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Abkhazia
Abkhazia (Abkhaz: Аҧсны́ Apsny, IPA /apʰsˈnɨ/; Georgian: აფხაზეთი Apkhazeti; Russian: Абхазия Abkhaziya) is a disputed territory on the eastern coast of the Black Sea and the south-western flank of the Caucasus.
Abkhazia considers itself an independent state, called the Republic of Abkhazia or Apsny. This status is recognised by Russia, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Nauru, Tuvalu and Vanuatu and also by the partially recognised states of South Ossetia, Transnistria and Nagorno-Karabakh.
The Georgian government and the majority of the world's governments consider Abkhazia a part of Georgia's territory. Under Georgia's official designation it is an autonomous republic, called the Autonomous Republic of Abkhazia, whose government sits in exile in Tbilisi. On 28 August 2008, the Parliament of Georgia passed a resolution declaring Abkhazia a "Russian-occupied territory".
The status of Abkhazia is a central issue of the Georgian–Abkhazian conflict. The wider region formed part of the Soviet Union until 1991. As the Soviet Union began to disintegrate towards the end of the 1980s, ethnic tensions grew between Abkhaz and Georgians over Georgia's moves towards independence. This led to the 1992–1993 War in Abkhazia that resulted in a Georgian military defeat, de facto independence of Abkhazia and the mass exodus and ethnic cleansing of the Georgian population from Abkhazia. In spite of the 1994 ceasefire agreement and years of negotiations, the status dispute has not been resolved, and despite the long-term presence of a United Nations monitoring force and a Russian-dominated Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) peacekeeping operation, the conflict has flared up on several occasions. In August 2008, the sides again fought during the South Ossetia War, which was followed by the formal recognition of Abkhazia by Russia, the annulment of the 1994 cease fire agreement and the termination of the UN and CIS missions.[citation needed]
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Afghanistan
Afghanistan
i/æfˈɡænɨstæn/ (Persian/Pashto: افغانستان, Afġānistān), officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming part of South Asia, Central Asia, and Greater Middle East, it is also considered to be part of a broader West Asia. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of 647,500 km2 (250,001 sq mi), making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world. It is bordered by Pakistan in the south and the east, Iran in the west, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan in the north, and China in the far northeast.
Afghanistan has been an ancient focal point of the Silk Road and human migration. Archaeologists have found evidence of human habitation from as far back as 50,000 BC. Urban civilization may have begun in the area as early as 3,000 to 2,000 BC. Sitting at an important geostrategic location that connects the Middle East with Central Asia and the Indian subcontinent, the land has been home to various peoples through the ages and witnessed many military campaigns, notably by Alexander the Great, Genghis Khan, and in modern era Western forces. The land also served as a source from which the Greco-Bactrians, Kushans, Saffarids, Ghaznavids, Ghorids, Timurids, Mughals and many others have risen to form major empires.
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Anping, Tainan
Anping District (Chinese: 安平區; pinyin: ĀnpíngQū; Wade–Giles: An-p'ing Ch'ü; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: An-pêng-khu) is a district of Tainan City. In March 2012, it was named one of the Top 10 Small Touist Towns by the Tourism Bureau of Taiwan.
The history of Anping dates back to the 17th century, when the Dutch East India Company occupied Tayuan/Tayoan/Tayouan/Tayowan (transliterated into Chinese characters as 大灣/台員/大員/台圓/大圓/台窩灣), meaning "foreigner" in Sirayan. In the period of the Japanese occupation, the history of trade between China and Japan unfolded at Anping.
Anping was originally a small island separated from the mainland of Tainan until the 19th century. Due to the ocean current, the small lagoon between Anping island and Tainan was silted up and gradually disappeared, and Anping became a part of Tainan.[citation needed]
Night market in Anping
Tianhou temple in Anping
Statue of Koxinga at Anping Fort
Anping Port
Yuguang Bridge
Yanshuei River and Taijiang National Park
wn.com/Anping,_Tainan -
Armenia
Armeniai/ɑrˈmiːniə/ (Armenian: Հայաստան Hayastan [hɑjɑsˈtɑn]), officially the Republic of Armenia (Հայաստանի Հանրապետություն, Hayastani Hanrapetut’yun, [hɑjɑstɑˈni hɑnɾɑpɛtuˈtʰjun]), is a landlocked, mountainous country in the South Caucasus region of Eurasia. Located at the crossroads of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bordered by Turkey to the west, Georgia to the north, the de facto independent Nagorno-Karabakh Republic and Azerbaijan to the east, and Iran and the Azerbaijani exclave of Nakhchivan to the south.
A former republic of the Soviet Union, Armenia is a unitary, multiparty, democratic nation-state with an ancient and historic cultural heritage. The Kingdom of Armenia became the first state in the world to adopt Christianity as its religion, in the early years of the 4th century (the traditional date is 301 AD). The modern Republic of Armenia recognizes the Armenian Apostolic Church, the world's oldest national church, as the country's primary religious establishment. Armenians have their own unique alphabet invented by Mesrob Mashtots in 406 AD.
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Australia
Australia (
/əˈstreɪljə/), officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent as well as the island of Tasmania and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area. Neighbouring countries include Indonesia, East Timor and Papua New Guinea to the north; the Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and New Caledonia to the north-east; and New Zealand to the south-east.
For at least 40,000 years before European settlement in the late 18th century, Australia was inhabited by indigenous Australians, who belonged to one or more of roughly 250 language groups. After discovery by Dutch explorers in 1606, Australia's eastern half was claimed by Great Britain in 1770 and settled through penal transportation to the colony of New South Wales from 26 January 1788. The population grew steadily in subsequent decades; the continent was explored and an additional five self-governing Crown Colonies were established.
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Azerbaijan
Azerbaijan (
i/ˌæzərbaɪˈdʒɑːn/ AZ-ər-by-JAHN; Azerbaijani: Azərbaycan), officially the Republic of Azerbaijan (Azerbaijani: Azərbaycan Respublikası) is the largest country in the Caucasus region located at the crossroads of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bounded by the Caspian Sea to the east, Russia to the north, Georgia to the northwest, Armenia to the west, and Iran to the south. The exclave of Nakhchivan is bounded by Armenia to the north and east, Iran to the south and west, while having a short borderline with Turkey to the northwest.
Azerbaijan has an ancient and historic cultural heritage. Aside from having been the first Muslim-majority country to have operas, theater and plays, Azerbaijan today is among the Muslim-majority countries where support for secularism and tolerance is the highest. The Azerbaijan Democratic Republic, the first democratic and secular republic in the Muslim world, was established in 1918, but was incorporated into the Soviet Union in 1920. Azerbaijan regained independence in 1991. Shortly thereafter, during the Nagorno-Karabakh War, neighboring Armenia occupied Nagorno-Karabakh, its surrounding territories and the enclaves of Karki, Yukhary Askipara, Barkhudarly and Sofulu. The Nagorno-Karabakh Republic, which emerged in Nagorno-Karabakh, continues to be not diplomatically recognized by any nation and the region is still considered a de jure part of Azerbaijan, despite being de facto independent since the end of the war. Azerbaijan has come under repeated international criticism for its record on human rights.
wn.com/Azerbaijan -
Bahrain
Bahrain ( pronunciation) (Arabic: البحرين, al-Baḥrayn) (Persian: بحرين, Baḥrain), officially the Kingdom of Bahrain (Arabic: مملكة البحرين, Mamlakat al-Baḥrayn), is a small island state near the western shores of the Persian Gulf. It is ruled by the Al Khalifa royal family. The population in 2010 stood at 1,234,571, including 666,172 non-nationals. Formerly an emirate, Bahrain was declared a kingdom in 2002.
Bahrain is an archipelago of 33 islands, the largest being Bahrain Island, at 55 km (34 mi) long by 18 km (11 mi) wide. Saudi Arabia lies to the west and is connected to Bahrain by the King Fahd Causeway. The peninsula of Qatar is to the southeast across the Gulf of Bahrain. The planned Qatar Bahrain Causeway will link Bahrain and Qatar and become the world's longest marine causeway.
Known for its oil and pearls, Bahrain is also home to many large structures, including the Bahrain World Trade Center and the Bahrain Financial Harbour, with a proposal in place to build the 1,022 m (3,353 ft) high Murjan Tower. The Qal'at al-Bahrain (the harbour and capital of the ancient land of Dilmun) was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2005. The Bahrain Formula One Grand Prix takes place at the Bahrain International Circuit.
wn.com/Bahrain -
Bangladesh
Coordinates: 23°N 90°E / 23°N 90°E / 23; 90
Bangladesh (i/ˈbɑːŋɡlədɛʃ/ or i/bæŋɡləˈdɛʃ/ (Anglicized pronunciation); Bengali: বাংলাদেশ), officially the People's Republic of Bangladesh (Bengali: গণপ্রজাতন্ত্রী বাংলাদেশ Gônoprojatontri Bangladesh) is a sovereign state located in South Asia. It is bordered by India and Burma and by the Bay of Bengal to the south. The capital (and largest city) is Dhaka, located in central Bangladesh. The official state language is Bengali. The name Bangladesh means "Land of Bengal" or "Country of Bengal" the in the Bengali language, from Bangla "Bengal" and desh holding a dual meaning of "land" and "country" as English "country," German land, French pays, etc.
The borders of present-day Bangladesh were established with the partition of Bengal during the reign and demise of the British India. Its map was chartered by Sir Cyril Radcliffe during the creation of Pakistan and India in 1947, when the region became East Pakistan, part of the newly formed nation of Pakistan. Due to political exclusion and economic exploitation by the politically dominant West Pakistan, popular agitation grew against West Pakistan and led to the Bangladesh Liberation War in 1971, after the Bangladeshi Declaration of Independence on 26 March 1971. With the intervention of the Indian Army, the war came to an end on 16 December 1971 with the surrender of the Pakistan Army at Ramna Race Course.
wn.com/Bangladesh -
Bhutan
Coordinates: 27°25′01″N 90°26′06″E / 27.417°N 90.435°E / 27.417; 90.435
Bhutan (Dzongkha: འབྲུག་ཡུལ་, tr ʼbrug-yul, "Druk Yul"; Devanagari भूटान, Bhūṭān), officially the Kingdom of Bhutan, is a landlocked state in South Asia, located at the eastern end of the Himalayas and bordered to the south, east and west by the Republic of India and to the north by the People's Republic of China. Bhutan is separated from the nearby country of Nepal to the west by the Indian state of Sikkim, and from Bangladesh to the south by the Indian states of Assam and West Bengal.
Bhutan existed as a patchwork of minor warring fiefdoms until the early 17th century, when the area was unified by Shabdrung Ngawang Namgyal, who fled religious persecution in Tibet and cultivated a separate Bhutanese identity. In the early 20th century, Bhutan came into contact with the British Empire, after which Bhutan continued strong bilateral relations with India upon its independence. In 2006, Business Week rated Bhutan the happiest country in Asia and the eighth-happiest in the world, based on a global survey.
wn.com/Bhutan -
Brunei
Bruneii/bruːˈnaɪ/, officially the Nation of Brunei, the Abode of Peace (Malay: Negara Brunei Darussalam, Jawi: نڬارا بروني دارالسلام), is a sovereign state located on the north coast of the island of Borneo, in Southeast Asia. Apart from its coastline with the South China Sea, it is completely surrounded by the state of Sarawak, Malaysia, and it is separated into two parts by the Sarawak district of Limbang. It is the only sovereign state completely on the island of Borneo, with the remainder of the island belonging to Malaysia and Indonesia. Brunei's population was 401,890 in July 2011.
The official national history claims that Brunei can trace its beginnings to the 7th century, when it was a subject state of the Srivijayan empire under the name P'o-li. It later became a vassal state of Majapahit empire before converting to Islam in the 15th century. At the peak of its empire, the sultanate had control that extended over the coastal regions of modern-day Sarawak and Sabah, the Sulu archipelago, and the islands off the northwest tip of Borneo. The thalassocracy was visited by Ferdinand Magellan in 1521 and fought the Castille War in 1578 against Spain. Its empire began to decline with the forced ceding of Sarawak to James Brooke and the ceding of Sabah to the British North Borneo Chartered Company. After the loss of Limbang, Brunei finally became a British protectorate in 1888, receiving a resident in 1906. In the years after the Japanese wartime occupation during World War II, it formalised a constitution and fought an armed rebellion. Brunei regained its independence from the United Kingdom on 1 January 1984. Economic growth during the 1970s and 1990s, averaging 56% from 1999 to 2008, has transformed Brunei Darussalam into a newly industrialised country.
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Burma
Burmai/ˈbɜrmə/ BUR-mə, also known as Myanmar i/ˌmjɑːnˈmɑr/ MYAHN--MAR, is a country in South Asia and Southeast Asia. It is bordered by India, Bangladesh, China, Laos and Thailand. One-third of Burma's total perimeter of 1,930 kilometres (1,200 mi) forms an uninterrupted coastline along the Bay of Bengal and the Andaman Sea. At 676,578 km2 (261,227 sq mi), it is the 40th largest country in the world and the second largest country in Southeast Asia. Burma is also the 24th most populous country in the world with over 60.28 million people.
Burma is home to some of the early civilizations of Southeast Asia including the Pyu and the Mon. In the 9th century, the Burmans of the Kingdom of Nanzhao, entered the upper Irrawaddy valley and, following the establishment of the Pagan Empire in the 1050s, the Burmese language and culture slowly became dominant in the country. During this period, Theravada Buddhism gradually became the predominant religion of the country. The Pagan Empire fell due to the Mongol invasions (1277–1301), and several warring states emerged. In the second half of the 16th century, the country was reunified by the Taungoo Dynasty which for a brief period was the largest empire in the history of Southeast Asia. The early 19th century Konbaung Dynasty ruled over an area that included modern Burma as well as Manipur and Assam. The country was colonized by Britain following three Anglo-Burmese Wars (1824–1885).
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Cambodia
Cambodia (i/kæmˈboʊdiə/;Khmer: ព្រះរាជាណាចក្រកម្ពុជា, Kampuchea, IPA: [kɑmˈpuˈciə]), officially known as the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. With a total landmass of 181,035 square kilometres (69,898 sq mi), it is bordered by Thailand to the northwest, Laos to the northeast, Vietnam to the east, and the Gulf of Thailand to the southwest.
With a population of over 14.8 million, Cambodia is the 68th most populous country in the world. The official religion is Theravada Buddhism, which is practiced by around 95% of the Cambodian population. The country minority groups include Vietnamese, Chinese, Chams and 30 various hill tribes. The capital and largest city is Phnom Penh; the political, economic, and cultural center of Cambodia. The kingdom is a constitutional monarchy with Norodom Sihamoni, a monarch chosen by the Royal Throne Council, as head of state. The head of government is Hun Sen, who is currently the longest serving leader in South East Asia and has ruled Cambodia for over 25 years.
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Changhua County
Changhua County is the smallest county in Taiwan located on the westside of Taiwan. It is officially governed as a county of the Republic of China (Taiwan).
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Chiayi
Chiayi City (sometimes romanized as Jiayi) (Chinese: 嘉義市; Hanyu Pinyin: Jiāyì Shì; Tongyong Pinyin: Jiayì Shìh; Wade–Giles: Chia-i Shih; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Ka-gī chhī) is a city located in the plains of southwestern Taiwan. Formerly called Kagee during the late Qing Dynasty and Kagi during the Japanese era, its historical name is Tirosen.
First inhabited by the Hoanya aborigines, the region was named Tirosen.
With the arrival of Han Chinese in southwestern Taiwan, the name Tirosen evolved to become Chu-lô-san (Chinese characters: 諸羅山) in Hokkien. Eventually, Chu-lô-san was shortened to simply Chu-lô. Because of the choice of the characters, it has been mistakenly suggested that the origin of the name Chu-lô-san or Chu-lô came from the expression "mountains surrounding the east." "Peach City" is another name for Chiayi City due to its peach-shaped territory in ancient times. The tip of the peach is around Central Fountain and was called "Peach-tip" by citizens.
Chulôsan was once the foothold to which people from the mainland immigrated. In 1621, Yen Szu-Chi, who came from Zhangzhou, Fujian Province, first led his people to cultivate this land after they landed at Penkang (Peikang). In 1661 (the 15th year of Yung-Li, Ming Dynasty), Koxinga defeated the Dutch based in Taiwan. Then he established one province, Cheng-Tien-Fu (承天府), and two counties, Tien-Hsing (天興縣) and Wan-Nien (萬年縣), demarcated by the Hsin-Kang River (新港溪, the Yen-Shui River now). Chiayi was under the jurisdiction of the Tien-Hsing County.
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Chiayi City
Chiayi City (sometimes romanized as Jiayi) (Chinese: 嘉義市; Hanyu Pinyin: Jiāyì Shì; Tongyong Pinyin: Jiayì Shìh; Wade–Giles: Chia-i Shih; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Ka-gī chhī) is a city located in the plains of southwestern Taiwan. Formerly called Kagee during the late Qing Dynasty and Kagi during the Japanese era, its historical name is Tirosen.
First inhabited by the Hoanya aborigines, the region was named Tirosen.
With the arrival of Han Chinese in southwestern Taiwan, the name Tirosen evolved to become Chu-lô-san (Chinese characters: 諸羅山) in Hokkien. Eventually, Chu-lô-san was shortened to simply Chu-lô. Because of the choice of the characters, it has been mistakenly suggested that the origin of the name Chu-lô-san or Chu-lô came from the expression "mountains surrounding the east." "Peach City" is another name for Chiayi City due to its peach-shaped territory in ancient times. The tip of the peach is around Central Fountain and was called "Peach-tip" by citizens.
Chulôsan was once the foothold to which people from the mainland immigrated. In 1621, Yen Szu-Chi, who came from Zhangzhou, Fujian Province, first led his people to cultivate this land after they landed at Penkang (Peikang). In 1661 (the 15th year of Yung-Li, Ming Dynasty), Koxinga defeated the Dutch based in Taiwan. Then he established one province, Cheng-Tien-Fu (承天府), and two counties, Tien-Hsing (天興縣) and Wan-Nien (萬年縣), demarcated by the Hsin-Kang River (新港溪, the Yen-Shui River now). Chiayi was under the jurisdiction of the Tien-Hsing County.
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China
China (i/ˈtʃaɪnə/; Chinese: 中国; pinyin: Zhōngguó; see also Names of China), officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is the world's most-populous country, with a population of over 1.3 billion. Covering approximately 9.6 million square kilometres, the East Asian state is the world's second-largest country by land area, and the third- or fourth-largest in total area, depending on the definition of total area.
The People's Republic of China is a single-party state governed by the Communist Party of China. It exercises jurisdiction over 22 provinces, five autonomous regions, four directly controlled municipalities (Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, and Chongqing), and two mostly self-governing special administrative regions (Hong Kong and Macau). Its capital city is Beijing. The PRC also claims Taiwan—which is controlled by the Republic of China (ROC), a separate political entity—as its 23rd province, a claim controversial due to the complex political status of Taiwan and the unresolved Chinese Civil War. The PRC government denies the legitimacy of the ROC.
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Christmas Island
Coordinates: 10°29′S 105°38′E / 10.483°S 105.633°E / -10.483; 105.633 The Territory of Christmas Island is a territory of Australia in the Indian Ocean. It is 2,600 kilometres (1,600 mi) northwest of the Western Australian city of Perth, 360 km (220 mi) south of the Indonesian capital, Jakarta, 975 km (606 mi) ENE of the Cocos (Keeling) Islands, and 2,748 km (1,708 mi) west of the Territorian city of Darwin.
Christmas Island has a population of 1,403 residents who live in a number of "settlement areas" on the northern tip of the island: Flying Fish Cove (also known as Kampong), Silver City, Poon Saan, and Drumsite.
The island’s geographic isolation and history of minimal human disturbance has led to a high level of endemism among its flora and fauna, which is of significant interest to scientists and naturalists. 63% of its 135 square kilometres (52 sq mi) is an Australian national park. There exist large areas of primary monsoonal forest.
Phosphate, deposited originally as dead marine organisms (not guano as often thought), has been mined on the island for many years.
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Control Yuan
The Control Yuan (監察院; pinyin: Jiānchá Yuàn), one of the five branches of the Republic of China government in Taipei, is an investigatory agency that monitors the other branches of government. It may be compared to the Court of Auditors of the European Union, the Government Accountability Office of the United States, a political ombudsman, or a standing commission for administrative inquiry.
Since 2008, Wang Chien-shien has served as President of the Control Yuan.
The structure of the Control Yuan consists of the President, Vice President, a 27-member council and the Ministry of Audit (also known as the National Audit Office).
The council of the Yuan, chaired by the Yuan President, is divided into seven committees covering the following:
No member of the Control Yuan can hold another public office or profession while serving in the branch (according to Article 103 of the constitution), and members must be able to perform absent of partisan control or influence. Members can vote in no more than three committees and can join additional committees as non-voting members. Each committee can have up to 14 members and usually elects a convenor amongst themselves to chair committee meetings.
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Cook Islands
The Cook Islands (i/ˈkʊk ˈaɪləndz/; Cook Islands Māori: Kūki 'Āirani) is a self-governing parliamentary democracy in the South Pacific Ocean in free association with New Zealand. The 15 small islands have a total land area of 240 square kilometres (92.7 sq mi), but the Cook Islands Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) covers 1,800,000 square kilometres (690,000 sq mi) of ocean.
The main population centres are on the island of Rarotonga (14,153 in 2006), where there is an international airport. There is a much larger population of Cook Islanders in New Zealand, particularly the North Island. In the 2006 census, 58,008 self-identified as being of ethnic Cook Island Māori descent.
With about 100,000 visitors travelling to the islands in the 2010-11 financial year,tourism is the country's main industry, and the leading element of the economy, far ahead of offshore banking, pearls, and marine and fruit exports.
Defence and foreign affairs are the responsibility of New Zealand, in consultation with the Cook Islands. In recent times, the Cook Islands have adopted an increasingly independent foreign policy. Although Cook Islanders are citizens of New Zealand, they have the status of Cook Islands nationals, which is not given to other New Zealand citizens.
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Court of Auditors
The Court of Auditors (ECA) is the fifth institution of the European Union (EU). It was established in 1975 in Luxembourg to audit the accounts of EU institutions. The Court is composed of one member from each EU member state and its current president (as of 2008) is Vítor Manuel da Silva Caldeira.
The Court of Auditors was created by the 1975 Budgetary Treaty and was formally established on 18 October 1977, holding its first session a week later. At that time the Court was not a formal institution, it was an external body designed to audit the finances of the European Communities. It replaced two separate audit bodies, one which dealt with the finances of the European Economic Community and Euratom and one which dealt with the European Coal and Steel Community.
The Court did not have a defined legal status until the Treaty of Maastricht when it was made the fifth institution, the first new institution since the founding of the Community. By becoming an institution it gained some new powers, such as the ability to bring actions before the European Court of Justice (ECJ). However its audit power related only to the European Community pillar of the EU, but under the Treaty of Amsterdam it gained the full power to audit finances of the whole of the EU.
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Cyprus
Cyprusi/ˈsaɪprəs/ (Greek: Κύπρος, Kýpros, IPA: [ˈcipɾos]; Turkish: Kıbrıs, IPA: [ˈkɯbɾɯs]), officially the Republic of Cyprus (Greek: Κυπριακή Δημοκρατία, Kypriakī́ Dīmokratía, IPA: [cipɾiaˈci ðimokɾaˈtia]; Turkish: Kıbrıs Cumhuriyeti, IPA: [ˈkɯbɾɯs dʒumhuɾijeˈti]), is an island country in the Eastern Mediterranean Sea, east of Greece, south of Turkey, west of Syria, Lebanon, northwest of Israel and north of Egypt. Cyprus is the third largest island in the Mediterranean Sea and the Republic of Cyprus is a member state of the European Union.
The earliest known human activity on the island dates back to around the 10th millennium BC. Archaeological remains from this period include the well-preserved Neolithic village of Khirokitia, which has been declared a World Heritage Site with an "enhanced protection" status in the event of armed conflict by UNESCO, along with the archaeological sites of Paphos and the Painted Churches of the Troodos Region. Cyprus is home to some of the oldest water wells in the world.
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East Timor
The Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste (tiˈmɔr ˈlɛʃteɪ), commonly known as East Timori/ˌiːst ˈtiːmɔr/ (Tetum: Timór Lorosa'e, Portuguese: Timor-Leste), is a sovereign state in Southeast Asia. It comprises the eastern half of the island of Timor, the nearby islands of Atauro and Jaco, and Oecusse, an exclave on the northwestern side of the island, within Indonesian West Timor. The small country of 15,410 km² (5,400 sq mi) is located about 640 km (400 mi) northwest of Darwin, Australia.
East Timor was colonized by Portugal in the 16th century, and was known as Portuguese Timor until Portugal's decolonization of the country. In late 1975, East Timor declared its independence, but later that year was invaded and occupied by Indonesia and was declared Indonesia's 27th province the following year. In 1999, following the United Nations-sponsored act of self-determination, Indonesia relinquished control of the territory and East Timor became the first new sovereign state of the 21st century on May 20, 2002. East Timor is one of only two predominantly Roman Catholic countries in Asia, the other being the Philippines.
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Easter Island
Coordinates: 27°7′S 109°22′W / 27.117°S 109.367°W / -27.117; -109.367
Easter Island (Rapa Nui: Rapa Nui, Spanish: Isla de Pascua) is a Polynesian island in the southeastern Pacific Ocean, at the southeasternmost point of the Polynesian Triangle. A special territory of Chile that was annexed in 1888, Easter Island is famous for its 887 extant monumental statues, called moai, created by the early Rapanui people. It is a World Heritage Site (as determined by UNESCO) with much of the island protected within Rapa Nui National Park. In recent times the island has served as a warning of the cultural and environmental dangers of overexploitation. Ethnographers and archaeologists also blame diseases carried by European colonizers and slave raiding of the 1860s for devastating the local peoples.
Easter Island is claimed to be the most remote inhabited island in the world.
The name "Easter Island" was given by the island's first recorded European visitor, the Dutch explorer Jacob Roggeveen, who encountered it on Easter Sunday 1722, while searching for Davis or David's island. Roggeveen named it Paasch-Eyland (18th century Dutch for "Easter Island"). The island's official Spanish name, Isla de Pascua, also means "Easter Island".
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Egypt
Egypti/ˈiːdʒɪpt/ (Arabic: مصر, Miṣr, Egyptian Arabic: [mɑsˤɾ] ; Coptic: Ⲭⲏⲙⲓ, Kīmi ; Sahidic Coptic: ⲕⲏⲙⲉ, Kēme), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: جمهوريّة مصر العربيّة (help·info), is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world. Covering an area of about 1,010,000 square kilometers (390,000 sq mi), Egypt is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the north, the Gaza Strip and Israel to the northeast, the Red Sea to the east, Sudan to the south and Libya to the west.
Egypt is one of the most populous countries in Africa and the Middle East. The great majority of its over 81 million people live near the banks of the Nile River, in an area of about 40,000 square kilometers (15,000 sq mi), where the only arable land is found. The large areas of the Sahara Desert are sparsely inhabited. About half of Egypt's residents live in urban areas, with most spread across the densely populated centres of greater Cairo, Alexandria and other major cities in the Nile Delta.
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Executive Yuan
The Executive Yuan (Chinese: 行政院; pinyin: Xíngzhèng Yuàn) is the executive branch of the government of the Republic of China (ROC).
It is headed by a president (often translated as premier), and has a vice president (vice premier), and eight cabinet ministers, various chairpersons of commissions, and five to seven ministers without portfolio as its members. The vice premier, ministers, and chairpersons are appointed by the President of the Republic of China on the recommendation of the premier.
Its formation, as one of five Yuans of the government, stemmed from the Three Principles of the People, the constitutional theory of Sun Yat-sen, but was adjusted constitutionally over the years to adapt to the situation in Taiwan by changes in the laws and the Constitution of the Republic of China.
Empowered by various laws, or even the Constitution, under the Executive Yuan several individual boards are formed to enforce different executive functions of the government. Unless regulated otherwise, the chairs are appointed by and answer to the Premier. The committee members of the boards are usually (a) governmental officials for the purpose of interdepartmental coordination and cooperation; or (b) creditable professionals for their reputation and independence.
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Fiji
Fijii/ˈfiːdʒiː/ (Fijian: Viti; Fiji Hindi: फ़िजी), officially the Republic of Fiji (Fijian: Matanitu ko Viti; Fiji Hindi: फ़िजी गणराज्यFijī Gaṇarājya), is an island nation in Melanesia in the South Pacific Ocean about 1,100 nautical miles (2,000 km; 1,300 mi) northeast of New Zealand's North Island. Its closest neighbours are Vanuatu to the west, France's New Caledonia to the southwest, New Zealand's Kermadec to the southeast, Tonga to the east, the Samoas, France's Wallis and Futuna to the northeast and Tuvalu to the north.
The majority of Fiji's islands were formed through volcanic activity started around 150 million years ago. Today, some geothermal activity still occurs on the islands of Vanua Levu and Taveuni. Fiji has been inhabited since the second millennium BC. The country comprises an archipelago of more than 332 islands, of which 110 are permanently inhabited, and more than 500 islets, amounting to a total land area of circa 18,300 square kilometres (7,100 sq mi). The two major islands, Viti Levu and Vanua Levu, account for 87% of the population of almost 850,000. The former contains Suva, the capital and largest city. Most of Fijians live on Viti Levu's coasts, either in Suva or in smaller urban centres. Viti Levu's interior is sparsely inhabited due to its terrain.
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Finland
Coordinates: 65°N 27°E / 65°N 027°E / 65; 027
Finlandi/ˈfɪnlənd/ ( Finnish: Suomi; Swedish: Finland (help·info)), officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.
Around 5.4 million people reside in Finland, with the majority concentrated in the southern region. It is the eighth largest country in Europe in terms of area and the most sparsely populated country in the European Union. Finland is a parliamentary republic with a central government based in Helsinki and local governments in 336 municipalities, and an autonomous region of the Åland Islands. About one million residents live in the Greater Helsinki area, which consists of Helsinki, Espoo, Kauniainen and Vantaa, and a third of the country's GDP is produced there. Other larger cities include Tampere, Turku, Oulu, Jyväskylä, Lahti and Kuopio.
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Forbidden City
Coordinates: 39°54′53″N 116°23′26″E / 39.91472°N 116.39056°E / 39.91472; 116.39056
The Forbidden City was the Chinese imperial palace from the Ming Dynasty to the end of the Qing Dynasty. It is located in the middle of Beijing, China, and now houses the Palace Museum. For almost 500 years, it served as the home of emperors and their households, as well as the ceremonial and political center of Chinese government.
Built in 1406 to 1420, the complex consists of 980 buildings and covers 720,000 m2 (7,800,000 sq ft). The palace complex exemplifies traditional Chinese palatial architecture, and has influenced cultural and architectural developments in East Asia and elsewhere. The Forbidden City was declared a World Heritage Site in 1987, and is listed by UNESCO as the largest collection of preserved ancient wooden structures in the world.
Since 1925, the Forbidden City has been under the charge of the Palace Museum, whose extensive collection of artwork and artifacts were built upon the imperial collections of the Ming and Qing dynasties. Part of the museum's former collection is now located in the National Palace Museum in Taipei. Both museums descend from the same institution, but were split after the Chinese Civil War.
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France
France (Englishi/ˈfræns/ FRANSS or /ˈfrɑːns/ FRAHNSS; French: [fʁɑ̃s] (
listen)), officially the French Republic (French: République française [ʁepyblik fʁɑ̃sɛz]), is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, and from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean. It is often referred to as l’Hexagone ("The Hexagon") because of the geometric shape of its territory. It is the largest western European country and it possesses the second-largest exclusive economic zone in the world, covering 11,035,000 km2 (4,260,000 sq mi), just behind that of the United States (11,351,000 km2 / 4,383,000 sq mi).
Over the past 500 years, France has been a major power with strong cultural, economic, military and political influence in Europe and around the world. During the 17th and 18th centuries, France colonised great parts of North America and Southeast Asia; during the 19th and early 20th centuries, France built the second largest colonial empire of the time, including large portions of North, West and Central Africa, Southeast Asia, and many Caribbean and Pacific Islands.
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French Polynesia
French Polynesia (i/ˈfrɛntʃ pɒlɨˈniːʒə/; French: Polynésie française, pronounced: [pɔlinezi fʁɑ̃sɛz]; Tahitian: Pōrīnetia Farāni) is an overseas country of the French Republic (pays d'outre-mer). It is made up of several groups of Polynesian islands, the most famous island being Tahiti in the Society Islands group, which is also the most populous island and the seat of the capital of the territory (Papeetē). Although not an integral part of its territory, Clipperton Island was administered from French Polynesia until 2007.
The island groups that make up French Polynesia were not officially united until the establishment of the French protectorate in 1889. The first of these islands to be settled by indigenous Polynesians were the Marquesas Islands in AD 300 and the Society Islands in AD 800. The Polynesians were organized in loose chieftainships.
European communication began in 1521 when the Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan sighted Pukapuka in the Tuāmotu-Gambier Archipelago. Dutchman Jakob Roggeveen came across Bora Bora in the Society Islands in 1722, and the British explorer Samuel Wallis visited Tahiti in 1767. The French explorer Louis Antoine de Bougainville visited Tahiti in 1768, while the British explorer James Cook visited in 1769. Christian missions began with Spanish priests who stayed in Tahiti for a year from 1774; Protestants from the London Missionary Society settled permanently in Polynesia in 1797.
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Fujian
Coordinates: 25°54′N 118°18′E / 25.9°N 118.3°E / 25.9; 118.3
Fujian (help·info) (Chinese: 福建), formerly romanised as Fukien or Foukien, is a province on the southeast coast of mainland China. Fujian is bordered by Zhejiang to the north, Jiangxi to the west, and Guangdong to the south. Taiwan lies to the east, across the Taiwan Strait. The name Fujian came from the combination of Fuzhou and Jianzhou (a former name for Jian'ou) two cities in Fujian, during the Tang Dynasty. With a Han majority, it is one of the most culturally and linguistically diverse provinces in China.
Most of Fujian is administered by the People's Republic of China. However, the archipelagos of Kinmen and Matsu are under the control of the Republic of China (Taiwan). Thus, there are two provinces (in the sense of government organizations): the Fujian Province administered by the People's Republic of China and the Fujian Province of the Republic of China.
Recent archaeological discoveries demonstrate that Fujian had entered the Neolithic Age by the middle of the 6th millennium BC. From the Keqiutou site (7450–5590 BP), an early Neolithic site in Pingtan Island located about 70 kilometres (43 mi) southeast of Fuzhou, numerous tools made of stones, shells, bones, jades, and ceramics (including wheel-made-ceramics) have been unearthed, together with spinning wheels, a definitive evidence of weaving.
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Georgia (country)
Georgiai/ˈdʒɔrdʒə/ (Georgian: საქართველო Sakartvelo, IPA: [sɑkʰɑrtʰvɛlɔ] ( listen)) is a sovereign state in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Located at the crossroads of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bounded to the west by the Black Sea, to the north by Russia, to the south by Turkey and Armenia, and to the southeast by Azerbaijan. The capital of Georgia is Tbilisi. Georgia covers a territory of 69,700 km² and its population is almost 4.7 million. Georgia is a unitary, semi-presidential republic, with the government elected through a representative democracy.
During the classical era independent kingdoms became established in what is now Georgia. The kingdoms of Colchis and Iberia adopted Christianity in the early 4th century. A unified Georgia reached the peak of its political and economic strength during the reign of King David IV and Queen Tamar in the 11th–12th centuries. At the beginning of the 19th century, Georgia was annexed by the Russian Empire. After a brief period of independence following the Russian Revolution of 1917, Georgia was occupied by Soviet Russia in 1921, becoming the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic and part of the Soviet Union. After independence in 1991, post-communist Georgia suffered from civil unrest and economic crisis for most of the 1990s. This lasted until the Rose Revolution of 2003, after which the new government introduced democratic and economic reforms.
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Guam
Guam (i/ˈɡwɑːm/; Chamorro: Guåhån) is an organized, unincorporated territory of the United States located in the western Pacific Ocean. It is one of five U.S. territories with an established civilian government. Guam is listed as one of sixteen Non-Self-Governing Territories by the Special Committee on Decolonization of the United Nations. The island's capital is Hagåtña (formerly Agaña). Guam is the largest and southernmost of the Mariana Islands.
The Chamorros, Guam's indigenous people, first populated the island approximately 4,000 years ago. The island has a long history of European colonialism. Discovered by Ferdinand Magellan during a Spanish expedition on March 6, 1521, the first colony was established in 1668 by Spain with the arrival of settlers including Padre San Vitores, a Catholic missionary. For more than two centuries Guam was an important stopover for the Spanish Manila Galleons that crossed the Pacific annually. The island was controlled by Spain until 1898, when it was surrendered to the United States during the Spanish-American War and later formally ceded as part of the Treaty of Paris.
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Guangdong
Coordinates: 23°24′N 113°30′E / 23.4°N 113.5°E / 23.4; 113.5
Guangdong is a province on the South China Sea coast of the People's Republic of China. The province was previously often written with the alternative English name Kwangtung Province. It surpassed Henan and Sichuan to become the most populous province in China in January 2005, registering 79 million permanent residents and 31 million migrants who lived in the province for at least six months of the year. The provincial capital Guangzhou and economic hub Shenzhen are amongst the most populous and important cities in China.
Since 1989 Guangdong has topped the total GDP rankings among all provincial-level divisions, with Jiangsu and Shandong second and third in rank. According to provincial annual preliminary statistics, Guangdong's GDP in 2010 reached CNY 4,550 billion, or USD 689.02 billion, making its economy roughly the same size as that of Turkey or Indonesia. Guangdong has the fourth highest GDP per capita among all provinces of mainland China, after Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Liaoning. The province contributes approximately 12% of the PRC's national economic output, and is home to the production facilities and offices of a wide-ranging set of multinational and Chinese corporations. Guangdong also hosts the largest Import and Export Fair in China called the Canton Fair in Guangdong's capital city Guangzhou.
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Hawaii
Coordinates: 21°18′41″N 157°47′47″W / 21.31139°N 157.79639°W / 21.31139; -157.79639
Hawaii (i/həˈwaɪ.iː/ or /həˈwaɪʔiː/; Hawaiian: Hawaiʻi Hawaiian pronunciation: [hɐˈvɐiʔi]) is the most recent of the 50 U.S. states (August 21, 1959), and is the only U.S. state made up entirely of islands. It is the northernmost island group in Polynesia, occupying most of an archipelago in the central Pacific Ocean.
Hawaii’s diverse natural scenery, warm tropical climate, abundance of public beaches and oceanic surrounding, and active volcanoes make it a popular destination for tourists, surfers, biologists, and volcanologists alike. Due to its mid-Pacific location, Hawaii has many North American and Asian influences along with its own vibrant native culture. Hawaii has over a million permanent residents along with many visitors and U.S. military personnel. Its capital is Honolulu on the island of Oʻahu.
The state encompasses nearly the entire volcanic Hawaiian Island chain, which comprises hundreds of islands spread over 1,500 miles (2,400 km). At the southeastern end of the archipelago, the eight "main islands" are (from the northwest to southeast) Niʻihau, Kauaʻi, Oʻahu, Molokaʻi, Lānaʻi, Kahoʻolawe, Maui, and the island of Hawaiʻi. The last is by far the largest and is often called "The Big Island" to avoid confusion with the state as a whole. The archipelago is physiographically and ethnologically part of the Polynesian subregion of Oceania.
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Hong Kong
Coordinates: 22°16′42″N 114°09′32″E / 22.27833°N 114.15889°E / 22.27833; 114.15889
Hong Kong (Chinese: 香港) is one of two special administrative regions (SARs) of the People's Republic of China (PRC), the other being Macau. A city-state situated on China's south coast and enclosed by the Pearl River Delta and South China Sea, it is known for its expansive skyline and deep natural harbour. With a land mass of 1,104 km2 (426 sq mi) and a population of seven million people, Hong Kong is one of the most densely populated areas in the world. Hong Kong's population is 95 percent ethnic Chinese and 5 percent from other groups. Hong Kong's Han Chinese majority originate mainly from the cities of Guangzhou and Taishan in the neighbouring Guangdong province.
Hong Kong became a colony of the British Empire after the First Opium War (1839–42). Originally confined to Hong Kong Island, the colony's boundaries were extended in stages to the Kowloon Peninsula in 1860 and then the New Territories in 1898. It was occupied by Japan during the Pacific War, after which the British resumed control until 1997, when China resumed sovereignty. The region espoused minimum government intervention under the ethos of positive non-interventionism during the colonial era. The time period greatly influenced the current culture of Hong Kong, often described as "East meets West", and the educational system, which used to loosely follow the system in England until reforms implemented in 2009.
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Hsinchu
Hsinchu City (Chinese: 新竹市; Hanyu Pinyin: Xīnzhú Shì; Tongyong Pinyin: Sinjhú Shìh; Wade–Giles: Hsin-chu Shih; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Sin-tek) is a city in northern Taiwan. Hsinchu is popularly nicknamed "The Windy City" (Chinese: 風城; Hanyu Pinyin: Fēngchéng; Tongyong Pinyin: Fongchéng) for its windy climate.
Hsinchu City is administered as a special municipality within Taiwan (ROC). The city is bordered by Hsinchu County to the north and east, Miaoli County to the south, and the Taiwan Strait to the west. Hsinchu City is composed of three districts: North District, East District, and Xiangshan District.
In 1626, after Spain occupied northern Taiwan, Spanish missionaries arrived at Tek-khàm (竹塹; sm: zhúqiàn), where the Taokas Taiwanese aborigines lived. During the Qing Dynasty, it was renamed Hsinchu. In the 21st year of Guangxu's Regime, Hsinchu Sub Office was established, responsible for independent administration on June 24. In June of the 24th Year of Kuang Hsu's Regime, it altered its local official system again. Hsinchu County was abolished. It was then under the administration of Hsinchu Administration Office, Taipei County. On November 11, 27th Year of Kuang Hsu's Regime, it established the Hsinchu Office. In 1920, under Japanese rule, Hsinchu Street was established, with the founding of Hsinchu Street District Office. In 1930, the city system was applied. It was renamed as Hsinchu City, under the governing of Hsinchu-Chou, with the establishment of Hsinchu City Office. In 1941, its administration district was expanded, merging with Xiangshan and Qiu Kang, and became a part of Liu Jia Zhuang.
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Hsinchu City
Hsinchu City (Chinese: 新竹市; Hanyu Pinyin: Xīnzhú Shì; Tongyong Pinyin: Sinjhú Shìh; Wade–Giles: Hsin-chu Shih; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Sin-tek) is a city in northern Taiwan. Hsinchu is popularly nicknamed "The Windy City" (Chinese: 風城; Hanyu Pinyin: Fēngchéng; Tongyong Pinyin: Fongchéng) for its windy climate.
Hsinchu City is administered as a special municipality within Taiwan (ROC). The city is bordered by Hsinchu County to the north and east, Miaoli County to the south, and the Taiwan Strait to the west. Hsinchu City is composed of three districts: North District, East District, and Xiangshan District.
