The Research Of Taiwan's Political Transition From The Legitimacy's View

Taiwan is an inalienable part of China. Taiwan's political development is the development of China's contemporary political system and a part of China's contemporary political changes. Cross-strait political developments are mutually interlinked. This paper takes the dialectical materialism and the historical materialism as the basic guiding ideology to explain Taiwan's history of political transition, using the legitimacy theory. The paper, taking the legitimacy foundation as a standpoint, firstly inspects the legitimacy foundation of the authoritarian system, the backing of Taiwan political transition, subsequently discusses the power of the political transition, trying hard to promulgate that the legitimacy crisis is the reason of Taiwan political transition, finally expounds that the process of political transition is also the process of reproduction of the legitimacy resources.The papert is divided into three chapters.The foreword part introduces the significance and methods of studying Taiwan's political transition,and outlines the basic state of Domestic and foreign researches on the legitimacy of the political transition, and elaborates the meanings of the core concepts ,such as legitimacy ,political transition and so on.Chapter I: Through the the analysis of the historical conditions of party-state authoritarian regime that the KMT established ,the paper has pointed out that the legitimacy of Taiwan's party-state authoritarian system is mainly built on the basis of the support of powerholders and the effectiveness.The external support of powerholders is the protection and support of USA in the military, ecnomic and international status. The in-house support of powerholders is the compromise of the interest of Taiwan's social elites and the KMT through the local elections. The effectiveness is the performance of rule that includes the high efficiency of the government's operation, the high economic growth and the improved lives of people. Chapter II: Through the study of Taiwan's economic, political, cultural, social development and changes, the paper has pointed out that Taiwan's political transition stems from a crisis of legitimacy. In the new social and historical conditions, the original basis for the legitimacy of political rule can not satisfy the needs of the political subject and the political object, and so a crisis of legitimacy appears: on the one hand, the ability of the political subject becomes weaker and weaker; on the other hand, the political object has the new benefit demands, that are not effectively satisfied in the framework of the existing system.Chapter III: Through analyzing the process of Taiwan's political transition, the paper has pointed out that the process of Taiwan's political transition is the process of reproducing the legitimacy resources. In the dual pressures of internal and external crisis,the KMT was forced to open the process of political transition. The KMT strengthened the inward legitimacy through the localization to add energy enhancing the effectiveness of political rule; The KMT expanded down the legitimacy through the liberalization and democratization and reshaped the relationship between state and society to obtain public recognition and support.Epilogue:The paper makes the general description of the research of Taiwan's political transition from the legitimacy's view.