Scholars met the Presidents of the Legislative Yuan and the Control Yuan one year ago. Will there be a follow-up?
by Marco Respinti*
*Conclusions of the webinar “Parliaments, Democracy, and Tai Ji Men,” co-organized by CESNUR and Human Rights Without Frontiers on June 30, 2024, United Nations International Day of Parliamentarism
As a way of concluding today’s webinar, I wish to start elaborating on a few suggestions I uttered introducing the hybrid seminar organized on July 1, 2022, at the Renaissance Hotel in Washington DC and online, by CESNUR, the Center for Studies on New Religions, and Human Rights Without Frontiers on “Effective Parliamentarism and the Tai Ji Men Case.” Subsequently, I will remind our audience of the important fact-finding tour of the Republic of China (ROC) in Taiwan done by a delegation of activists and scholars organized in April 2023 by “Bitter Winter”, its parent organization CESNUR, and Human Rights Without Frontiers during the 2023 edition of their International Forum on Freedom of Religion or Belief.
The term “parliamentarism” indicates a political system where a representative legislative assembly elected by citizens operates in a state where powers are classically separated in three branches to secure democracy (the other two are, of course, the executive power and the judicial power). The name owes to the fact that the legislative body at the core of this system is called “parliament.” While the parliamentary system started developing in 16th century England, the word “parliament” is originally French, “parlement,” and has a glorious history dating back to ancient Greece and developing throughout the Middle Ages in Europe.
The meaning of the word is quite clear and reveals the nature of the concept. “Parlement” is constructed on the verb that means “to talk” and comes remotely from the assemblies where free citizens used to discuss topics relevant to the public life of the “polis,” the ancient Greek city-state which also gives name to “politics.”
In Rome, the same function was played by that august body that was called the “Senate,” a word meaning the assembly of the elder citizens, or the wisest and most inclined to conserve customs and traditions in the republic. The Roman Senate underwent many reforms in history, and even distortions when unscrupulous rulers entered the scene, but no one ever dared to completely cancel it. This happened because of the awe, almost of a mystical nature, which has always accompanied that institution of true representation and democracy.
So, a parliament is the place where people meet and debate, evaluating proposals and eventually deliberating. This kind of ancient assemblies gave the tone to a lively and healthy society, where citizens took part in the building of the common good. The presence of such an assembly is a vital sign of democracy, being not a political regime, but a way of exerting political power centered on the constructive participation of citizens.
Those variously named ancient forms of democratic participation to the public life evolved in what we now call “parliaments.” They were always political bodies, but in a rather different and deeper sense of the word, in comparison to the usual and current meaning, which basically refers to partisan politics.
This is clearly showed by the remote Latin origin of the word behind the French “parlement:” “parlamentum.” It was applied to different institutions. For example, to the assembly of all the abbots of the Cistercian order of monks, in Catholic Middle Ages, or the place that political rulers used for negotiations and where they met foreign delegates. This meaning entered the text of the Medieval mother of all representative body politics, including the modern, i.e., the “Magna Charta” in 1215 England. Parliaments were always home to real politics. They became a bicameral legislative body in the strictest sense again in Medieval England after “Magna Carta,” with the word slowly assuming its modern restricted meaning. Let me just add here a sense of bleakness in seeing how, and how often, modern parliaments have transformed from those revered place of respectful discussions, even of gentlemen disagreements, to arenas where politicians fight with fists and kicks live on camera and with no shame.
Today no single democratic regime lacks a parliament. Even monarchic countries have parliaments, and for sure this is not only an invention of modern times. Like all democratic countries, the ROC also has a parliament. It is called Legislative Yuan, unicameral and composed of 113 members whom Taiwanese citizens elect every four years. All of us know it quite well. We have studied it and many of us also saw it in practice during the visit of the delegation of scholars and activists that I previously mentioned. On that occasion, we similarly deepened our knowledge of a very peculiar and important institution of Taiwanese democracy, the Control Yuan. This is a supervisory and auditory body of the government that functions as a checker on public officials.
