"Being a racial minority in Taiwan's society, we indigenous people are at a crossroads: Are we to integrate with the social mainstream, or stick to our tribal traditions? We earnestly hope the government can respect our point of view in handling tribal affairs, and we – the members of the nine tribes – should also recognize the value of our own cultures and try to maintain them."
So says Tien Chun-chih (田春枝), director of the Taipei City Aboriginal Community Development Association, a private group that organizes cultural and educational activities among Taipei's indigenous people. But it has become increasingly difficult for tribal families to maintain their traditions in the face of overwhelming economic and political pressures to assimilate into Chinese society. Awareness of the extraordinarily rapid modernization taking place in Taiwan has reached into the most secluded of mountain villages, drawing increasing numbers of young men and women into urban areas in search of jobs. The gutted villages are thus becoming locales for the very old, the very young, and the physically infirm, hardly an ideal environment for transmitting tribal culture.
Rukai teenage girls wait their turn at a dance performance – intelligent tourism development, including support for material and performing arts, can assist cultural preservation.
According to the 1990 census, the nine major aboriginal tribes – Atayal, Saisiyat, Bunun, Tsou, Rukai, Paiwan, Puyuma, Ami, and Yami – have a combined population of 330,000, or 1.7 percent of Taiwan's population (see map). With the exception of the Yami tribe on Lanyu (Orchid Island) off the southeastern coast, most of the indigenous peoples are scattered in remote areas of the Central Mountain Range or along the narrow eastern coastal plain. But an estimated eighty thousand tribespeople have in recent years migrated to cities in search of employment.
The current challenge to traditional tribal life is but one more instance in a lengthy history of such difficulties. The problems date back to the late eighteenth century when the first waves of Han Chinese immigrants crossed the Taiwan Straits from Fukien province to the western shores of Taiwan. After landing, the Han settlers encountered the various indigenous tribes, still commonly called the "Taiwan aborigines."
The origin of these tribes is unclear. Their own oral traditions about their past vary, but according to Fu Yang-chih (傅仰止), a research fellow at the Institute of Ethnology, Academia Sinica, the most probable of several hypotheses is that they originated in the South Pacific, then migrated to New Guinea and the Philippines before coming to the island roughly five thousand years ago.
Ami tribesman and Ministry of the Interior official Lin Chiang-yi – "The government has no intention of forcing the indigenous people to assimilate."
After arriving, most of the original tribes settled in the wild and fertile western plains. Called Pingpu, or "plains people," the original ten tribes assimilated, declined, or regrouped long ago, in large part a result of pressure from later immigrants to the island.
Rectification of names
To many indigenous people, even the Chinese name the government uses for tribespeople is an illustration of insufficient respect for their sensitivities. In fact, a number of Chinese terms have been used over the years. The most common name used in government documents is shan-ti tung-pao 土地同胞, often shortened to shan-pao 山胞, and translated as "aborigines." Another term, popular primarily in conversation, is shan-ti jen 山地人, or "mountain people," but this is inaccurate because many of the tribes live (or originally lived) on the plains.
An even more unflattering name occurs in the widespread Taiwanese dialect (Fukienese), 番仔, translated as "savages," which, incidentally, was the common word used in Western accounts of Formosa until the twentieth century, when "aborigine" became common.
Many tribespeople urge using the term yuan-chu min 原住民, or "indigenous people." Thus far, there is no consensus, but the Ministry of the Interior recently decided in principle to start using this term.
Atayal tribespeople pick tea leaves in central Taiwan – advanced agricultural techniques have replaced slash-and-burn methods in many tribal areas.
As larger numbers of Chinese migrated from mainland China, the Han Chinese and tribespeople began a competition for land that has lasted down to the present day. Ironically, many of the Chinese immigrants were themselves forced off their land – by floods, famine, warfare, and rapacious government officials on the mainland. For them, Taiwan was a frontier, far from the officials in Peking. But eventually the court prevailed, Taiwan fell under Ching dynasty rule, and the minority tribal peoples experienced even greater pressure on their lands and customs from the Chinese newcomers.
