BRIEF RESEARCH REPORT article
Front. Polit. Sci.
Sec. Peace and Democracy
This article is part of the Research TopicNon-Western Democracies – Theories, Conceptual Analyses, Case StudiesView all 8 articles
Taiwan: Democratic David in 21st Century East Asia
Provisionally accepted
- Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, United States
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Taiwan is not just a victim-in-waiting, damsel in distress, or pawn in a new Cold War. Taiwan stands as an exemplar: the world’s first “Chinese democracy” and a democratic David in the shadow of an autocratic Goliath. Taiwan’s success in deepening democracy and resisting Chinese sharp power may hold lessons on how to counter the rising global tide of authoritarianism. To elucidate these lessons, we review Taiwan’s democratic history and ongoing efforts to defend its hard-won democracy.
Keywords: Taiwan, democratic David, Sharp power, East Asian democracy, Asian values
Received: 19 May 2025; Accepted: 13 Nov 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Chin and Rector. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: John J Chin, jjchin@andrew.cmu.edu
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