There are two perspectives to the development of Taiwan’s national referendum:

The first perspective converts the long-term governmental system of the past and drives the nation into sovereignty practice based on the Referendum Law. The second perspective is for a national referendum to form a basic practical experience, starting with the anti Fourth Nuclear Power Plant movement, and concurrently gaining experience by the method of government seeking consultation from the people. These two perspectives combine the Referendum Law with the dialectical relationship of exercising a referendum, for which the Democratic Progressive Party has undoubtedly played a key role in its drive and integration. From its foundation to becoming the ruling party, through long-term historical effort, on November 27, 2003, the ruling Democratic Progressive Party integrated the public’s highest expectations to pass the Referendum Law in the Legislative Yuan, marking a new milestone for democratic politics in Taiwan under a conventional representative democracy and providing a burgeoning road for the development of Taiwan’s democracy.

Exploring Taiwan’s local historical context, the dimension of Taiwan’s constitutional system is attributed to adopting ‘Progressive Reform’, for which the process hardly avoided debate and compromise, through a reform system almost impossible to permeate and even hiding numerous conflictive fundamentals. The design for the constitutional system is inadequate, and with the reality of a political party in office with no majority in the legislative assembly, there is great difficulty under the present system to make any progress in systematic or societal reform. Originally, people expected party rotation to have the capability of implementing deep reforms, but it resulted bitterly and caused people to worry. In addition, the opposition party zealously wanted to regain greater control and factions of society that went through deeper reforms became even more united to oppose any new ones. Obviously, democratic elections not necessarily push forward reform but only through the cultivation of democracy deepening and the reoccurrence of the people’s sovereign rights, employing a democratic referendum is the most important and promptest model. Systematically, a national referendum not only declares the people’s sovereign rights, but allows the people to be directly involved in public policy, conducing also to breaking the deadlock in constitutional government; in political culture, it serves an educational function, teaching the public to be a conscientious active citizen and not a party grounded voter; in the process of democracy deepening, via the process of public debate, it not only stirs public participation in political affairs, but also promotes understanding in public administration and at the same time proceeds to the next step of producing common consensus, realistically obtaining democracy deepening.

However, one must be careful in understanding the meaning of referendum. In a representative democracy, it does not mean there is mutual exclusion or conflictive relations of both. In reality, looking at every referendum process in Western democratic countries, political elites and even political parties often play a role in agenda setting, initiation and publicity. The most important effect on a referendum with democratic representation is not to eliminate legislative representation and the influence of political parties, but to introduce once again the role of the voter to allow public opinion to take shape, to establish a direct channel of communication, as well as to allow a competition of dual-representation, and at the same time, also allow public opinion to periodically take participation in legislation.

With the above mentioned viewpoint, let’s use the nature of referendum as well as the relationship of representative democracy to observe:

1. Referendum and representative government resembles a competition, but are not confrontations of the democratic channel. According to the above debate, the intention for a referendum is to integrate entirely the referendum’s democratic channel into the representative system. Via this democracy import, direct public opinion settles political disputes, therefore, both the referendum and representative democracy are two co-existing democratic systems, even serving a competitive relationship. Taiwan’s experience shows that democratic elections driving party rotation instead produced political deadlock, and in times of the sovereignty question under threat, the referendum replaced representative democracy, becoming a new democracy aspect.
2. The behavior of political parties and political elites in both a representative democracy and referendum play important but different roles. In the process of legislating the referendum law, as well as before and after subjecting the issue to debate and setting the agenda, it is important to notice, establishing a referendum or the representative elite setting the agenda generally is not to satisfy or frame an already democratic system or using the referendum as a channel to gain political majority.
3. Types of referendum depend on the administration of political elites and political parties as also referendum topics. Because the administration of referendum topics requires a degree of intervention from the political elite, there are inextricable aspects to the referendum system. Public policy and sovereignty level are all probably subjects of debate, among which the role of the referendum is very different, from formulating public opinion to communicating the ‘people’s will’. The referendum is diverse in nature, possesses a complex culture and is different from the normal representative political system.
4. The referendum is a ‘direct’ legal process doubly introducing public opinion, therefore, the quality of public opinion is subjected to topics of influence. For instance, during an election, the key players are the voters, where the results signify the collective preference of the people and where the competence of the candidate is determined. Nevertheless, due to the nature of referendum topics, public involvement to determine residence, using policy to determine ‘nationality’, and also to guarantee the sovereign rights of the ‘people’. Consequently, the levels of public opinion vary.

As a result, referendum can be of assistance to a representative democracy. But as a new democratic channel to fulfill direct democracy, referendum can compete with representative democracy, and can even play a very active role in special issues such as national sovereignty or enacting a new constitution. Especially, under the complicated circumstance of cross-strait relations, referendum is the only way to show the collective will of Taiwanese people, defend Taiwan from China’s war threat, and protect the democracy of Taiwan. This is the reason why President Chen has planned to hold the 320 Peace Referendum. Through active agenda setting and through national mobilization by holding a referendum contemporarily with the presidential election, the so-called defensive referendum is already a preemptive statement: the preemptive weapon against China’s threat – except for long-range missiles – and is also the direct democracy of Taiwanese people.

When we look back the long road of referendum campaign, for a country like Taiwan, having experienced authoritarian regime and obtaining unique international status, the 320 Peace Referendum therefore is not only the internal engine for mature civil society and democracy, including social reform, civil organizations, and people’s political awareness. As the first direct democracy being practiced by Taiwanese people, this referendum will bring the direction for future cross-strait policy. The referendum is no longer a mobilization for election campaign; it will be the turning point of Taiwan’s future. Confirmed by the referendum, the proposition of this long-term development can be the hard guide line of governmental policy. With the country’s taking the right course and decision making power, the referendum will surely become a great contribution brought by the 2004 Presidential election to the history of Taiwan.