to vote KMT,
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many are not as ideologically orientated as the Chinese nationalist veterans. In the 1994 Taipei mayoral campaign, the NP had already begun to broaden its appeal to include attacks on KMT political corruption and DPP violence. Thus in the Taipei mayoral debate Chao was as scathing as Chen in attacking corruption associated with the Taipei metro project. In addition, Chao appealed to the law and order constituency by attacking the violence of DPP affiliated taxi groups in Taipei and raising the case of a DPP official convicted of drug dealing. 29 Furthermore, the NP began making use of social issues that would appeal to sections of the urban middle classes. For instance, its 1994 manifesto style ad carried the slogan, "First Rate Beef: Chao Shao-kang's 42 Public Policies. ''3~ This included niche ap- peals that had been largely neglected by the major parties such as welfare for the handicapped.
The NP's greatest election success in 1995 came on the back of its broadest elec- tion appeal, with catchy slogans such as a "Hung parliament," and "five-day working week. ''31 The NP began to refer to itself as the "Party of the Ordinary City Dweller. ''32 Since the NP was aware that its target voters, the "jungongjiao" already had very generous welfare provisions, it took a very conservative stance on new social wel- fare proposals. This contrasted sharply with the welfare expansion policies of both the KMT and DPP. For instance, the welfare section of its manifesto ad began with "Below heaven there are no free lunches. ''33 However, the NP continued to attract its core voters with the familiar themes of anti-Taiwan independence, attacking Lee Teng-hui, and blaming the KMT for corruption. One such ad claimed optimistically that "With a hung parliament, Taiwan independence is finished"34Another singled out Lee for the deteriorating state of political corruption, asking, "Who let the con- sortiums, factions, and yes men into the Legislative Yuan? ''35
In the final campaign of its growth phase for the 1996 presidential and National Assembly elections the NP reverted to focus almost exclusively on core appeals such as opposition to Taiwanese independence and blaming Lee for bringing Tai- wan to the verge of war with the mainland. One such NP ad asked voters fearful of war, "Do you love Lee Teng-hui more than your life? ''36 While another was equally sensational "Don't let our children become the cannon fodder for Taiwan indepen- dence. If you don't want war, then vote for the NP. "37 Although the NP still steered clear of the unification issue, it would appear likely that its more narrow approach would limit its appeal, however, the party did even better than the 1995 legislative campaign. I will return to why the NP's narrow appeal was still successful in 1996 in the section on the political opportunity structure.
Even at the NP's height of popularity, its political project meant that expanding beyond its core constituencies was easier said than done. Chu Kao-cheng was one of those advocating an even broader appeal to expand support. As Chu recalled debating this issue in vain with the party founders, "Now you have 25 percent of votes in Taipei, but to increase that to 37.5 percent is too difficult. But in Yunlin you have two percent; it would be quite easy to increase fourfold to eight percent. I said you need to show concern for workers and farmers. But I can tell you they are so lazy. It's a Mainlander party. I said to them I am Taiwanese, but I can speak for Mainlanders. You are Mainlanders and you must also speak for Taiwanese. ''38 The NP's conservative welfare and Chinese nationalist approach meant that the party could not make the breakthroughs Chu suggested.
58 East Asia / Spring 2006
The critical turning point in the NP's policy package came in early 1998 when a group of NP moderates led by Yao Li-ming proposed a formula for dealing with the cross-Strait issue titled "One China, Two Countries." The objective was to reach out to centrist voters by moving the NP to a more moderate identity position. As Yao explained, "Here is the KMT (on the right of the unification vs. independence spectrum), here is the DPP (on the left), and we can stand in the middle. We can be the critical minority; we can be the force of moderation. This way our votes will be sure to increase. ''39 Despite the fact that in essence the "One China, Two Countries" proposal was very similar to the official existing position of a confederacy, the pro- posal was harshly attacked by party founders Li Ching-hua and Chao Shao-kong as the equivalent of Taiwanese independence. The defeat of this proposal represents a lost opportunity to shift the party image at a time when public opinion was moving to the centre-left.
