Electoral System and Indigenous Political Representation in Taiwan | SOAS University of London
Channel: SOAS University of London
Date: 2018-03-14

This lecture titled "Electoral System and Indigenous Political Representation in Taiwan" was given by Dr Cheng-Hao Pao on 22 February 2018 at the Centre of Taiwan Studies, SOAS University of London.
You can find out more about this event at https://goo.gl/fL44Gu

This study offers a novel empirical account of the representative behavior of the indigenous legislators of Taiwan. Based on behavioral data, the analysis seeks first to know whether the lack of descriptive representation leads to the harm of substantive representation or not, and then second to illustrate the change and continuity of the issues which indigenous legislators pay attention to. The research findings indicates that although dedicated indigenous seats are always occupied by Amis, Atayal, and Paiwan, the interests of other indigenous peoples do not be harmed. In other words, the current electoral system does not guarantee descriptive representation of all indigenous peoples but provide a substantive representation to them. Basically, the elected indigenous legislators regard themselves as representatives of all indigenous peoples. Furthermore, although the issues concerned by indigenous legislators may be influenced by constituency and party affiliation, they are still highly related to indigenous interests. Indigenous legislators in Taiwan do response to the needs of the represented.

Keywords: indigenous people, descriptive representation, substantive representation, representative behavior

Speaker Bio
Dr. Cheng-Hao PAO completed his PhD at the University of Hull in UK in 2005 and joined the lecturing staff as assistant professor in 2007, having worked for two years as a part-time assistant professor at Fo-Guan University and Tamkang University (TKU). In 2017, he was made Full Professor. From 2012 to 2015, apart from lecturing at TKU, he was also the director of the International Cooperation Department at Taiwan Foundation for Democracy (TFD). He is the chair of the department since August 2013. He also establishes the Centre for Indigenous Development Studies at TKU and serves as the director since August 2014.

His principle areas of interest are: democratization, electoral behavior and indigenous politics. He is currently engaged in legislative study with special reference to indigenous legislative behaviour in Taiwan, Australia, and New Zealand. He also published around 30 articles about indigenous voting behavior and consequently won the Distinguished Research Talent award in 2016 and 2017.