Election of the Legislative Yuan of the Republic of China in 1998

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Legislative Yuan in 19982001 →

(Turnout 68.1%)

 %

50

40

30th

20th

10

0

46.4

29.6

7.1

7.5

9.4

KMT

DPP

Xindg

Otherwise.

Independent

Gains and losses

compared to 1995

 % p

   8th

   6th

   4th

   2

   0

  -2

  -4

  -6

+0.3

-3.6

-5.9

+7.4

+1.7

KMT

DPP

Xindg

Otherwise.

Independent

The 1998 election of the Legislative Yuan of the Republic of China took place on December 5, 1998 . The 225 MPs of the Legislative Yuan , the legislative assembly of the Republic of China in Taiwan, were elected . It was the third such election since the democratization of Taiwan in the early 1990s. The election was won by the Kuomintang , which was able to maintain its government majority. The turnout was 68.1%. On the same day, the mayoral elections were held in the two largest cities, Taipei and Kaohsiung .

prehistory

The election campaign was essentially fought out between three parties, the Kuomintang (KMT), the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) and the Xindang . In parallel to the election of the Legislative Yuan, mayoral elections were held in Taipei and Kaohsiung. The election campaigns were very mixed and the protagonists in Taipei and Kaohsiung also became main actors in the national election campaign. The most prominent face of the DPP in the election campaign was Chen Shui-bian , the popular mayor of Taipei. He faced the also very popular Ma Ying-jeou from the Kuomintang in Taipei's mayoral election . The mayoral election in the second largest city, Kaohsiung, where incumbent Wu Den-yih (KMT) and his challenger Frank Hsieh (DPP) faced each other met with somewhat less media interest .

The Kuomintang's share of the vote had steadily declined in the last two elections, with the result that some election observers predicted their imminent complete loss of importance and the takeover of power by the DPP. Internal restructuring of the KMT had begun in the 1980s, which was further promoted in the 1990s by party chairman Lee Teng-hui . While the old power elite of the KMT used to be composed almost exclusively of people with family roots in mainland China, the party became increasingly “Taiwanized”, ie more and more cadres from the island of Taiwan rose to leadership positions on. However, the official KMT party goal of reunification with mainland China has not been abandoned. In response to this internal transformation of the KMT, the Xindang (“New Party”) split off from the Kuomintang in 1993. With regard to relations with mainland China, the Xindang took a much more conservative course and demanded strict adherence to the “one-China policy” and the goal of an early reunification with the mainland. The Xindang drew their voters disproportionately from sections of the population who came from the mainland and had an average higher level of education. In the last legislative yuan election in 1995 , the Xindang received 13% of the vote.

The Kuomintang and Xindang were opposed by the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which had emerged from the opposition movement against the decades-long one-party rule of the Kuomintang, had its voter pool primarily among the native Taiwanese population and took a contradicting standpoint on the question of relations with the People's Republic of China. From the start, the DPP emphasized Taiwan's autonomy and independence from China. On October 6, 1996, the Taiwan Independence Party split from the DPP, taking a more uncompromising position on the question of independence and rejecting the supposed political tactics of the DPP. In 1998 the “New National Alliance” was formed, which also represented a radical standpoint of independence.

In addition to the recurring theme of Taiwan's identity and its relationship to the People's Republic of China, a variety of topics were discussed in the election campaign, such as internationalization and modernization, economic reforms and environmental protection.

A total of 499 candidates from eleven political parties and independent candidates applied for seats in parliament.

• Taiwanese politicians
• 

  President Lee Teng-hui (2004), KMT

• 

  Lin Yi-hsiung (1992)
  DPP chairman

• 

  Ma Ying-jeou (2008) KMT candidate in Taipei

• 

  Chen Shui-bian (2009), DPP Mayor of Taipei

• 

  Wu Den-yih (2009) KMT Mayor of Kaohsiung

• 

  Frank Hsieh (2008), DPP candidate in Kaohsiung

Election mode

In 1997, an amendment to the constitution came into force that expanded the powers of the legislative yuan vis-à-vis the government (the executive yuan ). In addition, the number of elected members of the Legislative Yuan was increased from 164 to 225 members. This took place as part of a major reshuffle in Taiwan's political structures. As part of this reform, the Taiwan Provincial Assembly was dissolved and the office of governor of Taiwan Province was abolished. The increase in the number of mandates was also done in order to open up a new field of activity for the members of the former provincial assembly and to increase the acceptance of the reform. 58 members of the former Provincial Assembly (including 34 KMT, 13 DPP) ran for election in a row in the election of the Legislative Yuan. Of the 225 MPs, 168 were elected in multi-person constituencies using the simple non-transferable voting mode , the indigenous peoples of Taiwan elect 8 representatives in appropriate constituencies, and 8 MPs were elected by the Taiwanese overseas. Another 41 MPs were filled according to the nationwide share of the votes of the parties. A 5 percent threshold was applied .