Although the NP focused on familiar themes in its disastrous 1998 campaign, the party's platform was in the process of change. In that year the NP gave greater stress to attacking KMT corruption than any previous propaganda campaign, in fact 30.2 percent of its issue mentions in newspaper ads addressed the corruption issue. 4~ For instance, one NP ad claimed that, "A vote for the KMT is a vote for collusion with money politics "'41 Following the defeat of the "One China, Two Countries" proposals, the NP also began to take more extreme positions on identity questions. In addition to anti-independence messages, the NP dropped the confederacy model, and began to give more attention to unification. For instance, NP Election General Manager Chao Shao-kong proposed the election theme of "Unification, Equal Rights, and Humanity. ''42 Similarly, Chao allowed extremist Chinese nationalists such as Feng Hu-hsiang to be nominated, while three years earlier his nomination had been blocked by Chao.
In addition to the damage created by the NP's move towards a more extreme identity position, the election revealed the shaky foundation of its "Ordinary City Dweller" party appeal. In the words of the political scientist Chen Ming-tong, "The ordinary city dweller is not a class and there is no such class consciousness, this cannot be the base for a political party. For a party to try to make this its base is like constructing a building from the sand on a beach. ''43 Nevertheless, in many respects the NP's policy package in 1998 was quite similar to that employed in 1994. Why was the election result so poor? Again this is something that I come back to in the section on the overall political environment.
Over the next five years, under the leadership of extreme Chinese nationalists, the NP made a thorough transition into becoming an extremist single-issue party. As Yang Tai-shun commented in 2001, "Now if you say the NP is an unificationist party, I cannot disagree. ''44 The direction of change was apparent when NP Chair Li Ching-hua appointed Li Ao to be the NP's presidential candidate in 2000, despite the fact that Li Ao was not a party member and took more radical positions on re- lations with the mainland than the NP, Li Ao became the first candidate to openly consider the PRC's "One Country, Two Systems" unification model. 45 The degree that the NP was focused on identity alone could be seen by the way that in the NP's newspaper election ads in 2000 a record of 75 percent of its issue mentions were opposed to Taiwan independence. 46
The move towards extremism was continued under the leadership of both Hsieh Chi-ta and Yu Mu-ming. In 2001 the NP became the first Taiwanese political party to
Fell 59
hold direct party-to-party negotiations with the Chinese Communist Party. Similarly, the official party policy on cross-Strait political integration became "One Country, Three Systems," a close relation of the PRC's "One Country, Two Systems." In the 2001 campaign the legislator Feng Hu-hsiang went one further, with his bus ad slogan, "One Country, Two Systems Saves Taiwan." The tone of Chinese na- tionalism and use of Chinese nationalist symbols reached fever pitch. The NP's central election rallies were a long series of patriotic Chinese nationalist songs, such as "China Must be Strong." Despite the departure of Lee from the KMT, the NP became even more obsessed with attacking this symbol of Taiwanese identity. As political scientist Wu Chung-li commented, "Later they were too strongly af- fected by Lee Teng-hui, so when Lee Teng-hui did anything they began to attack and criticize. The result of this was that everyone felt they were moving further and further to the right. ''47
Although the NP has taken a more low-key approach to elections since 2001, it remains a party intoxicated by extreme Chinese nationalism. This was reinforced in one of its central election activities in the 2004 legislative campaign. Party chairman Yu Mu-ming led a ceremony in which NP politicians took a huge ROC flag with the red section replaced with white; they each drew their own blood to colour the white part red to show the depth of their love for the ROC. 48 Since the early 1990s there has been a steady decline in the support for both Chinese unification and Chinese identity, therefore the NP was focusing on increasingly unpopular stances. Moreover, party image surveys show that the general public was aware of the direction of NP change, thus this cannot have helped the NP's electoral prospects after 2000. 49 The Taiwanese electorate has repeatedly punished parties that go to extremes, such as the DPP in 1991 and 1996. The NP's defeat in 2001 and failure to recover since should also partly be attributed to such a punishment. 5~
Resources
A shortage of political resources is one of the most serious obstacles new chal- lenger political parties must overcome to gain a foothold on the electoral arena. Even if a new political party is able to generate sufficient resources, can it actually use these resources effectively? This section examines the impact of the NP's changing human, financial, media, and organisational resources on its election success and failure. The human resource pool that the NP built up in its first few years was criti- cal in its initial expansion, bringing financial, media and organisational resources in their wake. Later the gradual erosion of the NP's human resources and gross mismanagement of its resources contributed to the party's decline after 1997.
