In his second inaugural address on May 20, 2004, ROC President Chen Shui-bian said, "I have always believed that there is no such thing as a great president, for only a great people can create a great country."
One obvious measure of how great a people are is how free their society is. On this count, the Taiwanese people must be recognized as possessing greatness: Though they emerged from authoritarian rule and began building a genuine democracy less than two decades ago, their country is the freest in Asia, according to the 700-page "Freedom in the World 2006 - The Annual Survey of Political Rights and Civil Liberties," published by Freedom House.
Like most other peoples in the world struggling to compete in the age of globalization, however, the Taiwanese people are just beginning to come to grips with another key element that makes for a truly great people: their willingness--and even eagerness--to welcome newcomers into their national family.
Offering citizenship to foreigners who love Taiwan and call it home is more than a mark of broad-mindedness. It is a matter of enlightened self-interest, an essential requirement for making swift progress on all fronts both at home and in the international arena. While several reasons can be cited to explain why the United States is powerful, one of the most important is its desire and ability to continually attract talented people from all over the planet by offering them U.S. citizenship along with a good living environment.
The United States is famous, of course, as a society of people most of whose ancestors arrived with little more than the shirts on their backs. "Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free," reads the well-known sonnet penned by poet Emma Lazarus in 1883, giving voice to the "silent lips" of the Statue of Liberty, the "Mother of Exiles" who has welcomed millions of new arrivals onto America's shores.
While America is still a refuge to the oppressed, the numbers of legally admitted poor immigrants have dwindled in recent decades. Reflecting that change, one might revise Lady Liberty's plea to read, "Give me your best, your brightest, your richest."
And the world eagerly obliges. The parents of tens of thousands of Taiwan's brightest university graduates have ponied up the out-of-sight tuition fees demanded by U.S. schools so that their children can receive prestigious advanced degrees. Later, a large proportion of them stay on, helping to keep America powerful in return for U.S. citizenship and a bright future for their progeny. America has a good thing going on, skimming the cream off the entire world, including Taiwan, at little or no cost to itself.
Taiwan can do the same. It has much to offer and is a magnet for talented, idealistic people from every continent, who fall in love with the beautiful island and its people. As one might expect from adventurers from advanced countries who enjoy the stimulation of new environments, they are typically animated by the urge to innovate, matched by a global vision that makes them especially valuable. As a group, they make significant contributions to the country, and they could make much greater ones if only Taiwan would let them become Taiwanese and allow them total freedom to develop as they please.
Alas, Taiwan's laws seem expressly designed to ensure that no outsider--anyone who is not of the Han Chinese racial group--will ever be welcomed into the family, and to make it all but impossible for them to develop their potential in any but a few narrow channels. This is true even if they marry and have children with Taiwanese.
While the immigration authorities of the world's advanced Western countries constantly adjust their rules and regulations to better compete in the rush to recruit skilled people, Taiwan has moved in the opposite direction. For example, under the June 2005 revision of the ROC Nationality Law, which enshrined earlier practice into law, applicants for citizenship are required to first renounce their original citizenship and risk becoming stateless persons, even though they have no automatic guarantee that citizenship will be forthcoming.
America's experience has shown that newcomers to the United States are among the most passionate defenders of its welfare and core principles. Similarly, many are the foreigners who, after living in Taiwan for a number of years, have come to feel that same passion about their adopted home.
The government and people of Taiwan are worrying themselves sick about myriad problems: the nation's declining birth rate, its shortfalls of various types of professionals, its exclusion from the United Nations, the ongoing threat posed by a totalitarian China bent on annexing it, the immaturity of its democracy and civil society, and the need to inject creative energy into its economy, education system and interaction with the world. Granting citizenship to immigrants from all over the globe who dearly love Taiwan will harness a powerful force to deal more effectively with these and all other problems.
--James Decker is a translator-editor at the ROC Government Information Office.