Why do tribal communities in the high mountain areas adjacent to India's northeast and Bangladesh enjoy more sovereignty compared to indigenous tribes in Taiwan's high mountain regions? On January 9th, our university's Graduate Institute of Development Studies (GIDS), Department of Sociology, International College of Cross-Cultural Studies' India Research Center (OCIA), and the Taiwan Association for India Studies jointly hosted an academic seminar on development studies. The seminar featured Dr. Oliver Scanlan, a scholar from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Taiwan currently conducting research at our university's Department of Sociology, who presented a lecture.
Also in attendance were Professor PingKuei Chen from the Department of Diplomacy and concurrently serving as the director of the India Research Center, as well as Professor TienSze Fang, director of the Taiwan Association for India Studies and also teaching at the General Education Center of Tsinghua University. The lecture was chaired by Professor Mei-Chuan Wei from GIDS.
Dr. Scanlan's lecture, titled "Contrasting Histories from the Plains to the Hills: Explaining Stronger Recognition for Indigenous Sovereignty in India compared with Taiwan," shared his research findings from Taiwan. His analysis primarily compared the strength of indigenous sovereignty between India and Taiwan's high mountain regions, focusing on field survey data from Meghalaya's Garo Hills in India, archival data from the British Library, and informal exchanges during his research in Taiwan. He attempted to explain why tribal communities in India's northeast highlands enjoy more sovereignty than those in Taiwan's high mountain regions.
Scanlan pointed out that different colonial experiences and forms of governance were crucial historical factors. During British rule, especially in Meghalaya's Garo Hills, governance was relatively lenient due to lack of strategic or economic interests. In contrast, Japanese colonial rule in Taiwan aimed to integrate Taiwan as a model colony, actively extracting resources and establishing stringent controls, which significantly affected indigenous sovereignty in Taiwan's high mountain regions, limiting it compared to India's northeast highlands.
Post-colonial political systems also played a role: Taiwan, under authoritarian rule by the Kuomintang (KMT) after the retreat from mainland China, centralized power for national security and the goal of retaking the mainland. In contrast, India adopted a federal democratic system emphasizing decentralization after independence. Scanlan highlighted these post-colonial political differences as influencing the varying degrees of indigenous sovereignty in Taiwan and India's high mountain regions.
Using a path-dependence approach, Scanlan explained the reasons for the significant differences in indigenous sovereignty between Taiwan and India's high mountain regions. He noted that Taiwan's high mountain areas lacked economic interest initially, being primarily regions for camphor tree growth. However, Japan later monopolized camphor production for economic gain, impacting Taiwan's economic landscape and security considerations. These dynamics were similar to India's northwest region facing security concerns from Russia but not affecting the high mountain areas.
In conclusion, Scanlan attributed the substantial differences in indigenous sovereignty between Taiwan and India's high mountain regions to historical trajectories shaped by colonial governance and post-colonial political systems. He stressed that Taiwan's KMT-led government post-World War II did not envision a decentralized, federal system akin to India's plural legalism.
Following the lecture, an enthusiastic question-and-answer session ensued. Attendees posed questions about Scanlan's use of Michel Foucault's concept of "liberal governmentality" in further comparative research and debated differing views on Japan's security considerations during its colonial rule of Taiwan. The exchange of opinions remained lively well after the event.