Results

A total of 10,188,302 of the 14,961,938 eligible voters cast their vote, bringing the turnout to 68.1%. 10,035,829 votes were valid and 152,473 ballots (1.5%) were invalid or blank. The votes cast included 76,134 valid votes from the natives from the highlands and 60,253 from the lowlands. The indigenous voter turnout was 59.4% and 51.4%, respectively.

The turnout in the two cities of Taipei and Kaohsiung was significantly higher at 80.9% and 80.5%, respectively. There was a change of power in both cities. Ma Ying-jeou (KMT) won the mayoral election in Taipei against Chen Shui-bian (DPP), while Frank Hsieh (DPP) narrowly beat Wu Den-yih (KMT) in the mayoral election in Kaohsiung .

Political party		be right		Mandates				Total seats
		number	in %	List	Foreign	Constituency	Native people-	number	%	+/-
	Kuomintang (中國 國民黨)	4,659,679	46.4	23	4th	90	6th	123	54.7	+38
	Democratic Progressive Party (民主 進步 黨)	2,966,834	29.6	15th	3	52	0	70	31.1	+16
	Xindang (新 黨)	708.465	7.1	3	1	7th	0	11	4.9	-10
	Taiwan Democratic Union (民主 聯盟)	375.118	3.7	0	0	4th	0	4th	1.8	New
	New National Alliance (新 國家 連線)	157,826	1.6	0	0	1	0	1	0.4	New
	Taiwan Independence Party (建國 黨)	145.118	1.5	0	0	1	0	1	0.0	New
	Impartial Democratic Union (全國 民主 非)	66,033	0.7	0	0	1	2	3	0.0	+3
	Taiwan Green Party (綠黨)	8,089	0.1	0	0	0	0	0	0.0	New
	Chinese Native Taiwan Party ((台灣 原)	1,171	0.0	0	0	0	0	0	0.0	0
	Young China Party (中國 青年 黨)	723	0.0	0	0	0	0	0	0.0	New
	National Democratic Party of Taiwan (國家 民主黨)	342	0.0	0	0	0	0	0	0.0	New
	Independent	946.431	9.4	0	0	12	0	12	5.3	+8
total		10,035,829	100	41	8th	168	8th	225	100.0	+61
Source: Taiwan Electoral Commission

Of the 225 elected MPs, 182 were men and 43 (19.1%) women.

• 

  Constituency results (parties with the highest voting power). All independents are added together. Kuomintang DPP Democratic Union of Taiwan Independents
  
  
  
  

• 

  Constituency results in hexagonal representation: Kuomintang DPP Xindang Impartial Democratic Union Taiwanese Democratic Union Taiwan Independence Party New National Alliance of Independents
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  

After the election

Composition of the newly elected Legislative Yuan: Kuomintang (123) Xindang (11) DPP (70) Taiwan Democratic Union (4) Impartial Democratic Union (3) Taiwan Independence Party (1) New National Alliance (1) Independents (12)









On the surface, the election result appeared to mark a turning point. The Kuomintang's seemingly continuous loss of votes since the introduction of democratization in Taiwan in the early 1990s did not continue, but the KMT was able to increase its share of the vote and the number of mandates, expand its relative parliamentary majority and thus halt its downward trend. The consolidation of the KMT contrasted with significant losses of the Xindang, so that the share of the vote of the “ pan-blue camp ” tended to decrease. The DPP suffered losses, but the share of the vote of the pan-green camp , which included the DPP and two parties that had split off from the DPP - the Taiwan Independence Party and the New National Alliance - was only slightly lower than 32.7% the previous DPP election result (33.2%).

Western observers rated the elections largely positively. After decades of one-party rule by the KMT, a vibrant multi-party democracy was developing in Taiwan. However, it was criticized that the practice of buying votes is still very widespread. In addition, the amalgamation of many politicians in opaque business activities was viewed critically. Some politicians with known links to organized crime had been elected to parliament and some campaign activities had been conducted as a dirty campaign .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b} Alexander C. Tan, Tsung-chi Yu: The December 1998 elections in Taiwan . In: Electoral Studies . tape 19 , no. 4 . Elsevier, December 2000, pp. 621–628 , doi : 10.1016 / S0261-3794 (00) 00005-6 (English).
2. ^ ^{A b c d e} Yun-han Chu, Larry Diamond: Taiwan's 1998 Elections: Implications for Democratic Consolidation . In: Asian Survey . tape 39 , no. 5 . University of California Press, September 1999, pp. 808-822 , doi : 10.2307 / 3021169 , JSTOR : 3021169 (English).
3. ^ Nation-building party formed. http://www.taiwandc.org/ , accessed on November 11, 2016 (English). 
4. ↑ Oscar Chung: Only the strongest survived. Taiwan Today, May 1, 1998; accessed November 10, 2016 . 
5. ↑ ^{a b c} A vote for the status quo. Taiwan Info, January 1, 1999, accessed November 10, 2016 . 
6. ↑ 1998 Legislator Election. Taiwan's Central Electoral Commission, accessed on November 10, 2016 (on the Election Commission website, the votes of the indigenous peoples are counted separately from the votes of the rest of the voters).