In 1626, after Spain occupied northern Taiwan, Spanish missionaries arrived at Tek-khàm (竹塹; sm: zhúqiàn), where the Taokas Taiwanese aborigines lived. During the Qing Dynasty, it was renamed Hsinchu. In the 21st year of Guangxu's Regime, Hsinchu Sub Office was established, responsible for independent administration on June 24. In June of the 24th Year of Kuang Hsu's Regime, it altered its local official system again. Hsinchu County was abolished. It was then under the administration of Hsinchu Administration Office, Taipei County. On November 11, 27th Year of Kuang Hsu's Regime, it established the Hsinchu Office. In 1920, under Japanese rule, Hsinchu Street was established, with the founding of Hsinchu Street District Office. In 1930, the city system was applied. It was renamed as Hsinchu City, under the governing of Hsinchu-Chou, with the establishment of Hsinchu City Office. In 1941, its administration district was expanded, merging with Xiangshan and Qiu Kang, and became a part of Liu Jia Zhuang.
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Hsinchu County
Hsinchu County (Chinese: 新竹縣; pinyin: Xīnzhú Xiàn) is a county in north-western Taiwan. The population of the county is mainly Hakka; there is a Taiwanese aboriginal minority in the southeastern part of the county. Zhubei is the capital of Hsinchu, where the government office and county office is located. Hsinchu is where most of the industrial factory and office of computer related companies are located, most known as Hsinchu Technology Zone in Taiwan. Also known as Chinese: 新竹科學園區; pinyin: Xīnzhú kēxuéyuán qū, literally "Hsinchu technology zone".
See also: Administrative divisions of the Republic of China
Hsinchu County controls one county-controlled city, three urban townships, and nine rural townships. They are:
Coordinates: 24°50′0″N 121°0′53″E / 24.833333°N 121.01472°E / 24.833333; 121.01472
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India
India (i/ˈɪndiə/), officially the Republic of India (Bhārat Gaṇarājya), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the south, the Arabian Sea on the south-west, and the Bay of Bengal on the south-east, it shares land borders with Pakistan to the west;China, Nepal, and Bhutan to the north-east; and Burma and Bangladesh to the east. In the Indian Ocean, India is in the vicinity of Sri Lanka and the Maldives; in addition, India's Andaman and Nicobar Islands share a maritime border with Thailand and Indonesia.
Home to the ancient Indus Valley Civilisation and a region of historic trade routes and vast empires, the Indian subcontinent was identified with its commercial and cultural wealth for much of its long history. Four of the world's major religions—Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, and Sikhism—originated here, whereas Zoroastrianism, Christianity, and Islam arrived in the 1st millennium CE and also helped shape the region's diverse culture. Gradually annexed by and brought under the administration of the British East India Company from the early 18th century and administered directly by the United Kingdom from the mid-19th century, India became an independent nation in 1947 after a struggle for independence that was marked by non-violent resistance led by Mahatma Gandhi.
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Indonesia
Indonesia (i/ˌɪndəˈniːʒə/ IN-də-NEE-zhə or /ˌɪndoʊˈniːziə/ IN-doh-NEE-zee-ə), officially the Republic of Indonesia (Indonesian: Republik Indonesia Indonesian pronunciation: [rɛpʊblɪk ɪndɔnɛsɪa]), is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania. Indonesia is an archipelago comprising approximately 17,508 islands. It has 33 provinces with over 238 million people, and is the world's fourth most populous country. Indonesia is a republic, with an elected legislature and president. The nation's capital city is Jakarta. The country shares land borders with Papua New Guinea, East Timor, and Malaysia. Other neighboring countries include Singapore, Philippines, Australia, and the Indian territory of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Indonesia is a founding member of ASEAN and a member of the G-20 major economies. The Indonesian economy is the world's 17th largest economy by nominal GDP.
The Indonesian archipelago has been an important trade region since at least the 7th century, when Srivijaya and then later Majapahit traded with China and India. Local rulers gradually absorbed foreign cultural, religious and political models from the early centuries CE, and Hindu and Buddhist kingdoms flourished. Indonesian history has been influenced by foreign powers drawn to its natural resources. Muslim traders brought Islam, and European powers brought Christianity and fought one another to monopolize trade in the Spice Islands of Maluku during the Age of Discovery. Following three and a half centuries of Dutch colonialism, Indonesia secured its independence after World War II. Indonesia's history has since been turbulent, with challenges posed by natural disasters, corruption, separatism, a democratization process, and periods of rapid economic change.
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Iran
Coordinates: 32°N 53°E / 32°N 53°E / 32; 53
Iran (i/ɪˈrɑːn/ or /aɪˈræn/;Persian: ایران [ʔiˈɾɒn] ( listen)), officially the Islamic Republic of Iran (Persian: جمهوری اسلامی ایران Jomhuri-ye Eslāmi-ye Irān), is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran", which in Persian means "Land of the Aryans", has been in use natively since the Sassanian era. It came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia ( /ˈpɜrʒə/ or /ˈpɜrʃə/). Both "Persia" and "Iran" are used interchangeably in cultural contexts; however, "Iran" is the name used officially in political contexts.
The 18th-largest country in the world in terms of area at 1,648,195 km2 (636,372 sq mi), Iran has a population of around 79 million. It is a country of particular geopolitical significance owing to its location in the Middle East and central Eurasia. Iran is bordered on the north by Armenia, Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan. As Iran is a littoral state of the Caspian Sea, which is an inland sea, Kazakhstan and Russia are also Iran's direct neighbors to the north. Iran is bordered on the east by Afghanistan and Pakistan, on the south by the Persian Gulf and the Gulf of Oman, on the west by Iraq and on the northwest by Turkey. Tehran is the capital, the country's largest city and the political, cultural, commercial and industrial center of the nation. Iran is a regional power, and holds an important position in international energy security and world economy as a result of its large reserves of petroleum and natural gas. Iran has the second largest proven natural gas reserves in the world and the fourth largest proven petroleum reserves.
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Iraq
Iraq (/ɪˈræk/ ori/ɪˈrɑːk/; Arabic: العراق al-‘Irāq); officially the Republic of Iraq (Arabic: 
جمهورية العراق (help·info) Jumhūriyyat al-‘Irāq), is a country in Western Asia spanning most of the northwestern end of the Zagros mountain range, the eastern part of the Syrian Desert and the northern part of the Arabian Desert.
Iraq borders Syria to the northwest, Turkey to the north, Iran to the east, Jordan to the southwest and Kuwait and Saudi Arabia to the south. Iraq has a narrow section of coastline measuring 58 km (36 mi) on the northern Persian Gulf. The capital city, Baghdad is in the center-east of the country.
Two major rivers, the Tigris and Euphrates, run through the center of Iraq, flowing from northwest to southeast. These provide Iraq with agriculturally capable land and contrast with the steppe and desert landscape that covers most of Western Asia.
Historically, Iraq was the center of the Abbasid Arabic Islamic Empire. Iraq has been known to the west by the Greek toponym 'Mesopotamia' (Land between the rivers) and has been home to continuous successive civilizations since the 6th millennium BC. The region between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers is often referred to as the cradle of civilization and the birthplace of writing, law and the wheel. At different periods in its history, Iraq was the center of the indigenous Akkadian, Sumerian, Assyrian, Babylonian, and Abbasid empires. It was also part of the Achaemenid, Hellenistic, Parthian, Sassanid, Roman, Rashidun, Umayyad, Mongol, Safavid, Afsharid, and Ottoman empires, and under British control as a League of Nations mandate.
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Israel
Coordinates: 31°N 35°E / 31°N 35°E / 31; 35
Israel, officially the State of Israel ( /ˈɪzriːəl/ or /ˈɪzreɪəl/; Hebrew: מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, Medīnat Yisrā'el, IPA: [me̞diˈnät jisʁäˈʔe̞l] ( listen); Arabic: دَوْلَة إِسْرَائِيل, Dawlat Isrāʼīl, IPA: [dawlat ʔisraːˈʔiːl]), is a parliamentary republic in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea. It borders Lebanon in the north, Syria in the northeast, Jordan and the West Bank in the east, Egypt and the Gaza Strip on the southwest, and the Gulf of Aqaba in the Red Sea to the south, and it contains geographically diverse features within its relatively small area. Israel is defined as a Jewish and Democratic State in its Basic Laws and is the world's only Jewish-majority state.
Following the adoption of a resolution by the General Assembly of the United Nations on 29 November 1947 recommending the adoption and implementation of the United Nations plan to partition Palestine, on 14 May 1948 David Ben-Gurion, the Executive Head of the World Zionist Organization and president of the Jewish Agency for Palestine, declared the establishment of a Jewish state in Eretz Israel, to be known as the State of Israel, a state independent from the British Mandate for Palestine. Neighboring Arab states invaded the next day in support of the Palestinian Arabs. Israel has since fought several wars with neighboring Arab states, in the course of which it has occupied the West Bank, Sinai Peninsula, Gaza Strip and the Golan Heights. Portions of these territories, including east Jerusalem, have been annexed by Israel, but the border with the neighboring West Bank has not yet been permanently defined.[neutrality is disputed] Israel has signed peace treaties with Egypt and Jordan, but efforts to resolve the Israeli–Palestinian conflict have so far not resulted in peace.
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Japan
Japani/dʒəˈpæn/ (Japanese: 日本 Nihon or Nippon; formally 日本国 Nippon-koku or Nihon-koku, literally the State of Japan) is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south. The characters that make up Japan's name mean "sun-origin", which is why Japan is sometimes referred to as the "Land of the Rising Sun".
Japan is an archipelago of 6,852 islands. The four largest islands are Honshū, Hokkaidō, Kyūshū and Shikoku, together accounting for ninety-seven percent of Japan's land area. Japan has the world's tenth-largest population, with over 127 million people. The Greater Tokyo Area, which includes the de facto capital city of Tokyo and several surrounding prefectures, is the largest metropolitan area in the world, with over 30 million residents.
Archaeological research indicates that people lived in Japan as early as the Upper Paleolithic period. The first written mention of Japan is in Chinese history texts from the 1st century AD. Influence from other nations followed by long periods of isolation has characterized Japan's history. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, victory in the First Sino-Japanese War, the Russo-Japanese War and World War I allowed Japan to expand its empire during a period of increasing militarism. The Second Sino-Japanese War of 1937 expanded into part of World War II in 1941, which came to an end in 1945 following the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Since adopting its revised constitution in 1947, Japan has maintained a unitary constitutional monarchy with an emperor and an elected parliament called the Diet.
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Jordan
Jordan ( /ˈdʒɔr.dən/;Arabic: اَلأُرْدُنّ, Al-'Urdunn), officially the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan (Arabic: اَلمَمْلَكَة اَلأُرْدُنِيَّة اَلهَاشِمِيَّة), Al-Mamlakah Al-Urdaniyyah Al-Hashimiyyah) is a kingdom on the East Bank of the River Jordan. The country borders Saudi Arabia to the east and south-east, Iraq to the north-east, Syria to the north and the West Bank and Israel to the west, sharing control of the Dead Sea with the latter. Jordan's only port is at its south-western tip, at the Gulf of Aqaba, which is shared with Israel, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia. Over half of Jordan is covered by the Arabian Desert. However, the western part of Jordan is arable land and forests. Jordan is part of the Fertile Crescent. The capital city is Amman. According to the CIA World Factbook, Jordan has the second highest life expectancy in the Middle East, after Israel. The average life expectancy is one position behind the United Kingdom, although the age remains exactly the same (80.05 years).
The precursor to modern Jordan was founded in 1921 as the Hashemite Emirate, and it was recognized by the League of Nations as a state under the British mandate in 1922 known as The Emirate of Transjordan. In 1946, Jordan became an independent sovereign state officially known as the Hashemite Kingdom of Transjordan. After capturing the West Bank area of Cisjordan during the 1948–49 war with Israel, Abdullah I took the title King of Jordan and Palestine, and he officially changed the country's name to the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan in April 1949.
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Kaohsiung
Kaohsiung (Chinese: 高雄; pinyin: Gāoxióng; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Ko-hiông; old names: Takao, Takow, Takau) is a city located in southwestern Taiwan, facing the Taiwan Strait on the west. Kaohsiung, officially named Kaohsiung City, is divided into thirty-eight districts. The city is one of five special municipalities of the Republic of China (Taiwan). On December 25, 2010, it merged with Kaohsiung County to form a larger municipality.
Kaohsiung is the second largest city in Taiwan, with a population around 2.9 million. It is a center for manufacturing, refining, shipbuilding, and other light and heavy industries. A major port, through which pass most of Taiwan's marine imports and exports, is located at the city but is not managed by the city government.
Kaohsiung International Airport serving the city is the second largest airport in Taiwan. The Port of Kaohsiung is the largest harbor in Taiwan. Kaohsiung is the terminal of the Sun Yat-sen Freeway. The city is served by the railway stations of Western Line and Pingtung Line. Taiwan High Speed Rail connects it with Taipei City. The Kaohsiung Mass Rapid Transit, the city's subway system, was launched in early 2008. Kaohsiung was the host city of the 2009 World Games, a multisport event primarily composed of sports not featured in the Olympic Games. The city is also home to the Republic of China Navy.
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Kaohsiung City
Kaohsiung (Chinese: 高雄; pinyin: Gāoxióng; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Ko-hiông; old names: Takao, Takow, Takau) is a city located in southwestern Taiwan, facing the Taiwan Strait on the west. Kaohsiung, officially named Kaohsiung City, is divided into thirty-eight districts. The city is one of five special municipalities of the Republic of China (Taiwan). On December 25, 2010, it merged with Kaohsiung County to form a larger municipality.
Kaohsiung is the second largest city in Taiwan, with a population around 2.9 million. It is a center for manufacturing, refining, shipbuilding, and other light and heavy industries. A major port, through which pass most of Taiwan's marine imports and exports, is located at the city but is not managed by the city government.
Kaohsiung International Airport serving the city is the second largest airport in Taiwan. The Port of Kaohsiung is the largest harbor in Taiwan. Kaohsiung is the terminal of the Sun Yat-sen Freeway. The city is served by the railway stations of Western Line and Pingtung Line. Taiwan High Speed Rail connects it with Taipei City. The Kaohsiung Mass Rapid Transit, the city's subway system, was launched in early 2008. Kaohsiung was the host city of the 2009 World Games, a multisport event primarily composed of sports not featured in the Olympic Games. The city is also home to the Republic of China Navy.
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Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan (i/ˌkɑːzəkˈstɑːn/ or /ˌkæzəkˈstæn/) (Kazakh: Қазақстан, Qazaqstan, pronounced [qɑzɑqstɑ́n]; Russian: Казахстан [kəzɐxˈstan]), officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country in Central Asia and Europe. The ninth largest country in the world by land area, it is also the world's largest landlocked country; its territory of 2,727,300 square kilometres (1,053,000 sq mi) is larger than Western Europe. It is neighbored clockwise from the north by Russia, China, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan, and also borders on a significant part of the Caspian Sea. Although Kazakhstan does not share a border with Mongolia, its most easterly point is only 38 kilometres (24 mi) from Mongolia's western tip. The terrain of Kazakhstan ranges from flatlands, steppes, taigas, rock-canyons, hills, deltas, and snow-capped mountains to deserts. With 16.6 million people (2011 estimate) Kazakhstan has the 62nd largest population in the world, though its population density is less than 6 people per square kilometre (15 per sq. mi.). The capital was moved in 1998 from Almaty, Kazakhstan's largest city, to Astana.
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Keelung
Keelung City (also Jilong or Chilung) is a major port city situated in the northeastern part of Taiwan. It borders New Taipei with which it forms the Taipei–Keelung metropolitan area, along with Taipei itself. Nicknamed the Rainy Port for its frequent rain and maritime role, the city is Taiwan's second largest seaport (after Kaohsiung). Keelung is currently administered as a provincial municipality within Taiwan Province of the Republic of China (Taiwan).
The city of Keelung was known as Kelung or Keelung to the Western world during the 19th century. However, the Taiwanese people have long called the city Kelang (Chinese: 雞籠; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Ke-lâng; literally "rooster cage or hencoop").
It has been proposed that the name Keelung was derived from the local mountain that took the shape of a rooster cage. However, it is more probable that the name was derived from the first inhabitants of the region, as are the names of many other Taiwanese cities. In this case, the Ketagalan people were the first inhabitants, and early Han settlers probably approximated "Ketagalan" with "Ke-lâng" (phonetics of the Southern Min Language).
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Kingdom of Tungning
The Kingdom of Tungning (simplified Chinese: 东宁王国; traditional Chinese: 東寧王國; pinyin: Dōngníng Wángguó) was a government that ruled Taiwan between 1661 and 1683. A pro-Ming Dynasty state, it was founded by Koxinga (also known as Zheng Chenggong) (鄭成功) after the Ming government in mainland China was replaced by the Manchu-ruled Qing Dynasty. Koxinga hoped to use the island as a base of operations to train military forces and recapture the mainland from the Manchus.
The Kingdom of Tungning is sometimes known as the Zheng Family Dynasty (simplified Chinese: 郑氏王朝; traditional Chinese: 鄭氏王朝; pinyin: Zhèngshì Wángcháo), Zheng Family Kingdom (simplified Chinese: 郑氏王国; traditional Chinese: 鄭氏王國; pinyin: Zhèngshì Wángguó) or Kingdom of Tungning (simplified Chinese: 延平王国; traditional Chinese: 延平王國; pinyin: Yánpíng Wángguó). Taiwan was referred to by Koxinga as Tungtu (simplified Chinese: 东都; traditional Chinese: 東都; pinyin: Dōngdū). In the West, it was known as the Kingdom of Taiwan, and the period of rule is sometimes referred to as the Koxinga Dynasty.
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Kiribati
Kiribati ([kɪribas] KIRR-i-bas or ˌkɪrəˈbɑdi;Gilbertese: [ˈkiɾibas]), officially the Republic of Kiribati, is an island nation located in the central tropical Pacific Ocean. The permanent population is just over 100,000 (2011), and the island nation is composed of 32 atolls and one raised coral island, dispersed over 3.5 million square kilometres, (1,351,000 square miles) straddling the equator, and bordering the International Date Line at its easternmost point.
The name Kiribati is the local pronunciation of "Gilberts", derived from the main island chain, the Gilbert Islands. The capital of South Tarawa consists of a number of islets connected through a series of causeways, located in the Tarawa archipelago. Kiribati became independent from the United Kingdom in 1979. It is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations, the IMF and the World Bank, and became a full member of the United Nations in 1999.
Kiribati was named in French by captains Krusenstern and Louis Isidore Duperrey "îles Gilbert", Gilbert Islands, after the British Captain Thomas Gilbert, who sighted the islands in 1788. The current name, Kiribati, is an adaptation of "Gilberts", from the former European name the "Gilbert Islands". Although the indigenous Gilbertese language name for the Gilbert Islands proper is Tungaru, the new state chose the name "Kiribati", the Gilbertese rendition of "Gilberts", as an equivalent of the former colony to acknowledge the inclusion of islands which were never considered part of the Gilberts chain.
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Kuwait
Kuwait, officially the State of Kuwaiti/kuːˈweɪt/ (Arabic: دولة الكويت, Dawlat al-Kuwayt) is a sovereign Arab state situated in the north-east of the Arabian Peninsula in Western Asia. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the south at Khafji, and Iraq to the north at Basra. It lies on the north-western shore of the Persian Gulf. The name Kuwait is derived from the Arabic أكوات ākwāt, the plural of كوت kūt, meaning a fortress built near water. The country covers an area of 17,820 square kilometers (6,880 sq mi) and has a population of about 3.5 million.
Historically, the region was the site of Characene, a major Parthian port for trade between Mesopotamia and India. The Bani Utbah tribe were the first permanent Arab settlers in the region, and laid the foundation of the modern emirate. By the 19th century, Kuwait came under the influence of the Ottoman Empire, and after World War I, it emerged as an independent sheikhdom under the protection of the British Empire. Kuwait's large oil fields were discovered in the late 1930s.
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Laos
Laos ((i/ˈlaʊs/, /ˈlɑː.ɒs/, /ˈlɑː.oʊs/, or /ˈleɪ.ɒs/) Lao: ສາທາລະນະລັດ ປະຊາທິປະໄຕ ປະຊາຊົນລາວ, pronounced [sǎː.tʰáː.laʔ.naʔ.lat páʔ.sáː.tʰiʔ.páʔ.tàj páʔ.sáː.són.láːw] Sathalanalat Paxathipatai Paxaxon Lao), officially the Lao People's Democratic Republic, is a landlocked country in Southeast Asia, bordered by Burma and China to the northwest, Vietnam to the east, Cambodia to the south and Thailand to the west. Its population was estimated to be 6.5 million in 2012.
Laos traces its history to the Kingdom which existed from the 14th to the 18th century when it split into three separate kingdoms. In 1893, it became a French protectorate, with the three kingdoms, Luang Phrabang, Vientiane and Champasak, uniting to form what is now known as Laos. It briefly gained independence in 1945 after Japanese occupation, but returned to French rule until it was granted autonomy in 1949. Laos became independent in 1953, with a constitutional monarchy under Sisavang Vong. Shortly after independence, a long civil war ended the monarchy, when the Communist Pathet Lao movement came to power in 1975.
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Lebanon
Lebanon (i/ˈlɛbənɒn/ or /ˈlɛbənən/; Arabic: لبنان Libnān or Lubnān, Lebanese Arabic: [lɪbˈneːn]), officially the Lebanese Republic (Arabic: الجمهورية اللبنانية al-Jumhūrīyah al-Libnānīyah, Lebanese Arabic: [elˈʒʊmhuːɾɪjje l.ˈlɪbneːnɪjje]), is a country in the East Mediterranean. It is bordered by Syria to the north and east, and Israel to the south. Lebanon's location at the crossroads of the Mediterranean Basin and the Arabian hinterland has dictated its rich history, and shaped a cultural identity of religious and ethnic diversity.
The earliest evidence of civilization in Lebanon dates back more than 7,000 years—predating recorded history. Lebanon was the home of the Phoenicians, a maritime culture that flourished for nearly 2,500 years (3000–539 BC). Following the collapse of the Ottoman Empire after World War I, the five provinces that comprise modern Lebanon were mandated to France. The French expanded the borders of Mount Lebanon, which was mostly populated by Maronite Catholics and Druze, to include more Muslims. Lebanon gained independence in 1943, and established a unique political system, known as confessionalism, a power-sharing mechanism based on religious communities – Bechara El Khoury who became independent Lebanon's first President and Riad El-Solh, who became Lebanon's first prime minister, are considered the founders of the modern Republic of Lebanon and are national heroes for having led the country's independence. French troops withdrew from Lebanon in 1946.
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Lotus Lake
Coordinates: 22°41′06″N 120°17′51″E / 22.68506°N 120.297396°E / 22.68506; 120.297396
Lotus Lake (Chinese: 蓮池潭; pinyin: Liánchí Tán; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Liân-tî-thâm) is a man-made lake and popular tourist destination on the east side of Zuoying District in Kaohsiung City in southern Taiwan. Opened in 1951, it is famous for the lotus plants on the lake and the numerous temples around the lake, including the Spring and Autumn Pavilions (春秋閣), the Dragon and Tiger Pagodas (龍虎塔), and the Confucian Temple (孔廟).
Lotus Lake was the site for several water sporting events for World Games 2009, including canoe polo, water ski, and dragon boat.
Dragon and Tiger Pagodas
Dragon and Tiger Pagodas
Taoist God statue
Bei-Ji Shien-tien Emperor (Taoist God)
Confucius temple at Lotus Lake in Kaohsiung
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Macau
Coordinates: 22°10′N 113°33′E / 22.167°N 113.55°E / 22.167; 113.55
Macau (Chinese: 澳門), also spelled Macao ( /məˈkaʊ/), is one of the two special administrative regions of the People's Republic of China, the other being Hong Kong. Macau lies on the western side of the Pearl River Delta across from Hong-Kong which is to the east, bordering Guangdong province to the north and facing the South China Sea to the east and south.
The territory's economy is heavily dependent on gambling and tourism, but also includes manufacturing.
Macau is a former Portuguese colony, and is both the first and last European colony in China. Portuguese traders first settled in Macau in the 16th century and subsequently administered the region until the handover on 20 December 1999. The Sino-Portuguese Joint Declaration and the Basic Law of Macau stipulate that Macau operates with a high degree of autonomy until at least 2049, fifty years after the transfer. Macau was first lent by the Chinese empire as a trading port in the 16th century, and had to administer the city under Chinese authority and sovereignty. In 1887, Macau became a colony of the Portuguese empire and its sovereignty transferred to the Portuguese.
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Madagascar
Madagascar, officially the Republic of Madagascar (older name Malagasy Republic, Malagasy: Repoblikan'i Madagasikara [republiˈkʲan madaɡasˈkʲarə̥], French: République de Madagascar) is an island country located in the Indian Ocean off the southeastern coast of Africa. The nation comprises the island of Madagascar (the fourth-largest island in the world), as well as numerous smaller peripheral islands. Following the prehistoric breakup of the supercontinent Gondwana, Madagascar split from India around 88 million years ago, allowing plants and animals on the island to evolve in complete isolation. Consequently, Madagascar is a biodiversity hotspot in which over 90% of its wildlife is found nowhere else on Earth. The island's diverse ecosystems and unique wildlife are threatened by human settlement.
Initial human settlement of Madagascar occurred from 350 BCE and 550 CE by Austronesian peoples arriving on outrigger canoes from Borneo who were later joined around 1000 CE by Bantu migrants crossing the Mozambique Channel. Other groups continued to settle on Madagascar over time, each one making lasting contributions to Malagasy cultural life. The Malagasy ethnic group is often divided into eighteen or more sub-groups of which the largest are the Merina of the central highlands.
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Malaysia
Malaysia (i/məˈleɪʒə/ mə-LAY-zhə or i/məˈleɪsiə/ mə-LAY-see-ə) is a federal constitutional monarchy in Southeast Asia. It consists of thirteen states and three federal territories and has a total landmass of 329,847 square kilometres (127,350 sq mi) separated by the South China Sea into two similarly sized regions, Peninsular Malaysia and Malaysian Borneo. Land borders are shared with Thailand, Indonesia, and Brunei, and maritime borders exist with Singapore, Vietnam, and the Philippines. The capital city is Kuala Lumpur, while Putrajaya is the seat of the federal government. In 2010 the population exceeded 27.5 million, with over 20 million living on the Peninsula.
Malaysia has its origins in the Malay Kingdoms present in the area which, from the 18th century, became subject to the British Empire. The first British territories were known as the Straits Settlements, whose establishment was followed by the Malay kingdoms becoming British protectorates. The territories on Peninsular Malaysia were first unified as the Malayan Union in 1946. Malaya was restructured as the Federation of Malaya in 1948, and achieved independence on 31 August 1957. Malaya united with Sabah, Sarawak, and Singapore on 16 September 1963, with si being added to give the new country the name Malaysia. However, less than two years later in 1965, Singapore was expelled from the federation. Since independence, Malaysia has had one of the best economic records in Asia, with GDP growing an average 6.5% for almost 50 years. The economy has traditionally been fuelled by its natural resources, but is expanding in the sectors of science, tourism, commerce and medical tourism.
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Maldives
Maldives (i/ˈmɒldaɪvz/ or /ˈmɒldiːvz/), (Dhivehi: ދިވެހިރާއްޖެ, Dhivehi Raa'je), officially Republic of Maldives (Dhivehi: ދިވެހިރާއްޖޭގެ ޖުމްހޫރިއްޔާ, Dhivehi Raa'jeyge Jumhooriyya), also referred to as the Maldive Islands, is an island nation in the Indian Ocean formed by a double chain of twenty-six atolls oriented north-south off India's Lakshadweep Islands, between Minicoy Island and Chagos Archipelago. It stands in the Laccadive Sea, about 700 kilometres (430 mi) south-west of Sri Lanka and 400 kilometres (250 mi) south-west of India. During the colonial era, the Dutch referred to the country as "Maldivische Eilanden" in their documentation, while "Maldive Islands" is the anglicised version of the local name used by the British, which later came to be written "Maldives".
The archipelago is located on top of the Chagos-Maldives-Laccadive Ridge, a vast submarine mountain range in the Indian Ocean. Maldives also form a terrestrial ecoregion together with the Chagos and the Lakshadweep. The atolls of Maldives encompass a territory spread over roughly 90,000 square kilometres (35,000 sq mi), making it one of the world's most geographically dispersed countries. Its population of 328,536 (2012) inhabits 200 of its 1,192 islands. Maldives' capital and largest city Malé had a population of 103,693 in 2006. It is located at the southern edge of North Malé Atoll, in the Kaafu Atoll. It is also one of the Administrative divisions of the Maldives. Traditionally it was the King's Island where the ancient Maldive Royal dynasties were enthroned.
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Marshall Islands
The Marshall Islands, officially the Republic of the Marshall Islands (Marshallese: Aolepān Aorōkin M̧ajeļ), is an island country located in the northern Pacific Ocean. Geographically, the country is part of the larger island group of Micronesia, with the population of around 68,000 people spread out over 34 low-lying coral atolls, comprising 1,156 individual islands and islets. The islands share maritime boundaries with the Federated States of Micronesia to the west, Wake Island to the north,Kiribati to the south-east, and Nauru to the south. The most populous atoll is Majuro, which also acts as the capital.
Micronesian colonists gradually settled the Marshall Islands during the 2nd millennium BC, with inter-island navigation made possible using traditional stick charts. Islands in the archipelago were first explored by Europeans in the 1520s, with Spanish explorer Alonso de Salazar sighting an atoll in August 1526. Other expeditions by Spanish and English ships followed, with the islands' current name stemming from British explorer John Marshall. Recognised as part of the Spanish East Indies in 1874, the islands were sold to Germany in 1884, and became of German New Guinea in 1885. The Empire of Japan occupied the Marshall Islands in World War I, which were later joined with other former German territories in 1919 by the League of Nations to form the South Pacific Mandate. In World War II, the islands were conquered by the United States in the Gilbert and Marshall Islands campaign. Along with other Pacific Islands, the Marshall Islands were then consolidated into the United-States-governed Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands. Self-government was achieved in 1979, and full sovereignty in 1986, under a Compact of Free Association with the United States.
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Matsu Islands
The Matsu Islands (simplified Chinese: 马祖列岛; traditional Chinese: 馬祖列島; pinyin: Mǎzǔ Lièdǎo; Fuzhou dialect: Mā-cū liĕk-dō̤ or less frequently, simplified Chinese: 马祖群岛; traditional Chinese: 馬祖群島; pinyin: Mǎzǔ Qúndǎo; Fuzhou dialect: 馬祖島 Mā-cū-dō̤) are a minor archipelago of 19 islands and islets in the Taiwan Strait administered as Lienchiang County (連江縣; Lièng-gŏng-gâing) under Fujian Province of the Republic of China (Taiwan). Only a small area of what is historically Lienchiang County is under the control of the ROC. The People's Republic of China (AKA "China") controls the part of the county on mainland China and has a separate administration for that jurisdiction, Lianjiang County, which claims the entire archipelago to be its Mazu Township (馬祖鄉; Mā-cū-hiŏng).
They are named after the goddess Mazu. Kinmen is the other archipelago on the Fujian coast controlled by the ROC.
Fujianese Mainlanders started migrating to the islands during the Yuan Dynasty. Most people on Matsu came from Houguan (侯官) (today Changle County (長樂縣 Diòng-lŏ̤h-gâing), Fujian).
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Ming Dynasty
The Ming Dynasty, also Empire of the Great Ming, was the ruling dynasty of China for 276 years (1368–1644) following the collapse of the Mongol-led Yuan Dynasty. The Ming, described by some as "one of the greatest eras of orderly government and social stability in human history", was the last dynasty in China ruled by ethnic Han Chinese. Although the Ming capital Beijing fell in 1644 to a rebellion led by Li Zicheng (who established the Shun Dynasty, soon replaced by the Manchu-led Qing Dynasty), regimes loyal to the Ming throne—collectively called the Southern Ming—survived until 1662.
Ming rule saw the construction of a vast navy and a standing army of one million troops. Although private maritime trade and official tribute missions from China had taken place in previous dynasties, the tributary fleet under the Muslim eunuch admiral Zheng He in the 15th century far surpassed all others in size. There were enormous construction projects, including the restoration of the Grand Canal and the Great Wall and the establishment of the Forbidden City in Beijing during the first quarter of the 15th century. Estimates for the late-Ming population vary from 160 to 200 million.
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Mongolia
Mongoliai/mɒŋˈɡoʊliə/ (Mongolian: Монгол улс (help·info), literally Mongol country/state) is a landlocked country in East and Central Asia. It is bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south, east and west. Although Mongolia does not share a border with Kazakhstan, its western-most point is only 38 kilometres (24 mi) from Kazakhstan's eastern tip. Ulan Bator, the capital and largest city, is home to about 45% of the population. Mongolia's political system is a parliamentary republic.
The area of what is now Mongolia has been ruled by various nomadic empires, including the Xiongnu, the Xianbei, the Rouran, the Gökturks and others. The Mongol Empire was founded by Genghis Khan in 1206. After the collapse of the Yuan Dynasty, the Mongols returned to their earlier pattern of constant internal conflict and occasional raids on the Chinese borderlands. In the 16th and 17th centuries, Mongolia came under the influence of Tibetan Buddhism. At the end of the 17th century, all of Mongolia had been incorporated into the area ruled by the Qing Dynasty. During the collapse of the Qing Dynasty in 1911, Mongolia declared independence, but had to struggle until 1921 to firmly establish de facto independence from the Republic of China, and until 1945 to gain international recognition.
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Nauru
Coordinates: 0°31′38″S 166°56′12″E / 0.527288°S 166.936724°E / -0.527288; 166.936724
Nauru (Englishi/nɑːˈuːruː/ nah-OO-roo), officially the Republic of Nauru and formerly known as Pleasant Island, is an island country in Micronesia in the South Pacific. Its nearest neighbour is Banaba Island in Kiribati, 300 kilometres (186 mi) to the east. Nauru is the world's smallest republic, covering just 21 square kilometres (8.1 sq mi). With just over 9,322 residents, it is the second least-populated country after Vatican City.
Settled by Micronesian and Polynesian people, Nauru was annexed and claimed as a colony by the German Empire in the late 19th century. After World War I, Nauru became a League of Nations mandate administered by Australia, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom. During World War II, Nauru was occupied by Japanese troops, who were bypassed by the Allied advance across the Pacific. After the war ended, it entered into trusteeship again. Nauru gained its independence in 1968.
Throughout the first half of the 20th century, Nauru was a "rentier state". Nauru is a phosphate rock island, with rich deposits close to the surface, which allow for simple strip mining operations; moreover, it has some phosphate reserves which are presently (as of 2011) not economically viable for extraction. Nevertheless, this island was a major exporter of phosphate starting in 1907, when the Pacific Phosphate Company began mining there, through the formation of the British Phosphate Commission in 1919, and continuing after independence. This returned to Nauru full control of its minerals under the Nauru Phosphate Corporation, until the deposits ran out during the 1980s. For this reason, Nauru briefly boasted the highest per-capita income enjoyed by any sovereign state in the world during the late 1960s and early 1970s.
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Netherlands
The Netherlands (i/ˈnɛðərləndz/; Dutch: Nederland [ˈneːdə(r)lɑnt] or [ˈneɪ̯də(r)lɑnt] (
listen); West Frisian: Nederlân; Papiamento: Hulanda) is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with some islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders with Belgium, Germany and the United Kingdom. It is a parliamentary democracy organised as a unitary state. The country capital is Amsterdam and the seat of government is The Hague. The Netherlands in its entirety is often referred to as Holland, although North and South Holland are actually only two of its twelve provinces (a case of pars pro toto; see terminology of "the Netherlands").
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New Caledonia
Coordinates: 21°15′S 165°18′E / 21.25°S 165.30°E / -21.25; 165.30
New Caledonia (French: Nouvelle-Calédonie) is a special collectivity of France located in the southwest Pacific Ocean, 1,500 kilometres (930 mi) east of Australia and about 20,000 kilometres (12,000 mi) from Metropolitan France. The archipelago, part of the Melanesia subregion, includes the main island of Grande Terre, the Loyalty Islands, the Belep archipelago, the Isle of Pines and a few remote islets. The Chesterfield Islands in the Coral Sea are also part of New Caledonia. Locals refer to Grande Terre as "Le Caillou", the rock.
New Caledonia has a land area of 18,576 square kilometres (7,172 sq mi). The population (2011 estimate) is 256,275. The capital of the territory is Nouméa.
The earliest traces of human presence in New Caledonia date back to the Lapita period. The Lapita were highly skilled navigators and agriculturists with influence over a large area of the Pacific.
The British first sighted New Caledonia on September 4, 1774, during the second voyage of Captain James Cook. He named the territory New Caledonia, as the north-east of the island reminded him of Scotland. The west coast of Grande Terre was approached by Jean-François de Galaup, comte de Lapérouse in 1788, shortly before his disappearance, and the Loyalty Islands were first visited in 1796. From then until 1840, only a few sporadic contacts with the archipelago were recorded. Contacts became more frequent after 1840, because of the interest in sandalwood from New Caledonia.
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New Taipei
New Taipei City (Chinese: 新北市; pinyin: Xīnběi Shì; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Sin-pak-chhī) is the most populous city of Taiwan. The area includes a substantial stretch of Taiwan's northern coastline and surrounds the Taipei Basin. New Taipei surrounds Taiwan's capital city Taipei, and is bordered by Keelung to the northeast, Yilan County to the southeast, and Taoyuan County to the southwest.
New Taipei had been administered as Taipei County (Chinese: 臺北縣 or 台北縣 Táiběixiàn) of Taiwan until its reorganization as a special municipality on December 25, 2010.
Initially the official English version of the city's name was assigned to be Xinbei City by the county authority, which is the pinyin transliteration of the Chinese city name. The new mayor Eric Chu requested the name New Taipei City as the official English rendering instead.New Taipei is named from "新臺北", where New is the literal translation of "新" and Taipei is the transcription of "臺北". Considering the mayor's request and the public opinion, the Ministry of the Interior (MOI) approved the name New Taipei City on December 31, 2010.
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New Taipei City
New Taipei City (Chinese: 新北市; pinyin: Xīnběi Shì; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Sin-pak-chhī) is the most populous city of Taiwan. The area includes a substantial stretch of Taiwan's northern coastline and surrounds the Taipei Basin. New Taipei surrounds Taiwan's capital city Taipei, and is bordered by Keelung to the northeast, Yilan County to the southeast, and Taoyuan County to the southwest.
New Taipei had been administered as Taipei County (Chinese: 臺北縣 or 台北縣 Táiběixiàn) of Taiwan until its reorganization as a special municipality on December 25, 2010.
Initially the official English version of the city's name was assigned to be Xinbei City by the county authority, which is the pinyin transliteration of the Chinese city name. The new mayor Eric Chu requested the name New Taipei City as the official English rendering instead.New Taipei is named from "新臺北", where New is the literal translation of "新" and Taipei is the transcription of "臺北". Considering the mayor's request and the public opinion, the Ministry of the Interior (MOI) approved the name New Taipei City on December 31, 2010.
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New Zealand
New Zealand (Māori: Aotearoa) is an island country located in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. The country geographically comprises two main landmasses ‒ that of the North and South Islands ‒ as well as numerous smaller islands. New Zealand is situated some 1,500 kilometres (900 mi) east of Australia across the Tasman Sea and roughly 1,000 kilometres (600 mi) south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga. Because of its remoteness, it was one of the last lands to be settled by humans.
During its long isolation, New Zealand developed a distinctive biodiversity of both animal and plant life. Most notable are the large number of unique bird species, many of which became extinct after the arrival of humans and introduced mammals. With a mild maritime climate, the land was mostly covered in forest. The country's varied topography and its sharp mountain peaks owe much to the tectonic uplift of land and volcanic eruptions caused by the Pacific and Indo-Australian Plates clashing beneath the earth's surface.
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Niue
Niue ( /ˈnjuːeɪ/ NEW-ay; Niuean: Niuē) is an island country in the South Pacific Ocean. It is commonly known as the "Rock of Polynesia", and inhabitants of the island call it "the Rock" for short. Niue is 2,400 kilometres (1,500 mi) northeast of New Zealand in a triangle between Tonga to the southwest, the Samoas to the northwest, and the Cook Islands to the southeast. The land area is 260 square kilometres (100 sq mi) with about 1,400 people who are predominantly Polynesian.
Though self-governing, Niue is in free association with New Zealand, and lacks full sovereignty. All Niueans are New Zealand citizens and Queen Elizabeth II is Niue's head of state in her capacity as Queen of New Zealand. Most diplomatic relations are conducted by New Zealand on Niue's behalf. 90-95% of Niuean people live in New Zealand, along with about 70% of the speakers of the Niuean language.[citation needed]
In 2003, Niue became the world's first "WiFi nation", in which free wireless Internet access is provided throughout the country by The Internet Users Society-Niue.
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North Korea
Coordinates: 40°00′N 127°00′E / 40°N 127°E / 40; 127 The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK; Chosŏn'gŭl: 조선민주주의인민공화국), commonly referred to as "North Korea" ( listen), is a country in East Asia, occupying the northern half of the Korean Peninsula. Its capital and largest city is Pyongyang. The Korean Demilitarized Zone serves as the buffer zone between North Korea and South Korea. The Amnok, or Yalu, and the Tumen rivers form the border between North Korea and China. A section of the Tumen River in the far northeast is the border with Russia.
The peninsula was governed by the Korean Empire until it was annexed by Japan after the Russo-Japanese War in 1910. It was divided into Soviet- and American-occupied zones in 1945, after the end of World War II. North Korea refused to participate in a United Nations–supervised election held in the south in 1948, which led to the creation of separate Korean governments for the two occupation zones. North and South Korea each claimed sovereignty over the whole Korean Peninsula, which led to the Korean War of 1950. The Armistice Agreement of 1953 ended the fighting; but the two countries are officially still at war against each other, for a peace treaty was never signed. Both states were accepted into the United Nations in 1991.
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Northern Cyprus
The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) (Turkish: Kuzey Kıbrıs Türk Cumhuriyeti), commonly called Northern Cyprus, is a self-declared state that comprises the northeastern part of the island of Cyprus. Recognised only by Turkey, Northern Cyprus is considered by the international community to be occupied territory of the Republic of Cyprus.
Northern Cyprus extends from the tip of the Karpass Peninsula in the north east, westward to Morphou Bay and Cape Kormakitis (the Kokkina/Erenköy exclave marks the westernmost extent of the area), and southward to the village of Louroujina/Akıncılar. A buffer zone under the control of the United Nations stretches between Northern Cyprus and the rest of the island and divides Nicosia, the island's largest city and capital of both states.
Tensions between the Greek Cypriot and Turkish Cypriot populations in Cyprus culminated in 1974 with a coup d'état, an attempt to annex the island to Greece, and an invasion by Turkey in response. This resulted in the partitioning of the island, the resettlement of many of its inhabitants, and a unilateral declaration of independence by the north in 1983. Due to its lack of recognition, Northern Cyprus is heavily dependent on Turkey for economic, political and military support.
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Oman
Oman (i/oʊˈmɑːn/ oh-MAAN; Arabic: عمان ʻUmān), officially called the Sultanate of Oman (Arabic: سلطنة عُمان Salṭanat ʻUmān), is an Arab state in southwest Asia on the southeast coast of the Arabian Peninsula. It is bordered by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to the northwest, Saudi Arabia to the west, and Yemen to the southwest. The coast is formed by the Arabian Sea on the southeast and the Gulf of Oman on the northeast. The Madha and Musandam enclaves are surrounded by the UAE on their land borders, with the Strait of Hormuz and Gulf of Oman forming Musandam's coastal boundaries.