During the NP's first six months it built up a remarkable team of well known and highly educated politicians. These included former judges, government minis- ters, democracy activists and high-ranking KMT officials. Chat Shao-kong, Wang Chien-hsuan and Chu Kao-cheng were all true political stars of the early 1990s. With its popular founders the NP was able to attract campaign funding, supporters and project their fame on a further group of less well known but well-qualified can- didates for the mid- 1990s election campaigns. This was how Hsieh Chi-ta described the situation, "Many people joined in the momentum of the Taipei (1994 mayoral) campaign, people saw the NP was on the rise and were willing to join us .... When
60 East Asia / Spring 2006
the NP was at its weakest (at the start), no one would join us. But when we were on the rise, everyone said I love you, I love you, I support you. ''s~
The party leaders were also active recruiting potential new politicians, perhaps also in the hope of building up their own factional support base. Two of my in- terviewees, Lai Shi-pao and Yao Li-ming, explained how Wang Chien-hsuan had brought them into the party. Chu Kao-cheng brought a team of politicians from his failed Chinese Social Democratic Party that worked on expanding the NP base in central and southern Taiwan. These stars also ensured that the NP received significant media exposure, initially in the print media, but also with the rapid growth of cable networks, NP politicians were able to display their debating skills on the electronic media too. In Taiwan's first televised candidate debate in i994, Chao gave a highly theatrical performance that completely overshadowed his KMT rival.
Similarly, NP politicians were regular guests on the new politics talk shows that have become the staple fare of the news channels every evening. These Taiwanese versions of the UK's Question Time invite one politician from each major party to discuss the topical political issues of the day. Although the NP did not have its own newspaper, it was also able to get sympathetic coverage in one of the top dailies on the island, the United Daily News, which had become increasingly critical of the KMT under Lee. Naturally, the NP's stars were also the key to its initial supply of financial resources. They were able to attract donations from the masses of NP supporters, but also from the business links that they had built up while in govern- ment and parliament.
While the NP was at its peak in the mid-1990s, it was highly adept at using its resources efficiently. This can be seen in the high success rate of NP candidates in 1995, despite spending far less on advertising than either of the established par- ties. By encouraging its supporters to allocate votes evenly, it was able to get all its candidates elected in a number of prestigious urban constituencies, such as six out of six in Taipei city in 1995 compared to the KMT's four out of ten.
Nevertheless, even at the NP's peak, its human resources had critical weaknesses. Firstly, the NP had failed to persuade all the Non Mainstream KMT leaders to defect. As though many had doubts about Lee's policy line they preferred the security of high office. For instance, if the current Taipei mayor Ma Ying-jeou had joined the NR it would have had a much wider support base. Secondly, unlike the DPP and KMT, the NP operated as a soft party, in that it did not insist on its members renounc- ing membership of other parties. Therefore many of its supporters remained KMT members. The problem here was that it was easy for members to switch allegiance to the strongest Pan KMT party, be that the KMT or PFR
A combination of the erosion of the NP's human resources along with serious wastage of available resources contributed to the decline of the NR After 1996 the defection of new recruits to the NP from the KMT declined and, almost simultane- ously, the party began to lose some of its political stars. In addition, as a result of political struggles, repeated election defeats, many of the NP's stars have lost their prestige and star status. After NP chair Hsieh Chi-ta lost election in Kaohsiung in 2001 and served time in jail over a libel case, it is unlikely she will be able to return to the election stage. A similar case concerns the former Taipei city councillor Chu Mei-feng. Not long after failing in her bid to be elected to the Legislative Yuan in 2001. Chu gained fame throughout the Chinese-speaking world after an explicit
Fell 61
VCD showing her and her married lover was distributed free by a local magazine. After losing two elections in a row, even NP founder Wang Chien-hsuan is no longer regarded as a political star.