Our delegation had two long separate public conversations with the President of the Legislative Yuan, Yu Shy-Kun, and the President of the Control Yuan, Chen Chu. Given the international nature of that delegation, which also met the press and some NGOs of the civil society, the public words uttered by the two Presidents of the Legislative Yuan and the Control Yuan had an international character and appeal. Questions were put, answers were given. Facts were analyzed, perspectives were designed. Problems were presented, considerations were offered. Thus, more than one year later, it is time to re-appraise the finding of that tour and the words that were spoken. The UN International Day of Parliamentarism is indeed a perfect occasion.
To the benefit of the delegation, President Yu Shyi-Kun proudly underlined that the ROC ranks no. 2 in Asia and no. 18 in the world for its respect of human rights, according to Freedom House. He agreed that this doesn’t of course mean that everything in the ROC is perfect, while the delegation surely agreed in concluding that it is a sufficiently sound and honorable basis for pacific improvements. Remaining errors and injustices should be redressed, including the Tai Ji Men case. It is quite safe to say, more than twelve months after the meeting, that President Yu Shyi-Kun had no problem in sharing this view. The delegation of scholars and activists felt in fact quite encouraged and comforted by his openness and availability to confront difficulties and complications calmly and seriously.
Similarly, President Chen Chu appeared quite committed to the same endeavor. Reaffirming that ROC abides by the rule of law, she repeated that solutions to injustices must always come from a serene approach to misdeeds, not remitting responsibilities, but searching for “middle ways” that may compensate wrongdoings on one side and on the other hand not require public official in the Taiwanese government and bureaucracy to renounce to the separation of powers and the law of the land.
The delegation listened to everything with much interest, and also, I should say, some concern. The ROC, we all know, is a bastion of democracy in a geopolitical space of the world where democracy is rare and often abused or totally neglected. Members of that delegation do not engage in politics, but they were also not naïve at the point of ignoring that the ROC is a strategic and indispensable partner of the West against rogue states, the members of the delegation understanding “the West” as the geopolitical space where a decent level of human rights and religious liberty is respected‒and when not, a place where citizens can effectively and freely challenge power. ROC is in fact proud of being a defender of human rights and religious liberty, and this meant a lot for a delegation whose main interest and focus was religious liberty. The case of Tai Ji Men is being widely, and increasingly, discussed internationally, as the Presidents of the Legislative Yuan and Control Yuan acknowledged one year ago.
Thus, the Tai Ji Men case is the real litmus test of the important public and international commitment displayed one year ago by the Presidents of the Legislative Yuan and Control Yuan. Yet, a full year and plus passed and the situation of that paramount and emblematic case is still frozen. Nothing substantial happened since the words of the Presidents of the Legislative Yuan and Control Yuan; nothing moved forward, nothing changed, nothing improved. The case is still all there, intact, as absurd as it is: a spiritual movement is still denied, after almost 28 years, its right to religious liberty after having been accused first, and then found not guilty, of a non-existent fiscal fraud and fraudulent practices, as all levels of the Taiwanese justice repeatedly ruled. However, tax harassment continued as a perverse punishment for a crime that was never committed.
More than one year ago, that delegation of scholars and activists met the Presidents of the Legislative Yuan and Control Yuan. They both seemed very reasonable. All needed of course to be discussed further in practical details, but after more than 14 months none of this has been done. Meanwhile, after the 2024 elections, the Legislative Yuan has a new President, while the President of the Control Yuan remains the same. We call again on the new President of the Legislative Yuan and on the President of the Control Yuan to follow up along the lines discussed in our 2023 meetings and quickly move in the direction of doing all that is in their institutional power to solve the Tai Ji Men case once for all. The offices of the two Presidents are political in the best sense and are committed to a centuries-old heritage that operate for the common good of all citizens.
Until it solves the Tai Ji Men case, the Republic of China in Taiwan will keep on showing the entire world the evident stain that tarnish its otherwise elegant democratic suit; and the authority of the Taipei’s parliament, heir to an old, noble tradition of discussion and problem-solving, will remain sadly diminished.