For a period, Oman was a moderate regional power, formerly having a sultanate extending across the Strait of Hormuz to Iran, and modern day Pakistan, and far south to Zanzibar on the coat of south-east Africa. Over time, as its power declined, the sultanate came under heavy influence from the United Kingdom, though Oman was never formally part of the British Empire, or a British protectorate. The Omani royal family claim that Oman has been ruled by the Al Said dynasty since 1744, although without substantial proof. Oman has long-standing military and political ties with the United Kingdom and the United States, although it maintains an independent foreign policy.
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Orchid Island
Coordinates: 22°03′N 121°32′E / 22.05°N 121.533°E / 22.05; 121.533
Orchid Island (Yami language: Ponso no Tao or Pongso no Tao; Chinese: 蘭嶼; pinyin: Lán Yǔ; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Lân-sū) is a 45 km² volcanic island off the southeastern coast of Taiwan Island and separated from the Batanes of the Philippines by the Bashi Channel of the Luzon Strait. It is governed as Lanyu Township of Taitung County.
The island is home to the Tao, an ethnic minority group who migrated to the island from the Batan Archipelago 800 years ago. The island is known to them as Ponso no Tao or Pongso no Tawo (island of the people) or Irala. Out of a total current population of 4,000, approximately 2,400 belong to the aboriginal Tao community and the remaining 1,600 are mainly Han Chinese. In neighboring Philippines the island is referred to as Botel Tobago.
The Lanyu nuclear waste storage facility was built in 1982. The plant receives nuclear waste from Taiwan's three nuclear power plants operated by state utility Taiwan Power Company (Taipower). About 100,000 barrels of nuclear waste from the nation’s three operational nuclear power plants have been stored at the Lanyu complex. In 2002 and 2012, there were major protests from local residents, calling on Taipower to remove the nuclear waste from the island.
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Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean is the largest of the Earth's oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, bounded by Asia and Australia in the west, and the Americas in the east.
At 165.2 million square kilometres (64.1 million square miles) in area, this largest division of the World Ocean – and, in turn, the hydrosphere – covers about 46% of the Earth's water surface and about one-third of its total surface area, making it larger than all of the Earth's land area combined. The equator subdivides it into the North Pacific Ocean and South Pacific Ocean, with two exceptions: the Galápagos and Gilbert Islands, while straddling the equator, are deemed wholly within the South Pacific. The Mariana Trench in the western North Pacific is the deepest point in the world, reaching a depth of 10,911 metres (35,797 ft).
The eastern Pacific Ocean was first sighted by Europeans early in the 16th century. Spanish explorer Vasco Núñez de Balboa crossed the Isthmus of Panama in 1513 and named it Mar del Sur (South Sea). The ocean's current name was given by Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan during the Spanish expedition of world circumnavigation in 1521, who encountered favourable winds as he reached the ocean and called it Mar Pacifico in Portuguese, meaning "peaceful sea".
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Pakistan
Pakistan (i/ˈpækɨstæn/ or i/pɑːkiˈstɑːn/; Urdu: پاکستان) (Urdu pronunciation: [paːkɪˈst̪aːn] ( listen)), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan (Urdu: اسلامی جمہوریۂ پاکستان), is a sovereign country in South Asia. It sits at the crossroads of the strategically important regions of South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. It has a 1,046-kilometre (650 mi) coastline along the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Oman in the south and is bordered by India to the east, Afghanistan to the west and north, Iran to the southwest and China in the far northeast. It is separated from Tajikistan by Afghanistan's narrow Wakhan Corridor in the north, and it shares a marine border with Oman.
The territory of modern Pakistan was the site of several ancient cultures, including the Neolithic Mehrgarh and the Bronze Age Indus Valley Civilisation, and has undergone invasions or settlements by Hindu, Persian, Indo-Greek, Islamic, Turco-Mongol, Afghan and Sikh cultures. Thus the area has been ruled by numerous empires and dynasties, including the Indian Mauryan Empire, the Persian Achaemenid Empire, the Arab Umayyad Caliphate, the Mongol Empire, the Mughal Empire, the Durrani Empire, the Sikh Empire and the British Empire. As a result of the Pakistan Movement led by Muhammad Ali Jinnah and India's struggle for independence, Pakistan was created in 1947 as an independent nation for Muslims from the regions in the east and west of India where there was a Muslim majority. Initially a dominion, Pakistan adopted a new constitution in 1956, becoming an Islamic republic. A civil war in 1971 resulted in the secession of East Pakistan as the new country of Bangladesh.
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Palau
Palau (i/pəˈlaʊ/, sometimes spelled Belau or Pelew), officially the Republic of Palau (Palauan: Beluu ęr a Belau), is an island country located in the western Pacific Ocean. Geographically part of the larger island group of Micronesia, with the country's population of around 21,000 people spread out over 250 islands forming the western chain of the Caroline Islands. The islands share maritime boundaries with Indonesia, the Philippines, and the Federated States of Micronesia. The most populous island in the group is Koror, with the capital city, Ngerulmud, located on nearby Babeldaob.
The country were originally settled around 3000 years ago by migrants from the Philippines, with a Negrito population sustained until around 900 years ago. The islands were first visited by Europeans in the 18th century, and were made part of the Spanish East Indies in 1885. Following Spain's defeat in the Spanish–American War in 1898, the islands were sold to Imperial Germany in 1899 under the terms of the German–Spanish Treaty, where they were administered as part of German New Guinea. The Imperial Japanese Navy conquered Palau during World War I, and the islands were later made a part of the Japanese-ruled South Pacific Mandate by the League of Nations. During World War II, skirmishes, including the major Battle of Peleliu, were fought between American and Japanese troops as part of the Mariana and Palau Islands campaign. Along with other Pacific Islands, Palau was made a part of the United States-governed Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands in 1947. Having voted against joining the newly-independent Federated States of Micronesia in 1979, the islands gained full sovereignty in 1994 under a Compact of Free Association with the United States.
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Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea (PNG; Tok Pisin: Papua Niugini), officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is a country in Oceania, occupying the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and numerous offshore islands (the western portion of the island is a part of the Indonesian provinces of Papua and West Papua). It is located in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, in a region defined since the early 19th century as Melanesia. The capital is Port Moresby.
Papua New Guinea is one of the most culturally diverse countries on Earth. According to recent data, 841 different languages are listed for the country, although 11 of these have no known living speakers. . (A detailed series of language maps of Papua New Guinea may be found at Ethnologue) There may be at least as many traditional societies,out of a population of about 6.2 million. It is also one of the most rural, as only 18% of its people live in urban centres. The country is one of the world's least explored, culturally and geographically, and many undiscovered species of plants and animals are thought to exist in the interior of Papua New Guinea.
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Penghu
The Penghu Islands, also known as Pescadores (from Portuguese: "fishermen") are an archipelago off the western coast of Taiwan in the Taiwan Strait consisting of 90 small islands and islets covering an area of 141 square kilometers. Though claimed by both the Republic of China (Taiwan) and the People's Republic of China, they are administered by Taiwan.
The whole archipelago forms Penghu County of Taiwan, the archipelago along with the island of Taiwan, composed the former Japanese territory of Formosa.
Peng-hu was first recorded in unofficial historical records and regional logs in 1171 during the Southern Song Dynasty. From the middle of the 17th century to 1895, Taiwan and the archipelago were ruled by pirates, the colonial Dutch Empire (attempts at conquest from 1622 onward), the Koxinga kingdom (Tungning), and the Qing Dynasty, successively.
The Penghu archipelago was captured by the French in March 1885, in the closing weeks of the Sino-French War, and evacuated four months later. The Pescadores Campaign was the last campaign of Admiral Amédée Courbet, whose naval victories during the war had made him a national hero in France. Courbet was among several French soldiers and sailors who succumbed to cholera during the French occupation of Penghu. He died aboard his flagship Bayard in Makung harbour on 11 June 1885.
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Penghu Islands
The Penghu Islands, also known as Pescadores (from Portuguese: "fishermen") are an archipelago off the western coast of Taiwan in the Taiwan Strait consisting of 90 small islands and islets covering an area of 141 square kilometers. Though claimed by both the Republic of China (Taiwan) and the People's Republic of China, they are administered by Taiwan.
The whole archipelago forms Penghu County of Taiwan, the archipelago along with the island of Taiwan, composed the former Japanese territory of Formosa.
Peng-hu was first recorded in unofficial historical records and regional logs in 1171 during the Southern Song Dynasty. From the middle of the 17th century to 1895, Taiwan and the archipelago were ruled by pirates, the colonial Dutch Empire (attempts at conquest from 1622 onward), the Koxinga kingdom (Tungning), and the Qing Dynasty, successively.
The Penghu archipelago was captured by the French in March 1885, in the closing weeks of the Sino-French War, and evacuated four months later. The Pescadores Campaign was the last campaign of Admiral Amédée Courbet, whose naval victories during the war had made him a national hero in France. Courbet was among several French soldiers and sailors who succumbed to cholera during the French occupation of Penghu. He died aboard his flagship Bayard in Makung harbour on 11 June 1885.
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Philippine Sea
The Philippine Sea is a marginal sea east and north of the Philippines occupying an estimated surface area of 2 million mi² (5 million km²) on the western part of the North Pacific Ocean. It is bordered by the Philippine archipelago (Luzon, Samar, Leyte and Mindanao) on the southwest; Palau, Yap, and Ulithi (of the Carolines) on the southeast; the Marianas, including Guam, Saipan, and Tinian, on the east; the Bonin and Iwo Jima on the northeast; the Japanese islands of Honshu, Shikoku, and Kyūshū on the north; the Ryukyu Islands on the northwest; and Taiwan in the west.
The sea has a complex and diverse undersea relief. The floor is formed into a structural basin by a series of geologic faults and fracture zones. Island arcs, which are actually extended ridges protruding above the ocean surface due to plate tectonic activity in the area, enclose the Philippine Sea to the north, east and south. The Philippine archipelago, Ryukyu Islands, and the Marianas are examples. Another prominent feature of the Philippine Sea is the presence of deep sea trench, among them the Philippine Trench and the Mariana Trench, containing the deepest point on the planet.
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Philippine Sea Plate
The Philippine Sea Plate is a tectonic plate comprising oceanic lithosphere that lies beneath the Philippine Sea, to the east of the Philippines. Most segments of the Philippines, including northern Luzon, are part of the Philippine Mobile Belt, which is geologically and tectonically separate from the Philippine Sea Plate.
To the north, the Philippine Sea Plate meets the Okhotsk Plate at the Nankai Trough. The Philippine Sea Plate, the Amurian Plate, and the Okhotsk Plate meet at Mount Fuji in Japan. Thickened crust of the Izu-Bonin-Mariana arc colliding with Japan constitutes the Izu Collision Zone.
The eastern side of the Philippine Sea Plate is a convergent boundary with the Pacific Plate subducting at the Izu-Ogasawara Trench. The east of the plate includes the Izu-Ogasawara (Bonin) and the Mariana Islands, forming the Izu-Bonin-Mariana Arc system. There is also a divergent boundary between the Philippine Sea Plate and the small Mariana Plate which carries the Mariana Islands.
To the south, the Philippine Sea Plate is bounded by the Caroline Plate and Bird's Head Plate.
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Philippines
The Philippinesi/ˈfɪlɨpiːnz/ FI-lə-peenz (Filipino: Pilipinas [ˌpɪlɪˈpinɐs]), officially known as the Republic of the Philippines (Filipino: Republika ng Pilipinas) is a sovereign country in Southeast Asia in the western Pacific Ocean. To its north across the Luzon Strait lies Taiwan. West across the South China Sea sits Vietnam. The Sulu Sea to the southwest lies between the country and the island of Borneo, and to the south the Celebes Sea separates it from other islands of Indonesia. It is bounded on the east by the Philippine Sea. Its location on the Pacific Ring of Fire and its tropical climate make the Philippines prone to earthquakes and typhoons but have also endowed the country with natural resources and made it one of the richest areas of biodiversity in the world. An archipelago comprising 7,107 islands, the Philippines is categorized broadly into three main geographical divisions: Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao. Its capital city is Manila.
With an estimated population of about 98 million people, the Philippines is the 7th most populated Asian country and the 12th most populated country in the world. An additional 12.5 million Filipinos live overseas. Multiple ethnicities and cultures are found throughout the islands. In prehistoric times, Negritos were some of the archipelago's earliest inhabitants. They were followed by successive waves of Austronesian peoples who brought with them influences from Malay, Hindu, and Islamic societies. Trade introduced Chinese cultural influences which remain to this day.
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Qatar
Qatar (i/ˈkɑːtɑr/ or i/kəˈtɑr/;Arabic: قطر [ˈqɑtˤɑr]; local vernacular pronunciation: [ɡɪtˤɑr]), also known as the country or State of Qatar or locally Dawlat Qaṭar, is a sovereign Arab state, located in Western Asia, occupying the small Qatar Peninsula on the northeasterly coast of the much larger Arabian Peninsula. Its sole land border is with Saudi Arabia to the south, with the rest of its territory surrounded by the Persian Gulf. A strait of the Persian Gulf separates Qatar from the nearby island state of Bahrain.
Qatar has been ruled as an absolute monarchy by Al Thani family since the mid-19th century. Formerly a British protectorate noted mainly for pearling, it became independent in 1971, and has become one of the region's wealthiest states due to its enormous oil and natural gas revenues. In 1995, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani became Emir when he seized power from his father, Khalifa bin Hamad Al Thani, in a peaceful coup d'état. The most important positions in Qatar are held by the members of the Al Thani family, or close confidants of the al-Thani family. Beginning in 1992, Qatar has built intimate military ties with the United States, and is now the location of U.S. Central Command’s Forward Headquarters and the Combined Air Operations Center.
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Qing
The Qing Dynasty was the last imperial dynasty of China, ruling from 1644 to 1912 with a brief, abortive restoration in 1917. It was preceded by the Ming Dynasty and followed by the Republic of China.
The dynasty was founded by the Jurchen Aisin Gioro clan in contemporary Northeastern China. The Aisin Gioro leader, Nurhachi, who was originally a vassal of the Ming emperors, began unifying the Jurchen clans in the late sixteenth century. By 1635, Nurhachi's son Hong Taiji could claim they constituted a single and united Manchu people and began forcing the Ming out of Liaoning in southern Manchuria. In 1644, the Ming capital Beijing was sacked by a peasant revolt led by Li Zicheng, a former minor Ming official who became the leader of the peasant revolt, who then proclaimed the Shun dynasty. The last Ming ruler, the Chongzhen Emperor, committed suicide when the city fell. When Li Zicheng moved against Ming general Wu Sangui, the latter made an alliance with the Manchus and opened the Shanhai Pass to the Manchurian army. Under Prince Dorgon, they seized control of Beijing and overthrew Li Zicheng's short-lived Shun Dynasty. Complete pacification of China was accomplished around 1683 under the Kangxi Emperor.
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Qing Dynasty
The Qing Dynasty was the last imperial dynasty of China, ruling from 1644 to 1912 with a brief, abortive restoration in 1917. It was preceded by the Ming Dynasty and followed by the Republic of China.
The dynasty was founded by the Jurchen Aisin Gioro clan in contemporary Northeastern China. The Aisin Gioro leader, Nurhachi, who was originally a vassal of the Ming emperors, began unifying the Jurchen clans in the late sixteenth century. By 1635, Nurhachi's son Hong Taiji could claim they constituted a single and united Manchu people and began forcing the Ming out of Liaoning in southern Manchuria. In 1644, the Ming capital Beijing was sacked by a peasant revolt led by Li Zicheng, a former minor Ming official who became the leader of the peasant revolt, who then proclaimed the Shun dynasty. The last Ming ruler, the Chongzhen Emperor, committed suicide when the city fell. When Li Zicheng moved against Ming general Wu Sangui, the latter made an alliance with the Manchus and opened the Shanhai Pass to the Manchurian army. Under Prince Dorgon, they seized control of Beijing and overthrew Li Zicheng's short-lived Shun Dynasty. Complete pacification of China was accomplished around 1683 under the Kangxi Emperor.
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Russia
Russiai/ˈrʌʃə/ or /ˈrʊʃə/ (Russian: Россия, tr. Rossiya; IPA: [rɐˈsʲijə] ( listen)), also officially known as the Russian Federation (Russian: Российская Федерация, tr. Rossiyskaya Federatsiya; IPA: [rɐˈsʲijskəjə fʲɪdʲɪˈratsɨjə] ( listen)), is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects. From northwest to southeast, Russia shares borders with Norway, Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland (both via Kaliningrad Oblast), Belarus, Ukraine, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, China, Mongolia, and North Korea. It also has maritime borders with Japan by the Sea of Okhotsk, and the US state of Alaska by the Bering Strait. At 17,075,400 square kilometres (6,592,800 sq mi), Russia is the largest country in the world, covering more than one eighth of the Earth's inhabited land area. Russia is also the eighth most populous nation with 143 million people. It extends across the whole of northern Asia and 40% of Europe, spanning nine time zones and incorporating a wide range of environments and landforms. Russia has the world's largest reserves of mineral and energy resources and is the largest producer of oil and natural gas globally. Russia has the world's largest forest reserves and its lakes contain approximately one-quarter of the world's fresh water.
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Samoa
Samoa (i/səˈmoʊ.ə/; Samoan: Sāmoa, IPA: [ˌsaːˈmoa]), officially the Independent State of Samoa (Samoan: Malo Sa'oloto Tuto'atasi o Sāmoa), formerly known as Western Samoa, is a country encompassing the western part of the Samoan Islands in the South Pacific Ocean. It became independent from New Zealand in 1962. The two main islands of Samoa are Upolu and one of the biggest islands in Polynesia, Savai'i. The capital city, Apia, and Faleolo International Airport are situated on the island of Upolu.
Samoa was admitted to the United Nations on 15 December 1976. The entire island group, inclusive of American Samoa, was called Navigators Islands by European explorers before the 20th century because of the Samoans' seafaring skills.
The oldest date so far from pre-historic remains in Samoa has been calculated by New Zealand scientists to a likely true age of circa 3,000 years ago from a Lapita site at Mulifanua during the 1970s.
The origins of the Samoans is closely linked to modern research about Polynesia in various scientific disciplines such as genetics, linguistics and anthropology. Scientific research is ongoing although a number of different theories exist; including one proposing that the Samoans originated from Austronesian predecessors during the terminal eastward Lapita expansion period from Southeast Asia and Melanesia between 2,500 and 1,500 BCE. The Samoan origins are currently being reassessed due to new scientific evidence and carbon dating findings from 2003 and onwards.
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Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia (i/ˌsaʊdi əˈreɪbi.ə/ or i/ˌsɔːdiː əˈreɪbi.ə/; Arabic: السعودية as-Su‘ūdīyah[citation needed] or incorrectly as-Sa‘ūdīyah, officially known as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (Arabic: المملكة العربية السعودية al-Mamlakah al-‘Arabīyah as-Su‘ūdīyah Arabic pronunciation (help·info)), is the largest state in Western Asia by land area, constituting the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and the second-largest in the Arab world, after Algeria. It is bordered by Jordan, and Iraq on the north and northeast, Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates on the east, Oman on the southeast, and Yemen on the south. The Red Sea lies to its west, and the Persian Gulf lies to the east. Saudi Arabia has an area of approximately 2,250,000 km2 (870,000 sq mi), and it has an estimated population of 27 million, of which 9 million are registered foreign expatriates and an estimated 2 million are illegal immigrants. Saudi nationals comprise an estimated 16 million people.
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was founded by Abdul-Aziz bin Saud (known for most of his career as Ibn Saud) in 1932, although the conquests which eventually led to the creation of the Kingdom began in 1902 when he captured Riyadh, the ancestral home of his family, the House of Saud, referred to in Arabic as the Al Saud. The Saudi Arabian government, which has been an absolute monarchy since its inception, refers to its system of government as being Islamic, though this is contested by many due to its strong basis in Salafism, a minority school of thought in Islam. The kingdom is sometimes called "The Land of the Two Holy Mosques" in reference to Al-Masjid al-Haram (in Mecca), and Al-Masjid al-Nabawi (in Medina), the two holiest places in Islam.
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Singapore
Singapore (i/ˈsɪŋəpɔər/ SI-ngə-pohr), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, 137 kilometres (85 mi) north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the Singapore Strait to its south. Singapore is highly urbanised but almost half of the country is covered by greenery. More land is being created for development through land reclamation.
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Siraya language
Siraya is a Formosan language spoken until the end of the 19th century by the indigenous Siraya people of Taiwan. Dialects of Siraya included Taivoa and Makatao.
Several Siraya communities have been involved in a Sirayan cultural and language revitalization movement for more than a decade. Through linguistic research and language teaching, the natives are 'awaking' their mother tongue that has been 'dormant' for a century. Today a group of Siraya children in the Shinhua township particularly in Kou-pei and Chiou Chen Lin area are able to speak and sing in the Siraya language.
The Siraya language entered the historical record in the early 17th century when traders from the Dutch East India Company, expelled from mainland China and Chinese waters, set up a stronghold on Taiwan at Fort Zeelandia, which was in the Siraya-speaking area. During the period of Dutch rule in Taiwan, Calvinist missionaries used Siraya and Babuza (also known as Favorlang) as contact languages. A translation of the Gospel of St. Matthew into Siraya (174 pages of Siraya and Dutch text, Gravius 1661) and a catechism in Siraya (288 pages of Siraya and Dutch text, Gravius 1662) were published, and have been subsequently republished. The Dutch colony was driven out in 1661 by Ming loyalist refugees from China, and Taiwan was subsequently incorporated into the Qing Empire. During the period of Qing Dynasty rule, use of Siraya receded, but some Siraya language materials survive in the form of Siraya land contracts with Chinese translations, known as the Sinckan Manuscripts. The last records were lists of words made in the early 19th century.
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Solomon Islands
Solomon Islandsi/ˈsɒləmən ˈaɪləndz/ is a sovereign state in Oceania, east of Papua New Guinea, consisting of nearly one thousand islands. It covers a land mass of 28,400 square kilometres (11,000 sq mi). The capital, Honiara, is located on the island of Guadalcanal. The nation of the Solomon Islands is a member of the Commonwealth of Nations.
The Solomon Islands are believed to have been inhabited by Melanesian people for many thousands of years. Spanish navigator Álvaro de Mendaña was the first European to arrive in Solomon Islands in 1568 and named them Islas Salomón. The United Kingdom established a protectorate over the Solomon Islands in 1893. In the Second World War there was fierce fighting between the Americans and the Japanese in the Solomon Islands campaign of 1942–45, including the Battle of Guadalcanal.
Self-government was achieved in 1976 and independence two years later. The Solomon Islands is a constitutional monarchy with the Queen of the Solomon Islands, at present Elizabeth II, as the head of state. Gordon Lilo Darcy is the eleventh and current Prime Minister of the Solomon Islands.
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South China Sea
The South China Sea is a marginal sea that is part of the Pacific Ocean, encompassing an area from the Singapore and Malacca Straits to the Strait of Taiwan of around 3,500,000 square kilometres (1,400,000 sq mi). The area's importance largely results from one-third of the world's shipping transiting through its waters, and that it is believed to hold huge oil and gas reserves beneath its seabed.
It is located
The minute South China Sea Islands, collectively an archipelago, number in the hundreds. The sea and its mostly uninhabited islands are subject to competing claims of sovereignty by several countries. These claims are also reflected in the variety of names used for the islands and the sea.
South China Sea is the dominant term used in English for the sea, and the name in most European languages is equivalent, but it is sometimes called by different names in neighboring countries, often reflecting historical claims to hegemony over the sea.
The English name is a result of early European interest in the sea as a route from Europe and South Asia to the trading opportunities of China. In the sixteenth century Portuguese sailors called it the China Sea (Mar da China); later needs to differentiate it from nearby bodies of water led to calling it the South China Sea. The International Hydrographic Organization refers to the sea as "South China Sea (Nan Hai)".
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South Korea
South Korea ( listen), officially the Republic of Korea (Hangul: 대한민국; Hanja: 大韓民國; Daehan Minguk listen), is a sovereign state in the southern part of the Korean Peninsula. The name "Korea" is derived from Goryeo, a dynasty which ruled in the Middle Ages (an initial "G" in Korean is pronounced like an English "K").
Its neighbors are China to the west, Japan to the east, North Korea to the north, and the Korea Strait to the south. South Korea lies in the north temperate zone with a predominantly mountainous terrain. It covers a total area of 99,392 square kilometers and has a population of almost 50 million. The capital and largest city is Seoul, with a population of 9,794,304.
Archaeological findings show that the Korean Peninsula was occupied by the Lower Paleolithic period.Korean history begins with the founding of Gojoseon in 2333 BC by the legendary Dan-gun. Following the unification of the Three Kingdoms of Korea under Silla 668 AD, Korea went through the Goryeo Dynasty and Joseon Dynasty as one nation until the end of the Korean Empire in 1910, when it was annexed by Japan. After liberation and occupation by Soviet and U.S. forces at the end of World War II, the nation was divided into North and South Korea. The latter was established in 1948 as a democracy, though political turmoil and times of military rule and martial law characterized much of the period until the foundation of the Sixth Republic in 1987.
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South Ossetia
South Ossetia ( /əˈsɛtiə/ə-SET-ee-ə or /ɒˈsiːʃə/o-SEE-shə; Ossetic: Хуссар Ирыстон, Xussar Iryston; Georgian: სამხრეთ ოსეთი, Samxret Oseti; Russian: Южная Осетия, Yuzhnaya Osetiya) or Tskhinvali Region (Georgian: ცხინვალის რეგიონი, Tsxinvalis regioni; Russian: Цхинвальский регион, Tskhinvalskiy region) is a disputed region and partly recognized state in the South Caucasus, located in the territory of the South Ossetian Autonomous Oblast within the former Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic.
South Ossetians declared independence from Georgia in 1990, calling themselves the Republic of South Ossetia. The Georgian government responded by abolishing South Ossetia's autonomy and trying to retake the region by force. This led to the 1991–1992 South Ossetia War. Georgian fighting against those controlling South Ossetia occurred on two other occasions, in 2004 and 2008. The last conflict led to the 2008 South Ossetia war, during which Ossetian and Russian forces gained full, de facto control of the territory of the former South Ossetian Autonomous Oblast.
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Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka (i/ʃriː ˈlɑːŋkə/, /sriːˈlɑːŋkə/, or /sriːˈlæŋkə/;Sinhala: ශ්රී ලංකාව, Tamil: இலங்கை), is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent in South Asia. Known until 1972 as Ceylon ( /sɨˈlɒn/, /seɪˈlɒn/, or /siːˈlɒn/), Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar, the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the Maldives.
As a result of its location in the path of major sea routes, Sri Lanka is a strategic naval link between West Asia and South East Asia. It was an important stop on the ancient Silk Road. Sri Lanka has also been a center of the Buddhist religion and culture from ancient times, being the nation where the Buddhist teachings were first written down as well as the oldest continually Buddhist country. Sri Lanka boasts a diverse range of cultures, languages and religions. The Sinhalese people form the majority of the population; Tamils, who are concentrated in the north and east of the island, form the largest ethnic minority. Other communities include Moors, Burghers, Kaffirs, Malays and the aboriginal Vedda people.
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State of Palestine
Palestine (Arabic: فلسطين Filasṭīn/Falasṭīn/Filisṭīn), officially declared as the State of Palestine (Arabic: دولة فلسطين, Dawlat Filasṭin), is a state that was proclaimed in exile in Algiers on 15 November 1988, when the Palestine Liberation Organization's (PLO) National Council (PNC) adopted the unilateral Palestinian Declaration of Independence. At the time of the 1988 declaration, the PLO did not exercise control over any territory, and its claimed territory remains under Israeli occupation. It claims the Palestinian territories (defined according to the 1967 borders), and has designated Jerusalem as the capital of Palestine, despite Israeli control.
The 1974 Arab League summit designated the PLO as the "sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people and reaffirmed their right to establish an independent state of urgency." The PLO has had observer status at the United Nations as a "non-state entity" since 22 November 1974, which entitles it to speak in the UN General Assembly but not to vote. After the Declaration of Independence, the UN General Assembly officially "acknowledged" the proclamation and voted to use the designation "Palestine" instead of "Palestine Liberation Organization" when referring to the Palestinian permanent observer. In spite of this decision, the PLO does not participate at the UN in its capacity of the State of Palestine's government. Since 1998, the PLO is arranged for seating in the UN General Assembly immediately after non-member states, and before all other observers.
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Suriname
Suriname, officially the Republic of Suriname (Dutch: Republiek Suriname, Dutch pronunciation: [ˌrepyˈblik ˌsyriˈnaːmə]), is a country in northern South America. It borders French Guiana to the east, Guyana to the west, Brazil to the south, and the Atlantic Ocean to the north. Suriname was first colonized by the British, and captured by the Dutch in 1667, who governed it as the colony of Suriname until 1954. The country of Suriname achieved independence from the Kingdom of the Netherlands, in which Suriname, the Netherlands Antilles, and the Netherlands itself cooperated on a basis of equality since 1954, on 25 November 1975.
At just under 165,000 km2 (64,000 sq mi) Suriname is the smallest sovereign state in South America (French Guiana comprises less territory, but is French territory). It has an estimated population of approximately 560,000, most of whom live on the country's north coast, where the capital Paramaribo is located.
The name Suriname may derive from a Taino (Arawak-speaking) group called "Surinen" who first inhabited the region prior to European arrival.
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Syria
Syria (/ˈsɪriə/ ( listen) SIRR-ee-ə; Arabic: سورية Sūriyya or سوريا Sūryā; Syriac: ܣܘܪܝܐ; Kurdish: Sûrî), officially the Syrian Arab Republic (Arabic: الجمهورية العربية السورية al-Jumhūriyyah al-‘Arabīyah as-Sūriyyah Arabic pronunciation (help·info)), is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest.
In English, the name Syria was formerly synonymous with the Levant, known in Arabic as Sham, while the modern state encompasses the sites of several ancient kingdoms and empires, including the Eblan civilization of the third millennium BC. In the Islamic era, its capital city, Damascus, the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world, was the seat of the Umayyad Caliphate, and a provincial capital of the Mamluk Sultanate of Egypt.
The population of Syria is 74% Sunni, 12% Alawi, 10% Christian, and 3% Druze. Combined, 87% of the Syrian population is Muslim, while the other 10% is Christian, which includes mainly Arab Christians but also Assyrians and Armenians. Major ethnic minorities in Syria include Kurds (9%), Assyrians, Armenians, Turkmens and Circassians. The majority of the population is Arab (90%).
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Taichung
Taichung (臺中; literally "Central Taiwan") is a city located in west-central Taiwan, with a population of just over 2.6 million people, making it the third largest city on the island after New Taipei and Kaohsiung. On 25 December 2010, it merged with Taichung County to form a single special municipality. The city's motto is "economic, cultural and international city."
Taichung City is located in the Taichung Basin along the main western coastal plain that stretches from northern Taiwan along the west coast nearly to the southern tip. The city is located just north of 24° north and about 120.5° east longitude.
Taichung City borders Changhua County (彰化縣), Nantou County (南投縣), Hualien County (花蓮縣), Yilan County (宜蘭縣), Hsinchu County (新竹縣), Miaoli County (苗栗縣).
The Central Mountain Range lies just to the east of the city. Lower, rolling hills run to the north leading to Miaoli County. Flat coastal plains dominate the landscape to the south leading to Changhua County and the Taiwan Strait to the west.
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Taichung City
Taichung (臺中; literally "Central Taiwan") is a city located in west-central Taiwan, with a population of just over 2.6 million people, making it the third largest city on the island after New Taipei and Kaohsiung. On 25 December 2010, it merged with Taichung County to form a single special municipality. The city's motto is "economic, cultural and international city."
Taichung City is located in the Taichung Basin along the main western coastal plain that stretches from northern Taiwan along the west coast nearly to the southern tip. The city is located just north of 24° north and about 120.5° east longitude.
Taichung City borders Changhua County (彰化縣), Nantou County (南投縣), Hualien County (花蓮縣), Yilan County (宜蘭縣), Hsinchu County (新竹縣), Miaoli County (苗栗縣).
The Central Mountain Range lies just to the east of the city. Lower, rolling hills run to the north leading to Miaoli County. Flat coastal plains dominate the landscape to the south leading to Changhua County and the Taiwan Strait to the west.
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Tainan
Tainan is a city in southern Taiwan. It is the fifth largest city of Taiwan, one of special municipalities directly under the Executive Yuan by central government of the ROC. Tainan faces the Taiwan Strait in the west and south. Tainan's complex history of comebacks, redefinitions and renewals inspired its popular nickname "the Phoenix City."
Tainan was initially established by the Dutch East India Company as a ruling and trading base which called Fort Zeelandia during the period of Dutch rule on Taiwan. After Dutch colonists were defeated by Koxinga in 1661, Tainan was remained as the capital of the Tungning Kingdom until 1683 and afterwards the capital of Taiwan prefecture under the rule of Qing Dynasty until 1887, when the Qing Dynasty established Taipei as the new provincial capital. Tainan has been historically regarded as one of the oldest cities in Taiwan, and its former name, Tayouan (大員), has been claimed to be the source of the name Taiwan. It is also one of Taiwan's cultural capitals, for its rich folk cultures including the famous local snack food, extensively preserved Taoist rites and other living local traditions covering child birth to funeral. The city houses the first Confucian school–temple, built in 1665, the remains of the Eastern and Southern gates of the old city, and countless other historical monuments. Tainan claims more Buddhist and Taoist temples than any other city in Taiwan.
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Tainan City
Tainan is a city in southern Taiwan. It is the fifth largest city of Taiwan, one of special municipalities directly under the Executive Yuan by central government of the ROC. Tainan faces the Taiwan Strait in the west and south. Tainan's complex history of comebacks, redefinitions and renewals inspired its popular nickname "the Phoenix City."
Tainan was initially established by the Dutch East India Company as a ruling and trading base which called Fort Zeelandia during the period of Dutch rule on Taiwan. After Dutch colonists were defeated by Koxinga in 1661, Tainan was remained as the capital of the Tungning Kingdom until 1683 and afterwards the capital of Taiwan prefecture under the rule of Qing Dynasty until 1887, when the Qing Dynasty established Taipei as the new provincial capital. Tainan has been historically regarded as one of the oldest cities in Taiwan, and its former name, Tayouan (大員), has been claimed to be the source of the name Taiwan. It is also one of Taiwan's cultural capitals, for its rich folk cultures including the famous local snack food, extensively preserved Taoist rites and other living local traditions covering child birth to funeral. The city houses the first Confucian school–temple, built in 1665, the remains of the Eastern and Southern gates of the old city, and countless other historical monuments. Tainan claims more Buddhist and Taoist temples than any other city in Taiwan.
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Taipei
Taipei City (/ˌtaɪˈpeɪ/; [tʰǎipèi]; Chinese: 臺北市 or 台北市; pinyin: Táiběi Shì) is the capital of the Republic of China (Taiwan). Situated at the northern tip of the island of Taiwan, Taipei is located on the Tamsui River; it is about 25 km southwest of Keelung, a port city on the Pacific Ocean. It lies in the two relatively narrow valleys of the Keelung (基隆河) and Xindian (新店溪) rivers, which join to form the Tamsui River along the city's western border. The city proper (Taipei City) is home to an estimated 2,618,772 people. Taipei, New Taipei, and Keelung together form the Taipei metropolitan area with a population of 6,900,273. However, they are administered under different local governing bodies. "Taipei" sometimes refers to the whole metropolitan area, while "Taipei City" refers to the city proper. Taipei City proper is surrounded on all sides by New Taipei.
Taipei is the political, economic, and cultural center of Taiwan. The National Palace Museum which has one of the largest collections of Chinese artifacts and artworks in the world is located in Taipei. Considered to be a global city, Taipei is part of a major industrial area. Railways, high speed rail, highways, airports, and bus lines connect Taipei with all parts of the island. The city is served by two airports – Taipei Songshan and Taiwan Taoyuan.
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Taipei 101
Taipei 101 (Chinese: 台北101 / 臺北101), formerly known as the Taipei World Financial Center, is a landmark skyscraper located in Xinyi District, Taipei, Taiwan. The building ranked officially as the world's tallest from 2004 until the opening of the Burj Khalifa in Dubai in 2010. In July 2011, the building was awarded LEED Platinum certification, the highest award in the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) rating system and became the tallest and largest green building in the world. Taipei 101 was designed by C.Y. Lee & partners and constructed primarily by Samsung C&T and KTRT Joint Venture. The tower has served as an icon of modern Taiwan ever since its opening, and received the 2004 Emporis Skyscraper Award.Fireworks launched from Taipei 101 feature prominently in international New Year's Eve broadcasts and the structure appears frequently in travel literature and international media.
Taipei 101 comprises 101 floors above ground and 5 floors underground. The building was architecturally created as a symbol of the evolution of technology and Asian tradition (see Symbolism). Its postmodernist approach to style incorporates traditional design elements and gives them modern treatments. The tower is designed to withstand typhoons and earthquakes. A multi-level shopping mall adjoining the tower houses hundreds of fashionable stores, restaurants and clubs.
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Taipei City
Taipei City (/ˌtaɪˈpeɪ/; [tʰǎipèi]; Chinese: 臺北市 or 台北市; pinyin: Táiběi Shì) is the capital of the Republic of China (Taiwan). Situated at the northern tip of the island of Taiwan, Taipei is located on the Tamsui River; it is about 25 km southwest of Keelung, a port city on the Pacific Ocean. It lies in the two relatively narrow valleys of the Keelung (基隆河) and Xindian (新店溪) rivers, which join to form the Tamsui River along the city's western border. The city proper (Taipei City) is home to an estimated 2,618,772 people. Taipei, New Taipei, and Keelung together form the Taipei metropolitan area with a population of 6,900,273. However, they are administered under different local governing bodies. "Taipei" sometimes refers to the whole metropolitan area, while "Taipei City" refers to the city proper. Taipei City proper is surrounded on all sides by New Taipei.
Taipei is the political, economic, and cultural center of Taiwan. The National Palace Museum which has one of the largest collections of Chinese artifacts and artworks in the world is located in Taipei. Considered to be a global city, Taipei is part of a major industrial area. Railways, high speed rail, highways, airports, and bus lines connect Taipei with all parts of the island. The city is served by two airports – Taipei Songshan and Taiwan Taoyuan.
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Taitung County
Taitung County is a county in eastern Taiwan. While its name means "Eastern Taiwan", it is also known as "Houshan" (Chinese: 後山; pinyin: hòushān; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: āu-soaⁿ) by many of the locals, meaning behind the mountains or the back mountains. Taitung is officially administered as a county of the Republic of China.
Taitung runs along the south east coast of Taiwan. Taitung county, possessing 3,515 km2 is the 3rd largest county in Taiwan. Taitung County's coastline is 231 km long. Taitung currently has a population of 231,863. The country possess only one registered city, Taitung City. The rest of the county is composed of two towns and thirteen villages.
Due in part to its remote location and isolation by mountains from Taiwan's main population centers, Taitung was the last part of the island to be colonized by Han Chinese immigrants (late 19th century). Throughout the 20th century Taitung remained an economic backwater. Sparsely populated even today, this isolation may have been a blessing in disguise, as Taitung mostly escaped the urbanization and pollution that have come to plague much of the island's lowland areas.
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Taiwan
Taiwan (i/ˌtaɪˈwɑːn/ TY-WAHN; Chinese: 臺灣 or 台灣; pinyin: Táiwān; see below), officially the Republic of China (ROC; Chinese: 中華民國; pinyin: Zhōnghuá Mínguó), is a state in East Asia. Originally based in mainland China, the Republic of China now governs the island of Taiwan (formerly known as Formosa), which forms over 99% of its current territory, as well as Penghu, Kinmen, Matsu, and other minor islands. Neighboring states include the People's Republic of China to the west, Japan to the east and northeast, and the Philippines to the south. Taipei is the capital city and economic and cultural centre of the country, and New Taipei is the most populous city.
The earliest evidence of inhabitation of Taiwan dates back to the late Paleolithic era. The island of Taiwan was mainly inhabited by Taiwanese aborigines before being colonized in the 17th century by the Dutch and the Spanish Empire. The first Han Chinese polity on Taiwan began when Koxinga's troops defeated Dutch forces and established the Kingdom of Tungning. The island was subsequently ruled by the Qing Dynasty after the kingdom's defeat in the Battle of Penghu in 1683, a period that lasted for over 200 years. Following Japan's victory over the Qing Dynasty in the first Sino-Japanese war, Taiwan was ceded to Japan under the Treaty of Shimonoseki in 1895.
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Taiwan Province
Taiwan Province (traditional Chinese: 臺灣省 or 台灣省; simplified Chinese: 台湾省; pinyin: Táiwān Shěng) is one of the two administrative divisions of the Republic of China (ROC) that are officially referred to as "provinces". The province covers approximately 73% of the territory controlled by the ROC, with around 40% of the total population.
Geographically it covers the majority of the island of Taiwan as well as almost all of its surrounding islands, the largest of which are the Penghu archipelago, Green Island and Orchid Island. Taiwan Province does not cover territories in the direct-controlled special municipalities of Taipei, Kaohsiung, Taichung, Tainan, and New Taipei, all of which located geographically within main island of Taiwan. It also does not include the counties of Kinmen and Lienchiang, which are located alongside the southeast coast of Mainland China and administered as a separate Fujian Province.
Historically Taiwan Province covers the entire island of Taiwan and all its associated islands. All the special municipalities were split off from the province between 1967 and 2010. Since 1997 most of the Taiwan provincial government's functions have been transferred to the central government of the Republic of China following a constitutional amendment. The Taiwan provincial government has effectively become a nominal institution under the Executive Yuan's administration.
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Taiwan Strait
The Taiwan Strait or Formosa Strait, formerly known as the Black Ditch, is a 180-km-wide (111.85-mile-wide) strait separating the island of Taiwan from the Asian mainland. The strait is part of the South China Sea and connects to East China Sea to the northeast. The narrowest part is 130 km (81 mi) wide.
Fujian province in mainland China is to the west of the strait, while important islands like Quemoy, Xiamen Island, Pingtan Island, and the Matsu Islands lie just off the coast. To the east are the west coasts of Taiwan and Penghu. The island fishermen use the strait as a fishing resource. The Min and Jiulong Rivers empty into the strait.
There have been discussions about the strategic importance of the Taiwan Strait. Some Japanese politicians claimed that the Taiwan Strait is an essential sea route for oil shipment from the Middle East via the Malacca Strait to Japan. However, some have argued that this is merely an excuse for intervention since the sea lane east of Taiwan is even shorter
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Tajikistan
Tajikistan (i/tɑːˈdʒiːkɨstɑːn/, /təˈdʒiːkɨstæn/, or /tæˈdʒiːkiːstæn/; Тоҷикистон [ˈtɔjikɪsˈtɔn]), officially the Republic of Tajikistan (Tajik: Ҷумҳурии Тоҷикистон, Cumhuriyi Tocikiston; Persian: جمهوری تاجیکستان Jomhuri-ye Tajikestan; Russian: Республика Таджикистан, Respublika Tadzhikistan), is a mountainous landlocked country in Central Asia. It borders Afghanistan to the south, Uzbekistan to the west, Kyrgyzstan to the north, and China to the east. Gilgit Baltistan as well as Khyber Pakhtunkhwa of Pakistan are separated from Tajikistan by the narrow Wakhan Corridor of Afghanistan in the south.
