Now we will discuss the last part of our class, which is the law of the post World War II, ROC regime. How did ROC or the KMT came to Taiwan? After defeat of Japan in World War II, Republic of China, which is the official name of Taiwan or we call ROC, under the administration of Chinese Nationalist Party or Kuomintang, we call it KMT, acquired Taiwan as province as a part of China in 1945. In terms of population, the Japanese who had been living in Taiwan was repatriated by the KMT back to Japan. Also, they were about 2 million people, migrates from China with KMT between 1945 and the 1949, especially when the KMT were defeated by the Communist Party during the Civil War in China. These people were categorized by the KMT as Mainlander or 外省人 and those who had been inhibited in Taiwan before 1945, including Han Taiwanese or Han Chinese, and the intellectual people were called Native Taiwanese or 本省人 in mandarin KMT as the new
ruler also brought their law, the ROC to Taiwan. You might wonder again, what kind of law did the KMT introduced to Taiwan. Before governing Taiwan, the KMT followed the example of Meiji Japan to establish a modern Western legal system to eliminate the Western extraterritoriality, party, and they build a modern nation state. So there are several code modeled on European code. Again, especially on the German code, influenced by Japanese jurisprudence are corrugated between 1920 and the mid 1930, such as Civil Code, Criminal Code, Constitutional Law. However, this code was hardly enforced in China due to the chaos of continuous war. We can say these code were born in China, but actually grews in Taiwan after the ROC regime came to Taiwan. Let's back to post-war Taiwan. There were actually three period in a post-war ROC legal regime. The first is a quite short but crucial transitional period. Now, ROC though was applicable to everyone, regardless Mainlander, 外省人 or Native Taiwanese 本省人 in undiscriminating way. There's no more, legal [inaudible] in this period. In reality, the high-ranking officials, such as judges were almost always Mainlander who fill the vacancy of the Japanese colonist. In 1947, Native Taiwanese protested against the discrimination and the misrule of KMT. The response of KMT, just like that of the Japanese colonist 50 years ago, was a brutal military massacres. The follow-up reception silence the entire Civil Society for the next 40 years. Of course, in this period, there was no social movement. This period was also known as the period of White Terror. The second period was the law of authoritarian regime. The period began, as we indicated earlier, when ROC government moved to Taiwan due to the defeat of KMT in a Chinese Civil War. Interesting aspect on the international law, However, as a result, the Taiwan or the ROC on Taiwan became a de factostate in late 1949 because it was an independent sovereign state on this island. Although as we introduced earlier, ROC was model on modern Western law in the area of constitutional law, judiciary and the criminal justice, the element of western liberalism in ROC law were reduced. The most famous example is that, the term limit of the president was removed, meaning that the President can be president for the entire life. The second example is that, the election for the Congress members was suspended due to the national emergency. Similarly, this members can be congress members for life, or we call it a tenure congress members. The last example, which is also quite famous, is The Martial law in Taiwan, which lasts 38 years, which was once the longest Martial law era for the entire world. In Martial law period, Martial law limited freedom of speech and association. However, in other areas such as civil law and the commercial law, the enforcement was actually quite successful. The reason for the successful enforcement of civil and the commercial law, was due to the legacy of legal modernization in a Japanese period and the prosper economy in Taiwan during the 1960 and '70. Also, in the era of family law, the ROC Family Law actually brought more gender equal role to Taiwan. Moreover, American law was transplanted to Taiwan in this period. In 1950, the ROC joined the Cold War camp led by the US. Therefore, American Legal Institution and the ideas such as Chattel Secured Transaction Law were imported to Taiwan. The last point is, since the late 1970s, new generation of Taiwanese intellectual and political descent, who were also influenced by Western legal idea, began to demand political and legal reforms. The third and the last period was liberalization and democratization of law. Lifting of martial law in 1987 marked the beginning of this period. In the previous period, the Constitutional Court was to legitimate rather than constrain the authoritarian regime. However, in this period, the Constitutional Court gradually used their power to dismantle authoritarian government structure and to protect personal liberty. In 1991, the Constitutional Court rule that all tenure congress member must be retired. Then January election of Congress on a regular basis was held. Between 1991 and 2005, there were five constitutional revision, which we focus, among many other thing and transforming our dictatorship president election. Between 1991 and 2005, there were seven Constitutional revision which focused on, among many other thing, transforming a dictatorship presidential system into a democratic one. Therefore, the term limits of President was re-instituted, meaning that they won't be president for life. Also, the first direct presidential election was held in 1996. The first party turnover took place in 2000, when the Democratic Progressive Party, or DPP, defeat the KMT in the presidential election and the ended KMT's 55 years ruling. After that, Taiwan had a two more turnover respectfully, in 2008 and 2016. The total three successful and peaceful transition showing that Taiwan's achievement in democratic development. Last but not least, alongside the democratization of Taiwan order emergence of social movements since 1980s. Mainly movement push for legal reforms. Human rights group, for example, demand a more gender equal family law. Another example is Indigenous movement, which demand new legislation to rule in state. They are traditional territory, identity and culture.
