Taiwan Goes to the Polls

Tomorrow is Election Day in Taiwan, where the selection of a new president will shape the island’s relationship with China — and, by extension, shape international affairs.

Today’s newsletter offers a guide. We know that many readers have paid little if any attention to the campaign, but it’s been fascinating and has implications for the competition over global influence between the U.S. and China.

Background

The fate of Taiwan is one of the big unknowns of the 2020s. It is now a thriving democracy of around 23 million people, with average annual income higher than in parts of Europe. Many other countries, including the U.S., treat it almost as an independent nation without formally recognizing it as such. These countries instead maintain the diplomatic fiction that there is “one China,” including both mainland China and Taiwan.

Xi Jinping, China’s president, wants to reunify the two and absorb Taiwan in coming years, U.S. officials believe. Xi’s increasing bellicosity has raised fears that China will start a war. Official U.S. policy — known as strategic ambiguity — is to remain vague about how it would respond if China invaded. But President Biden has said publicly that the U.S. would come to Taiwan’s aid.

When foreign policy experts worry about how a world war might start, they often put Taiwan at the top of the list. (Our colleague Edward Wong told the back story on an episode of “The Daily” last year.)

The candidates

Tomorrow’s presidential election includes three candidates, one of whom — Lai Ching-te, the favorite and the current vice president — China would clearly like to see lose. Lai’s party, the Democratic Progressive Party, has historically favored independence. (Here’s a new Times story on the party.)