Most of Tajikistan's population belongs to the Persian-speaking Tajik ethnic group, who share language, culture and history with Afghanistan and Iran. Once part of the Samanid Empire, Tajikistan became a constituent republic of the Soviet Union in the 20th century, known as the Tajik Soviet Socialist Republic (Tajik SSR). Mountains cover over 90% of this Central Asian republic.
After independence, Tajikistan suffered from a devastating civil war which lasted from 1992 to 1997. Since the end of the war, newly established political stability and foreign aid have allowed the country's economy to grow. Trade in commodities such as cotton, aluminium and uranium has contributed greatly to this steady improvement.
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Taoyuan City
Taoyuan City (Chinese: 桃園市; pinyin: Táoyuán Shì; Wade–Giles: T'ao-yüan Shih; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Thô-hn̂g-chhī) is the county seat of Taoyuan County in Taiwan, located in the northwestern part of the island. Taoyuan city is the gateway of Taiwan: with the Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport in vicinity, and is a 30-minute ride to the capital, Taipei. After the December 25, 2010 creation of New Taipei City, the city of Taoyuan became the most populous County-controlled city in Taiwan, surpassing Banqiao, the former seat of Taipei County and once the most populous County-controlled city since the late 80s.[citation needed]
General statistics include:
Taoyuan is the native home to the Plains tribes of Taiwanese aborigines. Taoyuan's old name was Taoziyuan (Chinese: 桃仔園; pinyin: Táozǐyuán; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Thô-á-hn̂g; literally "peach orchard"), since there used to be many peach blossoms in the area. In 1920 under Japanese rule, the area was renamed Taoyuan Town(Chinese: 桃園街; pinyin: Táoyuán Jiē; literally "peach garden town"), and incorporated into the Hsinchu state as a county jurisdiction. After the Chinese Civil War, it was "Taoyuan Town, Taoyuan County". Since 1971, the name has remained Taoyuan City (桃園市).
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Thailand
Thailand ( /ˈtaɪlænd/ TY-land or /ˈtaɪlənd/;Thai: ประเทศไทย, RTGS: Prathet Thai), officially the Kingdom of Thailand (Thai: ราชอาณาจักรไทย, RTGS: Ratcha Anachak Thai; IPA: [râːt.tɕʰā ʔāːnāːtɕàk tʰāj] ( listen)), formerly known as Siam (Thai: สยาม; RTGS: Sayam), is a country located at the centre of the Indochina peninsula in Southeast Asia. It is bordered to the north by Burma and Laos, to the east by Laos and Cambodia, to the south by the Gulf of Thailand and Malaysia, and to the west by the Andaman Sea and the southern extremity of Burma. Its maritime boundaries include Vietnam in the Gulf of Thailand to the southeast, and Indonesia and India in the Andaman Sea to the southwest.
The country is a constitutional monarchy, headed by King Rama IX, the ninth king of the House of Chakri, who, having reigned since 1946, is the world's longest-serving head of state and the longest-reigning monarch in Thai history. The king of Thailand is titled Head of State, Head of the Armed Forces, the Upholder of the Buddhist religion, and the Defender of all Faiths.
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Tokelau
Tokelau ( /ˈtoʊkəlaʊ/) is a territory of New Zealand in the South Pacific Ocean that consists of three tropical coral atolls with a combined land area of 10 km2 and a population of approximately 1,400. The atolls lie north of the Samoan Islands, east of Tuvalu, south of the Phoenix Islands, southwest of the more distant Line Islands (both island groups belonging to Kiribati) and northwest of the Cook Islands.
The United Nations General Assembly designated Tokelau a Non-Self-Governing Territory. Until 1976 the official name was Tokelau Islands. Tokelau is sometimes referred to by the older, colonial name of The Union Islands.
The name Tokelau is a Polynesian word meaning "North Wind". The islands were named the Union Islands and Union Group by European explorers at an unknown time. Tokelau Islands was adopted as the name in 1946, and was contracted to Tokelau on 9 December 1976.
The change from Tokelau Islands to Tokelau marked a slight shift in emphasis, with consequences in regional diplomacy, in that the term Tokelau Islands clearly and substantially referred to a geographical expression, that is, a range of islands, whatever else it may connote. It is not necessarily controversial to refer by name to a range of islands, even though they may come under two or more political jurisdictions. Tokelau, on the other hand, can be taken to refer more immediately to some concept of nationhood, arguably infusing increased meaning to the draft 2006 independence constitution of Tokelau (which somewhat controversially claims Tokelauan inhabited Olohega (or Swains Island), currently part of American Samoa, as part of its national territory).[citation needed]
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Tonga
Tonga, officially the Kingdom of Tonga (Tongan: Puleʻanga Fakatuʻi ʻo Tonga), is a sovereign state and an archipelago in the South Pacific Ocean, comprising 176 islands scattered over 700,000 square kilometres (270,000 sq mi) of ocean in the South Pacific. Fifty-two of the islands are inhabited.
The Kingdom stretches over a distance of about 800 kilometres (500 mi) in a north-south line located at about a third of the distance from New Zealand to Hawaii.
Tonga also became known as the Friendly Islands because of the friendly reception accorded to Captain James Cook on his first visit there in 1773. He happened to arrive at the time of the ʻinasi festival, the yearly donation of the first fruits to the Tuʻi Tonga, the islands' paramount chief, and received an invitation to the festivities. According to the writer William Mariner, in reality the chiefs had wanted to kill Cook during the gathering, but could not agree on a plan.
Tonga is also the only island nation in the region to have avoided formal colonisation. In 2010, Tonga took a decisive step towards becoming a fully functioning constitutional monarchy after legislative reforms paved the way for its first ever fully representative elections which resulted in the election of Noble Sialeʻataongo Tuʻivakanō as its first democratically elected Prime Minister.
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Tropic of Cancer
Coordinates: 23°26′16″N 0°0′0″W / 23.43778°N 0°E / 23.43778; 0 (Prime Meridian)
The Tropic of Cancer, also referred to as the Northern tropic, is the circle of latitude on the Earth that marks the most northerly position at which the Sun may appear directly overhead at its zenith. This event occurs once per year, at the time of the June solstice, when the Northern Hemisphere is tilted toward the Sun to its maximum extent.
Its Southern Hemisphere counterpart, marking the most southerly position at which the Sun may appear directly overhead, is the Tropic of Capricorn. These tropics are two of the five major degree measures or major circles of latitude that mark maps of the Earth, besides the Arctic and Antarctic Circles and the Equator. The positions of these circles of latitude (other than the Equator) are dictated by the tilt of the Earth's axis of rotation relative to the plane of its orbit.
The imaginary line is called the Tropic of Cancer because when the Sun reaches the zenith at this latitude, it is entering the tropical sign of Cancer (summer solstice). When it was named, the Sun was also in the direction of the constellation Cancer (Latin for crab). However, this is no longer true due to the precession of the equinoxes. According to International Astronomical Union boundaries, the Sun now is in Taurus at the June solstice. According to sidereal astrology, which divides the zodiac into 12 equal parts, the Sun is in Gemini at that time. However, according to tropical astrology, which divides the ecliptic in twelve 30º sectors, starting with the vernal equinox, the Sun is always entering Cancer at this time, as the Earth's axial tilt is most inclined towards the Sun. The word "tropic" itself comes from the Greek τροπή (tropi), meaning turn, referring to the fact that the Sun appears to "turn back" at the solstices.
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Turkey
Turkey (Turkish: Türkiye), known officially as the Republic of Turkey ( Türkiye Cumhuriyeti (help·info)), is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia (mostly in the Anatolian peninsula) and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe. Turkey is bordered by eight countries: Bulgaria to the northwest; Greece to the west; Georgia to the northeast; Armenia, Azerbaijan (the exclave of Nakhchivan) and Iran to the east; and Iraq and Syria to the southeast. The Mediterranean Sea and Cyprus are to the south; the Aegean Sea is to the west; and the Black Sea is to the north. The Sea of Marmara, the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles (which together form the Turkish Straits) demarcate the boundary between East Thrace and Anatolia; they also separate Europe and Asia.
Turkey is one of the six independent Turkic states. The vast majority of the population are Muslims. The country's official language is Turkish, whereas Kurdish and Zazaki languages are spoken by Kurds and Zazas, who constitute 18% of the population.
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Turkmenistan
Turkmenistan (i/tɜrkˈmɛnɨstæn/ or i/tɜrkmɛnɨˈstɑːn/; Turkmen: Türkmenistan), formerly also known as Turkmenia (Russian: Туркмения), is one of the Turkic states in Central Asia. Until 1991, it was a constituent republic of the Soviet Union, the Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republic (Turkmen SSR). Turkmenistan is one of the six independent Turkic states. It is bordered by Afghanistan to the southeast, Iran to the south and southwest, Uzbekistan to the east and northeast, Kazakhstan to the north and northwest and the Caspian Sea to the west.
Turkmenistan's GDP growth rate of 11% in 2010[update] ranks 4th in the world, but these figures are subject to wide margins of error. It possesses the world's fourth largest reserves of natural gas resources. Although it is wealthy in natural resources in certain areas, most of the country is covered by the Karakum (Black Sand) Desert.
The Turkmen government operates as a single-party system. Turkmenistan was ruled by President for Life Saparmurat Niyazov (called "Türkmenbaşy" — "leader of the Turkmens") until his sudden death on 21 December 2006. Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov was elected the new president on 11 February 2007.
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Tuvalu
Tuvalu (i/tuːˈvɑːluː/ too-VAH-loo or /ˈtuːvəluː/ TOO-və-loo), formerly known as the Ellice Islands, is a Polynesian island nation located in the Pacific Ocean, midway between Hawaii and Australia. It comprises four reef islands and five true atolls spread out from 6° to 10° south. Its nearest neighbours are Kiribati, Nauru, Samoa and Fiji. Its population of 10,544 makes it the third-least populous sovereign state in the world, with only Vatican City and Nauru having fewer inhabitants. In terms of physical land size, at just 26 square kilometres (10 sq mi) Tuvalu is the fourth smallest country in the world, larger only than the Vatican City at 0.44 km2 (0.17 sq mi), Monaco at 1.98 km2 (0.76 sq mi) and Nauru at 21 km2 (8.1 sq mi).
The first inhabitants of Tuvalu were Polynesian people. In 1568 Spanish navigator Álvaro de Mendaña sailed through the islands and is understood to have sighted Nui during his expedition in search of Terra Australis. In 1819 the island of Funafuti was named Ellice's Island; the name Ellice was applied to all nine islands after the work of English hydrographer Alexander George Findlay (1812–1876). The islands came under Britain's sphere of influence in the late 19th century, when the Ellice Islands were declared a British protectorate by Captain Gibson, R. N. of HMS Curaçao between 9th and 16 October 1892. The Ellice Islands were administered as British protectorate by a Resident Commissioner from 1892 to 1916 as part of the British Western Pacific Territories (BWPT), and later as part of the Gilbert and Ellice Islands colony from 1916 to 1974.
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United Arab Emirates
The United Arab Emiratesi/juːˌnaɪtɨd ˌærəb ˈɛmɪrɨts/ (Arabic: دولة الإمارات العربية المتحدة, Al Imārāt al ‘Arabīyah al Muttaḥidah), sometimes simply called the Emirates or the UAE, is a country situated in the southeast of the Arabian Peninsula in Western Asia on the Persian Gulf, bordering Oman to the east and Saudi Arabia to the south, as well as sharing sea borders with Qatar to the west and Iran to the north.
The UAE is a federation of seven emirates (equivalent to principalities), each governed by a hereditary emir, with a single national president. The constituent emirates are Abu Dhabi, Ajman, Dubai, Fujairah, Ras al-Khaimah, Sharjah, and Umm al-Quwain. The capital is Abu Dhabi, which is also the state's center of political, industrial, and cultural activities.
Prior to independence in 1971, the UAE was known as the Trucial States or Trucial Oman, in reference to a 19th-century truce between the local sheikhs, hereditary rulers of the territories, and the United Kingdom. The term Pirate Coast was also used by some to refer to the emirates from the 18th to the early 20th century, owing to the preponderance of pirates operating from Emirati ports.
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United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland (commonly known as the United Kingdom, the UK, or Britain) is a sovereign state located off the north-western coast of continental Europe. The country includes the island of Great Britain, the north-eastern part of the island of Ireland and many smaller islands. Northern Ireland is the only part of the UK that shares a land border with another sovereign state—the Republic of Ireland. Apart from this land border the UK is surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, the North Sea, the English Channel and the Irish Sea.
The United Kingdom is a unitary state governed under a constitutional monarchy and a parliamentary system, with its seat of government in the capital city of London. It is a country in its own right and consists of four countries: England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. There are three devolved administrations, each with varying powers, based in Belfast, Edinburgh and Cardiff, the capitals of Northern Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. Associated with the UK, but not constitutionally part of it, are three Crown Dependencies. The United Kingdom has fourteen overseas territories. These are remnants of the British Empire which, at its height in 1922, encompassed almost a quarter of the world's land surface and was the largest empire in history. British influence can still be observed in the language, culture and legal systems of many of its former territories.
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United States
The United States of America (commonly abbreviated to the United States, the U.S., the USA, America, and the States) is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district. The country is situated mostly in central North America, where its forty-eight contiguous states and Washington, D.C., the capital district, lie between the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans, bordered by Canada to the north and Mexico to the south. The state of Alaska is in the northwest of the continent, with Canada to the east and Russia to the west, across the Bering Strait. The state of Hawaii is an archipelago in the mid-Pacific. The country also possesses several territories in the Pacific and Caribbean.
At 3.79 million square miles (9.83 million km2) and with over 312 million people, the United States is the third or fourth largest country by total area, and the third largest by both land area and population. It is one of the world's most ethnically diverse and multicultural nations, the product of large-scale immigration from many countries. The U.S. economy is the world's largest national economy, with an estimated 2011 GDP of $15.1 trillion (22% of nominal global GDP and over 19% of global GDP at purchasing-power parity). Per capita income is the world's sixth-highest.
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Uzbekistan
Uzbekistani/ʊzˌbɛkɨˈstɑːn/, officially the Republic of Uzbekistan (Uzbek: O‘zbekiston Respublikasi, Ўзбекистон Республикаси) is the only doubly landlocked country in Central Asia and one of only two such countries worldwide. It shares borders with Kazakhstan to the west and to the north, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan to the east, and Afghanistan and Turkmenistan to the south. Before 1991, it was part of the Soviet Union.
Uzbekistan is one of the Turkic states in Central Asia.
Once part of the Persian Samanid and later Timurid empires, the region was conquered in the early 16th century by Uzbek nomads, who spoke an Eastern Turkic language. Most of Uzbekistan’s population today belong to the Uzbek ethnic group and speak the Uzbek language, one of the family of Turkic languages.
Uzbekistan was incorporated into the Russian Empire in the 19th century, and in 1924 became a constituent republic of the Soviet Union, known as the Uzbek Soviet Socialist Republic (Uzbek SSR). It became independent on 31 August 1991 (officially, from the following day).
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Vanuatu
Vanuatu (Englishi/ˌvɑːnuːˈɑːtuː/ vah-noo-AH-too or /vænˈwɑːtuː/ van-WAH-too; Bislama IPA: [vanuaˈtu]), officially the Republic of Vanuatu (French: République de Vanuatu, Bislama: Ripablik blong Vanuatu), is an island nation located in the South Pacific Ocean. The archipelago, which is of volcanic origin, is some 1,750 kilometres (1,090 mi) east of northern Australia, 500 kilometres (310 mi) northeast of New Caledonia, west of Fiji, and southeast of the Solomon Islands, near New Guinea.
Vanuatu was first inhabited by Melanesian people. The first Europeans to visit the islands were the members of a Spanish expedition led by Portuguese navigator Fernandes de Queirós who arrived in Espiritu Santo in 1605. In the 1880s France and the United Kingdom claimed parts of the country, and in 1906 they agreed on a framework for jointly managing the archipelago as the New Hebrides through a British–French Condominium. An independence movement arose in the 1970s, and the Republic of Vanuatu was created in 1980.
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Vietnam
Vietnam ( listen), formally the Socialist Republic of Vietnam (Cộng hòa xã hội chủ nghĩa Việt Nam; listen), is the easternmost country on the Indochina Peninsula in Southeast Asia. With an estimated 91.5 million inhabitants as of 2012, it is the world's 13th-most-populous country, and the eighth-most-populous Asian country. The name Vietnam translates as "South Viet", and was officially adopted in 1945. The country is bordered by China to the north, Laos to the northwest, Cambodia to the southwest, and the South China Sea to the east.
The Vietnamese became independent from Imperial China in 938 AD, following the Battle of Bạch Đằng River. Successive Vietnamese royal dynasties flourished as the nation expanded geographically and politically into Southeast Asia, until the Indochina Peninsula was colonized by the French in the mid-19th century. The First Indochina War eventually led to the expulsion of the French in 1954, leaving Vietnam divided politically into two states, North and South Vietnam. Conflict between the two sides intensified, with heavy foreign intervention, during the Vietnam War, which ended with a North Vietnamese victory in 1975.
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Wallis and Futuna
Wallis and Futuna, officially the Territory of the Wallis and Futuna Islands (French: Wallis et Futuna or Territoire des îles Wallis et Futuna, Fakauvea and Fakafutuna: Uvea mo Futuna), is a Polynesian French island territory in the South Pacific between Tuvalu to the northwest, Rotuma of Fiji to the west, the main part of Fiji to the southwest, Tonga to the southeast, Samoa to the east, the New Zealand-associated state of Tokelau to the northeast and to a more distant north the Phoenix Islands (Kiribati). (However, Wallis and Futuna is not part of, nor even contiguous with, French Polynesia. Wallis and Futuna is located at the very opposite western end of Polynesia.)
Its land area is 264 km2 with a population of about 15,000. Mata-Utu is the capital and biggest city. The territory is made up of three main volcanic tropical islands along with a number of tiny islets, and is split into two island groups that lie about 260 km apart, namely Wallis Islands (Uvea) in the northeast, and Hoorn Islands (also called the Futuna Islands) in the southwest, including Futuna Island proper and the mostly uninhabited Alofi Island.
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Wuchiu
Wuqiu, Chinese: 烏坵; pinyin: Wūqiū) is a group of islands comprising two major islands, namely Greater Qiu Islet and Smaller Qiu Islet, in the Taiwan Strait. Administratively, the Wuqiu Township is part of Kinmen County of the Fujian Province of the Republic of China (Taiwan). Its name means "black mound".
It was part of the Putian County before the Kuomintang fled to Taiwan following the Chinese Civil War between Kuomintang and the Chinese Communist Party. In June 1954, it was provisionally reassigned to Kinmen County. Although part of the Kinmen County, there is no ferry service to the rest of the Kinmen County. Ferry connection is only available to the Port of Taichung on Taiwan.
Wuqiu consists of Greater Qiu Islet (大坵嶼 Dàqiū yǔ) and Smaller Qiu Islet (小坵嶼 Xiǎoqiū yǔ), not to be confused with two islets (大坵島 Dàqiū dǎo and 小坵島 Xiǎoqiū dǎo) lying off the north coast off Beigan in the Matsu Islands.
Greater Qiu Islet lies 9 nautical miles (17 km) from Lusi Island (鷺鷥島), 12 nmi (22 km) from Nanri Island (南日島), and 18 nmi (33 km) from Meizhou Island, both in China's Xiuyu District of Putian, Fujian. It is further from Republic of China territory; 72 nmi (133 km) from Kinmen, 86 nmi (159 km) from Nangan in the Matsu Islands, and 73 nmi (135 km) from Port of Taichung on Taiwan.
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Yemen
The Republic of Yemen (Arabic: الجمهورية اليمنية al-Jumhūrīyah al-Yamanīyah), commonly known as Yemeni/ˈjɛmən/ (Arabic: اليَمَن al-Yaman), is a country located in Western Asia, occupying the southwestern to southern end of the Arabian Peninsula. It is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the north, the Red Sea to the west, and Oman to the east. Yemen is considered one of the poorest countries in the Arab world. Its capital and largest city is Sana'a. Yemen's territory includes over 200 islands, the largest of which is Socotra, about 415 km (258 mi) to the south of mainland Yemen, off the coast of Somalia. It is the only state in the Arabian Peninsula to have a purely republican form of government. Approximately 53% of Yemenis are Sunnis, while 45% are Zaydi Shias.
One etymology derives Yemen from yamin, meaning "on the right side", as the south is on the right when facing the sunrise. Another derives Yemen from yumn, meaning "felicity", as the region is fertile. The Romans called it Arabia Felix (Happy Arabia) as opposed to Arabia Deserta (Deserted Arabia), which was their term for northern Arabia.
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Yunlin
Yunlin County is a county in the western part of Taiwan, the Republic of China. Yunlin is located to the right of the Taiwan Strait, the east of Nantou County and sharing a border with Changhua County divided by the Zhuoshui River. Yunlin is one of the counties of Taiwan that is part of the Chianan Plain, a flat land rich for agriculture with abundant waters. Agricultural products of Yunlin county include pomelo, tea leaves, suan cai, papaya and muskmelon. Due to Yunlin's abundant waters, it has potentials for hydroelectricity. Douliu is the largest city and the capital city of Yunlin.
Taiwan Railway Administration passes through Yunlin with stations:
Taiwan High Speed Rail is building a station in Yunlin to be completed at 2015.
Highways include:
Coordinates: 23°42′18″N 120°28′34″E / 23.70489°N 120.47607°E / 23.70489; 120.47607
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Yunlin County
Yunlin County is a county in the western part of Taiwan, the Republic of China. Yunlin is located to the right of the Taiwan Strait, the east of Nantou County and sharing a border with Changhua County divided by the Zhuoshui River. Yunlin is one of the counties of Taiwan that is part of the Chianan Plain, a flat land rich for agriculture with abundant waters. Agricultural products of Yunlin county include pomelo, tea leaves, suan cai, papaya and muskmelon. Due to Yunlin's abundant waters, it has potentials for hydroelectricity. Douliu is the largest city and the capital city of Yunlin.
Taiwan Railway Administration passes through Yunlin with stations:
Taiwan High Speed Rail is building a station in Yunlin to be completed at 2015.
Highways include:
Coordinates: 23°42′18″N 120°28′34″E / 23.70489°N 120.47607°E / 23.70489; 120.47607
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Ang Lee
Ang Lee (Chinese: 李安; Pinyin: Lǐ Ān; born October 23, 1954) is a Taiwanese-American film director. Lee has directed a diverse set of films such as Eat Drink Man Woman (1994), Sense and Sensibility (1995), Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000, which won the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film), Hulk (2003), and Brokeback Mountain (2005), for which he won an Academy Award for Best Director. He is the first person of Asian descent to win the Best Director Oscar.
Ang Lee was born in the town of Chaochou in Pingtung, a southern agricultural county in Taiwan. He grew up in a household that put heavy emphasis on education and the Chinese classics. Both of Lee's parents moved to Taiwan from China following the Chinese Nationalists' defeat in the Chinese Civil War in 1949. Lee's father, a native of Jiangxi Province in southern China, imbued his children with studying Chinese culture and art, especially calligraphy.
Lee studied in the National Tainan First Senior High School where his father was the principal. He was expected to pass the annual Joint College/University Entrance Examination, the only route to a university education in Taiwan. But after failing the Exam twice, to the disappointment of his father, he entered a three-year college, National Arts School (now reorganized and expanded as National Taiwan University of Arts) and graduated in 1975. His father had wanted him to become a professor, but he had become interested in drama and the arts at college. This early frustration set his career on the path of performance art. Seeing Ingmar Bergman's film The Virgin Spring (1960) was a formative experience for him.
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Apo Hsu
Apo Hsu (Apo Ching-Hsin Hsu) (Chinese: 許瀞心) is a conductor born in Taiwan and resident of both Taiwan and the United States. Hsu served as music director of the National Taiwan Normal University Symphony Orchestra and the Springfield Symphony Orchestra in Springfield, Missouri. Her past appointments include serving as artistic director of The Women's Philharmonic in San Francisco, California, and conductor of the Oregon Mozart Players in Eugene, Oregon. She has been a mentor for many young conductors on both sides of the world through her work at NTNU and at The Conductor’s Institute at Bard College in New York. Her performances have been featured in national broadcasts in the United States (on National Public Radio), Taiwan (on International Community Radio Taipei), and Korea (on Korean Broadcasting System).
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Buddhism
Buddhism is a religion and philosophy indigenous to the Indian subcontinent and encompasses a variety of traditions, beliefs, and practices largely based on teachings attributed to Siddhartha Gautama, who is commonly known as the Buddha (meaning "the awakened one" in Sanskrit and Pāli). The Buddha lived and taught in the eastern part of Indian subcontinent some time between the 6th and 4th centuries BCE. He is recognized by Buddhists as an awakened or enlightened teacher who shared his insights to help sentient beings end ignorance (avidyā), craving (taṇhā), and suffering (dukkha), by recognizing dependent origination and sunyata, and attain Nirvana.
Two major branches of Buddhism are recognized: Theravada ("The School of the Elders") and Mahayana ("The Great Vehicle"). Theravada has a widespread following in Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia. Mahayana is found throughout East Asia and includes the traditions of Pure Land, Zen, Nichiren Buddhism, Tibetan Buddhism, Shingon, Tiantai (Tendai) and Shinnyo-en. In some classifications, Vajrayana—practiced mainly in Tibet and Mongolia, and adjacent parts of China and Russia—is recognized as a third branch, while others classify it as a part of Mahayana. There are other categorisations of these three Vehicles or Yanas.
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Bunun people
The Bunun (Chinese: 布農; pinyin: Bùnóng; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Pò͘-lông), also historically known as the Vonum, are a tribe of Taiwanese aborigines and are best known for their sophisticated polyphonic vocal music. They speak the Bunun language. Unlike other aboriginal tribes in Taiwan, the Bunun are widely dispersed across the island. In the year 2000 the Bunun numbered 41,038. This was approximately 10% of Taiwan's total indigenous population, making them the fourth-largest tribal group. They have five distinct sub-tribes: the Takbunuaz, the Takituduh, the Takibaka, the Takivatan, and the Isbukun.
Until the coming of the Christian missionaries in the beginning of the 20th century, the Bunun were known to be fierce warriors and headhunters. The Bunun were one of the "high-mountain tribes" (along with the Atayal and the Taroko) who traditionally lived in small family units in Taiwan's Central Mountain Range and were hostile to all outsiders, whether they be Chinese immigrants or surrounding aboriginal tribes. Whereas most other aborigines were quite sedentary and tended to live in lower areas, the Bunun, along with the Atayal and Taroko were constantly on the move in Taiwan's Central Mountain Range, looking for new hunting grounds and practicing slash-and-burn agriculture. Their staple foods were millet, yam, and game.
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Chen Shui-bian
Chen Shui-bian (traditional Chinese: 陳水扁; simplified Chinese: 陈水扁; pinyin: Chén Shuǐbiǎn; Taiwanese: Tân Chúi-píⁿ; born October 12, 1950) is a former Taiwanese politician who was president from 2000 to 2008. Chen's election ended more than fifty years of Kuomintang (KMT) control of the Executive Yuan in Taiwan. A native-born Taiwanese, he is colloquially referred to as A-Bian (阿扁; Ābiǎn; Taiwanese: 阿扁仔 A-píⁿ-à).
A lawyer, Chen entered politics in 1980 during the Kaohsiung Incident as a member of the Tangwai movement and was elected to the Taipei City Council in 1981. He was jailed in 1985 for libel as the editor of the weekly pro-democracy magazine Neo-Formosa, following publication of an article critical of Elmer Feng, a college philosophy professor who was later elected a Kuomintang legislator. After being released, Chen helped found the DPP in 1986 and was elected a member of the Legislative Yuan in 1989, and Mayor of Taipei in 1994.
Chen won the 2000 presidential election on March 18 with 39% of the vote as a result of a split of factions within the Kuomintang, when James Soong ran for the presidency as an independent against the party nominee Lien Chan, becoming the only non-member of the Kuomintang to hold the office of president. Although Chen received high approval ratings during the first few weeks of his term, his popularity sharply dropped due to alleged corruption within his administration and the inability to pass legislation against the opposition KMT, who controlled the Legislative Yuan. In 2004, he won reelection by a narrow margin after surviving a shooting while campaigning the day before the election. Opponents suspected him of staging the incident for political purposes. However, the case was officially closed in 2005 with all evidence pointing to a single deceased suspect, Chen Yi-hsiung.
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Chen Yi (Kuomintang)
Chen Yi (traditional Chinese: 陳儀; simplified Chinese: 陈仪; pinyin: Chén Yí; courtesy names Gongxia (公俠) and later Gongqia (公洽), sobriquet Tuisu (退素); 1883 – June 18, 1950) was the Chief Executive and Garrison Commander (警備總司令) of Taiwan after it was surrendered by Japan to the Republic of China, which acted on behalf of the Allied Powers, in 1945. His infamous mishandling of the tension between Taiwanese locals and Mainlanders precipitated the February 28 Incident, and he was later dismissed and executed for disloyalty (though for reasons unrelated to his tenure in Taiwan).
Chen was born in Shaoxing, Zhejiang. After studying at Qiushi Academy (now Zhejiang University), in 1902 he went to a military academy in Japan for seven years [1]. He joined Guangfuhui while in Japan. He returned to Japan in 1917 to study in a military university for three years, then resided in Shanghai. He is said to have been a "Japanophile."
He was the first senator (總參議) and governor of Zhejiang (since October 1925). Chen was also the commander of the 19th Route Army of the National Revolutionary Army (國民革命軍第十九路軍軍長). After 1927, he worked in the Military Affairs Department (軍政部), then as the chairman of Fujian in 1933, and Secretary-General of the Executive Yuan.
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Chiang Ching-kuo
Chiang Ching-kuo (traditional Chinese: 蔣經國; simplified Chinese: 蒋经国; pinyin: Jiǎng Jīngguó; Wade–Giles: Chiang Ching-kuo; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Chiúⁿ Keng-kok; Shanghai/Ningbo dialect: [tɕiã.tɕiŋ.koʔ]) (April 27,1 1910 – January 13, 1988), Kuomintang (KMT) politician and leader, was the son of President Chiang Kai-shek and held numerous posts in the government of the Republic of China (ROC). He succeeded his father to serve as Premier of the Republic of China between 1972 and 1978, and was the President of the Republic of China from 1978 until his death in 1988. Under his tenure, the government of the Republic of China, while authoritarian, became more open and tolerant of political dissent. Towards the end of his life, Chiang relaxed government controls on the media and speech and allowed native Taiwanese into positions of power, including his successor Lee Teng-hui.
The son of President Chiang Kai-shek and his first wife Mao Fumei, Chiang Ching-kuo was born in Fenghua, Zhejiang, with the courtesy name of Jiànfēng (建豐). He had an adopted brother, Chiang Wei-kuo. "Ching" literally means "longitude" while "kuo" means "nation"; in his brother's name, "wei" literally means "parallel (of latitude)". The names are inspired by the references in Chinese classics such as the Guoyu, in which "to draw the longitudes and latitudes of the world" is used as a metaphor for a person with great abilities, especially in managing a country.
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Chiang Kai-shek
Chiang Kai-shek (October 31, 1887 – April 5, 1975) was a political and military leader of 20th-century China. He is known as Jiǎng Jièshí (蔣介石) or Jiǎng Zhōngzhèng (蔣中正) in Mandarin.
Chiang was an influential member of the Nationalist Party, the Kuomintang (KMT), and was a close ally of Sun Yat-sen. He became the Commandant of the Kuomintang's Whampoa Military Academy, and took Sun's place as leader of the KMT when Sun died in 1925. In 1926, Chiang led the Northern Expedition to unify the country, becoming China's nominal leader. He served as Chairman of the National Military Council of the Nationalist government of the Republic of China (ROC) from 1928 to 1948. Chiang led China in the Second Sino-Japanese War, during which the Nationalist government's power severely weakened, but his prominence grew. Unlike Sun Yat-sen, Chiang Kai-shek was socially conservative, promoting traditional Chinese culture in the New Life Movement and rejecting western democracy and the nationalist democratic socialism that Sun Yat-sen and some other members of the KMT embraced in favor of a nationalist authoritarian government.
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Chiefdom
A chiefdom is a political economy that organizes regional populations through a hierarchy of the chief(s).
In anthropological theory, one model of human social development rooted in ideas of cultural evolution describes a chiefdom as a form of social organization more complex than a tribe or a band society, and less complex than a state or a civilization. The most succinct definition of a chiefdom in anthropology is by Robert L. Carneiro: "An autonomous political unit comprising a number of villages or communities under the permanent control of a paramount chief" (Carneiro 1981: 45).
Chiefdoms are characterized by centralization of authority and pervasive inequality. At least two inherited social classes (elite and commoner) are present. (The ancient Hawaiian chiefdoms had as many as four social classes.) An individual might change social class during a lifetime by extraordinary behavior. A single lineage/family of the elite class becomes the ruling elite of the chiefdom, with the greatest influence, power, and prestige. Kinship is typically an organizing principle, while marriage, age, and gender can affect one's social status and role.
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Chin-hui Tsao
Chin-Hui Tsao (simplified Chinese: 曹锦辉; traditional Chinese: 曹錦輝; pinyin: Cáo Jǐnhūi; born June 2, 1981 in Hualien County, Taiwan) is a former Major League Baseball and CPBL pitcher. He is the second major league player and the first major league pitcher of Republic of China (commonly known as Taiwan) nationality, and like the first, former Los Angeles Dodgers outfielder Chin-Feng Chen, he is a Taiwanese aborigine (Amis). After the 2009 Taiwan Series he was found involved in game-fixing scandals and was expelled by CPBL on February 10, 2010.
Tsao pitched for his country in five major international competitions, including the Junior World Championships (1996–1997, 1999), the 1999 Asian Baseball Championship, and the 2004 and 2008 Summer Olympics. In the two Olympics appearances, Tsao went 0–1 with a 1.93 ERA and one save. At the 1999 Asia Cup, he dominated: making three appearances (11 innings, 3 hits, 0 runs, 1 walk, 19 strikeouts), fanning 15 batters in his one start against China.
Tsao had one of the Asia's best pitching arms. In the 2004 Olympics at Athens, he was clocked at 162 km/h (101 mph) at the park and 159 km/h (99 mph) on the TV gun.
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Chin-lung Hu
Hu Chin-lung (Chinese: 胡金龍; pinyin: Hú Jīnlóng; born February 2, 1984) is a Taiwanese professional baseball player. He is currently with the Southern Maryland Blue Crabs of the Atlantic League of Professional Baseball. Hu, along with his countryman Fu-Te Ni (a pitcher for the Detroit Tigers), has the shortest surname in Major League Baseball history. He is the fifth player—and first infielder—in Major League Baseball from Taiwan.
Hu was signed by the Dodgers on January 31, 2003, and began his professional career with the rookie league Ogden Raptors in 2003. He split 2004 between the Columbus Catfish in A ball and the Vero Beach Dodgers in High-A ball. In 2005, he played the whole season at Vero Beach and hit .313 with 23 stolen bases.
In 2006, he played for the Double-A Jacksonville Suns. Hu played in the All-Star Futures Game during the All-Star break in both 2006 and 2007. He won the MVP award for his performance in the 2007 game.
He was promoted to Triple-A Las Vegas on July 12, 2007, and made his major league debut on September 1, 2007, against the San Diego Padres. In his second MLB at bat, Hu hit a solo home run on September 11, 2007, against the Padres, becoming the first position player born in Taiwan to hit a home run in MLB. (Hu's teammate, pitcher Hong-Chih Kuo, had become the first Taiwanese-born player to hit a home run in MLB earlier in 2007). On September 25, Hu hit a two-run homer and became the first Taiwanese-born player to hit two home runs. Hu spent most of 2009 in AAA with the Albuquerque Isotopes and appeared in only five games with the Dodgers after a September callup.
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China
China (i/ˈtʃaɪnə/; Chinese: 中国; pinyin: Zhōngguó; see also Names of China), officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is the world's most-populous country, with a population of over 1.3 billion. Covering approximately 9.6 million square kilometres, the East Asian state is the world's second-largest country by land area, and the third- or fourth-largest in total area, depending on the definition of total area.
The People's Republic of China is a single-party state governed by the Communist Party of China. It exercises jurisdiction over 22 provinces, five autonomous regions, four directly controlled municipalities (Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, and Chongqing), and two mostly self-governing special administrative regions (Hong Kong and Macau). Its capital city is Beijing. The PRC also claims Taiwan—which is controlled by the Republic of China (ROC), a separate political entity—as its 23rd province, a claim controversial due to the complex political status of Taiwan and the unresolved Chinese Civil War. The PRC government denies the legitimacy of the ROC.
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Chinese people
The term Chinese people may refer to any of the following:
Race (hereditary reasons), nationality, citizenship, place of residence (geographical factors), and ancestry (historical and genealogical factors) can be used to define someone as Chinese.
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Cultural Revolution
The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, commonly known as the Cultural Revolution (Chinese: 文化大革命; pinyin: Wénhuà Dàgémìng), was a social-political movement that took place in the People's Republic of China from 1966 through 1976. Set into motion by Mao Zedong, then Chairman of the Communist Party of China, its stated goal was to enforce socialism in the country by removing capitalist, traditional and cultural elements from Chinese society, and to impose Maoist orthodoxy within the Party. The revolution marked the return of Mao Zedong to a position of absolute power after the failed Great Leap Forward. The movement politically paralyzed the country and significantly affected the country economically and socially.
The Revolution was launched in May 1966. Mao alleged that bourgeois elements were infiltrating the government and society at large, aiming to restore capitalism. He insisted that these "revisionists" be removed through violent class struggle. China's youth responded to Mao's appeal by forming Red Guard groups around the country. The movement spread into the military, urban workers, and the Communist Party leadership itself. It resulted in widespread factional struggles in all walks of life. In the top leadership, it led to a mass purge of senior officials who were accused of taking a "capitalist road", most notably Liu Shaoqi and Deng Xiaoping. During the same period Mao's personality cult grew to immense proportions.
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Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower (pronounced /ˈaɪzənhaʊər/, EYE-zən-how-ər; October 14, 1890 – March 28, 1969) was the 34th President of the United States from 1953 until 1961. He had previously been a five-star general in the United States Army during World War II, and served as Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces in Europe; he had responsibility for planning and supervising the invasion of North Africa in Operation Torch in 1942–43 and the successful invasion of France and Germany in 1944–45, from the Western Front. In 1951, he became the first supreme commander of NATO.
Eisenhower was of Pennsylvania Dutch ancestry, and was reared in a large family in Kansas, by parents with a robust work ethic and religious background. As one of five sons, he was conditioned by a competitive atmosphere which instilled self-reliance. He attended and graduated from West Point, and later was married with two sons. After World War II Eisenhower served as Chief of Staff under President Harry S. Truman, then assumed the post of President at Columbia University.
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Edward Yang
Edward Yang (simplified Chinese: 杨德昌; traditional Chinese: 楊德昌; pinyin: Yáng Déchāng; November 6, 1947 – June 29, 2007), along with Hou Hsiao-Hsien and Tsai Ming Liang, was one of the leading filmmakers of the Taiwanese New Wave and Taiwanese Cinema. He won the Best Director Award at Cannes for his 2000 film Yi Yi ("A One and a Two").
Edward Yang was born in Shanghai in 1947, and grew up in Taipei, Taiwan. After studying Electrical Engineering in National Chiao Tung University, he enrolled in the graduate program at the University of Florida, where he received his Masters Degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering in 1974. During this time and briefly afterwards, Yang worked at the Center for Informatics Research.[citation needed] Yang always had a great interest in film ever since he was a child, but put away his aspirations in order to pursue a career in the high-tech industry.[citation needed] Also, a brief enrollment at USC Film School after graduating with his M.S.E.E. convinced him that the world of film was not for him - he thought USC film school's teaching methodologies were too commercial-oriented.[citation needed] Yang then applied and was accepted into Harvard's architecture school, the Harvard Graduate School of Design, but decided not to attend.[dead link] Thereafter, he went to Seattle to work in microcomputers and defense software.
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Fu-Te Ni
Fu-Te Ni (Chinese: 倪福德; pinyin: Ní Fúdé; Wade–Giles: Ni Fu-te; born November 14, 1982) is a Major League Baseball relief pitcher in the Detroit Tigers organization. Before joining the Tigers, Ni was a professional baseball player from Taiwan's Chinese Professional Baseball League (CPBL). After his franchise, the Chinatrust Whales, disbanded on November 11, 2008, Ni signed a minor league contract with the Toledo Mud Hens, the Triple-A affiliate of the Tigers, in 2009.
Ni was called up in June 2009, becoming the sixth Taiwanese player to enter Major League Baseball. He is also the first player to transition from the CPBL to MLB. Ni made his major league debut on June 29, 2009 in relief of Rick Porcello against the Oakland Athletics. The first major league batter he faced was slugger Jason Giambi, and Ni struck him out.
CPBL fans used to call Ni Tu Di Gong, or Fu Teh Cheng Shen, because his given name is the same as the formal name for the Chinese God of the Land. Some called him Need Food because the pronunciation is similar to his name in Mandarin.
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Fujian
Coordinates: 25°54′N 118°18′E / 25.9°N 118.3°E / 25.9; 118.3
Fujian (help·info) (Chinese: 福建), formerly romanised as Fukien or Foukien, is a province on the southeast coast of mainland China. Fujian is bordered by Zhejiang to the north, Jiangxi to the west, and Guangdong to the south. Taiwan lies to the east, across the Taiwan Strait. The name Fujian came from the combination of Fuzhou and Jianzhou (a former name for Jian'ou) two cities in Fujian, during the Tang Dynasty. With a Han majority, it is one of the most culturally and linguistically diverse provinces in China.
Most of Fujian is administered by the People's Republic of China. However, the archipelagos of Kinmen and Matsu are under the control of the Republic of China (Taiwan). Thus, there are two provinces (in the sense of government organizations): the Fujian Province administered by the People's Republic of China and the Fujian Province of the Republic of China.
Recent archaeological discoveries demonstrate that Fujian had entered the Neolithic Age by the middle of the 6th millennium BC. From the Keqiutou site (7450–5590 BP), an early Neolithic site in Pingtan Island located about 70 kilometres (43 mi) southeast of Fuzhou, numerous tools made of stones, shells, bones, jades, and ceramics (including wheel-made-ceramics) have been unearthed, together with spinning wheels, a definitive evidence of weaving.
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Guangdong
Coordinates: 23°24′N 113°30′E / 23.4°N 113.5°E / 23.4; 113.5
Guangdong is a province on the South China Sea coast of the People's Republic of China. The province was previously often written with the alternative English name Kwangtung Province. It surpassed Henan and Sichuan to become the most populous province in China in January 2005, registering 79 million permanent residents and 31 million migrants who lived in the province for at least six months of the year. The provincial capital Guangzhou and economic hub Shenzhen are amongst the most populous and important cities in China.
Since 1989 Guangdong has topped the total GDP rankings among all provincial-level divisions, with Jiangsu and Shandong second and third in rank. According to provincial annual preliminary statistics, Guangdong's GDP in 2010 reached CNY 4,550 billion, or USD 689.02 billion, making its economy roughly the same size as that of Turkey or Indonesia. Guangdong has the fourth highest GDP per capita among all provinces of mainland China, after Jiangsu, Zhejiang and Liaoning. The province contributes approximately 12% of the PRC's national economic output, and is home to the production facilities and offices of a wide-ranging set of multinational and Chinese corporations. Guangdong also hosts the largest Import and Export Fair in China called the Canton Fair in Guangdong's capital city Guangzhou.
