Delegates from Taiwan, China and the United States kicked off the five-day "Strait Talk" symposium on the status and future of Taiwan Wednesday night with a speech from an Asian policy scholar on "Untying the Knot? U.S.-China-Taiwan Relations."
Five delegates each from Taiwan, China and the United States were chosen by application to participate in lectures, panel discussions and workshops that will last throughout the weekend. The delegates will meet behind closed doors so they can discuss the decade-long tension over Taiwan openly and honestly, said Annie Wang '07, a speaker and travel coordinator for the event.
"Awareness is just so important," said Wang, who hopes that the delegates will have productive dialogue and that the symposium will "expand our knowledge to global situations."
The Strait Talk symposium has been in the making for over a year and was initiated and organized by Brown students. The event is co-sponsored by the Brown Journal of World Affairs, the Brown Chinese Students Association and the Brown Taiwan Society.
Richard Bush, the director of the Center for Northeast Asian Policy Studies and the Michael H. Armacost chair at the Brookings Institute, discussed the political status of Taiwan in the "Strait Talk" convocation in C.W. Starr Auditorium. Bush has been working in the field of U.S.-Asia relations for over 30 years.
The purpose of Bush's speech was to discuss "the issue at large" at the symposium, Wang said. The major debate is over the possible sovereignty of Taiwan, which is currently a territory of the Republic of China. Bush outlined the history of Taiwan, which has been under the influence of China, Japan and the United States for the past three centuries.
Taiwan's recent democratization allowed for new ideas about the relation of Taiwan to mainland China to be voiced and for "the seeds of opposition" to be sown, Bush said. China views the possible secession of Taiwan as a threat to the legitimacy of its communist government and is likely "not to back down for fear of losing face," he said.
Bush described the tension between China and Taiwan as an issue of sovereignty versus security. The problem is "most profound in the political realm," he said.
The tension over the Taiwan strait is "quite a paradox," as nearly all of the people living in Taiwan are ethnic Chinese and many Taiwanese live full time on the mainland, he said. China and Taiwan are "natural partners" economically, due to the extensive trade and investments between the two, he said.
The United States plays a complex and delicate role in this issue - it currently recognizes the Chinese president instead of Taiwan's, but it is helping Taiwan make itself more militarily capable, Bush said. He said that the United States should act as a mediator and an "intellectual facilitator" between the two groups, since "each side is so suspicious of the other." However, he also believes that the United States should start this process and then withdraw, so that the nations will not become dependent on it for diplomacy.
Bush defended U.S. diplomatic policy when an audience member asked if the United States may be involving itself in the issue of Taiwanese sovereignty because of its hopes for a sovereign Iraq. "The U.S. always does things on a case-by-case basis," he said.
The delegates expressed a hopeful and enthusiastic attitude toward the event. The discussion was "wonderful," according to Sophia Y of the Hopkins University China Center, adding that she hopes that Strait Talk will promote the "peaceful resolution of the issue in the future."
The student organizers of the symposium garnered much praise. They took "incredible initiative" and were "responsible entirely" for the event, according to Professor of Political Science P. Terrence Hopmann, who introduced Bush.
