Taiwanese People's Party
Taiwanese People's Party 臺灣民眾黨 | |
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Founded | 10 July 1927 |
Dissolved | August 1931 |
Headquarters | Taichū, Japanese Taiwan |
Ideology | |
Party flag | |
Taiwanese People's Party | |
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Chinese name | |
Hanyu Pinyin | Táiwān Mínzhòng Dǎng |
Southern Min | |
Hokkien POJ | Tâi-oân Bîn-chiòng Tóng |
Transcriptions | |
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Romanization | Taiwan Minshu-tō |
The Taiwanese People's Party, founded in 1927, was nominally Taiwan's first political party, preceding the founding of the Taiwanese Communist Party by nine months. Initially a party with members holding moderate and conservative views, by the time of its banning, on 18 February 1931, it had become a solidly leftist, workers-oriented party. In a political atmosphere increasingly dominated by the rise of Japanese fascism, the party never participated in electoral politics.
History
The party grew out of the conflict within the
The party grew quickly. By the end of 1927, it had 15 branches and 456 members; among them, many prominent elites, including landowners, lawyers and doctors. However, the vague party charter soon presented problems: on the one hand the charter had apparently managed to placate the wary authorities; on the other, the vague wording had the effect of hiding away some of the divisive ideological differences among the most powerful players. During the party's short existence its internal politics was dominated by the struggle between the left-wing, led by Chiang Wei-shui, and the right-wing, represented by Peng Hua-ying , to define the party's core values, particularly its position on "the class question". Whereas Chiang's faction sought to define the party as representing the interests of workers and peasants, Peng's faction took the moderate position of "working to improve their quality of life". After Chiang set up the Taiwan Peasants' Union as a party affiliate in February 1928, Peng resigned in protest. In August 1930 a number of conservatives left the party to form the Taiwanese Alliance for Home Rule , led by Lin Hsien-tang and Tsai Pei-huo .[3]
By the third party congress later that year, Chiang had won control of the executive committee. His proposal for a revision of the party charter was passed the following year. It admonished "bourgeoise" and "reactionary" members for not heeding the international climate, which had "strengthened the consciousness of struggle within the island's masses". The revised charter characterized the party as one to work toward the political freedom and interests of workers, peasants, the urban proletariat, and all similarly oppressed. Chiang believed that the time was ripe for a strategy that combined class and national (anti-colonial) movements.[citation needed]
For the most part, the party was not effective in achieving its goals. On 7 July 1927 it put forward a "Statement of Recommendations", given to Prime Minister Hamaguchi Osachi, that demanded local autonomy for the island and urged freedom of speech. The following year, it demanded that the colonial governor institute popular, proportionally representative ballot for some councils. Its singular triumph was in forcing the authorities to set aside budget for establishing treatment centers for opium addicts. The party successfully created international pressure by filing complaints to the League of Nations (of which Japan remained a member until the early 1930s), which then sent a representative to investigate.[4]
As civilian rule gave way to a new, harsher phase of all-consuming
Platform
Part of a series on |
Three Principles of the People |
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The party program of the TPP was socialist, emphasizing constitutional democracy and separation of power with a new Taiwanese constitution. The party had a radical economic program aiming at redistributing land to peasants and removing big landlords, abolishing big bourgeoisie and privileged classes in Taiwan, and implementing socialist programs to nationalize big companies and improve workers' rights. It also included the liberation of the Taiwanese people and regaining Taiwanese sovereignty from the Empire of Japan. Those programs were heavily inspired by Sun Yat-sen's Three Principles of the People.[5]
See also
Explanatory notes
References
- ^ Shih-Shan Henry Tsai (2010). Whither Taiwan and Mainland China: National Identity, the State, and Intellectuals. Hong Kong University Press. pp. 145–146.
- ^ 蔣渭水最後的驚嘆號-崇隆大眾葬紀錄時代心情, 蔣渭水文化基金會
- ^ Han Cheung (12 August 2018). "Taiwan in Time: Fractured resistance". Taipei Times. Retrieved 12 August 2018.
- ^ Han Cheung (22 January 2017). "Taiwan in Time: Say no to opium". Taipei Times. Retrieved 22 January 2017.
- ^ https://nckur.lib.ncku.edu.tw/retrieve/149274/1010515010-000011.pdf