China’s relation to Taiwan has been in constant contention since the founding of the People’s Republic of China in October 1949 and the creation of the defeated Kuomintang (KMT) exile regime on the island two months later. The island’s autonomous sovereignty has continually been challenged, initially because of the KMT’s insistence that it continue to represent not just Taiwan but all of China—and later because Taiwan refused to cede sovereignty to the then-dominant power that had arisen on the other side of the Taiwan Strait. One thing that makes Taiwan so politically difficult and yet so intellectually fascinating is that it is not merely a security problem, but a ganglion of interrelated puzzles. The optimistic hope of the Ma Ying-jeou administration for a new era of peace and cooperation foundered on a landslide victory by the Democratic Progressive Party, which has made clear its intent to distance Taiwan from China’s political embrace. The Taiwanese are now waiting with bated breath as the relationship tautens. Why did détente fail, and what chance does Taiwan have without it? Contributors to this volume focus on three aspects of the evolving quandary: nationalistic identity, social economy, and political strategy.
“Provides essential background for an understanding of both why the issues between Taiwan and China remain difficult to resolve and why that lack of resolution poses a potential threat to peace in the western Pacific area.” STEVEN GOLDSTEIN, Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies, Harvard University
LOWELL DITTMER is Professor of Political Science at the University of California, Berkeley. He is editor in chief of the journal Asian Survey and the author of Sino-Soviet Normalization and Its International Implications, China’s Quest for National Identity, China Under Modernization, and South Asia’s Nuclear Crisis.
The “Bastille Effect” refers to the unique ways that former sites of political imprisonment are transformed, physically and culturally. In their afterlives, these sites represent sustained efforts to hold perpetrators accountable for state violence. For that narrative to surface, the sites must be cleansed of their profane past. In some cases, clergy are even enlisted to perform purifying rituals that grant the sites a new identity as memorials. Around the globe, carceral sites have been dramatically repurposed into places of enlightenment that offer inspiring allegories of human rights. Interpreting the complexities of those common threads, this book weaves together a broad range of cultural, interdisciplinary, and critical thought to offer new insights into the study of political imprisonment, collective memory, and post-conflict societies.
“The scholarly work of Michael Welch is recognized for its blend of critical theory and human rights. The Bastille Effect is no exception. This book reveals the terrible depths— and pains—of political imprisonment.” KIERAN MCEVOY, Queen’s University, Belfast
“With compelling case studies, this wide-ranging book expands the significance of human rights to political imprisonment, technologies of power, and the meaning of memory.” DIEGO ZYSMAN QUIRÓS, University of Buenos Aires
“Welch’s highly original project on the afterlife of sites of political imprisonment throws new critical light onto the politics of punishment and represents an important contribution to the burgeoning study of comparative penality.” TIM NEWBURN, London School of Economics
MICHAEL WELCH is Professor of Criminal Justice at Rutgers University and Visiting Professor at the Mannheim Centre for Criminology in the Department of Social Policy at the London School of Economics. He is the author of several books, including Escape to Prison: Penal Tourism and the Pull of Punishment.