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Hakka people
The Hakka (Hakka: Hak-kâ; Chinese: 客家; pinyin: Kèjiā), sometimes Hakka Han, are Han Chinese who speak the Hakka language and have links to the provincial areas of Guangdong, Jiangxi, Guangxi, Sichuan, Hunan and Fujian in China.
The Chinese characters for Hakka (客家) literally means "guest families". The Hakka's ancestors were often said to have arrived from what is today's central China centuries ago. In a series of migrations, the Hakkas moved, settled in their present locations in southern China, and then often migrated overseas to various countries throughout the world. The worldwide population of Hakkas is about 80 million, though the number of Hakka-language speakers is fewer. Hakka people have had a significant influence on the course of Chinese and world history: in particular, they have been a source of many revolutionary, government, and military leaders.
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Harry S. Truman
Harry S. Truman (May 8, 1884 – December 26, 1972) was the 33rd President of the United States (1945–1953). As President Franklin D. Roosevelt's third vice president and the 34th Vice President of the United States (1945), he succeeded to the presidency on April 12, 1945, when President Roosevelt died less than three months after beginning his unprecedented fourth term.
During World War I, Truman served in combat in France as an artillery officer in his National Guard unit. After the war, he joined the Democratic Party political machine of Tom Pendergast in Kansas City, Missouri. He was elected a county official and in 1934 United States senator. After he had gained national prominence as head of the wartime Truman Committee, Truman replaced vice president Henry A. Wallace as Roosevelt's running mate in 1944.
Truman faced many challenges in domestic affairs. The disorderly postwar reconversion of the economy of the United States was marked by severe shortages, numerous strikes, and the passage of the Taft–Hartley Act over his veto. He confounded all predictions to win election in 1948, helped by his famous Whistle Stop Tour of rural America. After his election, he passed only one of the proposals in his liberal Fair Deal program. He used executive orders to end racial discrimination in the armed forces and created loyalty checks that dismissed thousands of communist supporters from office.
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Hong Kong
Coordinates: 22°16′42″N 114°09′32″E / 22.27833°N 114.15889°E / 22.27833; 114.15889
Hong Kong (Chinese: 香港) is one of two special administrative regions (SARs) of the People's Republic of China (PRC), the other being Macau. A city-state situated on China's south coast and enclosed by the Pearl River Delta and South China Sea, it is known for its expansive skyline and deep natural harbour. With a land mass of 1,104 km2 (426 sq mi) and a population of seven million people, Hong Kong is one of the most densely populated areas in the world. Hong Kong's population is 95 percent ethnic Chinese and 5 percent from other groups. Hong Kong's Han Chinese majority originate mainly from the cities of Guangzhou and Taishan in the neighbouring Guangdong province.
Hong Kong became a colony of the British Empire after the First Opium War (1839–42). Originally confined to Hong Kong Island, the colony's boundaries were extended in stages to the Kowloon Peninsula in 1860 and then the New Territories in 1898. It was occupied by Japan during the Pacific War, after which the British resumed control until 1997, when China resumed sovereignty. The region espoused minimum government intervention under the ethos of positive non-interventionism during the colonial era. The time period greatly influenced the current culture of Hong Kong, often described as "East meets West", and the educational system, which used to loosely follow the system in England until reforms implemented in 2009.
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Hong-Chih Kuo
Hong-Chih Kuo (Chinese: 郭泓志; pinyin: Guō Hóngzhì; Wade–Giles: Kuo1 Hung2 Chih4; born July 23, 1981 in Tainan, Taiwan) is a Major League Baseball pitcher who is a Free Agent. When Kuo made his debut in 2005, he became the fourth MLB player from Taiwan (after Chin-Feng Chen, Chin-hui Tsao, and Chien-Ming Wang).
Kuo pitched for Taiwan in the Asian Games and in the inaugural World Baseball Classic, allowing three earned runs in two games.
Kuo was signed as a free agent by the Dodgers on June 19, 1999 for a bonus of $1.25 million, but elbow problems prevented him from participating with the team. He underwent two Tommy John surgeries in 2000 and 2003, respectively. It wasn't until 2005 that Kuo was able to pitch again on a consistent basis. That year, he pitched 11 games for the Vero Beach Dodgers and 17 games for the Jacksonville Suns before coming out of the bullpen for his Major League debut on September 2, 2005 against the Colorado Rockies.
Kuo started the 2006 season as a relief pitcher. After giving up eight earned runs on 15 walks in only 13 innings pitched in April, he was sent down to the Dodger's AAA affiliate, the Las Vegas 51s. That May and June in AAA he posted a 3.75 ERA in Las Vegas in 12 innings, striking out 18, but walking eight. He was called up by the Dodgers in June. Over June and July 2006, Kuo had a miserable 5.74 ERA in 14.1 IP.
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Hou Hsiao-hsien
Hou Hsiao-Hsien (simplified Chinese: 侯孝贤; traditional Chinese: 侯孝賢; pinyin: Hóu Xiàoxián; Wade–Giles: Hou2 Hsiao4-hsien2) (born April 8, 1947) is an award-winning film director and a leading figure of Taiwan's New Wave cinema movement.
A Hakka, Hou Hsiao-Hsien was born in Mei County, Guangdong province in 1947. He and his family fled the Chinese Civil War to Taiwan the following year. Hou was educated at the National Taiwan Academy of the Arts.
Hou generally makes rigorously minimalist dramas dealing with the upheavals of the Taiwanese (and occasionally larger Chinese) history of the past century by viewing its impacts on individuals or small groups of characters. A City of Sadness (1989), for example, portrays a family caught in conflicts between the local Taiwanese and the newly arrived Chinese Nationalist government after World War II. It was groundbreaking for broaching this long-taboo subject and became a major success despite its seemingly uncommercial nature.
His storytelling is elliptical and his style marked by extreme long takes with minimal camera movement but intricate choreography of actors and space within the frame. He uses extensive improvisation to arrive at the final shape of his scenes and the low-key, naturalistic acting of his performers. His compositions are decentered, and links between shots do not adhere to an obvious temporal or causal narrative logic. Without abandoning his famous austerity, his imagery has developed a sensual beauty during the 1990s, partly under the influence of his collaboration with cinematographer Mark Lee Ping-Bin. Hou's consistent screenwriting collaborator since the mid-1980s has been the renowned author Chu Tien-Wen, a collaboration that began with the screenplay for Chen Kunhou's 1983 film, Growing Up. He has also cast revered puppeteer Li Tian-lu as an actor in several of his movies, most notably The Puppetmaster (1993), which is based on Li's life.
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Jared Diamond
Jared Mason Diamond (born September 10, 1937) is an American scientist and author best known for his popular science books The Third Chimpanzee, Guns, Germs, and Steel, and Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. Originally trained in physiology, Diamond's work is known for drawing from a variety of fields, and he is currently Professor of Geography at the University of California, Los Angeles.
Diamond was born in Boston, Massachusetts, to a Bessarabian Jewish family. His father Louis K. Diamond was a physician and his mother Flora Kaplan a teacher, musician, and linguist. He attended the Roxbury Latin School and earned an A.B. from Harvard College in 1958 and a Ph.D. in physiology and membrane biophysics from the University of Cambridge in 1961.
After graduating from Cambridge, Diamond returned to Harvard as a Junior Fellow until 1965, and, in 1968, became Professor of Physiology at UCLA Medical School. While in his twenties, he developed a second, parallel, career in ornithology and ecology, specialising in New Guinea and nearby islands. Then in his fifties, Diamond developed a third career in environmental history and became Professor of Geography at UCLA, his current position. He was awarded the National Medal of Science in 1999 and an honorary doctorate by Westfield State University in 2009.
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Kavalan people
The Kavalan (endonym "kbaran" [kɨβaˈɾan]; "people living in the plain") (Chinese: 噶瑪蘭族) or Kuvalan are an indigenous people of Taiwan, part of the larger Taiwanese aborigine ethnic group. The Kavalan originally inhabited modern-day Yilan County. Most of them moved to the coastal area of Hualien County and Taitung County in the 19th century. Their language is also known as Kavalan.
Legend has it that the Kavalan arrived by sea from the east and that when they saw the stunning beauty of this location, they decided then and there to settle this bountiful land. The newly arrived Kavalan fought many battles against the local Atayal people, and in the end the Kavalan tribe drove the Atayal tribe into the mountains — true to their name "Kavalan", which means "flatland people". That name subsequently morphed into "Hamalan", ultimately yielding the modern-day "Yilan City". They were referred as 36 Kavalan tribes (蛤仔難三十六社), although there were more than 60 tribes. In the past, tribes north of the Lanyang River were called Sishihfan (西勢番) while those south of the river were Dongshihfan (東勢番).
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Kwang-chih Chang
Kwang-chih Chang (張光直) (1931–2001), aka K.C. Chang, was a Chinese/Taiwanese archaeologist and sinologist. He was a professor of archaeology at Harvard University, a Vice-President of the Academia Sinica and a curator at the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology. He helped to bring modern, western methods of archaeology to the study of ancient Chinese history. He also introduced new discoveries in Chinese archaeology to western audiences by translating works from Chinese to English. He pioneered the study of Taiwanese archaeology, encouraged multi-disciplinal anthropological archaeological research, and urged archaeologists to conceive of East Asian prehistory (China, Korea, and Japan) as a pluralistic whole.
His paternal grandfather was a farmer in Taiwan. His father moved to Beijing in 1921 to pursue his education, where he met and married K.C. Chang's mother. His father later became a professor of Japanese literature and language at Peking University. Born in Beijing as the second son in a family of four children, his family returned to Taiwan in 1946.
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Lee Teng-hui
Lee Teng-hui (traditional Chinese: 李登輝; simplified Chinese: 李登辉; pinyin: Lǐ Dēnghuī; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Lí Teng-hui; born 15 January 1923) is a politician of the Republic of China (commonly known as Taiwan). He was the President of the Republic of China and Chairman of the Kuomintang (KMT) from 1988 to 2000. He presided over major advancements in democratic reforms including his own re-election which marked the first direct presidential election for the Republic of China. The first native Taiwanese to become ROC president and KMT chairman, Lee promoted the Taiwanese localization movement and led an aggressive foreign policy to gain diplomatic allies. Critics accused him of betraying the party he headed, secret support of Taiwanese independence, and involvement in corruption (black gold politics).
After leaving office Lee was expelled from the KMT for his role in founding the pro-independence Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU), which forms part of the Pan-Green Coalition alongside Taiwan's Democratic Progressive Party. (Lee is considered the "spiritual leader" of the TSU.) Lee has been outspoken in support for Taiwanese independence though not necessarily a formal declaration.
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Ma Ying-jeou
Ma Ying-jeou (traditional Chinese: 馬英九; simplified Chinese: 马英九; pinyin: Mǎ Yīngjiǔ; born July 13, 1950) is the 12th and 13th term President of the Republic of China (Taiwan), and the Chairman of the Kuomintang Party, also known as the Chinese Nationalist Party. Previous roles include Justice Minister (1993–96) and Mayor of Taipei (1998-06). He is also the current Chairman of the Kuomintang (KMT) having served in that role since 2005 stepping down for a period between 2007 and 2009. Ma first won the presidency by 58.45% of the popular vote in the presidential election of 2008, and was re-elected in 2012 with 51.6% of the vote. He was sworn into office as president on May 20, 2008, and sworn in as the Chairman of the Kuomintang on October 17, 2009.
Ma Ying-jeou was born in Kwong Wah Hospital in Kowloon, Hong Kong on 13 July 1950. He is of Hakka ancestry, originating from Hunan Province of China. In a family of five children, Ma was the only son.
Ma earned his LL.B. from National Taiwan University in 1972. He pursued further studies in the United States, first earning an LL.M. from New York University Law School in 1976 and then an S.J.D. from Harvard Law School in 1981.
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Macau
Coordinates: 22°10′N 113°33′E / 22.167°N 113.55°E / 22.167; 113.55
Macau (Chinese: 澳門), also spelled Macao ( /məˈkaʊ/), is one of the two special administrative regions of the People's Republic of China, the other being Hong Kong. Macau lies on the western side of the Pearl River Delta across from Hong-Kong which is to the east, bordering Guangdong province to the north and facing the South China Sea to the east and south.
The territory's economy is heavily dependent on gambling and tourism, but also includes manufacturing.
Macau is a former Portuguese colony, and is both the first and last European colony in China. Portuguese traders first settled in Macau in the 16th century and subsequently administered the region until the handover on 20 December 1999. The Sino-Portuguese Joint Declaration and the Basic Law of Macau stipulate that Macau operates with a high degree of autonomy until at least 2049, fifty years after the transfer. Macau was first lent by the Chinese empire as a trading port in the 16th century, and had to administer the city under Chinese authority and sovereignty. In 1887, Macau became a colony of the Portuguese empire and its sovereignty transferred to the Portuguese.
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Mainland China
Mainland China, the Chinese mainland or simply the mainland, is a geopolitical term that refers to the area under the jurisdiction of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The term generally excludes the PRC Special Administrative Regions of Hong Kong and Macau.
There are two terms in Chinese for "mainland". Namely, Dalu (simplified Chinese: 大陆; traditional Chinese: 大陸), which means "continent", and Neidi (内地 / 內地), literally "inner land". In the PRC, the usage of the two terms are generally interchangeable and there is no prescribed method of reference in any jurisdiction. To emphasize "equal footing" in cross-strait relations, the term is used in official contexts with reference to Taiwan, with the PRC referring to itself as "the mainland side" (as opposed to "the Taiwan side"). But in its relations with Hong Kong and Macau, the PRC government refers to itself as "the Central People's Government".
By 1949, the Communist Party of China's (CPC) People's Liberation Army had largely defeated the Kuomintang (KMT)'s National Revolutionary Army in the Chinese Civil War on the mainland. This forced the Kuomintang to relocate the Government and institutions of the Republic of China to the relative safety of Taiwan, an island which was placed under the control of the Republic of China after the surrender of Japan at the end of World War II in 1945. With the establishment of the People's Republic of China on October 1, 1949, the CPC-controlled government saw itself as the sole legitimate government of China, competing with the claims of the Republic of China, whose authority is now limited to Taiwan and other islands. This has resulted in a situation in which two co-existing governments compete for international legitimacy and recognition as the "government of China".
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Mao Zedong
Mao Zedong, also transliterated as Mao Tse-tung listen (help·info), and commonly referred to as Chairman Mao (December 26, 1893 – September 9, 1976), was a Chinese Communist revolutionary, guerrilla warfare strategist, Marxist political philosopher, and leader of the Chinese Revolution. He was the architect and founding father of the People's Republic of China (PRC) from its establishment in 1949, and held authoritarian control over the nation until his death in 1976. His theoretical contribution to Marxism–Leninism, along with his military strategies and brand of policies, are collectively known as Maoism.
Mao rose to power by commanding the Long March, forming a Second United Front with Kuomintang (KMT) during the Second Sino-Japanese War to repel a Japanese invasion, and leading the Communist Party of China (CPC) to victory against Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek's Kuomintang (KMT) in the Chinese Civil War. After solidifying the reunification of China through his Campaign to Suppress Counterrevolutionaries, Mao enacted sweeping land reform, by using violence and terror to overthrow the feudal landlords before seizing their large estates and dividing the land into people's communes. During the years when Mao was China’s 'Great Helmsman', a range of positive changes came to China. These included promoting the status of women, improving popular literacy, doubling the school population, providing universal housing, abolishing unemployment and inflation, increasing health care access, and dramatically raising life expectancy. In addition, China's population almost doubled during the period of Mao's leadership (from around 550 to over 900 million). As a result, Mao is still officially held in high regard by many in China as a great political strategist, military mastermind, and savior of the nation. Maoists further promote his role as a theorist, statesman, poet, and visionary, while anti-revisionists continue to defend most of his policies.
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Matsu Islands
The Matsu Islands (simplified Chinese: 马祖列岛; traditional Chinese: 馬祖列島; pinyin: Mǎzǔ Lièdǎo; Fuzhou dialect: Mā-cū liĕk-dō̤ or less frequently, simplified Chinese: 马祖群岛; traditional Chinese: 馬祖群島; pinyin: Mǎzǔ Qúndǎo; Fuzhou dialect: 馬祖島 Mā-cū-dō̤) are a minor archipelago of 19 islands and islets in the Taiwan Strait administered as Lienchiang County (連江縣; Lièng-gŏng-gâing) under Fujian Province of the Republic of China (Taiwan). Only a small area of what is historically Lienchiang County is under the control of the ROC. The People's Republic of China (AKA "China") controls the part of the county on mainland China and has a separate administration for that jurisdiction, Lianjiang County, which claims the entire archipelago to be its Mazu Township (馬祖鄉; Mā-cū-hiŏng).
They are named after the goddess Mazu. Kinmen is the other archipelago on the Fujian coast controlled by the ROC.
Fujianese Mainlanders started migrating to the islands during the Yuan Dynasty. Most people on Matsu came from Houguan (侯官) (today Changle County (長樂縣 Diòng-lŏ̤h-gâing), Fujian).
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Nansha Islands
The Spratly Islands are a group of more than 750 reefs,islets, atolls, cays and islands in the South China Sea. The archipelago lies off the coasts of the Philippines and Malaysia (Sabah), about one third of the way from there to southern Vietnam. They contain less than four square kilometers of land area spread over more than 425,000 square kilometers of sea. The Spratlys are one of three archipelagos of the South China Sea which comprise more than 30,000 islands and reefs and which complicate governance and economics in that region of Southeast Asia. Such small and remote islands have little economic value in themselves, but are important in establishing international boundaries. There are no native islanders but there are, at least for now, rich fishing grounds; and initial surveys indicate the islands may contain significant reserves of oil and natural gas.
About 45 islands are occupied by relatively small numbers of military forces from Vietnam, the People's Republic of China, the Republic of China (Taiwan), Malaysia and the Philippines. Brunei has also claimed an EEZ in the southeastern part of the Spratlys encompassing just one area of small islands above mean high water (on Louisa Reef.)
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One-China policy
The One-China policy (simplified Chinese: 一个中国政策; traditional Chinese: 一個中國政策 ; pinyin: yī gè Zhōngguó zhèngcè) refers to the policy or view that there is only one state called "China", despite the existence of two governments that claim to be "China". As a policy, this means that countries seeking diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China (PRC) must break official relations with the Republic of China (ROC), and vice versa. Hence, all the countries recognizing the ROC recognize it as the sole legitimate representative of all of China, and not just the island of Taiwan and other islands which it controls. Similarly, all states that recognise the PRC either recognise the PRC as the legitimate representative of Taiwan or acknowledge the PRC's views on the matter—the latter is the position adopted by the United States, which prefers to leave that question ambiguous.
The One China policy is also different from the "One China" principle (一個中國原則/"一个中国"原則), which is the principle that insists both Taiwan and mainland China are inalienable parts of a single "China". A modified form of the "One China" principle known as the 1992 Consensus is the current policy of both the PRC and ROC governments. Under this consensus, both governments agree that there is only one sovereign state encompassing both mainland China and Taiwan, but disagree about which of the two governments is the legitimate government of this state.
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Paiwan people
The Paiwan (Chinese: 排灣; pinyin: Páiwān; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Pâi-oan) are an aboriginal tribe of Taiwan. They speak the Paiwan language. In the year 2000 the Paiwan numbered 70,331. This was approximately 17.7% of Taiwan's total indigenous population, making them the third-largest tribal group.
The unique ceremonies in Paiwan are Masaru and Maleveq. The Masaru is a ceremony that celebrates the harvest of rice, whereas the Maleveq commemorates their ancestors or gods.
One of the most important figures in Paiwan history was supreme chief Toketok (卓其督; ca. 1817 - 1874), who united 18 tribes of Paiwan under his rule, and in 1867 concluded a formal agreement with Chinese and Western leaders to ensure the safety of foreign ships landing on their coastal territories in return for amnesty for Paiwan tribesmen who had killed the crew of the barque Rover in March 1867.
In the past the Paiwan had a fearsome reputation as head-hunters. When Paiwan warriors returned home from a headhunting foray, "the women would gather together in front of the courtyard to welcome their heroes and would sing songs of triumph. The heads of their enemies were then hung on stone pillars in front of which were displayed wine and offerings. The sacrificial rite started, and the soul of the dead was duly consoled by the sorcerer. A tuft of hair was removed from the skull and solemnly put in a basket which was used for divination." During the civil war, between 1946 and 1949, many Paiwan men were forcibly enlisted in the Kuomintang forces. When the war ended, some of the Paiwan remained behind in China and formed their own communities.
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Paracel Islands
The Paracel Islands, also called Xisha Islands (Chinese: 西沙群岛) in Chinese and Hoàng Sa Islands (Quần đảo Hoàng Sa, 群島黃沙) in Vietnamese, is a group of islands under the administration of Hainan Province, the People's Republic of China. Vietnam and the Republic of China (Taiwan) also claim sovereignty of these islands. China and South Vietnam each occupied part of the Paracel Islands before 1974 when a brief conflict occurred. China took over and has controlled all of the Paracel Islands since then.
The Paracel Islands consist of over 30 islets, sandbanks or reefs, occupy about 15,000 km² of the ocean surface, and are located in the South China Sea. Turtles live on the islands, and seabirds have left nests and guano deposits, but there are no permanent human residents except for a small number of troops. The archipelago is approximately equidistant from the coastlines of Vietnam and China, 180 nautical miles SE of Hainan Island, and about one-third of the way from central Vietnam to the northern Philippines.
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Portuguese people
The Portuguese (Portuguese: os Portugueses) are a nation and ethnic group native to the country of Portugal, in the west of the Iberian peninsula of south-west Europe. Their language is Portuguese, and Roman Catholicism is the predominant religion.
Due to the large historical extent of the Portuguese Empire and the colonization of territories in Africa, Asia and the Americas, as well as historical and recent emigration, Portuguese communities can be found in many diverse regions around the globe, and a large Portuguese diaspora exists.
The Portuguese are a southwestern European population, with origins predominantly from Atlantic Europe, Western Europe and the Western Mediterranean.
The earliest modern humans inhabiting Portugal are believed to have been Paleolithic peoples that may have arrived in the Iberian Peninsula as early as 35,000 to 40,000 years ago. Current interpretation of Y-chromosome and mtDNA data suggests that modern-day Portuguese traces largely a significant amount of these lineages to the paleolithic peoples which began arriving to the European continent between the end of the last glaciation around 45,000 years ago.
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Pratas Islands
The Pratas Islands, also called Dongsha Islands (simplified Chinese: 东沙群岛; traditional Chinese: 東沙群島; pinyin: Dōngshā Qúndǎo), consist of three islands forming from an atoll located in northeastern South China Sea, 340 km (211 mi) southeast of Hong Kong. The islands are governed by the Republic of China (Taiwan). The People's Republic of China claims sovereignty over these islands along with all other territories currently controlled by the Republic of China. It is the seventh national park of the Republic of China. The main island of the group, Dongsha Island, is the largest of the South China Sea Islands.
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Province (China)
In the context of Chinese government, a province (sheng), formally provincial level division, is the highest-level administrative division. The People's Republic of China (PRC) currently administers 33 such divisions, classified as 22 provinces, 4 municipalities, 5 autonomous regions and 2 special administrative regions.
Additionally, the PRC claims sovereignty over Taiwan Province, but since the Chinese Civil War ended in 1949 this area has been administered by the Republic of China (ROC) under a province of the same name. The ROC also administers some offshore islands including Quemoy/Kinmen (Jinmen) and Matsu (Mazu), which form Fujian Province, ROC. These were part of an originally unified Fujian province, which since 1949 has been divided between the PRC and ROC.
In the People's Republic of China, every province has a Communist Party of China provincial committee, headed by a secretary beside the two special administrative regions. The committee secretary is in charge of the province, rather than the governor of the provincial government.
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Puyuma people
The Puyuma (Chinese: 卑南族; pinyin: Bēinán-zú; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Puyuma-cho̍k, Pi-lâm-cho̍k), also known as the Peinan or Beinan tribe, are one of the tribal groups of the Taiwanese aborigines. The tribe is generally divided into the Chihpen and Nanwang groups, both resident in Taitung County on the east coast of Taiwan.
In the year 2000 the Puyuma numbered 9,606. This was approximately 2.4% of Taiwan's total indigenous population, making them the sixth-largest tribal group. The Puyuma speak their tribal language as well as Mandarin and Taiwanese. The Puyuma language, however, is dying.
The name "Puyuma" means "unity" or "concord," and was originally the autonym of the speakers of the Nanwang dialect (Teng 2008). Zeitoun and Cauquelin (2006) also note that the word Puyuma can be analyzed as pu'-uma, which means "to send to the field."
The earliest records of the Peinan Site were made by Torii Ryūzō, an anthropologist in the early period of the Japanese Occupation of Taiwan. During his four visits to Taiwan for anthropological research, he took two photos of the stone pillars on the ground surface at the Peinan Site
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Rikichi Andō
Rikichi Andō (安藤 利吉, Andō Rikichi?, 3 April 1884 – 19 April 1946) was a general in the Imperial Japanese Army and 19th and final Japanese Governor-General of Taiwan from 30 December 1944 to October 1945.
Andō was a native of Miyagi Prefecture. He served as an instructor at the Army War College (Japan) from 1924-1925. From 1925-1927, he was sent to British India as a military attaché, and on his return to Japan, served in a number of staff assignments under the Imperial Japanese Army General Staff. He returned to the field in 1928 as commander of the 13th Infantry Regiment, and was promoted to Chief of Staff of the IJA 5th Division in 1930.
From 1931-1932, Andō returned to the General Staff, where he was Chief of Military Administration Section, Military Affairs Bureau. He was appointed military attaché to the United Kingdom from 1932-1934. After his return to Japan, he became Commandant of the Toyoma Army Infantry School, and subsequently commander of the 5th Independent Garrison Unit. From 1937-1938, he was Deputy Inspector-General of Military Training.
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Rufus Yerxa
Rufus H. Yerxa (born 1951) is currently Deputy Director-General of the World Trade Organization (WTO). He has served in this position since 2002. He was the former Chief International Counsel for Monsanto Company.
As an American public servant (under both Republican and Democratic administrations), he was US Ambassador to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) in Geneva; he played a key role in the Uruguay Round Negotiations. Yerxa served as a Deputy U.S. Trade Representative and U.S. Envoy to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, in Geneva. Prior to 1989, he served as the Assistant Chief Counsel of the House Ways and Means Committee and Staff Director of its Subcommittee on Trade.
From 1977 to 1981, he was the Legal Advisor to the Chairman of the International Trade Commission. An attorney and a member of the Washington State and District of Columbia Bars, Yerxa is a graduate of the University of Washington and the University of Puget Sound, and holds an LL.B. in international law from Cambridge University (UK). Prior to being named as Monsanto's international counsel, Yerxa was Monsanto's European general counsel.
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Rukai people
The Rukai (Chinese: 魯凱族; pinyin: Lǔkǎi zú; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Lú-khái-cho̍k) are one of Taiwan's aboriginal peoples. They speak the Rukai language and live in the mountains of southern Taiwan. As of the year 2000, the Rukai numbered 12,084 — making up 3% of Taiwan's total indigenous population and, as such, the fifth-largest indigenous group. The Rukai were also called Tsarisen, which means "people living in the mountain".
The Rukai People honor the Clouded Leopard and the hundred pacer, which they believe to be the spirit of their ancestor.
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Saisiyat people
The Saisiyat (Chinese: 賽夏; pinyin: Sàixià; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Sài-hā; "true people"), also spelled Saisiat are an indigenous people of Taiwan, part of the larger Taiwanese aborigine ethnic group. In the year 2000 the Saisiyat numbered 5,311. This was approximately 1.3% of Taiwan's total indigenous population, making them one of the smallest aboriginal groups in that country. The Saisiyat inhabit western Taiwan, overlapping the border between Hsinchu County and Miaoli County. They are divided into the Northern Branch (Wufong in the mountainous Hsinchu area) and the Southern Branch (Nanya and Shitan in the highlands of Miaoli), each with its own dialect. Their language is also known as Saisiyat.
Saisiyat is sometimes rendered as Saiset, Seisirat, Saisett, Saisiat, Saisiett, Saisirat, Saisyet, Saisyett, Amutoura, or Bouiok.
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Shi Lang
Shi Lang (Chinese: 施琅; pinyin: Shī Láng; 1621–1696) was a Chinese admiral who served under the Ming and Qing Dynasties. He was commander-in-chief of the Manchu fleets which destroyed the power of the Zheng family in the 1660s, and led the conquest of the Kingdom of Tungning (東寧王國) on Taiwan in 1683.
Shi Lang was born to a distinguished lineage in Jinjiang, Fujian, in 1621. He studied military strategy in his youth, and became particularly proficient in naval warfare, knowing how to take advantage of wind and tide. After fighting a number of undistinguished operations locally with his father, he joined Zheng Zhilong's naval fleet as captain of the left vanguard. Shi Lang served most of the early 1640s in the Zheng family's fleet, where he apparently saw some conflict with Zheng Zhilong's son Koxinga (Zheng Chenggong). When Shi defected to the Qing Dynasty in 1646, Koxinga killed Shi's father, brother and son.
The Manchu royals prized Shi Lang for his extensive naval experience and his network of contacts in the major trading ports of East Asia. He accompanied Prince Jidu (son of Jirgalang) on an expedition in Fujian in 1656, and attained the rank of Assistant Brigade-General. In the campaign of 1663 against the Zheng family, he commanded Dutch ships and men to follow up the Manchu victories. In 1668, he submitted a plan to drive the remnants of the Ming from Taiwan and the Pescadores, but the proposal was not utilised. He was given a post in the Imperial Bodyguard and attached to the Chinese Bordered Yellow Banner.
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Shih Ming-teh
Shih Ming-te or Shih Ming-teh (Chinese: 施明德; pinyin: Shī Míngdé, a.k.a. Nori; born January 15, 1941 in Kaohsiung) was a political prisoner for 25-and-a-half years in the Republic of China (Taiwan).
He was arrested at the age of 21 in 1962 and charged with creating the "Taiwan Independence League" (a study group) with the intention of overthrowing the Kuomintang government, Shih was sentenced to life imprisonment. The sentence was commuted to 15 years in 1975, and Shih was released on June 16, 1977.
He promptly joined the Tangwai (literally meaning "outside the party", because the Kuomintang was the only legally existing political party in Taiwan at that time), became a reporter for the Liberty Times and married the American researcher Linda Gail Arrigo. After playing a part in organizing the December 10, 1979 pro-democracy rally subsequently known as the Kaohsiung Incident, (also known as the Formosa Incident or Meilitao Incident), an arrest warrant was issued charging Shih with treason, and following 26 days on the run he was again arrested and sentenced to life in prison. In 1984, while he was incarcerated, Polish politician and Nobel Peace Prize laureate Lech Wałęsa nominated him for Peace Prize.
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South China Sea
The South China Sea is a marginal sea that is part of the Pacific Ocean, encompassing an area from the Singapore and Malacca Straits to the Strait of Taiwan of around 3,500,000 square kilometres (1,400,000 sq mi). The area's importance largely results from one-third of the world's shipping transiting through its waters, and that it is believed to hold huge oil and gas reserves beneath its seabed.
It is located
The minute South China Sea Islands, collectively an archipelago, number in the hundreds. The sea and its mostly uninhabited islands are subject to competing claims of sovereignty by several countries. These claims are also reflected in the variety of names used for the islands and the sea.
South China Sea is the dominant term used in English for the sea, and the name in most European languages is equivalent, but it is sometimes called by different names in neighboring countries, often reflecting historical claims to hegemony over the sea.
The English name is a result of early European interest in the sea as a route from Europe and South Asia to the trading opportunities of China. In the sixteenth century Portuguese sailors called it the China Sea (Mar da China); later needs to differentiate it from nearby bodies of water led to calling it the South China Sea. The International Hydrographic Organization refers to the sea as "South China Sea (Nan Hai)".
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Spratly Islands
The Spratly Islands are a group of more than 750 reefs,islets, atolls, cays and islands in the South China Sea. The archipelago lies off the coasts of the Philippines and Malaysia (Sabah), about one third of the way from there to southern Vietnam. They contain less than four square kilometers of land area spread over more than 425,000 square kilometers of sea. The Spratlys are one of three archipelagos of the South China Sea which comprise more than 30,000 islands and reefs and which complicate governance and economics in that region of Southeast Asia. Such small and remote islands have little economic value in themselves, but are important in establishing international boundaries. There are no native islanders but there are, at least for now, rich fishing grounds; and initial surveys indicate the islands may contain significant reserves of oil and natural gas.
About 45 islands are occupied by relatively small numbers of military forces from Vietnam, the People's Republic of China, the Republic of China (Taiwan), Malaysia and the Philippines. Brunei has also claimed an EEZ in the southeastern part of the Spratlys encompassing just one area of small islands above mean high water (on Louisa Reef.)
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Sun Yat-sen
Sun Yat-sen (12 November 1866 – 12 March 1925) was a Chinese revolutionary and first president and founding father of the Republic of China ("Nationalist China"). As the foremost pioneer of Republic of China, Sun is referred to as the "Father of the Nation" in the Republic of China (ROC), and the "forerunner of democratic revolution" in the People's Republic of China. Sun played an instrumental role in the overthrow of the Qing dynasty during the Xinhai Revolution. Sun was the first provisional president when the Republic of China was founded in 1912 and later co-founded the Kuomintang (KMT), serving as its first leader. Sun was a uniting figure in post-Imperial China, and remains unique among 20th-century Chinese politicians for being widely revered amongst the people from both sides of the Taiwan Strait.
Although Sun is considered one of the greatest leaders of modern China, his political life was one of constant struggle and frequent exile. After the success of the revolution, he quickly fell out of power in the newly founded Republic of China, and led successive revolutionary governments as a challenge to the warlords who controlled much of the nation. Sun did not live to see his party consolidate its power over the country during the Northern Expedition. His party, which formed a fragile alliance with the Communists, split into two factions after his death. Sun's chief legacy resides in his developing of the political philosophy known as the Three Principles of the People: nationalism, democracy, and the people's livelihood.
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Taiping Island
Taiping Island is the largest of the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea, and the only one where fresh water is available. The island is elliptical in shape being 1.4 km in length and 0.4 km in width. It is part of the Tizard Bank (Zheng He Reefs; 鄭和群礁), one of seven reefs in the Spratly Islands near the centre of the South China Sea. The Taiping Island Airport is the most prominent artificial feature on the island.
The island is administered by the Republic of China (Taiwan), as part of Cijin, Kaohsiung. It is also claimed by the People's Republic of China, the Philippines and Vietnam. The distance from Kaohsiung to Taiping Island is about 1,600 km (990 mi). The nearby Zhongzhou Reef is also under the possession of the ROC.
Taiping Island (Chinese: 太平島; pinyin: Tàipíng Dǎo; literally "peace island") is named in honor of a Nationalist Chinese Navy warship which sailed to the island in 1946, which allowed the ROC to assert its claim to the Spratly Islands in 1947. This name is favored by both Taipei and by Beijing. The island was previously called Huángshānmǎ Jiāo (黃山馬礁) or Huángshānmǎ Zhì (黃山馬峙) by Chinese fishermen.
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Taiwan
Taiwan (i/ˌtaɪˈwɑːn/ TY-WAHN; Chinese: 臺灣 or 台灣; pinyin: Táiwān; see below), officially the Republic of China (ROC; Chinese: 中華民國; pinyin: Zhōnghuá Mínguó), is a state in East Asia. Originally based in mainland China, the Republic of China now governs the island of Taiwan (formerly known as Formosa), which forms over 99% of its current territory, as well as Penghu, Kinmen, Matsu, and other minor islands. Neighboring states include the People's Republic of China to the west, Japan to the east and northeast, and the Philippines to the south. Taipei is the capital city and economic and cultural centre of the country, and New Taipei is the most populous city.
The earliest evidence of inhabitation of Taiwan dates back to the late Paleolithic era. The island of Taiwan was mainly inhabited by Taiwanese aborigines before being colonized in the 17th century by the Dutch and the Spanish Empire. The first Han Chinese polity on Taiwan began when Koxinga's troops defeated Dutch forces and established the Kingdom of Tungning. The island was subsequently ruled by the Qing Dynasty after the kingdom's defeat in the Battle of Penghu in 1683, a period that lasted for over 200 years. Following Japan's victory over the Qing Dynasty in the first Sino-Japanese war, Taiwan was ceded to Japan under the Treaty of Shimonoseki in 1895.
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Taiwan, China
"Taiwan, China" or "Taiwan, Province of China" is a set of politically controversial and potentially ambiguous terms that characterize Taiwan and its associated territories as a province or territory of "China". However, the term is problematic and potentially ambiguous because since 1949, two sovereign states with the name "China" exist, namely the Republic of China (ROC, founded 1911 and now known as "Taiwan") and the People's Republic of China (PRC, founded 1949 and now known as "China" for short since 1971). However, only one "China" actually rules Taiwan, namely Republic of China (which in reality is known as "Taiwan"), and has an administrative division called "Taiwan Province" but refers to it as "Taiwan Province, Republic of China"; whereas, the other "China", namely the People's Republic of China, which is the one internationally recognized as "China" (not the ROC), claims but does not control Taiwan as part of its territory. Because "Taiwan" and "China" are known internationally to be separately political entities, the juxtaposition of "Taiwan" and "China" in this order into one single term "Taiwan, China" implicitly places the ROC/"Taiwan" under the sovereignty of PRC/"China", in the same sense as "California, USA". The use of this term is usually politically promulgated by the Communist Chinese government as a way to claim and imply that the ROC/"Taiwan" is under its sovereignty, since the PRC claims to be the legitimate government of "all China", which, according to its own definition, includes Taiwan also, despite its lack of control. The ROC government disputes the PRC position and it, along with many ROC citizens, considers this term incorrect and offensive, and its use a purposeful false identification and lie which denies the ROC's sovereignty, and objects to its use. The term is particularly offensive to those Taiwanese who believe in Taiwan Independence and want to disassociate Taiwan with "China" and a Chinese identity, and consider it a lie and an oxymoron. However, some Taiwanese citizens do not necessarily oppose this term, particularly those who view themselves as "Chinese" and support eventual Chinese reunification.
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Taiwanese aborigines
Taiwanese aborigines (Chinese: 原住民; pinyin: yuánzhùmín; Wade–Giles: yüan2-chu4-min2; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: gôan-chū-bîn; literally "original inhabitants") is the term commonly applied in reference to the indigenous peoples of Taiwan. Although Taiwanese indigenous groups hold a variety of creation myths, recent research suggests their ancestors may have been living on the islands for approximately 8,000 years before major Han Chinese immigration began in the 17th century (Blust 1999). Taiwanese aborigines are Austronesian peoples, with linguistic and genetic ties to other Austronesian ethnic groups, such as peoples of the Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, Madagascar, Polynesia, and Oceania (Hill et al. 2007; Bird, Hope & Taylor 2004). The issue of an ethnic identity unconnected to the Asian mainland has become one thread in the discourse regarding the political status of Taiwan.
For centuries, Taiwan's aboriginal peoples experienced economic competition and military conflict with a series of colonizing peoples. Centralized government policies designed to foster language shift and cultural assimilation, as well as continued contact with the colonizers through trade, intermarriage and other dispassionate intercultural processes, have resulted in varying degrees of language death and loss of original cultural identity. For example, of the approximately 26 known languages of the Taiwanese aborigines (collectively referred to as the Formosan languages), at least ten are extinct, five are moribund (Zeitoun & Yu 2005:167) and several are to some degree endangered. These languages are of unique historical significance, since most historical linguists consider Taiwan to be the original homeland of the Austronesian language family (Blust 1999).
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Taiwanese people
Taiwanese people (traditional Chinese: 臺灣人 also 台灣人; simplified Chinese: 台湾人; pinyin: Táiwān rén; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Tâi-oân-lâng) may refer to individuals who either claim or are imputed cultural identity focused on the island of Taiwan and/or Taiwan Area which have been governed by the Republic of China (ROC) since 1945. At least three competing (occasionally overlapping) paradigms are used to identify someone as a Taiwanese person: a nationalist criteria, self-identification (including the concept of "New Taiwanese") criteria, and socio-cultural criteria. These standards are fluid, in keeping with an evolving social and political milieu. The complexity resulting from competing and evolving standards is compounded by a larger dispute regarding Taiwan's identity crisis, the political status of Taiwan, and its potential de jure Taiwan independence or political integration with the People's Republic of China.
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Truku people
The Truku (Chinese: 太魯閣族; pinyin: Tàilǔgé zú, also romanized as Taroko) people are an Indigenous Taiwanese tribe. Taroko is also the name of the area of Taiwan where the Truku tribe resides. The Executive Yuan, Republic of China has officially recognized the Truku since January 15, 2004. The Truku are the 12th aboriginal tribe in Taiwan to receive this recognition. Previously, the Truku and the related Seediq people were classified in the Atayal group.
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Tsai Ming-Liang
Tsai Ming-liang (Chinese: 蔡明亮; pinyin: Cài Míngliàng) (born October 27, 1957) is one of the most celebrated "Second New Wave" film directors of Taiwanese Cinema, along with earlier contemporaries such as Hou Hsiao-Hsien and Edward Yang. His films have been acclaimed worldwide and have won numerous film festival awards.
Tsai was born in Malaysia of Chinese ethnic background and spent his first 20 years of his life in Kuching, Sarawak, after which he moved to Taipei, Taiwan. This, he says, had "a huge impact on [his] mind and psyche," perhaps later mirrored in his films. "Even today," says Tsai, "I feel I belong neither to Taiwan nor to Malaysia. In a sense, I can go anywhere I want and fit in, but I never feel that sense of belonging."
He graduated from the Drama and Cinema Department of the Chinese Culture University of Taiwan in 1982 and worked as a theatrical producer, screenwriter, and television director in Hong Kong.
Tsai's film honours include a Golden Lion (best picture) for Vive L'Amour at the Venice Film Festival in 1994; the Silver Bear - Special Jury Prize for The River at the 47th Berlin International Film Festival; the FIPRESCI award for The Hole at the 1998 Cannes Film Festival; and the Alfred Bauer Award and Silver Bear for Outstanding Artistic Achievement for The Wayward Cloud at the 2005 Berlin International Film Festival.
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Tsou people
The Tsou (Chinese: 鄒; pinyin: Zōu; Wade–Giles: Tsou; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Chau) are an indigenous people of central southern Republic of China (Taiwan). They are spread across three administrative entities of the Republic of China — Nantou County, Chiayi County and Kaohsiung City.
They are sometimes confused with the Thao people of Sun Moon Lake. In the year 2000 the Tsou numbered 6,169. This was approximately 1.6% of Taiwan's total Indigenous population, making them the seventh-largest tribal group.
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Wang Chien-shien
Wang Chien-shien (Chinese: 王建煊; pinyin: Wáng Jiànxuān; Wade–Giles: Wáng Chìen-hsuān) (born August 7, 1938) is a founder of the New Party. He was finance minister of the Republic of China from 1990 to 1992 and is the chairman of the Chinese Management Association (since 1990). Wang is the President of the Control Yuan since July 2008.
Born in Anhui, Wang grew up in Taipei City and received a bachelor's degree from National Cheng Kung University and a master's degree from National Chengchi University. Wang was popular in the 1990s for his clean reputation and split with the Kuomintang to help found the New Party.