It is quite ironic that at the time its human resources were on the slide, the NP actually reached record funding levels ! This is because a system for state party fund- ing was instituted in 1997. However, the NP suffered from serious mismanagement of its financial resources in the four elections between 1997 and 2001. In the local executive contests of 1997 and 1998, along with the 2000 presidential election, the NP was contesting single-member district elections in which it could not compete with the established parties. The hope was that by contesting these elections it could create a coattail effect and avoid the party being ignored by the media. As former party leader Chou Yang-shan explained, "Standing for city and county executive elections was to gain exposure .... For example, when Wang Chien-hsuan stood for Taipei mayor, he told everyone to vote for Ma Ying-chiu, but to support the NP's city councillors. ''52
Taking part in these elections, however, was often counterproductive, wasting precious resources, creating conflict over nominations and the defeats demoralised party workers. NP leaders were also highly critical of the waste of the party's fi- nancial resources in these campaigns. In 1998 the NP party headquarters spent over NT$30 million on its highly divisive open primaries, add to this the huge amounts that its candidates spent on these primaries, it is no wonder that the party was short of funds for the actual general election campaign in December. There were similar complaints over the waste while Li Ching-hua was party chairman. As Hsieh Chi- ta recalled, "In one year he spent three year's party subsidy, NT$90 million. This included the presidential election. Originally we didn't need to stand for president, but he invited Li Ao. We had to give a deposit of NT$15 million (to the Central Elec- tion Commission). He said that Li Ao would pay this. Later Li Ao said he wouldn't pay, so we had to pay it. He said, T l l stand for you but you have to pay the money.' Finally he said TI1 pay you back after the election.' He brought us a collection of paintings to sell. But when they were examined they were fakes! ''53
The final area where the NP squandered its scarce resources concerns over- nomination of candidates at a time when the party's support base was declining. In 1998 the NP nominated 27 candidates in Taipei province, but only three were elected. However, the worst case of NP over-nomination came in 2001 when NP nominated 42 candidates and only one was successful. This is how Chou Yang-shan explained this phenomenon, "If in Taipei city we'd nominated two in the south and one in the north .... (in Taipei County) one in Hsintian, one in Panchiao, and one in Sanchung, then out of those six at least four would have been elected. But she (Hsieh) nominated too many, three in Taipei north, three in Taipei south, four in Taipei county, ten seats, all lost? '54
At the height of the NP's popularity, the party had a huge number of support organisations that were invaluable as voter mobilisation tools. However, the party failed to build on this base and allowed many of these groups to lapse. The NP sup- port groups were overwhelmingly concentrated in the greater Taipei region, making island-wide expansion even tougher. By 1997 some NP leaders were aware of the lack of NP organisational strength in many counties. Therefore Chou Yang-shan proposed using the NPs state subsidies to set up service centres where the party was
62 East Asia / Spring 2006
weak. However this plan was not effective, as Chao later had this budget drastically cut. Although the NP had done very well in its first national election in 1995, its newly elected politicians had a very poor re-election rate. This is closely related to the NP's failure to create strong candidate support organisations that are critical for consistently winning elections in Taiwanese politics. This was partly because most NP politicians felt uncomfortable with providing the kind of constituency services that many Taiwanese voters actually expect.
As one NP party worker explained, "The NP is based on ideals not service. DPP candidates will help their constituents when they get in trouble with the police and threaten the police. There is no way that the NP will do that. ''55 As early as 1995 Yang Tai-shun had warned of the dangers of not investing in organisational strength, "If the NP is unable to use its newly elected offices to create grassroots organisations and an image of party service, it is doubtful that the party will still be able to win votes with the appeal of highly educated candidates and anti-money politics. ''56 The consequences of failure to heed Yang's warnings are clear from the NP's results in 1998.