Because integration was usually considered unacceptable by both groups, most of the tribes gradually retreated into the mountains, especially as they lost the numerical strength to defeat the newest immigrants in battle. Once secluded from their enemies, they survived by means of slash-and-burn agriculture, hunting, and fishing. "At that time, we lived in the mountains and counted on nature to feed us; we might not have been full, but we were not hungry either," says Tien Wen-tung (田文統), a 75-year-old Bunun tribesman living in the central part of the island.
When Taiwan was ceded to Japan by the Treaty of Shimonoseki in 1895, the new rulers put pressure on the tribes to assimilate into society. The Japanese established schools for tribal peoples, suppressed indigenous languages, gave the natives Japanese names, and generally pursued a policy of subjugation if not forced assimilation.
Caged in by insufficient education and technical skills – most tribespeople in search of urban jobs end up doing manual labor.
After Taiwan was returned to Chinese control in 1945, and the ROC government moved to the island in 1949, official policy toward the indigenous people received rather low priority. The need to reconstruct the island's economy and make military preparations for a possible Communist attack on the island were far more pressing. For decades, the government has expressed concern about the status of the island's indigenous tribes, and also sought to foster their social and political development, but little was actually accomplished except in the area of education. In recent years, however, the government has started giving tribal matters higher priority. This is reflected in the number and status of government agencies entrusted with "aborigine affairs" (see box).
Lin Chiang-yi (林江義), an Ami tribesman and section chief of the Aboriginal Administration, Ministry of the Interior, expresses concern about the quality of life for tribal people: "After visiting Indian reservations in the United States and Canada and the Maori in New Zealand, I can say that the present living conditions of Taiwan's tribespeople are not inferior to those of other countries' native tribes. But there are still a lot of things that need to be done." In fact, tribal income and living standards remain far below the island average. "It's because most of them are still farmers, and profits are limited," Lin says.
Since 1988, the major public program for aiding indigenous people has been the provincial government's "Program for Social Development of Taiwan's Aborigines." Over a twelve-year period, the program will receive extensive appropriations, much of it for economic development projects such as upgrading the transportation links to remote tribal villages. Many projects will be funded as part of the Six-Year National Development Plan.
Kuo Hsiu-yen (郭秀岩), director of the provincial government's Aboriginal Administration Bureau, points out that most roads in tribal villages are still unpaved. Since the asphalt roads common in cities do not last long in mountain areas, the new roads will be concrete. The improved roads should facilitate the transportation of agricultural products like vegetables, tea, and fruit to the plains.
Another aspect of the plan concerns educational development. Providing better pay to teachers and improving school facilities are considered prerequisites for raising educational standards among indigenous people. According to the Aboriginal Administration Bureau, slightly more than 2 percent of the tribespeople have college or graduate school degrees, compared with 11 percent in Taiwan's total population; only 14 percent are high-school graduates, while 25 percent of the general public have diplomas.
It has always been difficult to recruit good teachers for the rugged and isolated mountain areas. And because primary school budgets come from county governments, which are typically short of funds, the mountain schools rarely have enough money to upgrade their classroom facilities and buy necessary teaching materials. "Each month my office budget is only US$57," says Tien Chin-hsiu (田錦秀), a kindergarten teacher and Bunun tribeswoman. "After paying the electricity and water bills, there is not much money left. I always bring my own stuff to school, such as a VCR and toys my grown-up children don't need anymore."
Under the new social development program, the Aboriginal Administration Bureau has established a special fund to modernize mountain school facilities. In addition, the Ministry of Education has begun intensive teacher-training classes for college graduates who are interested in teaching in mountain schools. Moreover, teachers working in mountain schools now receive yearly pay supplements based on the elevation of the village school (for example, US$1,400for schools between 1,000 to 2,000 meters, and US$3,300 above 2,500 meters.)
Private organizations are also deeply involved in improving the lot of native people. The Taiwan Province Aboriginal Construction Association, a private organization established in 1949 by native civil servants and elected representatives, works in tandem with various government programs for indigenous people.
Hua Chia-chih (華加志), president of the association, a Paiwan tribesman, and a member of the Legislative Yuan, says: "The association is the bridge between the government and the indigenous people. We tell our tribespeople what the authorities can do for them, and we pass on information about the problems of our people to the appropriate agencies." The association organizes various kinds of activities to supplement government programs, such as sponsoring agricultural product exhibits and organizing public health seminars in mountain schools.