In 2001, the three parties of the pan-Blue coalition, the Kuomintang, the People First Party, and the New Party agreed to field only one candidate for Taipei County magistrate in 2001 based on which party could field the most popular candidate in polls. Despite the unified ticket and a poll predicting him winning, Wang lost to Su Tseng-chang. He also participated in the 1998 Taipei City mayoral race. Wang is married to Su Fa-jau (蘇法昭).
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Wang Tuoh
Wang Tuoh (Chinese: 王拓; pinyin: Wáng Tuò; born January 9, 1944) is a Taiwanese writer, intellectual, literary critic and politician. He was born in Badouzi (八斗子), then a small fishing village near the northern port city of Keelung. His name was originally Wang Hung-chiu (王紘久).
Wang Tuoh published his first short story, The Hanging Tree in 1970, and went on to write a series of stories set in his home village of Badouzi that drew heavily on his own experiences in a small, insular village where everyone is part of a larger family that has been there for five generations. The most well-known of these stories is the novella Auntie Jinshui (金水嬸; published September 1976) which describes the story of the eponymous Auntie Jinshui. Auntie Jinshui is a street peddler who has successfully raised and educated six sons, but falls upon especially hard times after being swindled by a priest introduced to her by one of her sons. She then falls behind on her payments to her Hui (會), an informal village credit network, and finds herself gradually ostracized from her friends and family. This novella was also later made into a movie.
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Women in Taiwan
Women in Taiwan is a reference to Taiwanese women and their legal, social, workplace, and cultural status in Taiwan. Their status as women in Taiwan has been based on and affected by the "traditional patriarchal views and social structure" within Taiwanese society.
Despite of the ongoing prosperity in the Taiwan's economy and occurring democratic reforms, women of Taiwan still have to struggle against discrimination in several laws. Thus they still have to claim equal rights with Taiwanese men.
The 1930 Taiwanese Civil Codes provides limited rights to Taiwanese women, such as having no right in deciding their residence, the lack of right to own property, the lack of right to file a divorce, the lack of self-protection, and the lack of right to child custody. In the present-day Taiwanese legal system, the laws relating to Taiwanese women's rights can be found in the Constitution of the Republic of China, the Family Law of the ROC Civil Code, the Standards for Labor Work, Industry Law, Employee Service Act, and other related regulations for protecting gender equality in the Republic of China (Taiwan).
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Wu Den-yih
Wu Den-yih (traditional Chinese: 吳敦義; simplified Chinese: 吴敦义; pinyin: Wú Dūnyì; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Gô͘ Tun-gī; born January 30, 1948) is the Vice President of the Republic of China and a member of the ruling Kuomintang Party. Wu was the running mate of President Ma Ying-jeou and was elected Vice President in the 2012 presidential election with 51.5% of the vote. Wu served as Premier from 2009 until 2012.
Wu was born in Tsaotun, Nantou County, Taiwan. He earned a BA degree in history from the National Taiwan University in 1970.
Wu is married with Tsai Ling-yi. They have three sons and one daughter.
Wu Den-yih was the appointed mayor of Kaohsiung between 1990 and 1994, and he served as the mayor again from 1994 to 1998 by election. He was defeated by Frank Hsieh in the mayoral election in 1998. Wu was the general secretary of KMT from February 2007 to September 2009.
Wu was designated to succeed Liu Chao-shiuan as Premier of the Republic of China on 8 September 2009 by President Ma Ying-jeou. Liu and his Cabinet resigned en masse on 10 September, with Wu succeeding the post the same day. On 19 June 2011 Ma Ying-jeou announced that Wu would be his vice presidential candidate in the 2012 presidential election.
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Yami people
The Tao (Chinese: 達悟族; pinyin: Dáwù zú; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Ta̍t-ngō͘-cho̍k), originally recognized as Yami (雅美), are a Taiwanese aboriginal people, native to tiny outlying Orchid Island in Taiwan. The Tao are an Austronesian people linguistically and culturally closer to the Ivatan people of the Batanes islands in the Philippines than to other aboriginal peoples on the main island of Taiwan. The word "Tao" (pronounced Ta-o) means "person" or "people" in both the Tao language and all Philippine languages. The Tao people are traditionally good at making balangays (native canoes), which is a symbol of their tribe.
In the year 2000 the Yami numbered 3,872. This was approximately 1% of Taiwan's total indigenous population.
The Tao people of Pongso no Tao (Orchid Island)is a small island approximately 42 km in diameter. The coastline is the only inhabited area of the island, with ocean and volcanic rock on the shore and then mountains of great height inland. The soil of Orchid island is very salty. The Tao farming near the shore usually grow sweet potato for its edible root and leaves and Taro. As of the last few decades other non-indigenous fruits and vegetables have since been introduced. Coconuts are also available on the island but are not common or usually owned by families and kept on their own private land. It is rare to find a coconut tree or any tree for that matter that is not owned by anyone on the island. Being a small island everyone has claimed some part of and regularly farms there during the day. Millet is also grown on the island and is usually pounded down into a sticky cake and eaten with pork. Traditional millet festivals can be seen in the beginning of the summer months around the island. Taro is also mashed and mixed with smoked pork.
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Yani Tseng
Yani Tseng (Chinese: 曾雅妮 Zēng Yǎní; born 23 January 1989) is a Taiwanese professional golfer currently playing on the U.S.-based LPGA Tour. She is the youngest player ever, male or female, to win five major championships and is currently ranked number 1 in the Women's World Golf Rankings.
Tseng was the top-ranked amateur in Taiwan from 2004 to 2006. The highlight of her amateur career was winning the 2004 U.S. Women's Amateur Public Links, defeating Michelle Wie in the final, 1 up. Her amateur accomplishments include:
Tseng turned professional in January 2007. That year she competed on the Ladies Asian Golf Tour and won the DLF Women’s Indian Open. She also competed on the CN Canadian Women’s Tour where she won the CN Canadian Women’s Tour at Vancouver Golf Club.
Tseng entered the LPGA Qualifying Tournament in the fall of 2007 and finished sixth in the final Qualifying Tournament in December which gave Tseng full playing privileges on the LPGA Tour for 2008. In June 2008, she claimed her first LPGA tour victory at the LPGA Championship to become the first player from Taiwan to win an LPGA major championship. At age 19, she was also the youngest player to win the LPGA Championship and the second-youngest player to win an LPGA major.
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Zheng Jing
Zheng Jing (Chinese: 鄭經; pinyin: Zhèng Jīng; Wade–Giles: Cheng Ching; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: Teⁿ Keng) was a seventeenth century Chinese warlord and Ming Dynasty loyalist. He was the eldest son of Koxinga and grandson of pirate-merchant Zheng Zhilong. After the conquest of Taiwan in 1662 by his father, Zheng Jing controlled the military forces in Xiamen and Quemoy on his father's behalf. Upon the death of his father six months later, Zheng Jing contested throne as the King of Taiwan with his uncle, Zheng Shixi. The dispute was resolved in Zheng Jing's favor after he successfully landed an army in Taiwan despite strong opposition by the forces of his uncle. This was followed by Zheng Shixi withdrawing his claim.
With both the vast pirate fleet and the throne of Tainan, he intended to continue his father's plans to invade the Philippines; however, he was forced to abandon this venture when faced with the threat of a Manchu-Dutch alliance. His victory over a combined Manchu-Dutch fleet in 1664 resulted in ending the brief alliance.
wn.com/Zheng_Jing
RELEASE
ALBUMS
- Good Lovin'
- Juste un mot
- Choisis-moi
- Interlude radio
- Si c'était à refaire
- Combien de fois
- Ailleurs
- La la
- Ce serait si simple
- How Could You
- Le Mec parfait
- Présomptions
- Danger
- Never Enough Love (live)
- Interludes Live
- Choisis-moi (remix)
- You Can't Treat Love That Way
- Runnin' Around
- Fast Livin'
- There Was a Time
- Shootout in the Parking Lot
- Never Gonna Let You Go
- Roll Me Over
- Little Dancer
- Come and Take My Love
- Days and Nights
- Près de toi
- Somebody
- Interlude
- On tourne en rond
- Ne crois pas
- Life Goes On
- Être là-bas
- Y'a pas moyen
- J'ai besoin d'amour (feat. Dee Dee Bridgewater)
- Tu disais
- Never Really Mattered
- Carmen
- T'es où ? (feat. Fabe)
- Gabriel
- Soleil
- Take the Time
- C'est fini
- Bad for Me
- Never Enough Love
- All of Me
- Baiser volé
- Choisir
- Let's Get Busy
- Battles of the Heart
- I'm on My Way
- Ce que je ressens
- À l'interieur de moi
- Time
- The Fight Is On
- In the Middle of the Night
- Hot Lovin' Night
- So Long (live)
- Second Chance
- Medicine Man
- Living on the Stage
- Rock City
- Sign in the Sky
- Animal Victim
- Wild Jealousy
- Proud Mary (live)
- Slow Dancing (remix)
- Somebody (demo)
- Rag Blues (demo)
- All Through the Night (demo)
- Pictures of You
- Medicine Man (intro)
- Medicine Man
- Slow Dancing in Hell
- She Did a Real Good Job
- So Damn Easy
- Lost Gardens
- Shake Your Cages
- Go All the Way
- Don't Let in the Night
- In Love Again
- Face to the Wind
- In Trouble With Angels
- Life Keeps Moving On
- You've Got Me
- The Great Wall
- Dead Lights
- Animal Victim
- In the Middle of the Night
- Won't Give It Up
- Sign in the Sky
- Don't Ever Say Goodbye
- Broken Dream
- Second Change
- Bitter Cold
- Take Your Time
- Harder Than Hell
- So Long
- Intro
- Shout It Out
- Back to You
- The Fight Is On
- Wild Jealousy
- Rock City
- Hot Lovin' Night
- Living on the Stage
- I Need Your Love
- One Shot to the Heart
- Staying Alive
- Don't Look Back
- Intro
- Shout It Out
- Back to You
- The Fight Is On
- Wild Jealousy
- Rock City
- Hot Lovin' Night
- Living on the Stage
- I Need Your Love
- When Passion Burns
- Staying Alive
- One Shot to the Heart
- Don't Look Back
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Republic of China 2009 Recruitment Center of National Armed Forces CM Full 60 secs
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 1:04
- Updated: 09 Dec 2012
This is a short clip bring you by Recruitment Center of National Armed Forces (國防部人才招募中心). It's a great clip, actually. But I know, it's a Transformers rip off, for sure. Sorry for the video quality, the original video is 720x480 with max bit rate about 1000kbps. You can download this video clip from here: 210.69.230.66
http://wn.com/Republic_of_China_2009_Recruitment_Center_of_National_Armed_Forces_CM_Full_60_secs
This is a short clip bring you by Recruitment Center of National Armed Forces (國防部人才招募中心). It's a great clip, actually. But I know, it's a Transformers rip off, for sure. Sorry for the video quality, the original video is 720x480 with max bit rate about 1000kbps. You can download this video clip from here: 210.69.230.66
Discovering China - Republic of China 101st Anniversary
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 10:49
- Updated: 10 Dec 2012
In this episode we take a look at the 101st anniversary of the Republic of China.
http://wn.com/Discovering_China_Republic_of_China_101st_Anniversary
In this episode we take a look at the 101st anniversary of the Republic of China.
- published: 12 Oct 2012
- views: 612
- author: NTDTV
Shanghai - Peoples Republic of China
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 25:52
- Updated: 18 May 2012
In Shanghai, Joe decides to do as the locals do and start the day with some T'ai Chi in the park. This ancient practice of movement and meditation gets him ready to meet his co-host, Tianran, at her home. Tianran's family is very welcoming, and teaches Joe to use chopsticks. Tianran, a former gymnast, promises to take Joe to the circus school for a class later on. First, she wants to take him on a tour of Shanghai, starting with the city's most famous landmark - the Oriental Pearl TV Tower. At the top of the tower, the duo takes in a breathtaking view of Shanghai.
http://wn.com/Shanghai_Peoples_Republic_of_China
In Shanghai, Joe decides to do as the locals do and start the day with some T'ai Chi in the park. This ancient practice of movement and meditation gets him ready to meet his co-host, Tianran, at her home. Tianran's family is very welcoming, and teaches Joe to use chopsticks. Tianran, a former gymnast, promises to take Joe to the circus school for a class later on. First, she wants to take him on a tour of Shanghai, starting with the city's most famous landmark - the Oriental Pearl TV Tower. At the top of the tower, the duo takes in a breathtaking view of Shanghai.
- published: 08 Jan 2010
- views: 515
- author: TravelVideoStore
Ode For Republic Of China
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 2:20
- Updated: 13 Nov 2012
Teresa Teng sings it as the last song during one of her concert in Taipei.
http://wn.com/Ode_For_Republic_Of_China
Teresa Teng sings it as the last song during one of her concert in Taipei.
- published: 16 Jan 2006
- views: 96552
- author: teresateng
Touhou Hisoutensoku 12.3 - The People's Republic of China vs KING METAL SLIME Reimu
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 3:13
- Updated: 03 Dec 2012
You are already dead.
http://wn.com/Touhou_Hisoutensoku_123_The_People's_Republic_of_China_vs_KING_METAL_SLIME_Reimu
Dalian 2007 - BBC World Debate China: Resolving Tensions of Growth
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 47:27
- Updated: 11 Nov 2012
www.weforum.org 03.10.2007 China: Resolving Tensions of Growth In partnership with the World Economic Forum, and with the participation of leading Chinese experts, the BBC World Debate explores the tensions created by China's breathtaking economic growth. Economic success is quickly reshaping the nation's fortunes, creating new business and social expectations, and transforming society. How will the Chinese model maintain a balanced and sustainable path of rapid economic development, protect the environment and maintain social stability? Discussion Leaders Pierre E. Cohade, President, Asia-Pacific Region, Goodyear Tire Management Company (Shanghai), People's Republic of China Fan Gang, Director, National Economic Research Institute, China Reform Foundation, People's Republic of China CS Kiang, Chairman, Environment Fund, Peking University, People's Republic of China Wu Qing, Member of the Board, Beijing Cultural Development Center for Rural Women, People's Republic of China; Social Entrepreneur Facilitated by Nik Gowing, Main Presenter, BBC World, United Kingdom
http://wn.com/Dalian_2007_BBC_World_Debate_China_Resolving_Tensions_of_Growth
www.weforum.org 03.10.2007 China: Resolving Tensions of Growth In partnership with the World Economic Forum, and with the participation of leading Chinese experts, the BBC World Debate explores the tensions created by China's breathtaking economic growth. Economic success is quickly reshaping the nation's fortunes, creating new business and social expectations, and transforming society. How will the Chinese model maintain a balanced and sustainable path of rapid economic development, protect the environment and maintain social stability? Discussion Leaders Pierre E. Cohade, President, Asia-Pacific Region, Goodyear Tire Management Company (Shanghai), People's Republic of China Fan Gang, Director, National Economic Research Institute, China Reform Foundation, People's Republic of China CS Kiang, Chairman, Environment Fund, Peking University, People's Republic of China Wu Qing, Member of the Board, Beijing Cultural Development Center for Rural Women, People's Republic of China; Social Entrepreneur Facilitated by Nik Gowing, Main Presenter, BBC World, United Kingdom
- published: 03 Oct 2007
- views: 15166
- author: WorldEconomicForum
(01) Why We Fight: "Battle of China (ca. 1944) 1/5
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 10:01
- Updated: 08 Dec 2012
SUBSCRIBE TO EXCELLENT WORLD WAR II ERA VIDEOS The Battle of China(1944) was the sixth film of Frank Capra's Why We Fight propaganda film series. It describes the modern history of China, with the founding of the Republic of China by Sun Yat-sen, and leads on to the Japanese invasion. The invasion of China is explained in terms of the four-step plan for Japanese conquest, mentioned in the Tanaka Memorial. "Here was their mad dream. Phase One - the occupation of Manchuria for raw materials. Phase Two - the absorption of China for manpower. Phase Three - a triumphant sweep to the south to seize the riches of the Indies. Phase Four - the eastward move to crush the United States.". Special attention is paid to Japanese atrocities such as the bombing of Shanghai and the Nanking Massacre -- the film includes graphic film footage of the Nanking atrocities. The film mentions a Nanking massacre death toll of 40000 -- far lower than modern estimates; the true death toll was unknown at the time. The mass westward migration associated with the moving of the Chinese capital to Chongqing, and the construction of the Burma Road are also covered, and the film concludes with overview of the Chinese victory at the Battle of Changsha. The Chinese communists are never explicitly mentioned, but are implicitly acknowledged with a discussion of Chinese guerrilla warfare behind the Japanese lines. The introductory maps shown in the film show China as including Outer Mongolia and Tannu Tuva, as ...
http://wn.com/01_Why_We_Fight_Battle_of_China_ca_1944_1_5
SUBSCRIBE TO EXCELLENT WORLD WAR II ERA VIDEOS The Battle of China(1944) was the sixth film of Frank Capra's Why We Fight propaganda film series. It describes the modern history of China, with the founding of the Republic of China by Sun Yat-sen, and leads on to the Japanese invasion. The invasion of China is explained in terms of the four-step plan for Japanese conquest, mentioned in the Tanaka Memorial. "Here was their mad dream. Phase One - the occupation of Manchuria for raw materials. Phase Two - the absorption of China for manpower. Phase Three - a triumphant sweep to the south to seize the riches of the Indies. Phase Four - the eastward move to crush the United States.". Special attention is paid to Japanese atrocities such as the bombing of Shanghai and the Nanking Massacre -- the film includes graphic film footage of the Nanking atrocities. The film mentions a Nanking massacre death toll of 40000 -- far lower than modern estimates; the true death toll was unknown at the time. The mass westward migration associated with the moving of the Chinese capital to Chongqing, and the construction of the Burma Road are also covered, and the film concludes with overview of the Chinese victory at the Battle of Changsha. The Chinese communists are never explicitly mentioned, but are implicitly acknowledged with a discussion of Chinese guerrilla warfare behind the Japanese lines. The introductory maps shown in the film show China as including Outer Mongolia and Tannu Tuva, as ...
- published: 20 Mar 2008
- views: 76793
- author: 2bn442RCT
(HDTV, Ver. 1) 2011 TAIPEI 101 with Republic of China Centennial Firework in Taipei City Skyline
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 9:28
- Updated: 02 Dec 2012
中華民國100 年，2011 台北101 煙火秀HiHD 頻道轉播高畫質Full HD 版本
http://wn.com/HDTV,_Ver_1_2011_TAIPEI_101_with_Republic_of_China_Centennial_Firework_in_Taipei_City_Skyline
Michael Jackson - Beat It (Chinese Communist Party Version)
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 4:04
- Updated: 14 Dec 2012
The People's Republic of China decided that the original Beat It videoclip was not fit for the chinese people and asked the Office of censorship to create its own version of the clip, while keeping the original song. This is what resulted. (I am of course kidding) Clip was taken from (credits to the original author): 220.170.79.109 "The video was edited from a Chinese masterpiece, the Long March Song Cycle (长征组歌) which was made in February 1976."
http://wn.com/Michael_Jackson_Beat_It_Chinese_Communist_Party_Version
The People's Republic of China decided that the original Beat It videoclip was not fit for the chinese people and asked the Office of censorship to create its own version of the clip, while keeping the original song. This is what resulted. (I am of course kidding) Clip was taken from (credits to the original author): 220.170.79.109 "The video was edited from a Chinese masterpiece, the Long March Song Cycle (长征组歌) which was made in February 1976."
- published: 09 Jul 2010
- views: 528211
- author: aerialpc
(My HD Live) 2011 TAIPEI 101 with Skyline Firework, Republic of China Centennial (100 Years)
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 12:14
- Updated: 18 Nov 2012
中華民國100 年，2011 台北101 煙火秀Record by : cho0730 machine : SONY Handycam XR-150
http://wn.com/My_HD_Live_2011_TAIPEI_101_with_Skyline_Firework,_Republic_of_China_Centennial_100_Years
中華民國100 年，2011 台北101 煙火秀Record by : cho0730 machine : SONY Handycam XR-150
- published: 31 Dec 2010
- views: 37394
- author: cho0730
中華民國建國百年.新版國歌-國家建設篇(合唱版) ／Republic of China
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 1:42
- Updated: 20 Nov 2012
編曲：錢南章導演：胡毓鎮演唱：台北愛樂合唱團演奏：長榮交響樂團中華民國建國百年.新版國歌共分國家建設篇、兒童篇、綜合篇、觀光篇等4個主題， 每個主題又有「合唱版」、「演奏版」共8個版本， 台灣各地風光與重要建設均入鏡， 同時新版國歌融入輕快、歡樂元素， 特別是觀光篇採原住民二部合唱方式呈現，別具獨特風格。 中華民國建國百年.新版國歌系列: www.youtube.com
http://wn.com/中華民國建國百年新版國歌-國家建設篇合唱版_／Republic_of_China
編曲：錢南章導演：胡毓鎮演唱：台北愛樂合唱團演奏：長榮交響樂團中華民國建國百年.新版國歌共分國家建設篇、兒童篇、綜合篇、觀光篇等4個主題， 每個主題又有「合唱版」、「演奏版」共8個版本， 台灣各地風光與重要建設均入鏡， 同時新版國歌融入輕快、歡樂元素， 特別是觀光篇採原住民二部合唱方式呈現，別具獨特風格。 中華民國建國百年.新版國歌系列: www.youtube.com
- published: 28 Dec 2010
- views: 45863
- author: k382box
Great Firewall Of China (HUNGRY BEAST)
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 3:33
- Updated: 13 Dec 2012
Its the largest, most innovative internet censorship programme in the world: but how does it work? Marc Fennell climbs the Great Firewall of China - it's bigger. badder and better than you think. abc.net.au/hungrybeast Written by Marc Fennell Directed by Marc Fennell & Robert Grieves Animation by Robert Grieves Edited by Marc Fennell, Luke Huggett & Robert Grieves
http://wn.com/Great_Firewall_Of_China_HUNGRY_BEAST
Its the largest, most innovative internet censorship programme in the world: but how does it work? Marc Fennell climbs the Great Firewall of China - it's bigger. badder and better than you think. abc.net.au/hungrybeast Written by Marc Fennell Directed by Marc Fennell & Robert Grieves Animation by Robert Grieves Edited by Marc Fennell, Luke Huggett & Robert Grieves
- published: 04 Mar 2010
- views: 159636
- author: abchungrybeast
Republic of China Air Force 中華民國空軍
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 4:34
- Updated: 14 Dec 2012
獻給中華民國空軍
http://wn.com/Republic_of_China_Air_Force_中華民國空軍
TAIWAN(Republic Of China)中華民國國軍MV-2009
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 7:37
- Updated: 09 Dec 2012
身為台灣人,都應該為曾經拿槍保衛過國家而感到驕傲. 建議以HD去觀賞，聲音與畫面配合不會跑掉的很嚴重。
http://wn.com/TAIWANRepublic_Of_China中華民國國軍MV-2009
身為台灣人,都應該為曾經拿槍保衛過國家而感到驕傲. 建議以HD去觀賞，聲音與畫面配合不會跑掉的很嚴重。
- published: 10 May 2009
- views: 65877
- author: twman5566
中華民國國旗歌-- National Banner Song of the Republic of China
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 1:27
- Updated: 14 Dec 2012
中華民國國旗歌National Banner Song of the Republic of China
http://wn.com/中華民國國旗歌-_National_Banner_Song_of_the_Republic_of_China
中華民國國旗歌National Banner Song of the Republic of China
- published: 30 May 2009
- views: 101063
- author: LiouTao
Michael Anti: Behind the Great Firewall of China
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 18:52
- Updated: 14 Dec 2012
Michael Anti (aka Jing Zhao) has been blogging from China for 12 years. Despite the control the central government has over the Internet -- "All the servers are in Beijing" -- he says that hundreds of millions of microbloggers are in fact creating the first national public sphere in the country's history, and shifting the balance of power in unexpected ways. Michael Anti (Zhao Jing), a key figure in China's new journalism, explores the growing power of the Chinese internet. Full bio » www.ted.comTEDTalks is a daily video podcast of the best talks and performances from the TED Conference, where the world's leading thinkers and doers give the talk of their lives in 18 minutes (or less). TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design, and TEDTalks cover these topics as well as science, business, global issues, the arts and more. Find closed captions and translated subtitles in a variety of languages at www.ted.com Follow TED on Twitter: www.twitter.com Like TED on Facebook: www.facebook.com If you have questions or comments about this or other TED videos, please go to support.ted.com
http://wn.com/Michael_Anti_Behind_the_Great_Firewall_of_China
Michael Anti (aka Jing Zhao) has been blogging from China for 12 years. Despite the control the central government has over the Internet -- "All the servers are in Beijing" -- he says that hundreds of millions of microbloggers are in fact creating the first national public sphere in the country's history, and shifting the balance of power in unexpected ways. Michael Anti (Zhao Jing), a key figure in China's new journalism, explores the growing power of the Chinese internet. Full bio » www.ted.comTEDTalks is a daily video podcast of the best talks and performances from the TED Conference, where the world's leading thinkers and doers give the talk of their lives in 18 minutes (or less). TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design, and TEDTalks cover these topics as well as science, business, global issues, the arts and more. Find closed captions and translated subtitles in a variety of languages at www.ted.com Follow TED on Twitter: www.twitter.com Like TED on Facebook: www.facebook.com If you have questions or comments about this or other TED videos, please go to support.ted.com
- published: 30 Jul 2012
- views: 68363
- author: TEDtalksDirector
中華民國建國百年.新版國歌-兒童篇(合唱版) ／Republic of China
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 1:22
- Updated: 05 Dec 2012
編曲：李哲藝導演：李政叡演唱：台北愛樂合唱團演奏：長榮交響樂團中華民國建國百年.新版國歌共分國家建設篇、兒童篇、綜合篇、觀光篇等4個主題， 每個主題又有「合唱版」、「演奏版」共8個版本， 台灣各地風光與重要建設均入鏡， 同時新版國歌融入輕快、歡樂元素， 特別是觀光篇採原住民二部合唱方式呈現，別具獨特風格。 中華民國建國百年.新版國歌系列: www.youtube.com
http://wn.com/中華民國建國百年新版國歌-兒童篇合唱版_／Republic_of_China
編曲：李哲藝導演：李政叡演唱：台北愛樂合唱團演奏：長榮交響樂團中華民國建國百年.新版國歌共分國家建設篇、兒童篇、綜合篇、觀光篇等4個主題， 每個主題又有「合唱版」、「演奏版」共8個版本， 台灣各地風光與重要建設均入鏡， 同時新版國歌融入輕快、歡樂元素， 特別是觀光篇採原住民二部合唱方式呈現，別具獨特風格。 中華民國建國百年.新版國歌系列: www.youtube.com
- published: 28 Dec 2010
- views: 157779
- author: k382box
Nike 6.0 People's Republic of BMX China Trip 2010 NEW!!!.
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 8:19
- Updated: 06 Dec 2012
Garrett Reynolds, Dennis Enarson, Alex Kennedy and Jason Phelan made the trip to score some X Games medals, shred Shanghai/Beijing and ride with the locals as part of the Stoked Tour.
http://wn.com/Nike_60_People's_Republic_of_BMX_China_Trip_2010_NEW!!!
Garrett Reynolds, Dennis Enarson, Alex Kennedy and Jason Phelan made the trip to score some X Games medals, shred Shanghai/Beijing and ride with the locals as part of the Stoked Tour.
- published: 26 Oct 2010
- views: 35302
- author: BMXchannel100
The Great Firewall Of China
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 21:52
- Updated: 12 Dec 2012
May 2008 China has the most sophisticated censorship and internet surveillance in the world. But despite this autocratic control some guerrilla bloggers are still managing to get their message through. "The Government always wants to try to act as the cat to control people's access to information but I think the mouse is running faster." This is the voice of Isaac Mao, he was one of China's earliest bloggers, and has learnt how to work the system. "The Chinese government's goal is not to control one hundred percent of what people are doing one hundred percent of the time," if they are too authoritarian, they will be faced with civil unrest. As CNN correspondent Rebecca MacKinnon points out, "to remain in power they want to prevent certain uses of the internet that might lead to overthrow." Journalists like Zhang Shihe work the gaps in the censorship to broadcast their message, " I rely on my instinct. Am I telling the truth or lies? Am I trying to help improve the situation? I know if I can control this, I'll be fine." He regularly films and comments on rural working conditions, and has as yet avoided jail. But his story is not typical. With about 30 known journalists and 50 internet users known to be behind bars, the Committee to Protect Journalists has branded China "the world's leading jailer of journalists." Produced by ABC Australia Distributed by Journeyman Pictures
http://wn.com/The_Great_Firewall_Of_China
May 2008 China has the most sophisticated censorship and internet surveillance in the world. But despite this autocratic control some guerrilla bloggers are still managing to get their message through. "The Government always wants to try to act as the cat to control people's access to information but I think the mouse is running faster." This is the voice of Isaac Mao, he was one of China's earliest bloggers, and has learnt how to work the system. "The Chinese government's goal is not to control one hundred percent of what people are doing one hundred percent of the time," if they are too authoritarian, they will be faced with civil unrest. As CNN correspondent Rebecca MacKinnon points out, "to remain in power they want to prevent certain uses of the internet that might lead to overthrow." Journalists like Zhang Shihe work the gaps in the censorship to broadcast their message, " I rely on my instinct. Am I telling the truth or lies? Am I trying to help improve the situation? I know if I can control this, I'll be fine." He regularly films and comments on rural working conditions, and has as yet avoided jail. But his story is not typical. With about 30 known journalists and 50 internet users known to be behind bars, the Committee to Protect Journalists has branded China "the world's leading jailer of journalists." Produced by ABC Australia Distributed by Journeyman Pictures
- published: 27 May 2008
- views: 115267
- author: journeymanpictures
香港加入中華民國Hong Kong to Join Republic of China (Remake)
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 2:10
- Updated: 10 Dec 2012
Officially endorsed by the pro-democracy people in Hong Kong. 香港加入中華民國運動已得到全體泛民主派支持。 國旗歌: 山川壯麗， 物產豐隆， 炎黃世冑， 東亞稱雄； 毋自暴自棄， 毋故步自封， 光我民族， 促進大同。 創業維艱， 緬懷諸先烈， 守成不易， 莫徒務近功。 同心同德， 貫徹始終， 青天白日滿地紅； 同心同德， 貫徹始終， 青天白日滿地紅！ In this version, the Communist stars on the flag has been erased and I managed to find more pictures.
http://wn.com/香港加入中華民國Hong_Kong_to_Join_Republic_of_China_Remake
Officially endorsed by the pro-democracy people in Hong Kong. 香港加入中華民國運動已得到全體泛民主派支持。 國旗歌: 山川壯麗， 物產豐隆， 炎黃世冑， 東亞稱雄； 毋自暴自棄， 毋故步自封， 光我民族， 促進大同。 創業維艱， 緬懷諸先烈， 守成不易， 莫徒務近功。 同心同德， 貫徹始終， 青天白日滿地紅； 同心同德， 貫徹始終， 青天白日滿地紅！ In this version, the Communist stars on the flag has been erased and I managed to find more pictures.
- published: 15 Oct 2008
- views: 95296
- author: CaptainCool07
中華民國國旗歌National Flag Anthem of the Republic of China
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 1:11
- Updated: 13 Dec 2012
幾乎要遺忘的國旗歌曲再看到歌詞自然不是孩提時期那種每天要唱的厭惡感現在更能夠感受到那字裡行間與當時創作的時代背景和深遠意義了雖然現在政治惡鬥讓國家一直退步官商勾結讓貧富差距加大無論發生了什麼環境如何敗壞道德怎樣淪喪(今天聽到很瞎的白爛話) 還是有一群真正在為這片土地盡一份心力的好人存在著那群有想法有理念不被誘惑打倒的死硬派！ 無論如何台灣加油中華名國加油從自己做起找回書本裡那簡單的人生價值吧人人都可以成為巴萊只要有勇氣與擔當！ 100歲！ 生日快樂！ 台灣！
http://wn.com/中華民國國旗歌National_Flag_Anthem_of_the_Republic_of_China
幾乎要遺忘的國旗歌曲再看到歌詞自然不是孩提時期那種每天要唱的厭惡感現在更能夠感受到那字裡行間與當時創作的時代背景和深遠意義了雖然現在政治惡鬥讓國家一直退步官商勾結讓貧富差距加大無論發生了什麼環境如何敗壞道德怎樣淪喪(今天聽到很瞎的白爛話) 還是有一群真正在為這片土地盡一份心力的好人存在著那群有想法有理念不被誘惑打倒的死硬派！ 無論如何台灣加油中華名國加油從自己做起找回書本裡那簡單的人生價值吧人人都可以成為巴萊只要有勇氣與擔當！ 100歲！ 生日快樂！ 台灣！
- published: 09 Oct 2011
- views: 55616
- author: BenjaminSe7en
Fallout 3 - Communists invade Republic of Dave
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 2:31
- Updated: 08 Dec 2012
It's war. The Republic of Dave Military: Joint Security Force: Dave, Bob, Rosie (reinforcement). VS The Red Army of Chinese Ghoul Mafia: 10 American-Hating Communist Ghouls.
http://wn.com/Fallout_3_Communists_invade_Republic_of_Dave
It's war. The Republic of Dave Military: Joint Security Force: Dave, Bob, Rosie (reinforcement). VS The Red Army of Chinese Ghoul Mafia: 10 American-Hating Communist Ghouls.
- published: 01 Mar 2009
- views: 116355
- author: agrmonster
Introduction to China in 10 minutes
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 10:19
- Updated: 14 Dec 2012
Produced by: Eno Jin production Facts and research by: David at Randomwire
http://wn.com/Introduction_to_China_in_10_minutes
Produced by: Eno Jin production Facts and research by: David at Randomwire
- published: 20 Oct 2011
- views: 33657
- author: exportakademien
photo: AP / Nick Ut
14 Dec 2012
On November 23, the busiest shopping day of the year in the United States, while most television hosts were asking so-called "shopping experts" how to beat the crowds to get the best deals, Sellers and eight others were being arrested outside of the Paramount store for sitting in the middle of the street and refusing to move ... Over the past six months, I've interviewed a number of workers who've expressed similar sentiments....(size: 23.6Kb)
photo: AP / Jessica Hill
14 Dec 2012
The massacre involved two gunmen at a Connecticut school this morning, prompting the town of Newtown to lock down all of its schools and draw SWAT teams to the school, authorities said today ... Today's shooting occurred at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, about 12 miles east of Danbury ... and immediately began sending emergency units from the western part of the state....(size: 4.5Kb)
photo: AP / Newtown Bee, Shannon Hicks
15 Dec 2012
Twenty schoolchildren were slaughtered by a heavily armed gunman who opened fire at a suburban elementary school in Connecticut on Friday, ultimately killing at least 27 people including himself in the one of the worst mass shootings in US history ... As reports of the shooting spread, panicked parents rushed to the school searching for their children as students covered in blood were being carried out of the building ... Dozens of Shots....(size: 7.5Kb)
photo: AP / Manu Brabo
14 Dec 2012
One of Syria's key allies has admitted for the first time the Assad regime is losing the 20-month ground war ... They follow an attack on Wednesday at the Syrian Ministry of Interior that killed at least 5 people ... Memories of China Part 4- Funeral Dance ... Senior Communist Party of China (CPC) leader Liu Yunshan on Thursday said CPC leaders will be examined regularly on the changes in their work style and the results will be made public....(size: 6.6Kb)
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13 Dec 2012
MOSCOW, December 13 (RIA Novosti) – Syrian rebels behind the kidnapping of Ukrainian journalist Ankhar Kochneva have released a video threatening more attacks on Russians and Ukrainians, as a deadline for her execution approaches on Thursday. Kochneva, a 40-year-old Ukrainian citizen, was abducted in October by Syrian rebels as she traveled to the city of Homs, and has been held there by them since, they claim....(size: 2.1Kb)
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Executive Yuan of the Republic of China (Taiwan)) ... At the invitation of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of China (Taiwan), a six-member delegation from the lower house of the Polish Parliament led by Deputy Speaker Hon ... This noodl was issued by Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of China (Taiwan) and was initially posted at www.mofa.gov.tw....(size: 2.4Kb)
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This article is about the country. For other uses, see Taiwan (disambiguation).
"Republic of China" redirects here. For other uses, see Republic of China (disambiguation).
Taiwan (i/ˌtaɪˈwɑːn/ TY-WAHN; Chinese: 臺灣 or 台灣; pinyin: Táiwān; see below), officially the Republic of China (ROC; Chinese: 中華民國; pinyin: Zhōnghuá Mínguó), is a state in East Asia. Originally based in mainland China, the Republic of China now governs the island of Taiwan (formerly known as Formosa), which forms over 99% of its current territory,[f] as well as Penghu, Kinmen, Matsu, and other minor islands. Neighboring states include the People's Republic of China to the west, Japan to the east and northeast, and the Philippines to the south. Taipei is the capital city and economic and cultural centre of the country,[1] and New Taipei is the most populous city.
The earliest evidence of inhabitation of Taiwan dates back to the late Paleolithic era. The island of Taiwan was mainly inhabited by Taiwanese aborigines before being colonized in the 17th century by the Dutch and the Spanish Empire. The first Han Chinese polity on Taiwan began when Koxinga's troops defeated Dutch forces and established the Kingdom of Tungning. The island was subsequently ruled by the Qing Dynasty after the kingdom's defeat in the Battle of Penghu in 1683, a period that lasted for over 200 years. Following Japan's victory over the Qing Dynasty in the first Sino-Japanese war, Taiwan was ceded to Japan under the Treaty of Shimonoseki in 1895.
The Republic of China was established in mainland China in 1912 and governed varying amounts of the mainland until 1949. At the end of World War II, Japan surrendered Taiwan and associated islands to ROC forces. When Communist forces took control of mainland China and founded the People's Republic of China (PRC) in 1949, the ROC government moved to Taiwan. Since the founding of the PRC, international recognition of the ROC has gradually eroded as most countries switched recognition to the PRC. In 1971, the PRC assumed China's seat at the United Nations. Only 23 states now recognize the ROC as a sovereign state and maintain formal diplomatic relations with it.
Officially, the ROC government still claims sovereignty over all of "China", in a definition that includes mainland China and Mongolia, as well as Taiwan, via the ROC Constitution[21] but has not made retaking the mainland a political goal since 1992.[22] However, the government's stance on whether "retaking" or "reuniting" with China is desired or whether Taiwan and China are separate countries or are regions of one country depends on the which administration is in power (See Politics below). Meanwhile, the PRC also officially asserts itself to be the sole legal representation of China and actively claims Taiwan to be under its sovereignty, denying the status and existence of ROC as a sovereign state. It has not renounced the use of force as a response to any formal declaration of Taiwanese independence, or if it deems peaceful reunification no longer possible.[23] Cross-strait relations between Taiwan and China as well as issues of national identity within the country are important factors in Taiwanese politics and a cause of social and political division among political parties and their respective supporters.
In the 1980s and early 1990s, Taiwan evolved into a multi-party democracy with universal suffrage. Building on the infrastructure and education improvements initiated during the Japanese era, Taiwan has experienced rapid economic growth and industrialization during the latter half of the 20th century and is now an advanced industrial economy. It is one of the Four Asian Tigers and a member of the WTO and APEC. The 19th-largest economy in the world,[24][25] its advanced technology industry plays a key role in the global economy. Taiwan is ranked highly in terms of freedom of the press, health care,[26] public education, economic freedom, and human development.[e][19][27]
Contents |
[edit] Names
Main article: Names of the Republic of China
See also: Chinese Taipei
There are various names of the island of Taiwan in use today, derived from explorers or rulers by each particular period. The former name "Formosa" dates from 1544, when Portuguese sailors sighted the main island of Taiwan and named it Ilha Formosa, which means "Beautiful Island".[28] In the early 17th century, the Dutch East India Company established a commercial post at Fort Zeelandia (modern Anping, Tainan) on a coastal islet called "Tayouan" in the local Siraya language; the name was later extended to the whole island as "Taiwan".[29] Historically, "Taiwan" has also been written as 大灣, 臺員, 大員, 臺圓, 大圓 and 臺窩灣. Historically, the Japanese called Taiwan 高砂国 (State of Takasago) or 高砂 (Takasago).
The official name of the state is the "Republic of China"; it has also been known under various names throughout its existence. Shortly after the ROC's establishment in 1912, while it was still located on the Asian mainland, the government used the abbreviation "China" ("Zhongguó") to refer to itself. During the 1950s and 1960s, it was common to refer to it as "Nationalist China" to differentiate it from "Communist China" (or "Red China").[30] It was present at the UN under the name "China" until 1971, when it lost its seat to the People's Republic of China. Since then, the name "China" has been commonly used internationally to refer only to the People's Republic of China.[31] Over subsequent decades, the Republic of China has become commonly known as "Taiwan", after the island that composes most of its territory. The Republic of China participates in most international forums and organizations under the name "Chinese Taipei" due to diplomatic pressure from the PRC. For instance, it is the name under which it has competed at the Olympic Games since 1979, and its name as an observer at the World Health Organization. Additionally, the PRC refers to Taiwan as "Taiwan, China" in pursuit of its sovereignty claim.
History[link]
Main article: History of Taiwan
Evidence of inhabitation on Taiwan dates back to the late Paleolithic era. Organized control of parts of Taiwan was first established by the Dutch East India Company in the 17th century and from 1683, Taiwan was placed under Qing rule until its cession to Japan in 1895, in the aftermath of the First Sino-Japanese War.
On mainland China, the rule of Qing Dynasty ended when the Republic of China was formally established in 1912. The early years of the nation were rife with fights for power among factions. From the latter half of the 1920s, rivalry intensified between the ruling Kuomintang and the Communist Party of China, eventually leading to the Chinese Civil War.
In 1945, after the end of World War II, Taiwan was surrendered to ROC forces. In 1949, the central government of the ROC evacuated to Taiwan after it lost the civil war to the communists. The government on Taiwan was authoritarian until gradual liberalization from the mid-1980s onwards.
Aboriginal Taiwan[link]
Main article: Prehistory of Taiwan
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Taiwan was joined to the Asian mainland in the Late Pleistocene, until sea levels rose about 10,000 years ago. Fragmentary human remains have been found on the island, dated 20,000 to 30,000 years ago, as well as later artifacts of a Paleolithic culture.[32][33][34]
More than 4,000 years ago farmers from mainland China, believed to be the ancestors of current Taiwanese aborigines, settled on Taiwan. Their languages belong to the Austronesian language family, which also includes the Malayo-Polynesian languages spanning a huge area from Madagascar to Easter Island. The aboriginal languages on Taiwan show much greater diversity than the rest of Austronesian put together, leading linguists to propose Taiwan as the Urheimat of the family, from which sea-faring peoples dispersed across southeast Asia and the Pacific and Indian Oceans.[35][36]
Han Chinese began settling in the Penghu islands in the 13th century, but Taiwan's hostile tribes and its lack of trade resources valued in that era rendered it unattractive to all but "occasional adventurers or fishermen engaging in barter" until the 16th century.[37]
Opening in the 17th century[link]
The Dutch East India Company attempted to establish a trading outpost on the Penghu Islands (Pescadores) in 1622, but were driven off by the Ming authorities.[38] In 1624, the Company established a stronghold called Fort Zeelandia on an coastal islet of Tayouan, which is now part of the main island at Anping, Tainan.[29] David Wright, a Scottish agent of the Company who lived on the island in the 1650s, described the lowland areas of the island as being divided among 11 chiefdoms ranging in size from two settlements to 72. Some of these fell under Dutch control while others remained independent.[29][39] The Company began to import laborers from Fujian and Penghu (Pescadores), many of whom settled.[38]
In 1626, the Spanish landed on and occupied northern Taiwan, at the ports of Keelung and Tamsui, as a base to extend their trading. This colonial period lasted sixteen years until 1642, when the last Spanish fortress fell to Dutch forces.
