Towards an Enlightened Authoritarian Polity: the Kuomintang Central Reform Committee on Taiwan, 1950–1952

Abstract

Primarily relying on the Kuomintang Party archives recently available to scholarship at the Hoover Institution Archives, this article examines the roles of the Kuomintang Central Reform Committee and the party reform under it between 1950 and 1952. The Committee became a crucial contributing factor in terms of the survival of the once defeated and demoralized Kuomintang as a ruling party. While the Kuomintang under the Committee created a variety of direct or indirect controls over the government and society that gave it unquestioned dominance, it also began to interact closely with the people on Taiwan as a result of the party recruitment and the implementation of local-level political reforms, two salient agendas that had never taken place in the mainland. For the sake of revitalizing a party capable of responding to challenges in a new environment, the Kuomintang during its reform period promulgated new rules and regulations, set up new agendas and implement new policies, and instituted various party local branches in different social stratum and vocational categories. These measures, in turn, helped Kuomintang undergo an institutional and cognitional change that was totally unimaginable in the past.

Notes

^*Ramon H. Myers is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. He is the coauthor, with Linda Chao, of The First Chinese Democracy: Political Life in the Republic of China on Taiwan and has written numerous articles about Taiwan's political and economic history. His most recent work, with Jialin Zhang, is The Struggle across the Taiwan Strait: The Divided China Problem published by Hoover Institution Press in 2006.

^1. Robert Accinelli, Crisis and Commitment: United States Policy toward Taiwan, 1950–1955 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1996), pp. 29–34; Peter Lowe, The Origins of the Korean War (New York: Longman, 1997), pp. 186–200.

^2. See: Hoover Institution Archives, Kuomintang Central Reform Committee Archive (hereafter, CRCA), 6.4-2, reel 1, Chiang Kai-shek's introduction to Resolution on the Reforming of our Party, 18 July 1950.

^3. See: Bruce J. Dickson, ‘The lessons of defeat: the reorganization of the Kuomintang on Taiwan, 1950–52’, The China Quarterly no. 133, (1993), pp. 58–59; Xu Fuming, Zhongguo Guomindang de Gaizao, 1950–1952 [The Reform of the KMT, 1950–1952] (Taipei: Zhengzhong Shuju, 1986), pp. 45–53.

^4. Qin Xiaoyi, ed., Zhongtong Jianggong Dashi Changbian Chugao [The Preliminary Draft of Collected Materials Describing the Activities of President Chiang Kai-shek] (hereafter Dashi Changbian), Vol. 7, Part 2 (Taipei, 1978), p. 241.

^5. Qin Xiaoyi, ed., Zhongtong Jianggong Dashi Changbian Chugao [The Preliminary Draft of Collected Materials Describing the Activities of President Chiang Kai-shek] (hereafter Dashi Changbian), Vol. 7, Part 2 (Taipei, 1978), p. 331; KMT Central Reform Committee, Dangwu Baogao [Report on Party Affairs], Vol. 1 (Taipei, 1952), p. 13.

^6. Linda Chao and Ramon H. Myers, The First Chinese Democracy: Political Life in the Republic of China on Taiwan (Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1998), pp. 23–24.

^7. Dashi Changbian, Vol. 9, pp. 6–7.

^8. Dashi Changbian, Vol. 9, pp. 2–6.

^11. Li Songlin, Jiang Jieshi de Taiwan Shidai [Chiang Kai-shek and Taiwan] (Taipei: Fengyun Shidai, 1993), pp. 108–112; Dashi Changbian, Vol. 9, p. 169.

^9. Dashi Changbian, Vol. 9, pp. 60, 65–66; K. C. Wu, Wu Guozhen Zhuan [The Biography of K. C. Wu] (Taipei: Liberty Times, 1995), Vol. 2, pp. 428–440.

^10. Li Songlin, Jiang Jieshi de Taiwan Shidai [Chiang Kai-shek and Taiwan] (Taipei: Fengyun Shidai, 1993), pp. 108–112; Dashi Changbian, Vol. 9, p. 167.