The NP also failed to maintain existing support bases. In 2001 Hsieh Chi-ta had a disastrous policy of encouraging politicians to forsake their long-term base constitu- ency and stand in different unfamiliar districts. For instance, Hsieh left Taichung to stand in Kaohsiung and Chu Mei-feng moved from Taipei to Taichung. However, this meant that their existing strong bases were lost and they both failed to win in their new districts. Chou Yang-shan recalled his reaction to Hsieh's proposal, "At the time she wanted me to go to Taichung to stand for election, and I said I wouldn't go if you beat me to death. I said to her, why don't you stay in Taichung, she'd definitely win in Taichung. She said she wanted to go to Kaohsiung. ''57
Political Environment
Now we come to perhaps the most critical of the three explanatory variables in this model, that of the political opportunity structure or the political environment. For even if a party does have a convincing political project and sufficient resources, it is only likely to make an impact if there is a favourable political environment and if it is able to exploit this window of opportunity. The NP was able to grow in the mid- 1990s when there was an environment offering space for the NP to develop. The NP took advantage of the opportunities created by a KMT that was badly split and moving away from core party ideology, and from PRC military threats. In contrast, after 1996 the political environment progressively deteriorated for the NE With Lee at the height of his power and Ma Ying-jeou representing the KMT, it appeared that the KMT was reinvigorated. Since 2000 the environment has become even more hostile. The NP has had to compete with two rival centre-right parties, the PFP, and a more orthodox KMT.
The birth and development of a new political party is never an easy process; however, the NP was fortunate in arriving on the scene at the right time. The chang- ing balance of power between Taiwanese and Mainlanders in the divided KMT and state, and the KMT's shifting ideology, meant that there was much scope for the NP to attract dissatisfied KMT supporters and politicians. The NP arrived at a time when the KMT was wracked with intense divisions between the Mainstream and
l;'ell 63
Non Mainstream KMT. This meant that when the NKMTA did form the NR there was a significant pool of losers once Lee had forced Hau to resign. The NP was able to benefit when the KMT split for a second time in the approach to the 1996 presidential election, when there were actually two rebel KMT tickets challeng- ing Lee. Ideologically the NP could also benefit from the changes in the KMT, as there was a widespread perception that the KMT was forsaking party ideology and increasingly discriminated against Mainlanders.
The words of Hsieh Chi-ta reflect a common view of Lee and his mission, "As soon as he had this power, he began to persecute the Mainlanders and eradicate the Mainlander power. We realized what he was doing. Taiwan is clearly Chinese terri tory; he wanted to desinify Taiwan and remove Chinese thinking from Taiwan. We could see what he was doing, so we decided to form the NR The NP is protecting the ROC, protecting Chinese culture and at the same time protecting the KMT, as we originally came from the KMT. ''58 For many on the right of Taiwanese politics Lee has become a true hate figure, and the vast majority of NP party workers and politicians cited Lee Teng-hui as the key factor in their decision to join the NR
The NP also arrived at the right time to benefit from the actual election system and elections being held at the time. The multiple member district system for Taipei city council 1994 and parliamentary elections in 1995 and 1996 meant that there was space for the NP to develop. Secondly, as these elections were all held in the NP's true heartland of greater Taipei, it could make a greater impact.
The final environmental factor that benefited the NP in the mid-1990s was the PRC's military threats of 1995-1996. There is a common consensus that the PRC threats and military threats benefited Lee Teng-hui in 1996 and Chen Shui-bian in 2000. Nevertheless, this effect goes both ways, so that those that wish to stand up to China will vote for the strongest anti-China candidate, while those that are scared of China will opt for the strongest pro-China party. Therefore in the 1995 and 1996 parliamentary elections, the NP fitted the category as the strongest party of the right. Moreover, none of the rebel KMT presidential tickets actually had a party to support them, making the NP the natural home for their voters in the pa~ liamentary elections. Therefore the NP was still able to benefit in 1996 despite its narrow national identity and national security focus, as for the whole presidential campaign all the parties focused on these issues and the NP had quite a distinctive position from the KMT and DPR
Although 1996 saw the NP's peak election results, it was also the start of its decline, as the political environment gradually became less hospitable. After LinYang- kang and Hau Pei-tsun had been expelled from the KNIT, Lee had rid the party of two of his last heavyweight opponents. Lee fully consolidated his position in the KMT and government, filling the top positions with yes men. A stronger and more unified KMT at the national level meant the defection of KMT politicians and supporters to the NP dried up. In fact, in February 1998 the NP suffered its first case of reverse defection, when NP Kaohsiung south legislator Huang Kuo-chung quit the NP and rejoined the KMT. 59 Although the KMT had been badly divided over nominations at the local level for the 1997 local executive elections, the DPP rather than the NP was able to exploit this, as the NP was not strong enough outside Taipei to take advantage.
