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UC Riverside UC Riverside Electronic Theses and Dissertations Title Liberalization, Economic Dependence, and the Paradox of Taiwan’s Press Freedom Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/3j53d4r1 Author Huang, Jaw-Nian Publication Date 2016 License https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ 4.0 Peer reviewed|Thesis/dissertation eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA RIVERSIDE Liberalization, Economic Dependence, and the Paradox of Taiwan’s Press Freedom A Dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Political Science by Jaw-Nian Huang December 2016 Dissertation Committee: Dr. John W. Cioffi, Chairperson Dr. John Christian Laursen Dr. Bronwyn Anne Leebaw Dr. Perry Link Copyright by Jaw-Nian Huang 2016 The Dissertation of Jaw-Nian Huang is approved: Committee Chairperson University of California, Riverside ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to express my deepest appreciation to my committee chair, Dr. John W. Cioffi, who encouraged me and supported me at every point during my doctoral study. Without his guidance, this dissertation would not have been possible. I also wish to show my sincere gratitude to my committee members, Dr. John Christian Laursen, Dr. Bronwyn Anne Leebaw, and Dr. Perry Link, who provided expertise and insight that greatly ameliorated the research. I am moreover grateful to Dr. Rwei-ren Wu and Dr. Jieh-min Wu for their comments on an earlier version of the manuscript. Certainly, any errors are my own and should not tarnish the reputations of these esteemed persons. Also, I thank every interviewee of this dissertation who shared his or her inside stories that enhanced the credibility and readability of the research. I especially recognize the valuable help of San-tai Hsieh, Sylvia Feng, Yun-Kung Ting, Rwei-ren Wu, Yung- Mau Chao, Eve Chiu, Zi-chun Feng, Dong-Shi Lu, and Wan-Ling Yen in introducing me to important interviewees. I also thank the Ministry of Education in Taiwan, the Institute of Taiwan History at Academia Sinica in Taiwan, and the Chiang Ching-kuo Foundation for International Scholarly Exchange for their financial and physical support. Last but not least, I would like to note that this dissertation was completed two months after my son Ethan was born. I wish to express my warmest regards to my Mom and Dad, family members, and friends. My families always supported me both materially and spiritually. I would also like to pay special thanks to my wife Lilian. It is wholeheartedly expressed that your company, patience, and encouragement proved to be a necessary motivation towards the accomplishment of my end goal. iv ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION Liberalization, Economic Dependence, and the Paradox of Taiwan’s Press Freedom by Jaw-Nian Huang Doctor of Philosophy, Graduate Program in Political Science University of California, Riverside, December 2016 Dr. John W. Cioffi, Chairperson As a successful third-wave democracy in East Asia, why did Taiwan’s press freedom improve along with democratization in the 1990s but instead deteriorate after the second peaceful turnover of power in 2008 which symbolized democratic consolidation? Considering the liberal view in international relations, why did Taiwan’s press freedom make significant improvements accompanying Taiwan’s close economic connections with the US during the Cold War, only to become eroded when Taiwan recently developed deeper economic ties with China? This study offers a political economy explanation of the development and degradation of freedom of the press in Taiwan from 1949 through 2015 from both international and domestic perspectives. At the international level, it argues that a state’s press freedom should improve or deteriorate, when it depends economically on a liberal or repressive hegemon. Material self-interest and norm diffusion are proposed as the causal mechanisms to connect economic dependence to the degree of press freedom. At the domestic level, the argument is that a state tends to have a low or high level of press freedom, when its government plays a more or less interventionist role in the market v economy. State control and market co-optation are proposed as the mechanisms to establish the causal linkages between the state’s economic role and the level of media freedom. With archival and interview data gathered in Taiwan, historical institutionalism has been adopted as the analytical approach and both multiple within-case comparisons and process tracing as the research methods to investigate the case of Taiwan. Filling the gaps within existing scholarship, the case study supports the proposed theory and implies that 1) state power is not the only threat to freedom of the press, but corporate organizations and market forces may also play a role in curtailing or circumscribing it, 2) cross-national economic connections do not always benefit domestic practice regarding human and civil rights, but may cause damage to it on occasions when relations of economic interdependence involve more powerful authoritarian countries, and 3) norms may not only diffuse from liberal contexts to repressive states, but repressive norms are also likely to diffuse from more powerful authoritarian countries to more liberal but politically and economically weaker countries via the mechanism of transnational corporations. Given the growing concerns about the potential impacts that China’s economic rise might have on human rights and democracy around the world, this study especially deserves attention from democratic countries which have increasing economic linkages with China. Keywords: Economic dependence, the state’s economic role, norm diffusion, human rights, freedom of the press, Taiwan vi CONTENTS INTRODUCTION.......................................................................................................................... 1 I. Research Question .............................................................................................................. 1 II. The Concept of Press Freedom ........................................................................................... 7 III. Literature Review .............................................................................................................. 10 IV. Research Overview ........................................................................................................... 22 RESEARCH DESIGN ................................................................................................................. 28 I. International-level Explanation......................................................................................... 29 II. Domestic-level Explanation .............................................................................................. 35 III. Historical Institutionalism: An Analytical Framework ....................................................... 39 IV. Methods and Data ............................................................................................................ 44 THE COLD WAR AND AUTHORITARIAN CONTROL OVER THE MEDIA, 1949- 1988 ............................................................................................................................................... 50 I. The State’s Internal and External Economic Relations ..................................................... 50 II. Economic Interventionism and Media Institutions in Taiwan .......................................... 59 III. Economic Dependence on the US and Media Institutions in Taiwan ............................... 72 IV. Summary: Media Institutions and the Underdevelopment of Press Freedom ................ 89 NEOLIBERALISM AND THE MARKETIZATION OF THE MEDIA, 1988-2008 ............ 93 I. The State’s Internal and External Economic Relations ..................................................... 93 II. Economic Dependence on the US and Media Institutions in Taiwan ............................. 101 vii III. Economic Liberalization and Media Institutions in Taiwan ............................................ 114 IV. Summary: Media Institutions and the Improvements in Press Freedom ....................... 130 CHINA’S ECONOMIC RISE AND ITS INFLUENCE ON TAIWAN’S MEDIA, 2008- 2015 ............................................................................................................................................. 134 I. The State’s Internal and External Economic Relations ................................................... 134 II. Economic Dependence on China and Media Institutions in Taiwan .............................. 141 III. Economic Openness to China and Media Institutions in Taiwan ................................... 162 IV. Summary: Media Institutions and the Degradation of Press Freedom .......................... 177 CONCLUSION .......................................................................................................................... 181 I. Economic Dependence and Taiwan’s Press Freedom .................................................... 184 II. The State’s Economic Role and Taiwan’s Press Freedom ............................................... 186 III. General Discussion of Research Findings ........................................................................ 188 IV. Theoretical and Empirical Implications ........................................................................... 193 BIBLIOGRAPHY .....................................................................................................................