^12. Li Songlin, Jiang Jieshi de Taiwan Shidai [Chiang Kai-shek and Taiwan] (Taipei: Fengyun Shidai, 1993), pp. 108–112; Dashi Changbian, Vol. 9, pp. 168–169, 171–172, 180.

^13. Accinelli, Crisis and Commitment, pp. 3–28.

^14. Dashi Changbian, Vol. 9, p. 145.

^15. The 16 members were: Chen Cheng, Zhang Qiyun, Zhang Daofan, Gu Zhenggang, Zhen Yanfen, Chen Xueping, Hu Jianzhong, Yuan Shouqian, Cui Shuqin, Gu Fengxiang, Zeng Shubai, Jiang Jingguo (Chiang Ching-kuo), Xiao Zicheng, Shen Changhuan, Guo Zheng, and Lian Zhendong. See Gaizao [Reform] no. 1, (1 September 1950), pp. 19–25.

^16. CRCA, 6.4-1, reel 2, KMT Central Reform Committee, ‘Outline of the Reform Program of the Party’, July 1950 (n.d.).

^17. CRCA, 6.4-2, reel 12, Chiang Kai-shek's instruction at the 420th meeting of the CRC, 9 October 1952.

^18. Li Yunhan, Zhongguo Guomindang Shishu [A Historical Narration of the KMT] (Taipei: KMT Party Historical Commission, 1994), Vol. 4, pp. 74–80; Dickson, ‘The lessons of defeat’, p. 67.

^19. Dashi Changbian, Vol. 9, p. 215.

^20. CRCA, 6.4-2, reel 1, Minute of the 1st meeting of the CRC, 6 August 1950.

^21. Chao and Myers, The First Chinese Democracy, pp. 24–25.

^22. Peter Chen-main Wang, ‘A bastion created, a regime reformed, an economy reengineered, 1949–1970’, in Murray A. Rubinstein, ed., Taiwan, A New History (New York: M. E. Sharpe, 1999), pp. 328–332.

^23. CRCA, 6.4-2, reel 1, Resolution on the Reforming of our Party, 18 July 1950.

^24. Steven J. Hood, The Kuomintang and the Democratization of Taiwan (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1997), pp. 28–29, 51.

^25. CRCA, 6.4-2, reel 5, Annual report of the Central Reform Committee for the fiscal year 1951 (Taipei, August 1951), p. 4.

^26. CRCA, 6.4-2, reel 5, Annual report of the Central Reform Committee for the fiscal year 1951 (Taipei, August 1951), pp. 12–13; Gaizao no. 36, (16 February 1962), pp. 3–5.

^27. CRCA, 6.4-2, reel 3, Minute of the 109th CRC meeting, 5 April 1951; 6.4-2, reel 5, Regulations adopted in the 171st CRC meeting, 16 July 1951.

^28. CRCA, 6.4-2, reel 1, Minute of the 36th CRC meeting, 12 October 1950.

^29. CRCA, 6.4-2, reel 5, Annual report of the Central Reform Committee for the fiscal year 1951, August 1951 (n.d.), pp. 18–21.

^30. CRCA, 6.4-2, reel 2, Working guidelines for youth, laborers, farmers and social service, in the minutes of the 78th and the 79th CRC meeting, dated 29 and 31 January 1951.

^31. Cao Junhan, ‘Suzao Zhongguo Guomindang wei Gonggong Zhengce Zhengdang’ [‘Molding the KMT into a responsive public party’], in Yang Taishun, ed., Zhengdang Zhengzhi yu Taiwan Minzhuhua [Party Politics and Taiwan's Democratization] (Taipei: Democracy Foundation, 1991), pp. 57–59.

^32. See: Zhongguo Guomindang Gaizao Qijian Gongzuo Gaikuang Tuka Ji [A Pictorial Survey of General Working Conditions for the Kuomintang during the Reform Period) (Taipei, 1953), p. 34. According to the CRC, by August 1952 there were totally 115,037 members registered at the Kuomintang Taiwan Provincial Headquarters. See Dangwu Baogao, Vol. 2, pp. 5–6.