The association has nine hundred members. Its budget comes primarily from a membership fee of US$4 per person. "With that limited amount of money, I must apply for financial support from various government agencies," Hua says. His success comes in part from good connections. Hua was previously a Taiwan provincial commissioner and an assemblyman, and he has maintained good relationships with his provincial government colleagues.
In contrast with the association's close cooperation with government agencies, the Alliance of Taiwan Indigenous People is more radical and aggressive. Some tribespeople jokingly call this activist group the "always going to the streets to protest" organization. Liu Wen-hsiung (劉文雄), an Ami tribesman and ex-president of the alliance says: "We don't care how people look at us. We only care about our goals and how to reach them."
The organization was established in 1984, and has slightly more than two hundred members. "We don't deny the efforts and work the government has done to improve the living conditions in tribal villages," Liu says, "yet, we think the government should give more attention to our culture and our ideas in handling aboriginal affairs." One area where the organization has begun to have some success is in convincing the media and the public to stop using the term "aborigine." But a wide variety of terms is still in use, both in Chinese and in translation.
Alliance members are especially concerned about the potential loss of the nine major tribal languages. Linguistically related to Austronesian or Malayo-Polynesian, the tribal languages and their dialects are preserved only in oral tradition. But decades of official policy during and after the Japanese occupation period forced the use of Japanese and Mandarin in place of native languages. "To the indigenous people, this policy is the means by which forced assimilation is carried out," says Liu Wen-hsiung. In response to requests to take some remedial measures, the Aboriginal Education Committee of the Ministry of Education has begun recording the tribal languages and creating a written romanization system.
The alliance has also tackled legal issues, hitting a long-standing executive order from the central government which held that a tribal woman, upon marriage to a Han man, automatically lost her legal ethnic identity. On the other hand, a Han woman who married a tribal male remained a Han legally. But if a tribal male entered into a matrilocal marriage with a Han woman, he automatically became Han. Moreover, indigenous persons could legally discard their ethnic identity, but they could not reclaim it. After repeated, and heated, requests from indigenous people, the government revised the regulations in 1991. Those who lost their ethnic identity can now reclaim it.
Yet another issue concerns the government's land policy in tribal areas. Liu says: "The government doesn't have a comprehensive policy toward us. It always rushes to solve the problem of the moment. The land problem is a good example: the government knew about it, but didn't take any action until we protested. If this issue could have been solved earlier, fewer indigenous people would have moved to cities to seek employment."
Forty years ago, the government set aside 190,000 hectares for the use of 140,000 tribespeople. Today, the tribal population is close to 330,000, but the area of reserved land has not increased apace. The problem has been further complicated by the establishment of four national parks, which took land formerly reserved for the indigenous people. Other land has been appropriated by the Ministry of Defense for national security reasons and by the Ministry of Education for use as university research forests. As a result, there is insufficient land for the needs of the growing numbers of tribal people who earn their livelihood by farming.
In August 1988 and September 1989, the alliance took their cause to the streets, launching "return my land" protests which brought together more than two thousand protesters from all nine tribes. In 1990, the government zoned an additional 16,000 hectares of land for them to use. Although the amount of rezoned land has not satisfied the tribespeople, it is seen as a first step in the right direction.
"We feel that the level of the central government agency responsible for man aging tribal affairs – the Aboriginal Administration Section – is too low and should be elevated to a ministrial-level commission, just like the Mongolian & Tibetan Affairs Commission," Liu says. One major problem with the current setup is unclear or overlapping responsibilities. Tribal affairs often involve the ministries of defense, education, and economics, and a wide assortment of government bureaus.
Lin Chung-te (林春德), an Atayal and a member of the provincial assembly, says: "The structure of the government agencies in charge of tribal affairs is so awkward. It is like a man who has a small head, a large belly, and thin legs." Lin Chiang-yi of the Ministry of the Interior is aware of the problem: "We also hope that the section can be elevated to the ministry level," he says. "But the government is now being criticized for already having too much bureaucracy, so it is difficult to raise the level. The Executive Yuan approved making our section a department in 1988, but the proposal is still waiting in the Legislative Yuan."