Following the fall of the Ming Dynasty, Koxinga (Zheng Chenggong), a self-styled Ming loyalist, arrived on the island and captured Fort Zeelandia in 1662, expelling the Dutch government and military from the island. Koxinga established the Kingdom of Tungning (1662–1683), with his capital at Tainan. He and his heirs, Zheng Jing, who ruled from 1662 to 1682, and Zheng Keshuang, who ruled less than a year, continued to launch raids on the south-east coast of mainland China well into the Qing Dynasty.[38]
Qing rule[link]
Main article: Taiwan under Qing Dynasty rule
In 1683, following the defeat of Koxinga's grandson by an armada led by Admiral Shi Lang of southern Fujian, the Qing formally annexed Taiwan, placing it under the jurisdiction of Fujian province. The Qing imperial government tried to reduce piracy and vagrancy in the area, issuing a series of edicts to manage immigration and respect aboriginal land rights. Immigrants mostly from southern Fujian continued to enter Taiwan. The border between taxpaying lands and "savage" lands shifted eastward, with some aborigines becoming Sinicized while others retreated into the mountains. During this time, there were a number of conflicts between Chinese from different regions of southern Fujian, and between southern Fujian Chinese and aborigines.[28]
Northern Taiwan and the Penghu Islands were the scene of subsidiary campaigns in the Sino-French War (August 1884 to April 1885). The French occupied Keelung on 1 October 1884, but were repulsed from Tamsui a few days later. The French won some tactical victories but were unable to exploit them and the Keelung Campaign ended in stalemate. The Pescadores Campaign, beginning on 31 March 1885, was a French victory, but had no long-term consequences. The French evacuated both Keelung and the Penghu archipelago after the end of the war.
In 1885, the Qing redesignated Taiwan Prefecture of Fujian as Taiwan Province, the twentieth in the empire, with its capital at Taipei.[28] This was accompanied by a modernization drive that included building Taiwan's first railroad and starting a postal service.[40]
Japanese rule[link]
Main articles: Taiwan under Japanese rule and Republic of Formosa
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The Qing Dynasty was defeated in the First Sino-Japanese War (1894–1895) and Taiwan and Penghu were ceded in full sovereignty to the Empire of Japan. Inhabitants wishing to remain Qing subjects were given a two-year grace period to sell their property and move to mainland China. Very few Taiwanese saw this as feasible.[41] On 25 May 1895, a group of pro-Qing high officials proclaimed the Republic of Formosa to resist impending Japanese rule. Japanese forces entered the capital at Tainan and quelled this resistance on 21 October 1895.[42]
Japanese rule was instrumental in the industrialization of the island, extending the railroads and other transportation networks, building an extensive sanitation system and establishing a formal education system.[43] Japanese rule ended the practice of headhunting.[44] During this period, both rice and sugarcane production greatly increased. By 1939, Taiwan was the seventh greatest sugar producer in the world.[45] Still, the Taiwanese and aborigines were classified as second- and third-class citizens. After supressing Chinese guerillas in the first decade of their rule, Japanese authorites engaged in a series of bloody campaigns against the mountain aboriginals, culminating in the Wushe Incident of 1930.[46]
Around 1935, the Japanese began an island-wide assimilation project to bind the island more firmly to the Japanese Empire and people were taught to see themselves as Japanese. During World War II, tens of thousands of Taiwanese served in the Japanese military.[47] For example, former ROC President Lee Teng-hui's elder brother served in the Japanese navy and died while on duty in the Philippines in February 1945. The Imperial Japanese Navy operated heavily out of Taiwanese ports. The "South Strike Group" was based at the Taihoku Imperial University in Taipei. Many of the Japanese forces participating in the Aerial Battle of Taiwan-Okinawa were based in Taiwan. Important Japanese military bases and industrial centers throughout Taiwan, like Kaohsiung, were targets of heavy American bombing.[48]
In 1938 there were 309,000 Japanese settlers in Taiwan.[49] After World War II, most of the Japanese were repatriated to Japan.
After World War II[link]
Further information: Taiwan after World War II and Taiwan Strait Crisis
On 25 October 1945, the US Navy ferried ROC troops to Taiwan in order to accept the formal surrender of Japanese military forces in Taipei (then called "Taihoku"). General Rikichi Andō, governor-general of Taiwan and commander-in-chief of all Japanese forces on the island, signed the instrument of surrender and handed it over to General Chen Yi of the ROC military to complete the official turnover. Chen Yi proclaimed that day to be "Retrocession Day of Taiwan," but the Allies considered Taiwan and the Penghu Islands to be under military occupation but still under Japanese sovereignty until 1952.[50][51]
The ROC administration of Taiwan under Chen Yi was strained by increasing tensions between Taiwanese and mainlanders, which were compounded by economic woes, such as hyperinflation. Furthermore, cultural and linguistic conflicts between Taiwanese and the mainland Chinese quickly led to the loss of popular support for the new government.[52] The shooting of a civilian on 28 February 1947 triggered island-wide unrest, which was suppressed with military force in what is now called the 228 Incident. Mainstream estimates of the number killed range from 18,000 to 30,000, mainly Taiwanese elites.[53][54]
Chinese Nationalist one-party rule[link]
Main articles: Republic of China (1912–1949) and Nationalist Government
After the end of World War II, the Chinese Civil War resumed between the Chinese Nationalists (Kuomintang), led by Chiang Kai-shek, and the Chinese Communist Party, led by Mao Zedong. By 1949, a series of Chinese Communist offensives led to the defeat of the Nationalist army, and the Communists founded the People's Republic of China on 1 October.[55]
In December 1949, Chiang evacuated his government to Taiwan and made Taipei the temporary capital of the ROC (also called the "wartime capital" by Chiang Kai-shek).[56] Some 2 million people, consisting mainly of soldiers, members of the ruling Kuomintang party and the intellectual and business elites, were evacuated from mainland China to Taiwan at that time, adding to the earlier population of approximately six million. In addition, the ROC government took to Taipei many national treasures including China's gold reserves and foreign currency reserves.[57][58][59]
From this point onwards, the Kuomintang was reduced to control of Taiwan, Kinmen, Matsu Islands, and two major islands of Dongsha Islands and Nansha Islands. The Kuomintang continued to claim sovereignty over all "China", which it defined to include mainland China, Taiwan, Outer Mongolia and other areas. On mainland China, the victorious Communists claimed they ruled the sole and only China (which they claimed included Taiwan) and that the Republic of China no longer existed.[60]
Martial law, declared on Taiwan in May 1949,[61] continued to be in effect after the central government relocated to Taiwan. It was not repealed until 1987,[61] and was used as a way to suppress the political opposition in the intervening years.[62] During the White Terror, as the period is known, 140,000 people were imprisoned or executed for being perceived as anti-KMT or pro-Communist.[63] Many citizens were arrested, tortured, imprisoned and executed for their real or perceived opposition to the Kuomintang. Since these people were mainly from the intellectual and social elite, an entire generation of political and social leaders was decimated. It was not until 2008 that a public apology was made for those actions. No form of restitution or compensation has been made as of 2010.[64]
From this period through the 1980s, Taiwan was governed under the "Temporary Provisions Effective During the Period of Communist Rebellion". During this period of one-party rule, little distinction was made between the government and the Kuomintang, with public property, government property, and party property being largely interchangeable. Government workers and party members were mostly indistinguishable, with many government workers required to become KMT members, and party workers paid salaries and promised retirement benefits along the lines of government employees. In addition, the creation of other parties was outlawed, and many political opponents were persecuted and incarcerated.[citation needed]
Initially, the United States abandoned the KMT and expected that Taiwan would fall to the Communists. However, in 1950 the conflict between North Korea and South Korea, which had been ongoing since the Japanese withdrawal in 1945, escalated into full-blown war, and in the context of the Cold War, US President Harry S. Truman intervened again and dispatched the 7th Fleet into the Taiwan Straits to prevent hostilities between Taiwan and mainland China.[65] In the Treaty of San Francisco and the Treaty of Taipei, which came into force respectively on 28 April 1952 and 5 August 1952, Japan formally renounced all right, claim and title to Taiwan and Penghu, and renounced all treaties signed with China before 1942. Neither treaty specified to whom sovereignty over the islands should be transferred, because the United States and the United Kingdom disagreed on whether the ROC or the PRC was the legitimate government of China.[66] Continuing conflict of the Chinese Civil War through the 1950s, and intervention by the United States notably resulted in legislation such as the Sino-American Mutual Defense Treaty and the Formosa Resolution of 1955.
As the Chinese Civil War continued without truce, the government built up military fortifications throughout Taiwan. Within this effort, former KMT soldiers built the now famous Central Cross-Island Highway through the Taroko Gorge in the 1950s. The two sides would continue to engage in sporadic military clashes with seldom publicized details well into the 1960s on the nearby islands with an unknown number of night raids. During the Second Taiwan Strait Crisis in September 1958, Taiwan's landscape saw Nike-Hercules missile batteries added, with the formation of the 1st Missile Battalion Chinese Army that would not be deactivated until 1997. Newer generations of missile batteries have since replaced the Nike Hercules systems throughout the island.
During the 1960s and 1970s, the ROC maintained an authoritarian, single-party government while its economy became industrialized and technology oriented. This rapid economical growth, known as the Taiwan Miracle, was the result of a fiscal regime independent from mainland China and backed up, among others, by the support of US funds and demand for Taiwanese products.[67][68] In the 1970s, Taiwan was economically the second fastest growing state in Asia after Japan.[69] Taiwan, along with Hong Kong, South Korea and Singapore, became known as one of the Four Asian Tigers. Because of the Cold War, most Western nations and the United Nations regarded the ROC as the sole legitimate government of China until the 1970s. Later, especially after the termination of the Sino-American Mutual Defense Treaty, most nations switched diplomatic recognition to the PRC (see United Nations General Assembly Resolution 2758).
Up until the 1970s, the government was regarded by Western critics as undemocratic for upholding martial law, for severely repressing any political opposition and for controlling media. The KMT did not allow the creation of new parties and those that existed did not seriously compete with the KMT. Thus, competitive democratic elections did not exist.[70][71][72][73][74] From the late 1970s to the 1990s, however, Taiwan went through reforms and social changes that transformed it from an authoritarian state to a democracy. In 1979, a pro-democracy protest known as the Kaohsiung Incident took place in Kaohsiung to celebrate Human Rights Day. Although the protest was rapidly crushed by the authorities, it is today considered as the main event that united Taiwan's opposition.[75]
Democratization[link]
Main article: Democratic reforms
Chiang Ching-kuo, Chiang Kai-shek's son and successor as the president, began to liberalize the political system in the mid-1980s. In 1984, the younger Chiang selected Lee Teng-hui, an ethnically Taiwanese and U.S.-educated technocrat, to be his vice president. In 1986, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) was formed and inaugurated as the first opposition party in Taiwan to counter the KMT. A year later Chiang Ching-kuo lifted martial law. With the advent of democratization, the issue of the political status of Taiwan has resurfaced as a controversial issue (previously, discussion of anything other than unification under the ROC was taboo).
After the death of Chiang Ching-kuo in January 1988, Lee Teng-hui succeeded him and became the first ethnically Taiwanese president of the ROC. Lee continued to democratize the government and decrease the concentration of government authority in the hands of mainland Chinese. Under Lee, Taiwan underwent a process of localization in which Taiwanese culture and history were promoted over a pan-China viewpoint in contrast to earlier KMT policies which had promoted a Chinese identity. Lee's reforms included printing banknotes from the Central Bank rather than the Provincial Bank of Taiwan, and streamlining the Taiwan Provincial Government with most of its functions transferred to the Executive Yuan. Under Lee, the original members of the Legislative Yuan and National Assembly, elected in 1947 to represent mainland Chinese constituencies and having held the seats without re-election for more than four decades, were forced to resign in 1991. The previously nominal representation in the Legislative Yuan was brought to an end, reflecting the reality that the ROC had no jurisdiction over mainland China, and vice versa. Restrictions on the use of Taiwanese Hokkien in the broadcast media and in schools were also lifted.
Democratic reforms continued in the 1990s, with Lee Teng-hui re-elected in 1996, in the first direct presidential election in the history of the ROC.[76] During the later years of Lee's administration, he was involved in corruption controversies relating to government release of land and weapons purchase, although no legal proceedings commenced. In 2000, Chen Shui-bian of the DPP was elected as the first non-KMT President and was re-elected to serve his second and last term since 2004. Polarized politics has emerged in Taiwan with the formation of the Pan-Blue Coalition of parties led by the KMT, favoring eventual Chinese reunification, and the Pan-Green Coalition of parties led by the DPP, favoring an eventual and official declaration of Taiwan independence.
On 30 September 2007, the ruling Democratic Progressive Party approved a resolution asserting a separate identity from China and called for the enactment of a new constitution for a "normal country". It also called for general use of "Taiwan" as the country's name, without abolishing its formal name, the Republic of China.[77] The Chen administration also pushed for referendums on national defense and UN entry in the 2004 and 2008 elections, which failed due to voter turnout below the required legal threshold of 50% of all registered voters.[78] The Chen administration was dogged by public concerns over reduced economic growth, legislative gridlock due to a pan-blue, opposition-controlled Legislative Yuan and corruption involving the First Family as well as government officials.[79][80]
The KMT increased its majority in the Legislative Yuan in the January 2008 legislative elections, while its nominee Ma Ying-jeou went on to win the presidency in March of the same year, campaigning on a platform of increased economic growth, and better ties with the PRC under a policy of "mutual nondenial".[78] Ma took office on 20 May 2008. Part of the rationale for campaigning for closer economic ties with the PRC stem from the strong economic growth China attained since joining the World Trade Organization. However, some analysts say that despite the election of Ma Ying-jeou, the diplomatic and military tensions with the PRC have not been reduced.[81]
Geography[link]
Main article: Geography of Taiwan
The island of Taiwan lies some 180 kilometers off the southeastern coast of China, across the Taiwan Strait, and has an area of 35,883 km2 (13,855 sq mi).[16] The East China Sea lies to the north, the Philippine Sea to the east, the Luzon Strait directly to the south and the South China Sea to the southwest.[82] The shape of the main island of Taiwan is similar to a sweet potato seen in a south-to-north direction, and therefore, Taiwanese, especially the Min-nan division, often call themselves "children of the Sweet Potato."[83]
The island is characterized by the contrast between the eastern two-thirds, consisting mostly of rugged mountains running in five ranges from the northern to the southern tip of the island, and the flat to gently rolling Chianan Plains in the west that are also home to most of Taiwan's population. Taiwan's highest point is Yu Shan (Jade Mountain) at 3,952 meters, and there are five other peaks over 3,500 meters.[82] This makes it the world's fourth-highest island.[84]
Taiwan lies on the Tropic of Cancer, and its climate is marine tropical.[85] The northern part of the island has a rainy season that lasts from January through late March during the northeast monsoon, and experiences meiyu in May.[86] The entire island experiences hot, humid weather from June through September. The middle and southern parts of the island do not have an extended monsoon season during the winter months. Typhoons are common between July and October.[82][87]
The Penghu Islands, 50 km west of the main island, have an area of 126.9 km2 (49.0 sq mi). More distant islands controlled by the Republic of China are the Kinmen, Wuchiu and Matsu Islands off the coast of Fujian, with a total area of 180.5 km2 (69.7 sq mi), and the Pratas Islands and Taiping Island in the South China Sea, with a total area of 2.9 km2 (1.1 sq mi) and no permanent inhabitants.[16]
Geology[link]
Main article: Geology of Taiwan
The island of Taiwan lies in a complex tectonic area between the Yangtze Plate to the west and north, the Okinawa Plate on the north-east, and the Philippine Mobile Belt on the east and south. The upper part of the crust on the island is primarily made up of a series of terranes, mostly old island arcs which have been forced together by the collision of the forerunners of the Eurasian Plate and the Philippine Sea Plate. These have been further uplifted as a result of the detachment of a portion of the Eurasian Plate as it was subducted beneath remnants of the Philippine Sea Plate, a process which left the crust under Taiwan more buoyant.[88]
The east and south of Taiwan are a complex system of belts formed by, and part of the zone of, active collision between the North Luzon Trough portion of the Luzon Volcanic Arc and South China, where accreted portions of the Luzon Arc and Luzon forearc form the eastern Coastal Range and parallel inland Longitudinal Valley of Taiwan respectively.[89]
The major seismic faults in Taiwan correspond to the various suture zones between the various terranes. These have produced major quakes throughout the history of the island. On 21 September 1999, a 7.3 quake known as the "921 earthquake" killed more than 2,400 people. The seismic hazard map for Taiwan by the USGS shows 9/10 of the island as the highest rating (most hazardous).[90]
Political and legal status[link]
Main articles: Political status of Taiwan and Legal status of Taiwan
The political and legal status of Taiwan is a contentious issue. The People's Republic of China (PRC) claims that the Republic of China government is illegitimate, referring to it as the "Taiwan Authority". The ROC, however, with its own constitution, independently elected president and a large army, continues to view itself as an independent sovereign state. The territory of Taiwan has never been controlled by the PRC.[91][92] Internationally, there is controversy on whether the ROC still exists as a state or a defunct state per international law due to the loss of membership / recognition in the United Nations and lack of wide diplomatic recognition. According to a poll taken by the TVBS in 2010, the majority of Taiwanese residents—64%—opt for the status quo (i.e. no independence, no unification with mainland China), while 19% favor independence and 5% unification.[93]
Relations with the PRC[link]
See also: Cross-Strait relations
The political environment is complicated by the potential for military conflict should overt actions toward independence or reunification be taken. It is the official PRC policy to use force to ensure reunification if peaceful reunification is no longer possible, as stated in its anti-secession law, and for this reason there are substantial military installations on the Fujian coast.[94][95] Although more recently the PRC has conducted to promote peaceful relation with the current ROC government and aimed at gradual reunification.
The PRC supports a version of the One-China policy, which states that Taiwan and mainland China are both part of China, and that the PRC is the only legitimate government of China. It uses this policy to prevent the international recognition of the ROC as an independent sovereign state. For its part, the People's Republic of China appears to find the retention of the name "Republic of China" more acceptable than an official declaration of an independent Taiwan. With the rise of the Taiwanese independence movement, the name "Taiwan" has been employed increasingly often on the island.[96]
Foreign relations[link]
Main article: Foreign relations of the Republic of China
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Before 1928, the foreign policy of Republican China was complicated by a lack of internal unity—competing centers of power all claimed legitimacy. This situation changed after the defeat of the Peiyang Government by the Kuomintang, which led to widespread diplomatic recognition of the Republic of China.[97]
After the KMT's retreat to Taiwan, most countries, notably the countries in the Western Bloc, continued to maintain relations with the ROC. Due to diplomatic pressure, recognition gradually eroded and many countries switched recognition to the PRC in the 1970s.
The PRC refuses to have diplomatic relations with any nation that recognizes the ROC, and requires all nations with which it has diplomatic relations to make a statement recognizing its claims to Taiwan.[98] As a result, there are only 23 states that have official diplomatic relations with the Republic of China. In practice, most countries view the ROC as an independent state and as such maintain unofficial relations with it.[99]
The ROC maintains unofficial relations with most countries via de facto embassies and consulates called Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Offices (TECRO), with branch offices called "Taipei Economic and Cultural Offices" (TECO). Both TECRO and TECO are "unofficial commercial entities" of the ROC in charge of maintaining diplomatic relations, providing consular services (i.e. visa applications), and serving the national interests of the ROC in other countries.[100]
File:Taiwanarmspic1.jpg
F-16 fighters sold to the ROC by the United States
The United States is one of the main allies of the ROC and, since the Taiwan Relations Act passed in 1979, the United States has sold arms and provided military training to the Republic of China Armed Forces.[101] This situation continues to be an issue for the People's Republic of China which considers US involvement disruptive to the stability of the region. In January 2010, the Obama administration announced its intention to sell $6.4 billion worth of military hardware to Taiwan. As a consequence, the PRC threatened the US with economic sanctions and warned that their cooperation on international and regional issues could suffer.[102]
The official position of the United States is that the PRC is expected to "use no force or threat[en] to use force against Taiwan" and the ROC is to "exercise prudence in managing all aspects of Cross-Strait relations." Both are to refrain from performing actions or espousing statements "that would unilaterally alter Taiwan's status."[103]
Participation in international events and organizations[link]
The ROC was a founding member of the United Nations and held the seat of China on the Security Council and other UN bodies until 1971, when it was expelled by General Assembly Resolution 2758 and replaced in all UN organs with the PRC. Each year since 1992, the ROC has petitioned the UN for entry but its applications have not made it past committee.[104]
Due to its limited international recognition, the Republic of China is a member of the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization, represented by a government-funded organization, the Taiwan Foundation for Democracy (TFD) under the name "Taiwan".[105][106]
Also due to its One China policy, the PRC only participates in international organizations where the ROC is not recognized as a sovereign country. Most member states, including the United States, do not wish to discuss the issue of the ROC's political status for fear of souring diplomatic ties with the PRC.[107] However, both the US and Japan publicly support the ROC's bid for membership in the World Health Organization as an observer.[108] However, though the ROC has applied for WHO membership every year since 1997 under various denominations, their efforts have consistently been blocked by PRC.
Due to PRC pressure, the ROC is forced to use the name "Chinese Taipei" in international events such as the Olympic Games where the PRC is also a party.[109] The ROC is typically barred from using its national anthem and national flag in international events due to PRC pressure; ROC spectators attending events such as the Olympics are often barred from bringing ROC flags into venues.[110] The ROC is able to participate as "China" in organizations that the PRC does not participate in, such as the World Organization of the Scout Movement.
Opinions within Taiwan[link]
See also: Taiwan independence and Chinese reunification
Within Taiwan, opinions are polarized between those supporting unification, represented by the Pan-Blue Coalition of parties, and those supporting independence, represented by the Pan-Green Coalition.
The KMT, the largest Pan-Blue party, supports the status quo for the indefinite future with a stated ultimate goal of unification. However, it does not support unification in the short term with the PRC as such a prospect would be unacceptable to most of its members and the public.[111] Ma Ying-jeou, chairman of the KMT and the incumbent president of the ROC, has set out democracy, economic development to a level near that of Taiwan, and equitable wealth distribution as the conditions that the PRC must fulfill for reunification to occur.[112]
The DPP, the largest Pan-Green party, officially seeks independence, but in practice also supports the status quo because its members and the public would not accept the risk of provoking the PRC.[113][114]
Former President Chen Shui-bian of the Democratic Progressive Party stated during his years of administration that any decision should be decided through a public referendum of the people of the ROC. Both parties' current foreign policy positions support actively advocating ROC participation in international organizations, but while the KMT accepts the One-China principle, the DPP encourages the participation of Taiwan as a sovereign state.
On 2 September 2008, El Sol de México asked President Ma about his views on the subject of "two Chinas" and if there was a solution for the sovereignty issues between the two. The president replied that the relations are neither between two Chinas nor two states. It is a special relationship. Further, he stated that the sovereignty issues between the two cannot be resolved at present, but he quoted the "1992 Consensus", currently accepted by both the Kuomingtang and the Communist Party of China, as a temporary measure until a solution becomes available.[115]
The relationship with the PRC and the related issues of Taiwanese independence and Chinese reunification continue to dominate politics.[116] For any particular resolution, public favor shifts greatly with small changes in wording, illustrating the complexity of public opinion on the topic.[citation needed]
Government[link]
Main article: Government of the Republic of China
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The government of the Republic of China was founded on the Constitution of the ROC and its Three Principles of the People, which states that the ROC "shall be a democratic republic of the people, to be governed by the people and for the people."[117] The government is divided into five administrative branches (Yuan): the Executive Yuan (cabinet), the Legislative Yuan, the Judicial Yuan, the Control Yuan (audit agency), and the Examination Yuan (civil service examination agency). The Pan-Blue Coalition and Pan-Green Coalition are presently the dominant political blocs in the Republic of China.
The head of state and commander-in-chief of the armed forces is the president, who is elected by popular vote for a maximum of 2 four-year terms on the same ticket as the vice-president. The president has authority over the Yuan. The president appoints the members of the Executive Yuan as his cabinet, including a premier, who is officially the President of the Executive Yuan; members are responsible for policy and administration.[117]
The main legislative body is the unicameral Legislative Yuan with 113 seats. Seventy-three are elected by popular vote from single-member constituencies; thirty-four are elected based on the proportion of nationwide votes received by participating political parties in a separate party list ballot; and six are elected from two three-member aboriginal constituencies. Members serve four-year terms. Originally the unicameral National Assembly, as a standing constitutional convention and electoral college, held some parliamentary functions, but the National Assembly was abolished in 2005 with the power of constitutional amendments handed over to the Legislative Yuan and all eligible voters of the Republic via referendums.[117]
The premier is selected by the president without the need for approval from the legislature, but the legislature can pass laws without regard for the president, as neither he nor the Premier wields veto power.[117] Thus, there is little incentive for the president and the legislature to negotiate on legislation if they are of opposing parties. After the election of the pan-Green's Chen Shui-bian as President in 2000, legislation repeatedly stalled because of deadlock with the Legislative Yuan, which was controlled by a pan-Blue majority.[118] Historically, the ROC has been dominated by strongman single party politics. This legacy has resulted in executive powers currently being concentrated in the office of the president rather than the premier, even though the constitution does not explicitly state the extent of the president's executive power.[119]
The Judicial Yuan is the highest judicial organ. It interprets the constitution and other laws and decrees, judges administrative suits, and disciplines public functionaries. The president and vice-president of the Judicial Yuan and additional thirteen justices form the Council of Grand Justices.[120] They are nominated and appointed by the president, with the consent of the Legislative Yuan. The highest court, the Supreme Court, consists of a number of civil and criminal divisions, each of which is formed by a presiding judge and four associate judges, all appointed for life. In 1993, a separate constitutional court was established to resolve constitutional disputes, regulate the activities of political parties and accelerate the democratization process. There is no trial by jury but the right to a fair public trial is protected by law and respected in practice; many cases are presided over by multiple judges.[117]
Like most Asian democracies, Taiwan still allows for capital punishment. Efforts have been made by the government to reduce the number of executions, although they have not been able to completely abolish the punishment. As of 2006, about 80% of Taiwanese want to keep the death penalty.[121]
The Control Yuan is a watchdog agency that monitors (controls) the actions of the executive. It can be considered a standing commission for administrative inquiry and can be compared to the Court of Auditors of the European Union or the Government Accountability Office of the United States.[117] The Control Yuan is sometimes also compared to an ombudsman or national human rights institution.[citation needed] The Examination Yuan is in charge of validating the qualification of civil servants. It is based on the old imperial examination system used in pre-modern China. It can be compared to the European Personnel Selection Office of the European Union or the Office of Personnel Management of the United States.[117]
Politics[link]
Main article: Politics of the Republic of China
See also: Elections in the Republic of China and Human rights in Taiwan
The constitution of the Republic of China was drafted before the fall of mainland China to the Communists. It was created by the KMT for the purpose of all of its claimed territory, including Taiwan, even though the Chinese Communist party boycotted the drafting of the constitution. The constitution went into effect on 25 December 1947.[122]
The ROC remained under martial law from 1948 until 1987 and much of the constitution was not in effect. Political reforms beginning in the late 1970s and continuing through the early 1990s liberalized the country and transformed into a multiparty democracy. Since the lifting of martial law, the Republic of China has democratized and reformed, suspending constitutional components that were originally meant for the whole of China. This process of amendment continues. In 2000, the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) won the presidency, ending KMT's continuous control of the government. In May 2005, a new National Assembly was elected to reduce the number of parliamentary seats and implement several constitutional reforms. These reforms have been passed; the National Assembly has essentially voted to abolish itself and transfer the power of constitutional reform to the popular ballot.[123]
Major camps[link]
Emblem of the Democratic Progressive Party, the main Pan-Green Coalition party.
Emblem of the Kuomintang, the main Pan-Blue Coalition party.
The tension between the PRC and Taiwan colors most of the political life, and any government move towards "Taiwan independence" is met by threat of military attack from the PRC.[124] The PRC's official policy is to reunify Taiwan and mainland China under the formula of "one country, two systems" and refuses to renounce the use of military force, especially should Taiwan seek a declaration of independence.[125]
The political scene is generally divided into two major camps in terms of views on how Taiwan should relate to China or the PRC, referred to as Cross-Strait relations. It is the main political difference between two camps: the Pan-Blue Coalition, composed of the pro-unification Kuomintang, People First Party (PFP), and New Party, who believe that the ROC is the sole legitimate government of "China" (including Taiwan) and supports eventual Chinese reunification. The opposition Pan-Green Coalition is composed of the pro-independence Democratic Progressive Party and Taiwan Solidarity Union (TSU). It regards Taiwan as an independent, sovereign state synonymous with the ROC, opposes the definition that Taiwan is part of "China", and seeks wide diplomatic recognition and an eventual declaration of formal Taiwan independence.[126] The Pan-Green camp tends to favor emphasizing the Republic of China as being a distinct country from the People's Republic of China. Thus, in September 2007, the then ruling Democratic Progressive Party approved a resolution asserting separate identity from China and called for the enactment of a new constitution for a "normal country". It called also for general use of "Taiwan" as the country's name, without abolishing its formal name, the "Republic of China".[127] Some members of the coalition, such as former President Chen Shui-bian, argue that it is unnecessary to proclaim independence because "Taiwan is already an independent, sovereign country" and the Republic of China is the same as Taiwan.[128] Despite being a member of KMT prior to and during his presidency, Lee Teng-hui also held a similar view and was a supporter of the Taiwanization movement.[129]
Pan-Blue members generally support the concept of the One-China policy, which states that there is only one China and that its only government is the ROC. They favor eventual re-unification of China.[130] The more mainstream Pan-Blue position is to lift investment restrictions and pursue negotiations with the PRC to immediately open direct transportation links. Regarding independence, the mainstream Pan-Blue position is to maintain the status quo, while refusing immediate reunification.[111] President Ma Ying-jeou stated that there will be no unification nor declaration of independence during his presidency.[131][132] As of 2009, Pan-Blue members usually seek to improve relationships with mainland China, with a current focus on improving economic ties.[133]
Current political issues[link]
The dominant political issue in Taiwan is its relationship with the PRC. For almost 60 years, there were no direct transportation links, including direct flights, between Taiwan and mainland China. This was a problem for many Taiwanese businesses that had opened factories or branches in mainland China. The former DPP administration feared that such links would lead to tighter economic and political integration with mainland China, and in the 2006 Lunar New Year Speech, President Chen Shui-bian called for managed opening of links. Direct weekend charter flights between Taiwan and mainland China began in July 2008 under the current KMT government, and the first direct daily charter flights took off in December 2008.[134]
Other major political issues include the passage of an arms procurement bill that the United States authorized in 2001.[135] In 2008, however, the United States were reluctant to send over more arms to Taiwan out of fear that it would hinder the recent improvement of ties between the PRC and the ROC.[136] Another major political issue is the establishment of a National Communications Commission to take over from the Government Information Office, whose advertising budget exercised great control over the media.[137]
The politicians and their parties have themselves become major political issues. Corruption among some DPP administration officials has been exposed. In early 2006, President Chen Shui-bian was linked to possible corruption. The political effect on President Chen Shui-bian was great, causing a divide in the DPP leadership and supporters alike. It eventually led to the creation of a political camp led by ex-DPP leader Shih Ming-teh which believes the president should resign. The KMT assets continue to be another major issue, as it was once the richest political party in the world.[138] Nearing the end of 2006, KMT's chairman Ma Ying-jeou was also hit by corruption controversies, although he has since then been cleared of any wrong-doings by the courts.[139] Since completing his second term as President, Chen Shui-bian has been charged with corruption and money laundering.[140]
The merger of the KMT and People First Party (PFP) was thought to be certain, but a string of defections from the PFP to the KMT have increased tensions within the Pan-Blue camp.[141][142]
National identity[link]
Main articles: Taiwanese identity and Chinese nationalism
Roughly 84% of Taiwan's population descends from Han Chinese who migrated from mainland China between 1661 and 1895. Another significant fraction descends from Han Chinese who immigrated from mainland China in the 1940s and 1950s. But between 1895 and the present, Taiwan and mainland China have shared a common government for only 4 years. The shared cultural origin combined with several hundred years of geographical separation, some hundred years of political separation and foreign influences, as well as hostility between the rival ROC and PRC have resulted in national identity being a contentious issue with political overtones. Since democratization and the lifting of martial law, a distinct Taiwanese identity (as opposed to Taiwanese identity as a subset of a Chinese identity) is often at the heart of political debates. Its acceptance makes the island distinct from mainland China, and therefore may be seen as a step towards forming a consensus for de jure Taiwan independence.[143] The pan-green camp supports a distinct Taiwanese identity, while the pan-blue camp supports a Chinese identity only.[130] The KMT has downplayed this stance in the recent years and now supports a Taiwanese identity as part of a Chinese identity.[144][145]
According to a survey conducted in March 2009, 49% of the respondents consider themselves as Taiwanese only, and 44% of the respondents consider themselves as Taiwanese and Chinese. 3% consider themselves as only Chinese.[93] Another survey, conducted in Taiwan in July 2009, showed that 82.8% of respondents consider that the ROC and the PRC are two separate countries developing each on its own.[146] A recent survey conducted in December 2009 showed that 62% of the respondents consider themselves as Taiwanese only, and 22% of the respondents consider themselves as both Taiwanese and Chinese. 8% consider themselves as only Chinese. The survey also shows that among 18–29 year old respondents, 75% consider themselves as Taiwanese only.[147]
| Survey | Taiwanese | Chinese | Taiwanese and Chinese |
|---|---|---|---|
| Research, Development, and Evaluation Commission, Executive Yuan (April 2008)[148] | 67.1% | 13.6% | 15.2% |
| TVBS Poll Center (June 2008)[148] | 45% | 4% | 45% |
| Common Wealth Magazine (December 2009)[147] | 62% | 8% | 22% |
| National Chengchi University (June 2010)[149] | 51.6% | 3.8% | 40.4% |
| TVBS Poll Center (March 2009)[93][150] | 72% | 16% | (not an option for this question) |
| TVBS Poll Center (March 2009)[93][151] | 49% | 3% | 44% |
Military[link]
Main article: Republic of China Armed Forces
See also: Republic of China Military Academy
The Republic of China Army takes its roots in the National Revolutionary Army, which was established by Sun Yat-sen in 1925 in Guangdong with a goal of reunifying China under the Kuomintang. When the People's Liberation Army won the Chinese Civil War, much of the National Revolutionary Army retreated to Taiwan along with the government. It was later reformed into the Republic of China Army. Units which surrendered and remained in mainland China were either disbanded or incorporated into the People's Liberation Army.
Today, the Republic of China maintains a large and technologically advanced military, mainly as defense against the constant threat of invasion by the PRC under the Anti-Secession Law of the People's Republic of China.[95] From 1949 to the 1970s, the primary mission of the military was to "retake the mainland" through the Project National Glory. As this mission has shifted to defense, the ROC military has begun to shift emphasis from the traditionally dominant Army to the air force and navy. Control of the armed forces has also passed into the hands of the civilian government.[152] As the ROC military shares historical roots with the KMT, the older generation of high ranking officers tends to have Pan-Blue sympathies. However, many have retired and there are many more non-mainlanders enlisting in the armed forces in the younger generations, so the political leanings of the military have moved closer to the public norm in Taiwan.[153]
The ROC began a force reduction program to scale down its military from a level of 450,000 in 1997 to 380,000 in 2001.[154] As of 2009, the armed forces of the ROC number approximately 300,000,[155] with nominal reserves totaling 3.6 million as of 2005.[156] Conscription remains universal for qualified males reaching age eighteen, but as a part of the reduction effort many are given the opportunity to fulfill their draft requirement through alternative service and are redirected to government agencies or defense related industries.[157] Current plans call for a transition to a predominantly professional army over the next decade.[158][159] Conscription periods are planned to decrease from 14 months to 12.[160] In the last months of the Bush administration, Taipei took the decision to reverse the secular trend of declining defense spending, at a time when most Asian countries kept on reducing their military expenditures. It also decided to modernize both defensive and offensive capabilities. Taipei still keeps a large military apparatus relative to the island’s population: defense expenditures for 2008 were NTD 334 billion (approximately U.S. $10.5 billion), which accounted for 2.94% of GDP.
The armed forces' primary concern at this time is the possibility of an attack by the PRC, consisting of a naval blockade, airborne assault and/or missile bombardment. Four upgraded Kidd class destroyers were recently purchased from the United States, significantly upgrading Taiwan's air defense and submarine hunting abilities.[161] The Ministry of National Defense planned to purchase diesel-powered submarines and Patriot anti-missile batteries from the United States, but its budget has been stalled repeatedly by the opposition-Pan-Blue Coalition controlled legislature. The defense package was stalled from 2001–2007 where it was finally passed through the legislature and the US responded on 3 October 2008, with a $6.5 billion arms package including PAC III Anti-Air defense systems, AH-64D Apache Attack helicopters and other arms and parts.[162] A significant amount of military hardware has been bought from the United States, and, as of 2009, continues to be legally guaranteed by the Taiwan Relations Act.[101] In the past, France and the Netherlands have also sold military weapons and hardware to the ROC, but they almost entirely stopped in the 1990s under pressure of the PRC.[163][164]
The first line of defense against invasion by the PRC is the ROC's own armed forces. Current ROC military doctrine is to hold out against an invasion or blockade until the US military responds.[165] There is, however, no guarantee in the Taiwan Relations Act or any other treaty that the United States will defend Taiwan, even in the event of invasion.[166] The joint declaration on security between the US and Japan signed in 1996 may imply that Japan would be involved in any response. However, Japan has refused to stipulate whether the "area surrounding Japan" mentioned in the pact includes Taiwan, and the precise purpose of the pact is unclear.[167] The Australia, New Zealand, United States Security Treaty (ANZUS Treaty) may mean that other US allies, such as Australia, could theoretically be involved.[168] In practice, the risk of losing economic ties with China may prevent Australia from taking action.[169] The United States, United Kingdom, Japan, South Korea, Australia, Canada, Chile, and Peru conduct maritime exercises in the Pacific Ocean every 2 years called RIMPAC. They are conducted to promote stability and to be able to respond in case of an armed conflict in the region – that includes an invasion of Taiwan by China.[170]
Administrative divisions[link]
Main article: Administrative divisions of the Republic of China
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According to the 1947 constitution, written and promulgated whilst the ROC government still controlled mainland China, the territory of the ROC consisted of provinces, special municipalities, as well as Mongolia[171] and Tibet. Accordingly, when the ROC retreated to Taiwan in 1949, its claimed territory consisted of 35 provinces, 12 special municipalities, 1 special administrative region, as well as Mongolia[171] and Tibet. However, since its retreat, the ROC has controlled only Taiwan Province and some islands of Fujian Province. The ROC also controls the Pratas Islands (Dong-Sha) and Taiping Island in the Spratly Islands, which are part of the disputed South China Sea Islands. They were placed under Kaohsiung administration after the retreat to Taiwan.[172]
Since 1949, the government has made some changes in the area under its control. Taipei became a special municipality in 1967 and Kaohsiung in 1979. The two provincial governments were "streamlined", with their functions transferred to the central government (Fujian in 1956 and Taiwan in 1998).[173] In 2010, New Taipei, Taichung and Tainan were upgraded to special municipalities. This brought the top-level divisions of the ROC to their current state:[174]
| Level | Division type | Total | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1st | Special municipality (直轄市 zhíxiáshì) (5) |
Province (省 shěng) (2) (Streamlined) | 22 | |||
| 2nd | Provincial city (市 shì) (3) |
County (縣 xiàn) (14) | ||||
| 3rd | District (區 qū) (157) | County-controlled city (縣轄市 xiànxiáshì) (17) |
Urban Township (鎮 zhèn) (41) |
Rural Township (鄉 xiāng) (153) |
368 | |
| 4th | Village (里 lǐ) | Village (村 cūn) | 7,835 | |||
| 5th | Neighborhood (鄰 lín) | 147,877 | ||||
According to Article 4 of the Local Government Act, laws pertaining to special municipalities also apply to counties with a population exceeding 2 million. This provision is currently applied only to Taoyuan County.[175]
Economy[link]
Main articles: Economy of Taiwan and Economic history of Taiwan
The quick industrialization and rapid growth of Taiwan during the latter half of the 20th century has been called the "Taiwan Miracle". Taiwan is one of the "Four Asian Tigers" alongside Hong Kong, South Korea and Singapore.
Japanese rule prior to and during World War II brought changes in the public and private sectors, most notably in the area of public works, which enabled rapid communications and facilitated transport throughout much of the island. The Japanese also improved public education and made it compulsory for all Taiwanese citizens.
By 1945, hyperinflation was in progress in mainland China and Taiwan as a result of the war with Japan. To isolate Taiwan from it, the Nationalist government created a new currency area for the island, and started a price stabilization program. These efforts helped significantly slow the inflation.
When the KMT government fled to Taiwan it brought millions of taels of gold and the foreign currency reserve of mainland China to the island, which, according to the KMT stabilized prices and reduced hyperinflation.[176] Perhaps more importantly, as part of its retreat to Taiwan, the KMT brought the intellectual and business elites from Mainland China.[177] The KMT government instituted many laws and land reforms that it had never effectively enacted on mainland China. The government also implemented a policy of import-substitution, attempting to produce imported goods domestically. Much of this was made possible through US economic aid, subsidizing the higher cost of domestic production.
In 1950, with the outbreak of the Korean War, the US began an aid program which resulted in fully stabilized prices by 1952.[178] The KMT government instituted many laws and land reforms that it had never effectively enacted on mainland China; it implemented a policy of import-substitution, and it attempted to produce imported goods domestically. Much of this was made possible through US economic aid, subsidizing the higher cost of domestic production.
In 1962, Taiwan had a per-capita gross national product (GNP) of $170, placing its economy on a par with those of Zaire and Congo. By 2011 per-capita GNP, adjusted for purchasing power parity (PPP), had risen to $37,000, contributing to a Human Development Index equivalent to that of other developed countries. Taiwan's HDI in 2007 is 0.943 (25th, very high),[179] and stands at 0.868 in 2010 (18th, very high), according to the UN's new calculating method ("Inequality-adjusted HDI").
Today Taiwan has a dynamic, capitalist, export-driven economy with gradually decreasing state involvement in investment and foreign trade. In keeping with this trend, some large government-owned banks and industrial firms are being privatized.[180] Real growth in GDP has averaged about 8% during the past three decades. Exports have provided the primary impetus for industrialization. The trade surplus is substantial, and foreign reserves are the world's fifth largest.[181] The Republic of China has its own currency, the New Taiwan dollar.
