Politics
· Thirty years of Taiwan's democratic experiment — institutions, power structures, and why democratic infrastructure is more than voting 18 articles Updated 2026-10-10Featured
- Standard article2026-10
2026 Nine-in-One Elections: Stress Testing Democratic Infrastructure in the Era of AI Cognitive Warfare
On November 28, 2026, all 22 counties and municipalities across Taiwan will hold elections for nine positions simultaneously, electing over 11,000 local executives and representatives. This election is unlike any before it—the difference is not in the candidates, but in the environment in which it occurs: the CCP's upgraded national AI cognitive warfare, 123+ fake news websites, and prosecutors including AI disinformation as one of their four key focuses. This article is not an election information summary, but an analysis of the historical positioning and structural pressures of this election.
39 ~18 min - Standard article2026-07
Indigenous District Chiefs in Special Municipalities: The Elected Autonomous Office Preserved by the 2014 Municipal Upgrade Amendment
On December 25, 2014, the day Taoyuan was upgraded to a special municipality, the township mayor of Fuxing was about to lose elected status — a side effect of municipal upgrading is the erosion of indigenous self-governance. The Legislative Yuan fast-tracked an amendment to the Local Government Act, creating the new position of 'Mountain Indigenous District within a Special Municipality,' allowing all former mountain indigenous townships within the six special municipalities to continue electing their district chiefs and district representatives. There are six such districts nationwide, encompassing mountain and forest villages where Atayal, Bunun, Tsou, Rukai, Hakka, and Hoklo communities live side by side. This is the concrete implementation at the local governance level of the Additional Articles of the Constitution mandating the 'active preservation and development of indigenous cultures.'
34 ~12 min - Evolving · community2026-08
Taiwan's Election Rally Culture and Stage Truck Aesthetics: A Sociological Observation from "Dong Suan" to Democratic Carnival
Every election, Taiwan's streets transform into a massive democratic theater. From the Transformers-like aesthetics of stage trucks and the smoky scent of democratic sausages to the legal threshold of a 30-dollar bento box, this unique election rally culture is not only a tool for political mobilization but also a profound microcosm of Taiwan's vernacular vitality and social change.
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Electoral System 11
- Standard article
Indigenous District Chiefs in Special Municipalities: The Elected Autonomous Office Preserved by the 2014 Municipal Upgrade Amendment
On December 25, 2014, the day Taoyuan was upgraded to a special municipality, the township mayor of Fuxing was about to lose elected status — a side effect of municipal upgrading is the erosion of indigenous self-governance. The Legislative Yuan fast-tracked an amendment to the Local Government Act, creating the new position of 'Mountain Indigenous District within a Special Municipality,' allowing all former mountain indigenous townships within the six special municipalities to continue electing their district chiefs and district representatives. There are six such districts nationwide, encompassing mountain and forest villages where Atayal, Bunun, Tsou, Rukai, Hakka, and Hoklo communities live side by side. This is the concrete implementation at the local governance level of the Additional Articles of the Constitution mandating the 'active preservation and development of indigenous cultures.'
- Standard article
The Councilor System: Why It Differs from the Legislator System, and SNTV's 30 Years in Local Politics
In 2008, legislators switched to the single-member district two-vote system, while that same year's city and county councilor elections still used the SNTV system from the 1980s — the same country, the same voters, different offices on the same ballot, yet governed by two entirely different sets of rules. This is not a bug; it is the greatest unfinished business in Taiwan's electoral reform history, bound up with local factions, party interests, and the costs of complementary reforms. A structural map of how the two systems operate, why one was reformed and the other was not, and what this means for small parties and diverse representation.
- Standard article
Election Process: From Empty Ballot Box to Late-Night Counting, a Nationwide Democratic Ritual
Taiwan's elections are internationally renowned for their extremely transparent "manual counting". From the ceremonial display of an empty ballot box before voting to the process where each ballot is raised and called out during counting, this is not only about electing leaders but also a cornerstone for building social trust.
