An analysis by the Lowy Institute on how China plans to govern Taiwan following a successful annexation. Drawing on Chinese academic writings and policy discussions, the article observes a distinct shift in approach before and after 2019. Prior to that year, the article states that Chinese policymakers did genuinely believe in a carrot approach. China’s rhetorical overtures, such as giving Taiwanese leadership guaranteed vice presidency and spots in the Politburo, allowing them to retain their military, along with similar overtures made to Hong Kong about total administrative autonomy were the basis of their thinking.
* These assumptions categorically collapsed in 2019. The article argues that Chinese analysts recognize the collapse of Taiwanese trust in that framework following developments in Hong Kong. Rather than expecting voluntary reconciliation after annexation, Beijing’s planning increasingly assumes that coercive administrative and security measures would be necessary to consolidate control.
* The solutions being discussed have all revolved around whole-of-society transformations that necessitate the mass incarceration and surveillance, potentially of millions of people. They identify two successive generations of Taiwan-centric teaching of history as a culprit for the rise of Taiwanese identity, which must be rooted up and destroyed. Schools, universities, media organizations, internet platforms, and cultural institutions would likely become instruments for promoting Chinese nationalism and Communist Party legitimacy.
* Taiwan’s political and administrative state must also be completely overhauled. While some form of “autonomy” is still being envisaged, it emphasizes that for security reasons the Central authority must be given absolute power to intervene at any stage for any purpose in Taiwanese governance. In other words, a paper autonomy that exists at the grace of the Party, not unlike Hong Kong today. No alternate centre of power can exist.
* The article stresses that Chinese analysts do not appear naïve about the risks of insurgency, passive resistance, or underground opposition movements. Some Chinese writings reportedly acknowledge the possibility of long-term instability, sabotage, emigration of elites, and continuing hostility among the population even years after annexation.
Ultimately, a genuine shift in thinking appears to have happened over the last decade. Taiwan, in the eyes of strategists, is no longer a wayward province, but is instead increasingly seen as hostile alien territory that would require a lengthy period of systematic suppression. The article observes that there is growing Chinese awareness of the internal contradictions of their own purported solution.
>*Autonomy is offered as a tool to reduce resistance, reassure elites, and facilitate governance, yet it is explicitly denied the legal or political credibility that might make it reassuring. This contradiction is not lost on Chinese analysts. Some acknowledge that conditional autonomy may fail to generate trust or long-term buy-in, particularly in a society accustomed to rules-based governance. Yet few propose alternatives that would meaningfully constrain central authority. A stalemate emerges here, as autonomy is necessary but not credible, control is effective but destabilising, and no synthesis fully resolves the tension.*
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>From 2017, acting on orders from Chinese leader Xi Jinping, the authorities in Xinjiang put as many as one million Uyghur, Kazakh, and members of other Central Asian ethnic groups into prisons and internment camps…Taiwan’s political cleansing likely would be of a much greater magnitude
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**Submission Statement**
An analysis by the Lowy Institute on how China plans to govern Taiwan following a successful annexation. Drawing on Chinese academic writings and policy discussions, the article observes a distinct shift in approach before and after 2019. Prior to that year, the article states that Chinese policymakers did genuinely believe in a carrot approach. China’s rhetorical overtures, such as giving Taiwanese leadership guaranteed vice presidency and spots in the Politburo, allowing them to retain their military, along with similar overtures made to Hong Kong about total administrative autonomy were the basis of their thinking.
* These assumptions categorically collapsed in 2019. The article argues that Chinese analysts recognize the collapse of Taiwanese trust in that framework following developments in Hong Kong. Rather than expecting voluntary reconciliation after annexation, Beijing’s planning increasingly assumes that coercive administrative and security measures would be necessary to consolidate control.
* The solutions being discussed have all revolved around whole-of-society transformations that necessitate the mass incarceration and surveillance, potentially of millions of people. They identify two successive generations of Taiwan-centric teaching of history as a culprit for the rise of Taiwanese identity, which must be rooted up and destroyed. Schools, universities, media organizations, internet platforms, and cultural institutions would likely become instruments for promoting Chinese nationalism and Communist Party legitimacy.
* Taiwan’s political and administrative state must also be completely overhauled. While some form of “autonomy” is still being envisaged, it emphasizes that for security reasons the Central authority must be given absolute power to intervene at any stage for any purpose in Taiwanese governance. In other words, a paper autonomy that exists at the grace of the Party, not unlike Hong Kong today. No alternate centre of power can exist.
* The article stresses that Chinese analysts do not appear naïve about the risks of insurgency, passive resistance, or underground opposition movements. Some Chinese writings reportedly acknowledge the possibility of long-term instability, sabotage, emigration of elites, and continuing hostility among the population even years after annexation.
Ultimately, a genuine shift in thinking appears to have happened over the last decade. Taiwan, in the eyes of strategists, is no longer a wayward province, but is instead increasingly seen as hostile alien territory that would require a lengthy period of systematic suppression. The article observes that there is growing Chinese awareness of the internal contradictions of their own purported solution.
>*Autonomy is offered as a tool to reduce resistance, reassure elites, and facilitate governance, yet it is explicitly denied the legal or political credibility that might make it reassuring. This contradiction is not lost on Chinese analysts. Some acknowledge that conditional autonomy may fail to generate trust or long-term buy-in, particularly in a society accustomed to rules-based governance. Yet few propose alternatives that would meaningfully constrain central authority. A stalemate emerges here, as autonomy is necessary but not credible, control is effective but destabilising, and no synthesis fully resolves the tension.*
>From 2017, acting on orders from Chinese leader Xi Jinping, the authorities in Xinjiang put as many as one million Uyghur, Kazakh, and members of other Central Asian ethnic groups into prisons and internment camps…Taiwan’s political cleansing likely would be of a much greater magnitude
Grim.