Taiwan’s reputation for respecing all its citizens is tarnished by a ridiculous and fabricated case that should urgently be solved.
by Eileen Barker*
*A paper presented via video at the 2025 International Forum on World Citizenship Day “Transitional Justice Through Effective Relief: The Tai Ji Men Human Rights Case,” Taipei, April 1, 2025. See full videos of the morning session and the afternoon session of the Forum.
The concept of world citizenship implies that all peoples, whatever their age, whatever their gender, whatever their race, whatever their religion, belong equally to one great city—that of Planet Earth. Although we may differ in many respects, each of us is deserving of the respect of our brother and sister citizens. For better or for worse, the actions of one can affect the actions of others.
The global city builds up institutions that are intended to safeguard the rights of individuals. These institutions and the people within them can gain varying strengths of power over some, or all, other citizens. In optimal situations this power is seen as an authority, that is, it is recognised as legitimate power. The citizens accept that the institutions can be trusted to look after the interests of all citizens, whatever their age, their gender, their race and/or their religion.
The legitimacy of such authority can lie in the fact that an elected government has erected the institutions. Individuals chosen by the citizens have been given the authority to legislate and see to the fair administration of the rules that both protect the citizens and enable them to live safe and healthy lives in which each can contribute to the well-being of not only him or herself, but also that of his or her fellow citizens and the planet which sustains their needs.
However, not all local institutions are the result of free and fair elections. There are places that are ruled by tyrants and/or corrupt and self-serving individuals. But sometimes a freely elected government can become corrupted in at least one section of its institutions and the machinery that has been established to protect and enable, ceases to do so; instead, it restricts and controls some of the citizens in ways that those who had placed their trust in the government had certainly not intended.
Taiwan has a history of different types of governments. In the past, there have been occasions when its citizens have been restricted against their wishes. Today, however, it has a freely elected government and it is admired by its democratic brothers and sisters throughout the world for such matters as, for example, assuring freedom of religion and belief for all.
And yet, something has gone wrong. Something that has been acknowledged in the courts as having gone wrong. But, for almost twenty-nine years, that wrong has not been righted.
Back in 1996, Dr. Hong Tao-Tze, the current Shifu (Grand Master) of Tai Ji Men and Vice-President of the Association of World Citizens, and some of his disciples were imprisoned, having been accused of fraud by a Prosecutor. It was incorrectly claimed that his Qigong Academy was a cram school and money donated to Dr. Hong and the Academy, rather than being a gift, was taxable income.
The Prosecutor had sent a false indictment to the National Taxation Bureau, which resulted in the Bureau issuing tax bills. Yet, although Dr. Hong had been pronounced innocent of any tax fraud, the National Taxation Bureau persisted in pursuing its demand for taxes. Even after both the Supreme Court and a second ruling by the Supreme Administrative Court confirmed that the tribute from disciple to master was tax free, and most of the claims had already been cancelled, the National Taxation Bureau continues—to this day—to maintain its claim for the year 1992.
What Tai Ji Men considers to be sacred land was nationalized and other properties that were seized or frozen for years become ruined ghosts rather than the places where the spiritual traditions of the movement were to have been taught.
The 2005 International Forum on World Citizenship Day is surely an occasion when Taiwan should celebrate its highly commendable respect for all citizens, and ensure that its reputation for fostering and enabling freedom of religion and belief for all should no longer remain tarnished by this ridiculous situation.
Eileen Barker O.B.E. is Professor emerita of Sociology at the London School of Economics. She is widely regarded as one of leading contemporary sociologists of religion and the founder of the academic subfield of new religious movements studies. In 1988, she founded INFORM, the Information Network Focus on Religious Movements, with the aim of offering unbiased information on new religious movements to the media and the public.