In the 1998 elections the NP had run an anti-black gold, protect the ROC and anti-Lee campaign quite similar to those of 1994-5, however, it was ineffective due
64 East Asia / Spring 2006
to the changes in the environment. The critical factor was the KMT's promotion of some of the Mainlanders that had remained within the party. While in 1994 the NP faced one of Lee's puppets, in 1998 the KMT nominated Ma Ying-jeou, a Mainlander popular with NP supporters. Thus though Wang Chien-hsuan was the NP candidate, he did not campaign seriously and became a joke candidate. As Ma holds strong ROC Chinese nationalist views and since the PRC did not use military threats, the NP's protect the ROC appeals had little impact. Ma also had a strong reputation for fighting political corruption while he had been Justice Minister, so for once the black gold attacks failed to harm the KMT. Moreover, with Lee and Ma regularly appearing on the same stage and a Mainlander party secretary, Chang Hsiao-yen, running the KMT campaign, the KMT looked both more united and orthodox. Herein lies a critical problem facing purifier parties the world over. When the original party makes often-symbolic moves to return to party ideology, the purifier party will often struggle to hold on to its supporters. Therefore, in 1998, NP supporters throughout the island returned to the KMT.
The KMT of late 1998 was not actually united. The cracks in the party that emerged when Soong Chu-yu declared his candidacy for the presidential election had just been papered over. The impact of the Soong presidential campaign on the NP was similar to Ma's in 1998, as NP supporters and politicians defected to the Soong camp. However, unlike in 1996 there was no concurrent National Assembly election for the NP to benefit from, as these elections had been cancelled. As in 1996, the PRC's threats helped the strongest candidate on the left, Chen Shui-bian, but also the strongest candidate on the right. However, this was Soong, while the NP's candidate was either the third or fourth choice candidate for those afraid of PRC threats. Therefore in 2000, as in 1998, the NP candidate did nothing to add prestige to the party.
Although the relations between the Pan KMT parties have generally been cordial in the post-2000 period, the actual space for the NP to exist electorally has been severely squeezed. This is partly due to the fact that the NP has been a victim of its own success, but also due to the overall changes in the Pan Blue political camp. With Lee Teng-hui kicked out of the KMT and no longer president, one of the NP's long-term objectives had been achieved. Although Chen Shui-bian has replaced Lee as the NP's number one hate figure, the NP shares the anti-Chen message with the KMT and PFE Secondly, as mentioned earlier, the KMT under Lien and Ma have incorporated many of the NP's policy positions, so that the NP has been forced even further to the fight to maintain its distinctiveness. NP politicians naturally feel more comfortable with the new KMT. As Hsieh Chi-ta explained, "It was like in Snow White, where the father married a stepmother, and the stepmother kicks out Snow White. We were like Snow White. We had been kicked out. But after the stepmother had been kicked out, we could have a good relationship with the family. ''6~
Nevertheless, the most damaging aspect in the post-2000 political environment for the NP was the appearance of the PFE The PFP became the natural home for former NP voters and politicians. As Taiwanese elections have become less policy orientated the importance of having superstars, often known as "heavenly kings" has increased. The PFP had the advantage over the NP of having a political superstar in Soong Chu-yu, to attract funding, supporters and politicians. During 2000 and 2001 there was a steady rate of defection of NP politicians to the PFP, including Li
Fell 65
Ching-hua, Feng Ting-kuo and Yao Li-ming. NP chair Hsieh Chi-ta was furious at the way the PFP was poaching NP politicians. According to Hsieh, "He (Soong) wanted to make the NP his own party .... He wanted everything. In negotiations he wanted the best (NP politicians), and to give us the leftovers. ''6~ Moreover, the PFP had learnt from the NP's mistakes and used a more inclusive identity message and had greater balance between Mainlander and Taiwanese politicians fronting the party. Therefore in the 2001 legislative election there was a choice of three very similar centre-fight parties, all of whom nominated quite ambitiously. Unsurpris- ingly, the weakest of these was the NP, and this was the party largely abandoned by Pan Blue voters.
