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THE LONG-TERM EFFECTS OF STATE REPRESSION ON POLITICAL BEHAVIOR AND ATTITUDES: EVIDENCE FROM TAIWAN

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 November 2021

Fang-Yi Chiou Open the ORCID record for Fang-Yi Chiou [Opens in a new window]  and
Ji Yeon Hong Open the ORCID record for Ji Yeon Hong [Opens in a new window]
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Abstract

This article examines how violence against citizens affects their political attitudes and behavior in the long run, and how those effects vary over time. We construct and analyze a novel dataset on the victims of Taiwan's February 28 Incident, in 1947, with survey data spanning 1990 to 2017. Our empirical analysis shows that cohorts having directly or indirectly experienced the Incident are less likely to support the Kuomintang Party (KMT), the former authoritarian ruling party responsible for the Incident. They tend to disagree with the key conventional policy stand of the KMT (unification with mainland China), are more likely to self-identify as Taiwanese, and are less likely to vote for KMT presidential candidates. Taiwan's residents who were born in towns with larger number of casualties during the Incident are more likely to reject unification. Finally, the effects are found to vary over the period following democratization.

Keywords

state repressionauthoritarian regimedemocratizationlong-term effectspolitical behavior
Type
Article
Information
Journal of East Asian Studies , Volume 21 , Issue 3 , November 2021 , pp. 427 - 448
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the East Asia Institute

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