^33. CRCA, 6.4-2, reel 1, Minute of the 30th CRC meeting, 29 September 1950; 6.4-2, reel 4, Minute of the 143rd CRC meeting, 30 May 1951.

^34. Gaizao no. 47/48, (1 August 1952), pp. 42–43.

^35. CRCA, 6.4-2, reel 2, Minute of the 58th CRC meeting, 6 December 1950.

^36. CRCA, 6.4-2, reel 4, Minute of the 168th CRC meeting, 9 July 1951; Gaizao no. 19, (1 June 1951), p. 65.

^37. Dickson, ‘The lessons of defeat’, pp. 78–79.

^38. CRCA, 6.4-2, reel 3, Minute of the 118th meeting of the CRC, 19 April 1951.

^39. CRCA, 6.4-2, reel 2, Minute of the 82nd CRC meeting, 8 February 1951.

^40. Denny Roy, Taiwan: A Political History (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2003), pp. 84–85.

^41. Chen Yangde, Taiwan Difang Minxuan Lingdao Renwu zhi Biandong [Changes in Locally-elected Leaders] (Taipei: Siji chubanshe, 1981), pp. 120–125.

^42. Hao Yumei, Guomindang Timing Zhidu zhi Yanjiu [A Study of the Kuomintang's Nomination System] (Taipei: Zhengzhong shuju, 1981).

^43. CRCA, 6.4-2, reel 3, Minute of the 92nd CRC meeting, 28 February 1951; Minute of the 109th CRC meeting, 5 April 1951.

^44. Dickson, ‘The lessons of defeat’, pp. 74–75; Hood, The Kuomintang and the Democratization of Taiwan, pp. 33–34.

^46. Dashi Changbian, Vol. 10, pp. 6–8.

^45. CRCA, 6.4-2, reel 7, ‘General guidelines for national mobilization’, in Minute of the 293rd CRC meeting, 21 February 1951.

^47. Zhang Qiyun, Guomindang di Xinsheng [The Rebirth of the Kuomintang] (Taipei: Chinese Cultural Service, 1952), pp. 63–64.

^48. Ching-yuan Lin, ‘Agriculture and rural–urban migration: the 1949–53 land reform’, in James C. Hsiung et al., eds, The Taiwan Experience 1950–1980 (New York: Praeger, 1981), pp. 138–141.

^49. CRCA, 6.4-2, reel 2, Minute of the 87th CRC meeting, 19 February 1951.

^50. John F. Copper, Taiwan: Nation-State or Province? (Boulder, CO: Westview, 1996), pp. 131–132.

^51. CRCA, 6.4-1, reel 1, ‘Current condition of the Kuomintang’, 1952 (n.d.), ch. 2.

^52. F. A. Lumley, The Republic of China under Chiang Kai-shek: Taiwan Today (London: Barrie & Jenkins, 1976), p. 69; Chen Cheng, Land Reform in Taiwan (Taipei: China Publishing Company, 1961), pp. 47–48.

^53. CRCA, 6.4-1, reel 1, CRC working report for the year 1950; Xu, Zhongguo Guomindang de Gaizao, pp. 138–142.

^54. CRCA, 6.4-2, reel 3, Minute of the 119th CRC meeting, 19 April 1951.

^55. Hood, The Kuomintang and the Democratization of Taiwan, pp. 32–33.

^56. See Gabriel A. Almond and G. B. Powell, Comparative Politics: A Developmental Approach (Boston: Vakilis, 1966), p. 308.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Ramon H. Myers

57 *Ramon H. Myers is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University. He is the coauthor, with Linda Chao, of The First Chinese Democracy: Political Life in the Republic of China on Taiwan and has written numerous articles about Taiwan's political and economic history. His most recent work, with Jialin Zhang, is The Struggle across the Taiwan Strait: The Divided China Problem published by Hoover Institution Press in 2006.