- Standard article
Village Chief System: 7,748 Elected Heads, Taiwan’s Most Grassroots Political Unit
A 5:30 a.m. village office, a monthly administrative subsidy of NT$45,000, over 60 % non‑partisan — the village chief is the political position that looks least like “politics” in Taiwan’s elections, and the most complete evidence of Taiwan’s democratization. From the Japanese‑era Baojia system to direct elections in 1950, this nationwide total of 7,748 positions—more than the number of 7‑Eleven stores—has been operating as a local‑relationship agency for eight decades.
- Standard article
Voting Rights Thresholds Through History: From 20 to 18, Two Decades of Unfinished Constitutional Reform
On November 26, 2022, at 4 p.m., polling-station staff across Taiwan began opening ballot boxes for the constitutional amendment referendum—the first time since 2005 that a constitutional amendment had run the full process. With 5.64 million agreeing and 5.02 million disagreeing (53% approval), it still fell short of the threshold requiring a majority of all eligible voters (9.62 million). This traces the structural reasons behind Taiwan's voting age remaining unchanged for 75 years, from Article 130 of the 1947 Constitution to the failed 2022 referendum.
- Standard article
Election Bulletins: The State-Distributed Baseline of Fairness, and the Split-Stream of Candidate-Funded Campaign Literature
That thick bulletin every voter receives before casting a ballot is the product of design evolution accumulated since 1980. The split-stream logic — state-distributed vs. candidate-funded — separates 'what candidates want to say' from the influence of advertisers. It is the cheapest and most overlooked piece of Taiwan's democratic infrastructure.
- Standard article
What Are the Nine-in-One Elections? Nine Offices, Four Upgrades, and Three Decades of Local Self-Governance Evolution
The term 'Nine-in-One' was first widely used in 2014, built on four waves of municipal restructuring — the 1967 upgrade of Taipei and Kaohsiung, the 1979 Kaohsiung upgrade, the 2010 Five Municipalities upgrade, and the 2014 Taoyuan upgrade — alongside three institutional milestones: the first direct election of special municipality mayors in 1994, the consolidation under the Local Government Act in 1999, and the creation of mountain indigenous district mayors in 2014. Nine offices voted on a single day — special municipality mayors / special municipality councilors / county and city mayors / county and city councilors / township and city mayors / township and city councilors / mountain indigenous district mayors / mountain indigenous district councilors / village and borough wardens — represent the accumulated crystallization of three decades of Taiwan's local self-governance evolution.
- Standard article
The CEC System: A Counterintuitive Design of Dual Executive-Legislative Checks
The Central Election Commission's members are nominated by the Premier and confirmed by the Legislative Yuan. When the ruling party holds a minority in the legislature, nominations may be difficult to pass. This design, which forces the two political branches to check each other, is the last structural safeguard of electoral fairness in Taiwan — not a bug.
- Evolving · community
309 Village Head Books: Challengers Spending 30,000 or 120,000 See a 30% Win Rate
A novice from Taifeng Township, Changhua City, who received 732 votes in 2022 and paid 3,275 NTD for their own campaign. Out of the 13,988 village head candidates nationwide that year, only 309 submitted political donation books to the Control Yuan. When comparing these 309 books with election results, the success rate for challengers without incumbent status who spent under 30,000 NTD and those who spent over 120,000 NTD were both around 30%—the amount of money reveals how long someone has operated in the village, but it is difficult to turn a challenger into a village head.
- Evolving · community
The First Direct Presidential Election: Missiles, Ballots, and the Institutionalization of Taiwan
In 1996, Taiwan held its first direct presidential election by popular vote. Institutional reform, the Wild Lily Student Movement, and the Taiwan Strait military crisis converged on a single ballot, embedding democracy into the daily life of institutions beyond voting day.
- Evolving · community
Voting from Absence in Taiwan: The Visible Cost of Traveling Home, the Harder-to-Calculate Cost of Trust
Most voters in Taiwan still must return to their registered household location to vote, but election officials already have limited absentee voting options for work locations, and a new voting system for Indigenous peoples will be implemented in the 2026 local elections. From the estimated 8,896 types of ballots in the Nine-In-One elections to the different risks of mail, transfer, and early voting, this article breaks down how absentee voting lowers the barrier to returning home, why trust in ballot custody, secret voting, and public vote counting must be rebuilt, and compares a progressively verifiable path forward.
