Not Good Enough

"Taiwanese should therefore cherish the selfless efforts of academics such as Professor Hsu Shih-jung (徐世榮) of National Chengchi University’s Department of Land Economics, a man who has been on the front lines of the battle between the residents of Dapu and the triumvirate of greed, lies and corruption.

Every Taiwanese who wants to continue to live in a society where democracy and the rule of law are upheld should be concerned when people like Hsu, a gentle and respected academic, are dragged away by police and charged with “endangering public safety” for shouting slogans during a protest against Ma."

J.M Cole's house editorial for the Taipei Times yesterday. Whilst I agree with the general thrust of what he is saying, I must point that Hsu Shih-jung (徐世榮) is someone whose views on State-sanctioned theft I have criticized several times in the past. In a typical polemic, he will write that property rights are "inviolable" and then a paragraph further down will write that their violation is justified if it meets "the needs of the community" and if broad public participation is involved.

What the "gentle and respected" professor ought to be doing is arguing for the repeal of the Land Theft Act, not its revision - and let's be clear "revision" is going to be an endless legal process subject to further "revision". Protesting against the theft of homes in Miaoli and elsewhere is all very well, and such people will inevitably rack up street cred for their cuts and bruises - but it doesn't matter, because at the end of the day, the content of their protest is more important than their mere bodily prescence at the protests, and the content of Professor Hsu's protests is really just more dripping wet social-democracy.