Since 2001 the NP was a marginal player in elections, for most of this period overshadowed by the KMT/PFP joint ticket in the 2004 presidential election cam- paign. Moreover the NP has failed to capitalise on the gradual decline of Soong Chu-yu and the PFP's prestige. Instead it has been the resurgent KMT under Lien Chan that won all the seats that the PFP lost in the 2004 legislative election. Finally, the NP was further sidelined by KMT/PFP conservative nomination strategy for the 2004 legislative elections, which meant there was clearly very little space for NP candidates. The KMT's recovery has continued since Ma Ying-jeou became party Chair in 2005, so that by 2006 it has regained its status as the largest parliamentary party and has the highest levels of party identification. Thus a strong, united and orthodox KMT has reduced the NP to the role of a minor faction within the KMT.
5. Conclusion
This paper has examined the growth and decline of Taiwan's first significant third party. Although the party has shown a steady electoral decline since the late 1990s, the party should not be regarded as a failure, as it has actually been remarkably successful at achieving its original objectives. A sign of its success is that the party leaders are comfortable returning to their original role as a KMT faction. The most common explanation that the NP rose when united and fell when divided by bitter factional struggles has been challenged. Instead I argue that when the NP faced a benign political environment in the mid-1990s, the NP's moderate political mes- sage and rich human resources enabled the party to grow rapidly. However, after March 1996, the political environment became progressively more hostile, and as the NP's resources were eroded and wasted and the party moved towards a narrow and extremist political project, the party began its terminal decline.
What of the future for the NP? The signs are not too promising. In the 2005 National Assembly election the NP won a meagre 0.9 percent of the vote and only three seats. It is unlikely that the party will retain the same degree of influence under the new KMT Chair Ma as it had under Lien. It is possible that the NP could benefit from a complete collapse of the PFP or a divided KMT due to disputes over the selection of the Pan Blue presidential candidate for 2008. However, there is no guarantee that the NP would be the one to pick up the pieces. The party will also face a further challenge in the 2007 legislative elections which will feature a halv- ing of the number of legislators and a new single-member district election system. Experience shows that the single-member district system will favour the established parties and squeeze the space for smaller parties, such as the NE Moreover, the
66 East Asia / Spring 2006
mini-revival of 2002 and 2004 has only served to highlight the NP's geographical weakness, in that the party is now only a Taipei-based party. A final possible posi- tive scenario for the NP is that there will be a substantial shift in public opinion regarding closer political and economic relations with the mainland. Here again, if the KMT maintains its current course as seen under Lien and Ma, it would be the KMT, not the NP, that would reap the benefits.
Notes
1. Ferdinand Muller-Rommel, "Ecology Parties in Western Europe," West European Politics 4 (1982), 72-74.
2. Piero Ignazi, "The Silent Counter-Revolution: Hypothesis on the Emergence of Extreme Right- Wing Parties in Europe," European Journal of PoliticalResearch 22:1 (1992), 2-34; Ferdinand Muller-Rommel and Geoffrey Pridham, eds, Small Parties in Western Europe: Comparative and National Perspectives (London: Sage, 1997).
3. Robert Harmel and John Robertson, "Formation and Success of New Parties: A Cross National Analysis," International Political Science Review 6:4 (1985), 501-523.