Political Culture 3
- Evolving · community
The Joyful Impossible Party: Coriander Cake, the Yuzu List, and a Political Experiment That Never Completed Its Legal Registration
In November 2019, Chiu Wei-jie, Chang Chih-chi, and Chen Tzu-chien brought a coriander cake to their founding convention and listed a Shiba Inu named Yuzu on their proportional representation list. They claimed they wanted to lower the political threshold through humor, but the experiment stalled at the legal procedural stage when the party failed to complete its incorporation registration within one year of filing.
- Evolving · community
Come on, Come on, What Now, What Now: How a Slogan Switched Sides in the Great Recall and Entered the Taipei Mayoral Race
On June 28, 2025, groups recalling Wang Hung-wei used the slogan "Come on, come on, what now, what now, great recall, great success" on the streets of Dazhi. While Wang claims originality, critics cite a Legislative Yuan provocation; however, no independent video proves the origin. After the vote failed, the same phrase was repurposed by the anti-recall camp and entered the 2026 Taipei mayoral race.
- Standard article
Pets of Taiwan’s Presidents: From Authoritarian Wolfdogs in the Official Residence to the Social Resonance of the “First Cat”
In 1951, a wolfdog entered the Shilin Official Residence as Chiang Kai-shek’s guard; seventy years later, Tsai Ing-wen moved into the residence with her rescued cat, Think Think. From military dogs symbolizing authoritarian vigilance to rescued dogs and cats representing social concern, the changing pets of Taiwan’s presidents have, almost unintentionally, sketched the island’s democratic trajectory from strongman politics toward pluralism and equality.
Others 4
- Standard article
2026 Nine-in-One Elections: Stress Testing Democratic Infrastructure in the Era of AI Cognitive Warfare
On November 28, 2026, all 22 counties and municipalities across Taiwan will hold elections for nine positions simultaneously, electing over 11,000 local executives and representatives. This election is unlike any before it—the difference is not in the candidates, but in the environment in which it occurs: the CCP's upgraded national AI cognitive warfare, 123+ fake news websites, and prosecutors including AI disinformation as one of their four key focuses. This article is not an election information summary, but an analysis of the historical positioning and structural pressures of this election.
- Evolving · community
Taiwan's Election Rally Culture and Stage Truck Aesthetics: A Sociological Observation from "Dong Suan" to Democratic Carnival
Every election, Taiwan's streets transform into a massive democratic theater. From the Transformers-like aesthetics of stage trucks and the smoky scent of democratic sausages to the legal threshold of a 30-dollar bento box, this unique election rally culture is not only a tool for political mobilization but also a profound microcosm of Taiwan's vernacular vitality and social change.
- Standard article
Political Donation Transparency: The Control Yuan Platform, g0v Visualization, and 22 Years of Openness Infrastructure
Open the Control Yuan's political donation public search platform, enter any candidate's name, and you can find out who gave them money, how much, and what campaign activities the funds went toward. This infrastructure didn't fall from the sky — it was built step by step through the 2004 Political Donations Act, the 2008 platform launch, the 2017 data-openness agreement between the CEC and the Control Yuan, and a decade of g0v engineers filling in with visualization tools — one law at a time, one accounting report at a time, one civic engineer at a time.
- Evolving · community
The Indigenous Name Rectification Movement: From "Mountain Natives" to a Collective Subject in the Constitution
The 1990s Indigenous name rectification movement was ostensibly about changing a label, but in reality, it demanded state recognition of who has the right to name, who can serve as a political subject, and whose land and autonomy must be institutionalized. From the founding of the Taiwan Indigenous Rights Promotion Association in 1984 to the constitutional amendment struggles of 1991 and 1992, and finally to the inscription of "Indigenous" (1994) and "Indigenous Peoples" (1997) in the Constitution, this history was driven by tribal organizations, churches, delegates to the National Convention, legislators, and extra-institutional protests, with institutional traces preserving the process of mutual tension.