Taiwan and Mainland China : Impacts of Economic Progress and International Environment on Political Trajectory in Comparative Perspective

While Taiwan’s democratization and China’s continuing authoritarianism have often been attributed to the decisions of their leaders, might there, instead, be external factors which have ensured that these two polities would have walked along more or less the same route that they have so far, regardless of who their rulers are? Questions as such make for a good basis of comparison between the two states and may offer a deeper insight into the facets of democracy and authoritarianism. Without contesting the relevance of other factors in influencing these two states’ political trajectories, this paper explores and evaluates the two most popular sets of factors – economic factors related to the modernization theory and those from the international environment including impacts from abroad on regime security and on domestic dissident movements – which have been put forward to explain Taiwan’s democratization versus China’s continuing authoritarianism