4. Paul Lucardie, "Prophets, Purifiers and Prolocutors," Par~ Politics 6, no. 2 (2000): 175-185. 5. United Daily News, November 28, 1992, 1. 6. China Times', December 12, 1992, 10. 7. Julian Baum, "The Hollow Centre," Far Eastern Economic Review, January 7, 1993, 14. 8. Ibid. 9. It was called the "three in one" election as the local executive, city council and legislative elec-
tions were held on the same day. 10. China Times, November 18, 1998. Available at China Times' online database 11, This point was
made by a number of disgruntled KMT politicians in 2001. 12. Lee Teng-hui, interview by author, Taipei, October 17, 2001. 13. Taipei Times editorial, "Ma Ying-jeou trying to dress up unification," Taipei Times, April 2, 2006,
8. 14. Huang Hui-chen, interview by author, Taipei, September 26, 2001. 15. Hsieh Chi-ta, interview by author, Kaohsiung, September 7, 2001. 16. Chien Ta, Yellow Flag, Broken Dreams (Taipei: Chien Ta Publishing, 1999), 125. 17. Yu Mu-ming, interview by author, Taipei, October 5, 2001. 18. Hsieh Chi-ta, interview by author, Kaohsiung, September 7, 2001. 19. Chien Ta, Yellow Flag, Broken Dreams (Taipei: Chien Ta Publishing, 1999). 20. Chien Ta, Yellow Flag, Broken Dreams (Taipei: Chien Ta Publishing, 1999), 28. 21. Yu Mu-ming, interview by author, Taipei, October 5, 2001. 22. Chien Ta, Yellow Flag, Broken Dreams (Taipei: Chien Ta Publishing, 1999), 64-65. 23. Yang Tai-shun, interview by author, Taipei, November 1, 2001. When Taiwanese analysts talk
of a left and right, this refers to a political spectrum in which the far left supports independence and the far right supports unification with the mainland.
24. United Daily News, November 11, 1993, 1. 25. China Times, November 27, 1994. Available at www.tol.com.tw (accessed May 15, 2005). 26. Chen Fang-ming, interview by author, Taipei, November 2, 2001. 27. China Times, November 18, 1995, 32. 28. Yang Tai-shun, interview by author, l November, 2001. 29. See NP ad. United Daily News, December 1, 1994, 20. 30. China Times, November 25, 1994, 12. 31. China Times, November 11, 1995, 21. 32. China Times, December 1, 1995, 32. 33. United Daily News, November 18 1995, 32. 34. China Times, November 28, 1995, 5. 35. United Daily News, November 25, 1995, 41. 36. United Daily News, March 17, 1996, 12.
Fell 67
37. United Daily News, March 8, 1996, 9. 38. Chu Kao-cheng, interview by author, Kaohsiung, October 9, 2001. 39. Yao Li-ming, interview by author, Kaohsiung, 3 December, 2004. 40. Dafydd Fell, "Party Change and the Democratic Evolution ofTaiwan," PhD dissertation, School
of Oriental and African Studies, (2003), Table 2.9. 41. United Daily News, November 27, 1998, 57. 42. ChienTa, 383. 43. China Times, December 6, 1998, 15. 44. Yang Tai-shun, interview by author, Taipei, November 1, 2001. 45. Point made by Feng Hu-hsiang, interview by author, Taipei, October, 2001. 46. Dafydd Fell (2003), Table 2.9. 47. Wu Chung-li, interview by author, Chiayi, November 12, 2001. 48. See NP ad at http://www.np.org.tw/article.asp?channelid=A22&serial=926 (accessed June 28,
2OO5). 49. Dafydd Fell (2003), Figure 5.5. 50. In both 1991 and 1996 the DPP suffered severe election setbacks when taking extreme Taiwan
independence positions. 51. Hsieh Chi-ta, interview by author, Kaohsiung, September 7, 2001. 52. Quoted in Shu Ya-wen, "Survival and Development of Issue Parties: A Study of the Green Party
of Germany and New Party of Taiwan as Examples," MA dissertation Graduate Institute of Political Science, National Sun Yat Sen University, (2003), 120.
53. Hsieh Chi-ta, interview by author, Kaohsiung, September 7, 2001. 54. Quoted in Shu Ya-wen, "Survival and Development of Issue Parties: A Study of the Green Party
of Germany and New Party of Taiwan as Examples," MA dissertation Graduate Institute of Political Science, National Sun Yat Sen University, (2003), 119.
55. NP party worker, interview by author, Kaohsiung, September 7, 200 l. 56. China Times, December 3, 1995, 11. 57. Shu Ya-wen, 119. 58. Hsieh Chi-ta, interview by author, Kaohsiung, September 7, 2001. 59. China Times', February 20, 1998, available from www.tol.com.tw (accessed June 27, 2005). 60. Hsieh Chi-ta, interview by author, Kaohsiung, September 7, 2001. 61. Ibid.
