Organizer and Chair: Wenfang Tang, University of Pittsburgh
Discussant: Yun-han Chu, National Taiwan University
The separate histories of mainland China, Taiwan and Hong Kong over the past decades provide a rare opportunity to examine the socio-political consequences of differing economic and political environments. There were a few similar opportunities in decades past in comparisons between Western and Eastern Europe. However, these opportunities were less utilized than one might have hoped, and they are fast disappearing as Eastern European societies move towards their Western market brethren. The contrast between mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong provides one of the last great opportunities to compare societies which share a common historical culture but divergent recent experience.
The papers in this panel each make explicit comparisons between these societies. The first paper compares the sorting process from junior high school to academic and vocational tracks at senior high school level in Taichung, Taiwan, and Wuhan, Hubei province. The second paper compares religious practices and the role of religion in shaping social, economic and political attitudes in Taiwan and 45 mainland Chinese cities. The papers by Tianjian Shi and Yu-han Chu compare political participation and the transformation of civil culture in the mainland, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. The next paper examines the role of media in dealing with political opposition in the two societies. The last paper discusses the reform of state industries in the mainland and Taiwan.
With the recent explosion of social surveys in these societies, the possibility for systematic comparison is greater now than ever before. The papers in this panel use data from parallel questionnaire surveys from the three societies or in-depth field research materials. Our goal is to track both newly emergent change trajectories and the consequences of different economic and political environments over the last four decades in these societies.
Making the Cut: Educational Attainment in Urban China and Taiwan
C. Montgomery Broaded, University of Pittsburgh
Every summer in both mainland China and Taiwan, the most recent crop of junior high school graduates faces an institutional sorting process-the entrance examinations for senior high school-that will profoundly affect their subsequent educational and occupational opportunities. In both societies, after nine years of compulsory schooling with a largely standardized curriculum, the student stream is decisively separated at the senior high school level into academic and vocational tracks. Who ends up where in this process, and why?
In this paper I draw on extensive questionnaire data (supplemented with school records) from parallel surveys conducted in 1992 in the cities of Wuhan, Hubei Province (n = 670), and Taichung, Taiwan (n = 1,564), to compare urban educational attainment processes in the two societies. I am particularly interested in the influence of family background characteristics (parental levels of education, occupation, income, and political standing) and gender on the formation of educational aspirations and on actual educational attainments. I also explore the impact of structural features of the education systems themselves, including: (a) the practice, common to both societies, of assigning students to class-groups (banji) according to assessments of their academic ability; and (b) differences between the two societies in the proportions of the relevant age cohorts able to continue into higher education.
Religion and Society in Taiwan and the Mainland
Wenfang Tang, University of Pittsburgh
This study contains two parts. In the first half, I compare the characteristics of religion in Taiwan and mainland cities in four areas: (l) the popularity of major world religions and Chinese folk religions; (2) individual attitudes toward religion, such as the belief of life after death and the importance of religion in life; (3) religious behaviors, such as church attendance, ancestor worship, use of geomancy and auspicious dates; and (4) individual background conditions (age, education, gender, occupation, etc.) related to religious attitude and behavior. In part two, I compare the impact of religion on four other areas of individual attitude and behavior: (1) politics-political participation and attitudes toward authorities; (2) economy-importance of money and choice between security and opportunity; (3) society-family relations, friendship, and neighborhood and community ties; and (4) individual psychological well-being and life satisfaction. The purpose of these comparisons is to trace the consequences of the different institutional environments and diverse recent experiences in Taiwan and the mainland.
Data will be drawn from two surveys, the 1992 Chinese Urban Social Survey in 45 cities, and the 1990 Taiwan Social Change Survey. Both are based on probability samples. They contain parallel questions on attitude and behavior related to the above issues and individual background information. Since both surveys were also designed to provide comparison with the annual General Social Survey (GSS) in the United States, I will use data from the GSS survey to make further comparisons.
The Transformation of Civic Culture in Mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong
Yun-han Chu, National Taiwan University
This paper examines both the convergence and divergence of civic cultures in three Chinese societies-mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. We compare the contours of civic cultures across the three localities in terms of nationalism, moralism, belief in democratic values, political trust and efficacy, and political involvement. We then trace the cultural, socio-economic and institutional sources for cross-system as well as inter-generational differences in patterns of political belief and attitude. The empirical analysis is based on three comparable surveys conducted respectively in mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong during 1994-95 under the auspice of Political Participation and Political Culture in Mainland China, Taiwan and Hong Kong Project.
Coping with Socio-Political Change: A Comparison of the Media in China and Taiwan
Ran Wei, Chinese University of Hong Kong
This study compares the changing role of the media and its relationship with political power in two Chinese societies co-existing on both sides of the Taiwan Strait. The media on either side of the Taiwan Strait used to share striking similarities in their relations to power-either being integrated or co-opted into an authoritarian system. Nevertheless, differences of the kind existed. Operating in a free-market economy, Taiwan's media had to attend their business concerns. Thus, they have been fully market-oriented with the presence of constant competition. By comparison, political goals always overrode economic considerations in China's media.
Using data from the 1992 urban social survey in mainland China and the 1990 social change survey in Taiwan, this study continues to investigate the consequences of the unprecedented yet differing political, economic and social changes for these similarities and differences in the media between China and Taiwan. Their path seems further diverging. The democratization of Taiwan has contributed to the making of the media as an institution in its own right, acting back upon political and social forces. In contrast, China's media have show some market dynamism, but the absence of sweeping political reforms has prevented them from playing an independent role in public affairs.
States, Markets, and Industry: State Enterprise Reform in Taiwan and China
Elizabeth M. Freund, University of Richmond
This paper compares methods of reforming state industry in Taiwan and China. Taiwan has embarked on an ambitious program of privatization of key national industries. China on the other hand has chosen to marketize large state industry. Under marketization, the behavior of state firms becomes market-oriented, but the firms continue to be owned by the state. While much of the current literature on transitioning economies has focused on privatization of state industry, I argue that marketization is an alternative to privatization of state industry. Drawing on research conducted at the Taiwan's China Steel Corporation and China's Baoshan Iron and Steel Works (Baogang), I argue that privatization is suitable for China Steel, but not for Baogang. For transitioning economies such as China where it is often politically difficult to privatize state industry, marketization is an alternative method of reform.