Church organizations have also been very active in assisting the various tribal groups. Most notable are the Roman Catholics and the Presbyterians, but several other Protestant sects are also active. Sung Kuo-hsien (松國賢), a Bunun tribesman and program secretary of the Aboriginal Work Committee of the Presbyterian Church says: "The ministers speak tribal languages in their missionary work, and we have the Bible in romanized Ami, Paiwan, and Yami languages."
The Presbyterian Church has been socially active, helping the Yami in their protests against the dumping of nuclear wastes on Orchid Island, and joining another movement to convince the government not to include a tribal village in Yushan National Park. It also established the Indigenous People Service Center in Taipei to offer short-term free boarding service for tribespeople visiting relatives or seeking work in Taipei.
The Catholic Church is no less active. "To meet the demand of each area, we have set up several organizations," says Joyce Sung (宋祖思) of the Bishops' Commission for Social Concern for Aboriginal Development. "For example, we have several clinics in the mountain areas, a vocational training center in Taitung, family and marriage counseling centers, an institution for mentally-retarded children in Hualien, and a cooperative farm near Taitung to help transport local agricultural products to cities." The Church also sponsors a Huatung Teenage Girl Care Center, and serves tribespeople in liaison offices in both Taipei and Kaohsiung."
On the other hand, some tribespeople worry that the churches are responsible for the disappearance of their indigenous religions. Tribal religious beliefs and ritual ceremonies are strictly prohibited by some missionaries. "We agree that missionaries have helped us a lot, but the harm that Christianity has done to tribal beliefs is great too," says Chuan Kuo-chen (全國成), supervisor of the central Taiwan office of World Vision.
Beginning in the 1960s, better job opportunities and higher wages prompted a large-scale migration of indigenous people to the cities. Prior to then, less than five thousand tribespeople lived in urban areas. The total reached thirty thousand by 1980, and is eighty thousand today. The figure maybe even larger if unregistered temporary domiciles are included.
Housing is one of the many problems faced by these urban migrants. It is common for native construction workers to become urban nomads, moving from job to job and living in substandard quarters on the construction sites. Oftentimes they bring their families with them, but there is little chance they will be able to purchase their own homes because of the extraordinarily high price of urban real estate. In some instances, the government has tried to help. In Keelung, where a few hundred indigenous people have become deep-sea fishermen, the city government is building 143 units of public housing.
"There are more than forty thousand people on the waiting list to apply for Taipei city public housing," says Chou Shih-ming (周世明), section chief of the Aboriginal Administration in the Taipei city government. "And it is difficult to give preferential treatment to the indigenous people." The city government is now studying the feasibility of working with the Taipei county government to build public housing. "The city government has the money, and the county government has the land, "Chou says. "We still may jointly solve this housing problem."
Some tribespeople have established their own private organizations to help people adjust to the urban environment. One example is the Taipei City Aboriginal Community Development Association. "We try to do something for our tribespeople," says Tien Chun-chih, an Ami high school teacher and director of the association. "We have found that the best way to help is to provide information." The association informs people of city government programs such as emergency financial assistance, support for vocational training,s cholarships for students from low-income families, and business start-up loans.
The association helps promote tribal culture as well. "We feel tha tour native tribes should maintain their beautiful culture and art," Tien says. "But living in Taipei, we are losing this part of our tradition." Since its founding in November 1990, the association has organized a series of cultural and educational activities, including summer camps for Bunun and Ami tribespeople and classes in traditional Ami embroidery and garment-making "The better we adapt in cities, the farther we are removed from our tribal community," Tien says, "Sponsoring such classes is a good way to help maintain our traditions."
While many indigenous people worry that the government may take more steps that will force them to assimilate, Lin Chiang-yi of the Ministry of the Interior says that is not the official policy. "The Chinese themselves are a pluralistic people," he says. "Different races are a form of cultural wealth. The government has no intention of forcing the indigenous people to assimilate. On the contrary, it is now working hard to preserve the tribal cultural characteristics."
Since further migration away from Han society is out of the question, the options for indigenous people are limited: assimilate or integrate. Only the tribespeople themselves can decide either to integrate into society while still keeping in touch with their traditions or to allow their tribal culture to vanish through complete assimilation. While this has been the fate of many minority peoples when relentlessly pressured by a majority, it need not happen here. Although the impetus to integrate rather than assimilate must come from within, it is also the role of the government to ensure that such an option exists – and is protected by law in an environment of social understanding.