Since the beginning of the 1990s, the economic ties between Taiwan and Mainland China have been very prolific. As of 2008, more than US$150 billion[182] have been invested in the PRC by Taiwanese companies, and about 10% of the Taiwanese labour force works in the PRC, often to run their own businesses.[183] Although the economy of Taiwan benefits from this situation, some have expressed the view that the island has become increasingly dependent on the Mainland Chinese economy. A 2008 white paper by the Department of Industrial Technology states that "Taiwan should seek to maintain stable relation with China while continuing to protect national security, and avoiding excessive 'Sinicization' of Taiwanese economy."[184] Others argue that close economic ties between Taiwan and Mainland China would make any military intervention by the PLA against Taiwan very costly, and therefore less probable.[185]
Taiwan’s total trade in 2010 reached an all-time high of US$526.04 billion, according to Taiwan's Ministry of Finance. Both exports and imports for the year reached record levels, totaling US$274.64 billion and US$251.4 billion, respectively.[186]
In 2001, agriculture constituted only 2% of GDP, down from 35% in 1952.[187] Traditional labor-intensive industries are steadily being moved offshore and with more capital and technology-intensive industries replacing them. High-technology industrial parks have sprung up in every region in Taiwan. The ROC has become a major foreign investor in the PRC, Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, and Vietnam. It is estimated that some 50,000 Taiwanese businesses and 1,000,000 businesspeople and their dependents are established in the PRC.[188]
Because of its conservative financial approach and its entrepreneurial strengths, Taiwan suffered little compared with many of its neighbors from the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis. Unlike its neighbors, South Korea and Japan, the Taiwanese economy is dominated by small and medium sized businesses, rather than the large business groups. The global economic downturn, however, combined with poor policy coordination by the new administration and increasing bad debts in the banking system, pushed Taiwan into recession in 2001, the first whole year of negative growth since 1947. Due to the relocation of many manufacturing and labor intensive industries to the PRC, unemployment also reached a level not seen since the 1970s oil crisis. This became a major issue in the 2004 presidential election. Growth averaged more than 4% in the 2002–2006 period and the unemployment rate fell below 4%.[189]
Since the global financial crisis starting with United States in 2007, the unemployment rate has risen to over 5.9% and Economic Growth fallen to –2.9%.[citation needed] However, Taiwan managed to emerge from the crisis in very good shape. In 2010, economic growth reached 10%, the highest rate in almost 30 years, international trade jumped more than 39% to US$526.04 billion, and the job market rose with most businesses set to recruit. As a result, the IMF estimated Taiwan's 2010 GDP-PPP per capita at over US$34,700, surpassing those of Finland, France and Japan.
The ROC often joins international organizations under a politically neutral name. The ROC is a member of governmental trade organizations such as the World Trade Organization under the name Separate Customs Territory of Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu (Chinese Taipei) since 2002.[190]
Education[link]
Main article: Education in Taiwan
The higher education system was established in Taiwan by Japan during the colonial period. However, after the Republic of China took over Taiwan from Japan in 1945, the system was promptly replaced by the same system as in mainland China which mixed with features of the Chinese and American educational systems.[191]
The educational system includes six years of elementary school, three years of middle school, three years of high school, and four years of university.[192] The system has been successful in that pupils in Taiwan boast some of the highest test scores in the world, especially in mathematics and science;[193] However, it has also been criticized for placing excessive pressure on students and eschewing creativity in favor of rote memorization.[194][195]
Many Taiwanese students attend cram schools, or bushiban, to improve skills and knowledge on problem solving against exams of subjects like mathematics, nature science, history and many others. Courses are available for most popular subjects. Lessons are organized in lectures, reviews, private tutorial sessions, and recitations.[196][197]
As of 2003, the literacy rate in Taiwan is 96.1%.[5]
Demographics[link]
Main article: Demographics of Taiwan
Taiwan's population was estimated in 2012 at 23,239,268, most of whom are on the island of Taiwan. The remainder live on Penghu (97,268), Kinmen (105,434) and the Matsu Islands (10,135).[16]
Ethnic groups[link]
Main articles: Taiwanese aborigines and Taiwanese people
About 98% of Taiwan's population is of Han Chinese ethnicity.[5] Of these, 86% are descendants of early Han Chinese immigrants known as the "benshengren" (Chinese: 本省人; pinyin: Běnshěng rén; literally "home-province person") in Chinese.[5] This group is often referred to "native Taiwanese" in English, but the term is also frequently used for the Taiwanese aborigines. The benshengren group contains two subgroups: the Hoklo people (70% of the total population), whose ancestors migrated from the coastal southern Fujian (Min-nan) region in the southeast of mainland China starting in the 17th century, and the Hakka (15% of the total population), whose ancestors originally migrated south to Guangdong, its surrounding areas and Taiwan.[5]
About 12% of the population are known as waishengren (Chinese: 外省人; pinyin: Wàishěng rén; literally "out-of-province person"), composed of people who (or whose ancestors) emigrated from mainland China after the Chinese Civil War with the KMT government.[5]
The other 2% of the population are about 521,000 Taiwanese aborigines, divided into 14 major groups. The Ami, Atayal, Bunun, Kavalan, Paiwan, Puyuma, Rukai, Saisiyat, Sakizaya, Sediq, Thao, Truku and Tsou live mostly in the eastern half of the island, while the Yami inhabit Orchid Island.[5][198][199]
Languages[link]
Main article: Languages of Taiwan
Mandarin is the official national language and is spoken by the vast majority of the population of Taiwan. It has been the primary language of instruction in schools since the Japanese were forced out in the 1940s. Like Hong Kong and Macau, the ROC uses Traditional Chinese characters.[200] However, a small number of characters differ from those used in Hong Kong and Macau.
Most Waishengren speak primarily Mandarin. The 70% of the population belonging to the Hoklo ethnic group speak Taiwanese (a variant of the Min Nan speech of Fujian province) as their mother tongue, in addition to Mandarin, and many others have some degree of understanding. The Hakka ethnic group (15% of the population) use the Hakka language.[201] Although Mandarin is the language of instruction in schools and dominates television and radio, non-Mandarin languages or dialects have undergone a revival in public life in Taiwan, particularly since restrictions on their use were lifted in the 1990s.[200]
People educated during the period of Japanese rule (1895–1945) were taught using Japanese as the medium of instruction. A declining number of people in the older generations understand little or no Mandarin, speaking only the Japanese they learned in school and the Taiwanese or Hakka they spoke at home.
Taiwan's indigenous languages, the Formosan languages, do not belong to the Chinese or Sino-Tibetan language family, but rather to the Austronesian language family. Their use among Taiwan's aboriginal minority groups has been in decline as usage of Mandarin has risen.[200]
Religion[link]
Main article: Religion in Taiwan
The Constitution of the Republic of China protects people's freedom of religion and the practices of belief.[202] There are approximately 18,718,600 religious followers in Taiwan as of 2005 (81.3% of total population) and 14–18% are non-religious. According to the 2005 census, of the 26 religions recognized by the ROC government, the five largest are: Buddhism (8,086,000 or 35.1%), Taoism (7,600,000 or 33%), I-Kuan Tao (810,000 or 3.5%), Protestantism (605,000 or 2.6%), and Roman Catholicism (298,000 or 1.3%).[203] But according to the CIA World Factbook and other latest sources from US State Department or the Religious Affairs Section of the MOI, over 93% of Taiwanese are adherents of a combination of the polytheistic ancient Chinese religion, Buddhism, Confucianism, and Taoism; 4.5% are adherents of Christianity, which includes Protestants, Catholics, and other, non-denominational, Christian groups; and less than 2.5% are adherents of other religions, such as Islam.[5][204] Taiwanese aborigines comprise a notable subgroup among professing Christians: "...over 64 percent identify as Christian... Church buildings are the most obvious markers of Aboriginal villages, distinguishing them from Taiwanese or Hakka villages."[205]
Confucianism is a philosophy that deals with secular moral ethics, and serves as the foundation of both Chinese and Taiwanese culture. The majority of Taiwanese people usually combine the secular moral teachings of Confucianism with whatever religions they are affiliated with.
As of 2009, there are 14,993 temples in Taiwan, approximately one place of worship per 1,500 residents. 9,202 of those temples were dedicated to Taoism. In 2008, Taiwan had 3,262 Churches, an increase of 145.[206]
Largest cities[link]
Main article: List of cities in Taiwan
The figures below are the 2011 estimates for the twenty largest urban populations within administrative city limits; a different ranking exists when considering the total metropolitan area populations (in such rankings the Taipei-Keelung metro area is by far the largest agglomeration).
|
Largest cities or towns of Taiwan http://www.geonames.org/TW/largest-cities-in-taiwan.html |
|||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rank | City name | Division | Pop. | ||||||
 New Taipei |
1 | New Taipei | New Taipei City | 3,913,595 |  Taichung |
||||
| 2 | Kaohsiung | Kaohsiung City | 2,773,855 | ||||||
| 3 | Taichung | Taichung City | 2,662,770 | ||||||
| 4 | Taipei | Taipei City | 2,647,122 | ||||||
| 5 | Tainan | Tainan City | 1,876,706 | ||||||
| 6 | Hsinchu | Hsinchu City | 419,384 | ||||||
| 7 | Taoyuan | Taoyuan County | 409,796 | ||||||
| 8 | Keelung | Keelung City | 380,281 | ||||||
| 9 | Zhongli | Taoyuan County | 372,117 | ||||||
| 10 | Chiayi | Chiayi City | 271,594 | ||||||
Public health[link]
Main article: Healthcare in Taiwan
Health care in Taiwan is managed by the Bureau of National Health Insurance (BNHI).[207]
The current program was implemented in 1995, and is considered social insurance. The government health insurance program maintains compulsory insurance for citizens who are employed, impoverished, unemployed, or victims of natural disasters with fees that correlate to the individual and/or family income; it also maintains protection for non-citizens working in Taiwan. A standardized method of calculation applies to all persons and can optionally be paid by an employer or by individual contributions.[208]
BNHI insurance coverage requires co-payment at the time of service for most services unless it is a preventative health service, for low-income families, veterans, children under three years old, or in the case of catastrophic diseases. Low income households maintain 100% premium coverage by the BNHI and co-pays are reduced for disabled or certain elderly peoples.
According to a recently published survey, out of 3,360 patients surveyed at a randomly chosen hospital, 75.1% of the patients said they are "very satisfied" with the hospital service; 20.5% said they are "okay" with the service. Only 4.4% of the patients said they are either "not satisfied" or "very not satisfied" with the service or care provided.[209]
Taiwan has its own Center for Disease Control, and during the SARS outbreak in March of 2003 there were 347 confirmed cases. During the outbreak the CDC and local governments set up monitored stations throughout public transportation, recreational sites and other public areas. With full containment in July 2003, there has not been a case of SARS since.[210]
As of 2006, the BNHI Facility Contract Distribution facilities total 17,259, including:[211]
| Number | Subject |
|---|---|
| 16,174 | outpatient-only facilities |
| 5,701 | dental clinics |
| 2,422 | Chinese medicine clinics |
| 1,085 | inpatient/outpatient facilities |
| 437 | local community hospitals |
| 35 | Chinese medicine hospitals |
| 123 | academic medical centers |
Basic coverage areas of the insurance include:
|
|
|
In 2004, the infant mortality rate was 5.3 with 15 physicians and 63 hospital beds per 10,000 people. The life expectancy for males was 73.5 years and 79.7 years for females according to the World Health Report.
Other health related programs in Taiwan are the Centers for Disease Control[212] and the Department of Health.[213]
Culture[link]
Main article: Culture of Taiwan
The cultures of Taiwan are a hybrid blend of various sources, incorporating elements of traditional Chinese culture, attributable to the historical and ancestry origin of the majority of its current residents, Japanese culture, traditional Confucianist beliefs, and increasingly Western values.
After their move to Taiwan, the Kuomintang imposed an official interpretation of traditional Chinese culture over Taiwan. The government launched a program promoting Chinese calligraphy, traditional Chinese painting, folk art, and Chinese opera.
The status of Taiwanese culture is debated.[214] It is disputed whether Taiwanese culture is a regional form of Chinese culture or a distinct culture. Reflecting the continuing controversy surrounding the political status of Taiwan, politics continues to play a role in the conception and development of a Taiwanese cultural identity, especially in the prior dominant frame of a Taiwanese and Chinese dualism. In recent years, the concept of Taiwanese multiculturalism has been proposed as a relatively apolitical alternative view, which has allowed for the inclusion of mainlanders and other minority groups into the continuing re-definition of Taiwanese culture as collectively held systems of meaning and customary patterns of thought and behavior shared by the people of Taiwan.[215] Identity politics, along with the over one hundred years of political separation from mainland China, has led to distinct traditions in many areas, including cuisine and music.
One of Taiwan's greatest attractions is the National Palace Museum, which houses more than 650,000 pieces of Chinese bronze, jade, calligraphy, painting and porcelain, and is considered one of the greatest collections of Chinese art and objects in the world.[216] The KMT moved this collection from the Forbidden City in Beijing in 1949 when it fled to Taiwan. The collection, estimated to be one-tenth of China's cultural treasures, is so extensive that only 1% is on display at any time. The PRC had said that the collection was stolen and that it legitimately belongs in China, but Taiwan has long defended its collection as a necessary act to protect the pieces from destruction, especially during the Cultural Revolution. Relations regarding this treasure have warmed recently as each side has agreed to lend relics to the other; Beijing Palace Museum Curator Zheng Xinmiao said that artifacts in both Chinese and Taiwanese museums are "China's cultural heritage jointly owned by people across the Taiwan Strait."[217]
Karaoke, drawn from contemporary Japanese culture, is extremely popular in Taiwan, where it is known as KTV. KTV businesses operate in a hotel-like style, renting out small rooms and ballrooms varying on the number of guests in a group. Many KTV establishments partner with restaurants and buffets to form all-encompassing elaborate evening affairs for families, friends, or businessmen. Tour buses that travel around Taiwan have several TV's, equipped not for watching movies, but primarily for singing Karaoke. The entertainment counterpart of a KTV is an MTV, being found much less frequently out of the city. There, movies out on DVD can be selected and played in a private theater room. However MTV, more so than KTV, has a growing reputation for being a place that young couples will go to be alone and intimate.
Taiwan has a high density of 24-hour convenience stores, which, in addition to the usual services, provide services on behalf of financial institutions or government agencies such as collection of parking fees, utility bills, traffic violation fines, and credit card payments.[218] They also provide a service for mailing packages.
Taiwanese culture has also influenced other cultures. Bubble tea and milk tea are available in Singapore, Malaysia, Australia, Europe and North America. Taiwan television shows are popular in Singapore, Malaysia and other Asian countries. Taiwanese films have won various international awards at film festivals around the world. Ang Lee, a Taiwanese director, has directed critically acclaimed films such as: Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon; Eat Drink Man Woman; Sense and Sensibility; Brokeback Mountain; and Lust, Caution. Other famous Taiwanese directors include Tsai Ming-Liang, Edward Yang and Hou Hsiao-hsien.
Sports[link]
Main article: Sport in Taiwan
Baseball is Taiwan's national sport and it is a popular spectator sport. One of the most famous Taiwanese baseball pitchers is Chien-Ming Wang, who is a starting pitcher in Major League Baseball. Other notable players playing in the United States include Chin-hui Tsao who played for the Colorado Rockies (2003–2005) and the Los Angeles Dodgers (2007), Hong-Chih Kuo, Fu-Te Ni, and Chin-lung Hu. The Chinese Professional Baseball League in Taiwan was established in 1989,[219] and eventually absorbed the competing Taiwan Major League in 2003. As of 2008[update], the CPBL has four teams with average attendance of approximately 3,000 per game.
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Besides baseball, basketball is Taiwan's major sport.[220] The national team's forth place at the 1959 FIBA World Championship remains the second best finish ever of an Asian nation to this date.
Taekwondo has also become a rather mature and successful sport in recent years. In the 2004 Olympics, Mu Yen Chu and Shih Hsin Chen proudly won the first two gold medals in men's flyweight event and women's flyweight event, respectively. Ever since the 2004 Olympics, Taiwan's taekwondo potential has become extremely prominent. Subsequent taekwondo competitors such as Shu Chun Yang successfully consolidated Taiwan's taekwondo culture.
The ROC participates in international sporting organizations and events under the name of "Chinese Taipei" due to the ambiguity of the political status of Taiwan. In 2009, Taiwan hosted two international sporting events on the island. The World Games 2009 were held in Kaohsiung between 16 and 26 July 2009. Taipei hosted the 21st Summer Deaflympics in September of the same year. Furthermore, Taipei will host the Summer Universiade in 2017.[221]
Taiwan is also a major Asian country for Korfball. In 2008, Taiwan hosted the World Youth Korfball Championship and took the silver medal.[222] In 2009, Taiwan's korfball team won a bronze medal at the World Game.[223]
Yani Tseng is the most famous Taiwanese professional golfer currently playing on the U.S.-based LPGA Tour. She is the youngest player ever, male or female, to win five major championships and has been ranked number 1 in the Women's World Golf Rankings since February 2011.
Calendar[link]
Main article: Minguo calendar
See also: Chinese calendar and Public holidays in Taiwan
Taiwan uses two official calendars: the Gregorian calendar, and the Minguo calendar. The latter numbers years starting from 1911, the year of the founding of the Republic of China. For example, 2007 is the "96th year of the Republic",[224] while its months and days are numbered according to the Gregorian calendar.
Usually, year numbering may use the Gregorian system as well as the ROC era system. For example, 3 May 2004, may be written 2004-05-03 or 93–05–03. The use of two different calendar systems in Taiwan may be confusing, in particular for foreigners. For instance, products for export marked using the Minguo calendar can be misunderstood as having an expiration date 11 years earlier than intended.[225]
Taiwan also uses the lunar calendar for traditional festivals such as the Chinese New Year, the Lantern Festival, and the Dragon Boat Festival.[226]
See also[link]
Notes[link]
- ^ See Names of the Republic of China.
- ^ Waishengren usually refers to people who moved from mainland China to Taiwan after 1949 when the KMT retreated to Taiwan due to the Chinese Civil War, and to their descendants born in Taiwan. It usually does not include citizens of the People's Republic of China who more recently moved to Taiwan.
- ^ Taiwanese aborigines are officially categorised into 14 separate ethnic groups by the Republic of China.
- ^ Although the territories controlled by the ROC imply that the demonym is "Taiwanese", some consider that it is "Chinese" due to the claims of the ROC over all of China. Taiwanese people have various opinions regarding their own national identity.
- ^ a b The UN has not calculated an HDI for the ROC, which is not a member nation. The ROC government calculated its HDI for 2010 to be 0.868, which would rank it 18th among countries.
- ^ The island of Taiwan covers an area of 36,008 km2 (13,902.8 sq mi), while the total area under the jurisdiction of the ROC (Free Area) covers around 36,191 km2 (13,973.4 sq mi).[16]
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- ^ Quote: "Table 12: In Taiwan, some people identify themselves as Chinese, some identify themselves as Taiwan (sic). Do you identify yourself as Taiwanese or Chinese? (Do not prompt both Taiwanese and Chinese)"
- ^ Quote: "Table 13: In Taiwan, some people identify themselves as Chinese, some identify themselves as Taiwan (sic). Do you identify yourself as Taiwanese, Chinese or both Taiwanese and Chinese?"
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- ^ "China Threat to Attack Taiwan Alarms Asia". Associated Press. 2005-03-14. http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2005/03/14/international/i003051S91.DTL. [dead link]
- ^ Kapstein, Ethan B.; Michael Mastanduno (1999). Unipolar politics. Columbia University Press. p. 194. ISBN 0-231-11309-9. http://books.google.com/?id=68s2k0ztkCMC&pg=PA194. "The Japanese leadership openly split on whether a crisis in Taiwan was included in the geographic expression "area surrounding Japan." In the event, Japan refused to stipulate the contingencies under which it would provide rear area support for U.S. forces or even the geographic scope of the "area surrounding Japan". (...) The two sides have not articulated clearly what the alliance stands for, nor who it is defined to protect against."
- ^ Tow, William (2005). "ANZUS: Regional versus Global Security in Asia?". International Relations in the Asia-Pacific 5 (2): 197. DOI:10.1093/irap/lci113.
- ^ "China and Taiwan: flashpoint for a war". The Sydney Morning Herald. 2004-07-14. http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/07/13/1089694360063.html. Retrieved 2009-06-13.
- ^ Lotta Danielsson-Murphy. "ECFA poses new risks for Taiwan-Japan ties". http://www.etaiwannews.com/etn/news_content.php?id=1305355&lang=eng_news&cate_img=46.jpg&cate_rss=news_Editorial. Retrieved 2010-08-02.
- ^ a b Article 119 of the Constitution of the Republic of China regards Mongolia as a self-governing provincial-level locality
- ^ "World: Asia-Pacific Analysis: Flashpoint Spratly". BBC. 1999-02-14. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/279170.stm.
- ^ Hwang, Jim (1 October 1999). "Gone with the Times". Taiwan Review. http://taiwanreview.nat.gov.tw/ct.asp?xItem=1465&CtNode=1347. Retrieved 13 April 2012.
- ^ "中華民國國情簡介 政府組織". Taipei: Government Information Office. http://info.gio.gov.tw/ct.asp?xItem=19878&ctNode=2840&mp=21. Retrieved 13 April 2012.
- ^ "Premier Wu greenlights Taoyuan County upgrade". Taiwan Today. 14 December 2010. http://www.taiwantoday.tw/ct.asp?xItem=136286&ctNode=445.
- ^ "Gold Shipped to Taiwan in 1949 Helped Stabilize ROC on Taiwan". http://www.kmt.org.tw/english/page.aspx?type=article&mnum=112&anum=9442. Retrieved 14 June 2011.
- ^ Roy, Denny (2003). Taiwan: A Political History. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. pp. 76, 77. ISBN 0-8014-8805-2.
- ^ Makinen & Woodward 1989: "It was the fiscal regime change on Taiwan, as in the European episodes, that finally brought price stability. It was the aid program that brought the budget to near balance, and when the aid program reached its full proportions in 1952, prices stabilized."
- ^ As calculated by Taiwan's Ministry of Budget, National Accountancy and Statistics, based on the following figures (2007): life expectancy / 78.4 years ; literacy rate / 97.6% ; gross combined schooling rate / 101.9% ; per capita GDP-PPP / US$30,352
- ^ Her, Kelly (2005-01-12). "Privatization Set in Motion". http://taiwanreview.nat.gov.tw/ct.asp?xItem=1153&CtNode=128. Retrieved 2009-06-05.
- ^ "Reserves of foreign exchange and gold". World Fact Book. CIA. 4 September 2008. Archived from the original on 26 September 2008. http://www.webcitation.org/5b7FcMQjc. Retrieved 3 January 2011. "Rank 5 Taiwan $ 274,700,000,000 31 December 2007"
- ^ Harding, Phil (2010-01-23). "Taiwan's Grand Hotel welcome for Chinese visitors". BBC News. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/8475215.stm.
- ^ DoIT 2008, p. 5 "Notably, cross-strait political tensions have not prevented Taiwanese firms from investing heavily in China. The cross-strait investments now exceed US$ 100 billions. Four Taiwanese-owned firms rank among China's top 10 biggest exporters. 10% of the Taiwanese labor force now works in China."
- ^ DoIT 2008, p. 5 "Although used-to-be-hostile tension between Taiwan and China has been eased to a certain degree, Taiwan should seek to maintain stable relation with China while continuing to protect national security, and avoiding excessive "Sinicization" of Taiwanese economy. Strategies to avoid excessive "Sinicization" of the Taiwanese economy could include efforts to increase geographic diversity of overseas Taiwanese employment, diversifying Taiwan's export markets and investment. "
- ^ BBC News, "Taiwan Flashpoint", "Some Taiwanese worry their economy is now dependent on China. Others point out that closer business ties makes Chinese military action less likely, because of the cost to China's own economy."
- ^ "Taiwan’s 2010 trade hits record high". 2010-01-10. http://taiwantoday.tw/ct.asp?xItem=142731&ctNode=453&mp=9.
- ^ "US-Taiwan FTA would have limited impact". bilaterals.org. http://www.bilaterals.org/article.php3?id_article=242. Retrieved 2009-05-28.
- ^ Morris, Peter (4 February 2004). "Taiwan business in China supports opposition". Asia Times Online. http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/FB04Ad04.html.
- ^ "Coping with Asian financial crisis: The Taiwan experience | Seoul Journal of Economics". Find Articles at BNET. 2009-04-28. http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa5411/is_199801/ai_n21432097/. Retrieved 2009-05-28. [dead link]
- ^ "Separate Customs Territory of Taiwan, Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu (Chinese Taipei) and the WTO". World Trade Organization. http://www.wto.org/english/theWTO_e/countries_e/chinese_taipei_e.htm. Retrieved 2009-06-07.
- ^ Postiglione, Gerard A.; Grace C. L. Mak (1997). Asian higher education. Greenwood Publishing Group. pp. 346–348. ISBN 0-313-28901-8. http://books.google.com/?id=RTE8KCespeEC&pg=PA347.
- ^ "The Story of Taiwan-Education Taiwan's Educational Development and Present Situation". Government Information Office, Republic of China. http://www.gio.gov.tw/info/taiwan-story/education/edown/3-1.htm. Retrieved 2009-05-28.
- ^ Gary Phillips (17 November 2007) (PDF). Chance Favors the Prepared Mind: Mathematics and Science Indicators for Comparing States and Nations. American Institutes for Research. Archived from the original on 26 November 2007. http://web.archive.org/web/20071126225257/http://www.air.org/publications/documents/phillips.chance.favors.the.prepared.mind.pdf. Retrieved 2007-11-21.
- ^ Bucknall, Keven (2002). Chinese Business Etiquette and Culture. C&M Online Media, Inc.. p. 15. ISBN 0-917990-44-7. http://books.google.com/?id=npxUXbUg6uUC&pg=PA15.
- ^ "Betting on Taiwan's future with the Nankang software park". Taipei Times. 1999-11-01. http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/archives/1999/11/01/0000009019. Retrieved 2009-05-28.
- ^ "Over 70% of Taiwanese parents send kids to English bushibans". Invest in Taiwan, Department of Investment Services. 2005-09-02. Archived from the original on 8 June 2008. http://web.archive.org/web/20080608050510/http://investintaiwan.nat.gov.tw/en/news/200509/2005090201.html. Retrieved 2009-05-28.
- ^ C. Smith, Douglas (1997). Middle education in the Middle Kingdom. Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 119. ISBN 0-275-95641-5. http://books.google.com/?id=NqJP5uE9LewC&pg=PA119.
- ^ "Indigenous People". MOI Statistical Information Service. Feb 2012. http://sowf.moi.gov.tw/stat/month/m1-04.xls. Retrieved 14 April 2012.
- ^ "An Overview of Taiwan's Indigenous Groups". Taipei: Government Information Office. 2006. http://www.gio.gov.tw/taiwan-website/5-gp/culture/indigenous/. Retrieved 14 April 2012.
- ^ a b c Languages, The Republic of China Yearbook 2011, Government Information Office, Republic of China (Taiwan).
- ^ Lynn F. Lee. "Languages in Taiwan Today". Government Information Office, Republic of China. http://www.gio.gov.tw/taiwan-website/5-gp/yearbook/2002/chpt03-2.htm. Retrieved 2009-05-07.
- ^ Constitution of the Republic of China - Chapter II, Article 13: "The people shall have freedom of religious belief."
- ^ "Taiwan Yearbook 2006". Government of Information Office. 2006. Archived from the original on 2007-07-08. http://web.archive.org/web/20070708213510/http://www.gio.gov.tw/taiwan-website/5-gp/yearbook/22Religion.htm. Retrieved 2007-09-01.
- ^ "Taiwan: International Religious Freedom Report 2010". US Department of State: Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor. 17 November 2010. http://www.state.gov/j/drl/rls/irf/2010/148895.htm. Retrieved 17 March 2012.
- ^ Stainton, Michael (2002). "Presbyterians and the Aboriginal Revitalization Movement in Taiwan". Cultural Survival Quarterly 26.2, 5 May 2010 . Retrieved 21 March 2012.
- ^ "15,000 temples", Taiwan News, 28 July 2009. Retrieved 21 March 2012.
- ^ "Bureau of National Health Insurance". Taiwan BNHI. 2006-07-18. http://www.nhi.gov.tw.
- ^ "Bureau of National Health Insurance-National Health Insurance Act". Bureau of National Health Insurance, ROC. http://www.nhi.gov.tw/english/webdata.asp?menu=11&menu_id=295&webdata_id=1865. Retrieved 2009-05-28.
- ^ "Taiwanese Hospital Public Satisfaction Poll". Taiwan Department of Health. October 2004. http://www.hcquality.helthe.net/reports/showreports.php?id=2_1. [dead link]
- ^ "Center for Disease Control". Taiwan CDC. 2006-07-18. http://www.cdc.gov.tw.
- ^ "Bureau of National Health Insurance Full Summary" (PDF). Taiwan BNHI. 18 July 2006. http://www.nhi.gov.tw/english/file/s92.pdf.
- ^ "Centers for Disease Control, ROC (Taiwan)" (in Traditional Chinese). http://www.cdc.gov.tw. Retrieved 2009-06-05.
- ^ "Department of Health, Executive Yuan, ROC (Taiwan)" (in Traditional Chinese). http://www.doh.gov.tw. Retrieved 2009-05-28.
- ^ (Yip 2004:230-248; Makeham 2005:2-8; Chang 2005:224)
- ^ (Makeham & Hsiau 2005:125–129); (Winckler 1994:23–41)
- ^ [1][dead link]
- ^ "Taiwan to loan art to China amid warming ties". Agence France-Presse. 22 September 2010. Archived from the original on 9 October 2010. http://www.webcitation.org/5tLc0bqi3.
- ^ American Chamber of Commerce in Taipei. "Convenience Stores Aim at Differentiation" ( – Scholar search). Taiwan Business Topics 34 (11). http://www.amcham.com.tw/publication_topics_view.php?volume=34&vol_num=11&topics_id=558. [dead link]
- ^ "Intro of CPBL". Cpbl.com.tw. http://www.cpbl.com.tw/html/english/cpbl.asp. Retrieved 1 August 2010. [dead link]
- ^ Wang, Audrey (2008-06-01). "A Passion for Hoops". The Taiwan Review (Taiwan Review). http://taiwanreview.nat.gov.tw/ct.asp?xItem=43967&CtNode=128. Retrieved 2012-04-08.
- ^ Yeh, Joseph (2011-12-01). "Taipei to host 2017 Summer Universiade". The China Post (The China Post.). http://www.chinapost.com.tw/sports/other/2011/12/01/324608/Taipei-to.htm. Retrieved 2012-04-08.
- ^ "Netherlands Retains World Youth Korfball Champion; Taiwan is On the Way to the World...". Reuters Newswire. Sat 8 November 2008. http://www.reuters.com/article/2008/11/08/idUS82890+08-Nov-2008+BW20081108. Retrieved 14 June 2011.
- ^ Hazeldine, Richard (22 July 2009). "Jujitsu, korfball put Taiwan back on winning track". Taipei Times. http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2009/07/22/2003449286. Retrieved 14 June 2011.
- ^ Lotta Danielsson-Murphy. "Taiwan Calendar and Holidays". US-Taiwan Business Council. http://www.us-taiwan.org/taiwan_holidays.html. Retrieved 2009-05-28.
- ^ "Taiwan may drop idiosyncratic Republican calendar". Taipei Times. 2006-02-25. http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2006/02/25/2003294523. Retrieved 2009-05-28.
- ^ "Holidays and Festivals in Taiwan". Government Information Office, ROC. http://www.gio.gov.tw/info/festival_c/index_e.htm. Retrieved 2009-05-28.
Works cited[link]
- Fenby, Jonathan (2009). The Penguin History of Modern China: The Fall and Rise of a Great Power, 1850–2009. Penguin Books. ISBN 0-7139-9832-6.
- "2008 White Paper On Taiwan Industrial Technology". Department of Industrial Technology. 2008. http://doit.moea.gov.tw/itech/data/2008_1_1_EN.pdf. Retrieved 27 November 2009.
- Fung, Edmund S. K. (2000). In search of Chinese democracy: civil opposition in Nationalist China, 1929–1949. Cambridge modern China series. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-77124-5.
- Makinen, Gail E.; Woodward, G. Thomas (1989). "The Taiwanese hyperinflation and stabilization of 1945–1952". Journal of Money, Credit and Banking 21 (1): 90–105. JSTOR 1992580.
- Makeham, John; Hsiau, A-chin, eds. (2005). Cultural, Ethnic, and Political Nationalism in Contemporary Taiwan: Bentuhua. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 978-1-4039-7020-6.
Further reading[link]
- "Taiwan Flashpoint". BBC News. 2005. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/spl/hi/asia_pac/04/taiwan_flashpoint/html/introduction.stm.
- Bush, R.; O'Hanlon, M. (2007). A War Like No Other: The Truth About China's Challenge to America. Wiley. ISBN 0-471-98677-1.
- Bush, R. (2006). Untying the Knot: Making Peace in the Taiwan Strait. Brookings Institution Press. ISBN 0-8157-1290-1.
- Carpenter, T. (2006). America's Coming War with China: A Collision Course over Taiwan. Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 1-4039-6841-1.
- Cole, B. (2006). Taiwan's Security: History and Prospects. Routledge. ISBN 0-415-36581-3.
- Copper, J. (2006). Playing with Fire: The Looming War with China over Taiwan. Praeger Security International General Interest. ISBN 0-275-98888-0.
- Federation of American Scientists et al. (2006). "Chinese Nuclear Forces and US Nuclear War Planning". http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/china/Book2006.pdf.
- Feuerwerker, Albert (1968). The Chinese Economy, 1912–1949. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press.
- Gill, B. (2007). Rising Star: China's New Security Diplomacy. Brookings Institution Press. ISBN 0-8157-3146-9.
- Shirk, S. (2007). China: Fragile Superpower: How China's Internal Politics Could Derail Its Peaceful Rise. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-530609-0.
- Tsang, S. (2006). If China Attacks Taiwan: Military Strategy, Politics and Economics. Routledge. ISBN 0-415-40785-0.
- Tucker, N.B. (2005). Dangerous Strait: the US-Taiwan-China Crisis. Columbia University Press. ISBN 0-231-13564-5.
External links[link]
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Overviews and data[link]
- Taiwan entry at The World Factbook
- Taiwan flashpoint BBC News
- Taiwan country profile BBC News
- Background Note: Taiwan US Department of State
- Taiwan Travel Information and Travel Guide Lonely Planet
- Taiwan's 400 years of history New Taiwan, Ilha Formosa
- Key Development Forecasts for Taiwan from International Futures
Government agencies[link]
- Office of the government
- Office of the President
- Executive Yuan
- Judicial Yuan
- Control Yuan
- Examination Yuan
- Ministry of Foreign Affairs
- Taipei Economic & Cultural Representative Office in the US
- Government Information Office
- National Assembly
- Taiwan, The Heart of Asia, Tourism Bureau, Republic of China (Taiwan)
Maps[link]
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Coordinates: 22°57′N 120°12′E / 22.95°N 120.2°E / 22.95; 120.2
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Related pages:
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http://ru.wn.com/Китайская Республика
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http://hi.wn.com/चीनी गणराज्य
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This page contains text from Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwan
This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License, which means that you can copy and modify it as long as the entire work (including additions) remains under this license.
This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License, which means that you can copy and modify it as long as the entire work (including additions) remains under this license.
This article is about the People's Republic of China. For other uses, see China (disambiguation).
"PRC" redirects here. For other uses, see PRC (disambiguation).
| People's Republic of China
中华人民共和国
Zhōnghuá Rénmín Gònghéguó |
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Anthem:
 "March of the Volunteers" 《义勇军进行曲》 (Pinyin: "Yìyǒngjūn Jìnxíngqǔ") |
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.svg) |
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| Capital | Beijing 39°55′N 116°23′E / 39.917°N 116.383°E / 39.917; 116.383 |
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| Largest city | Shanghai[1][2] | |||||
| Official language(s) | Standard Chinese[3] | |||||
| Recognised regional languages | Mongolian, Tibetan, Uyghur, Zhuang, and various others | |||||
| Official written language | Vernacular Chinese | |||||
| Official script | Simplified Chinese[3] | |||||
| Ethnic groups | 91.51% Han;[4] 55 recognised minorities |
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| Demonym | Chinese | |||||
| Government | Nominally Marxist–Leninist single-party state[5][a] | |||||
| - | President[b] | Hu Jintao | ||||
| - | Congress Chairman | Wu Bangguo | ||||
| - | Premier | Wen Jiabao | ||||
| - | Conference Chairman | Jia Qinglin | ||||
| Legislature | National People's Congress | |||||
| Establishment | ||||||
| - | Unification of China under the Qin Dynasty | 221 BC | ||||
| - | Republic established | 1 January 1912 | ||||
| - | People's Republic proclaimed | 1 October 1949 | ||||
| Area | ||||||
| - | Total | 9,640,821 km2 [c] or 9,671,018 km² [c](3rd/4th) 3,704,427 sq mi |
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| - | Water (%) | 2.8[d] | ||||
| Population | ||||||
| - | 2010 census | 1,339,724,852[4] (1st) | ||||
| - | Density | 139.6/km2 (53rd) 363.3/sq mi |
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| GDP (PPP) | 2011 estimate | |||||
| - | Total | $11.299 trillion[6] (2nd) | ||||
| - | Per capita | $8,382[6] (91st) | ||||
| GDP (nominal) | 2011 estimate | |||||
| - | Total | $7.298 trillion[6] (2nd) | ||||
| - | Per capita | $5,413[6] (90th) | ||||
| Gini (2007) | 41.5[7] | |||||
| HDI (2011) |  0.687[8] (medium) (101st) |
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| Currency | Renminbi (yuan) (¥) (CNY) |
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| Time zone | China Standard Time (UTC+8) | |||||
| Date formats | yyyy-mm-dd or yyyy年m月d日 (CE; CE-1949) |
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| Drives on the | right, except for Hong Kong & Macau | |||||
| ISO 3166 code | CN | |||||
| Internet TLD | .cn[c] .中國[9] .中国 | |||||
| Calling code | +86[c] | |||||
| a. ^ Simple characterizations of the political structure since the 1980s are no longer possible.[10]
b. ^ As paramount leader, Hu Jintao holds four concurrent positions: General Secretary of the Communist Party of China, President of the People's Republic of China, and Chairman of the Central Military Commission for both state and party.[11] c. ^ 9,598,086 km2 (3,705,842 sq mi) excludes all disputed territories. |
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China (i/ˈtʃaɪnə/; Chinese: 中国; pinyin: Zhōngguó; see also Names of China), officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is the world's most-populous country, with a population of over 1.3 billion. Covering approximately 9.6 million square kilometres, the East Asian state is the world's second-largest country by land area,[13] and the third- or fourth-largest in total area, depending on the definition of total area.[14]
The People's Republic of China is a single-party state governed by the Communist Party of China.[15] It exercises jurisdiction over 22 provinces, five autonomous regions, four directly controlled municipalities (Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, and Chongqing), and two mostly self-governing special administrative regions (Hong Kong and Macau).[16] Its capital city is Beijing.[17] The PRC also claims Taiwan—which is controlled by the Republic of China (ROC), a separate political entity—as its 23rd province, a claim controversial due to the complex political status of Taiwan and the unresolved Chinese Civil War. The PRC government denies the legitimacy of the ROC.
China's landscape is vast and diverse, with forest steppes and the Gobi and Taklamakan deserts occupying the arid north and northwest near Mongolia and Central Asia, and subtropical forests being prevalent in the wetter south near Southeast Asia. The terrain of western China is rugged and elevated, with the Himalaya, Karakoram, Pamir and Tian Shan mountain ranges separating China from South and Central Asia. The world's apex, Mt. Everest (8,848 m), lies on the China–Nepal border, while the world's second-highest point, K2 (8,611 m), is situated on China's border with Pakistan. The country's lowest and the world's third-lowest point, Lake Ayding (−154 m), is located in the Turpan Depression. The Yangtze and Yellow Rivers, the third- and sixth-longest in the world, have their sources in the Tibetan Plateau and continue to the densely populated eastern seaboard. China's coastline along the Pacific Ocean is 14,500 kilometres (9,000 mi) long—the 11th-longest in the world—and is bounded by the Bohai, Yellow, East and South China Seas.
The nation of China has had numerous historical incarnations. The ancient Chinese civilization—one of the world's earliest—flourished in the fertile basin of the Yellow River in the North China Plain.[18] China's political system was based on hereditary monarchies, known as dynasties, beginning with the semi-mythological Xia of the Yellow River basin (approx. 2000 BC) and ending with the fall of the Qing Dynasty in 1911. Since 221 BC, when the Qin Dynasty first conquered several states to form a Chinese empire, the country has expanded, fractured and been reformed numerous times. The Republic of China, founded in 1911 after the overthrow of the Qing dynasty, ruled the Chinese mainland until 1949. In 1945, the ROC acquired Taiwan from Japan following World War II.
In the 1946–1949 phase of the Chinese Civil War, the Chinese Communist Party defeated the nationalist Kuomintang in mainland China and established the People's Republic of China in Beijing on 1 October 1949. The Kuomintang relocated the ROC government to Taiwan, establishing its capital in Taipei. The ROC's jurisdiction is now limited to Taiwan and several outlying islands, including Penghu, Kinmen and Matsu. Since 1949, the People's Republic of China and the Republic of China (now widely known as "Taiwan") have remained in dispute over the sovereignty of China and the political status of Taiwan, mutually claiming each other's territory and competing for international diplomatic recognition. In 1971, the PRC gained admission to the United Nations and took the Chinese seat as a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council. China is also a member of numerous formal and informal multilateral organizations, including the WTO, APEC, BRICS, the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, the BCIM and the G-20. As of September 2011, all but 23 countries have recognized the PRC as the sole legitimate government of China.
Since the introduction of market-based economic reforms in 1978, China has become the world's fastest-growing major economy.[19] As of 2012, it is the world's second-largest economy, after the United States, by both nominal GDP and purchasing power parity (PPP),[20] and is also the world's largest exporter and second-largest importer of goods. In per capita terms, China ranked 90th by nominal GDP and 91st by GDP (PPP) in 2011, according to the IMF. China is a recognized nuclear weapons state and has the world's largest standing army, with the second-largest defense budget. In 2003, China became the third nation in the world, after the former Soviet Union and the United States, to independently launch a successful manned space mission. China has been characterized as a potential superpower by a number of academics,[21] military analysts,[22] and public policy and economics analysts.[23]
Contents |
Etymology[link]
Main article: Names of China
| China | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Chinese name | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Simplified Chinese: | 中国 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Traditional Chinese: | 中國 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Literal meaning: | Middle Kingdom[24][25] | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| People's Republic of China | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Alternative Chinese name | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Simplified Chinese: | 中华人民共和国 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Traditional Chinese: | 中華人民共和國 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Mongolian name | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Mongolian: |  |
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| Tibetan name | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Tibetan: | ཀྲུང་ཧྭ་མི་དམངས་སྤྱི མཐུན་རྒྱལ་ཁབ |
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This article contains Chinese text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Chinese characters. |
The word "China" is derived from Cin (چین), a Persian name for China popularized in medieval Europe by the account of the 13th-century Venetian explorer Marco Polo.[26][27] The first recorded use in English dates from 1555.[28] The Persian word is, in turn, derived from the Sanskrit word Cīna (चीन),[29] which was used as a name for China as early as AD 150.[30] There are various scholarly theories regarding the origin of this word. The traditional theory, proposed in the 17th century by Martino Martini, is that "China" is derived from "Qin" (秦), the westernmost of the Chinese kingdoms during the Zhou Dynasty, or from the succeeding Qin Dynasty (221–206 BC).[31] The word Cīna is used in two Hindu scriptures – the Mahābhārata of the 5th century BC and the Laws of Manu of the 2nd century BC – to refer to a country located in the Tibetan-Burman borderlands east of India.[32][33]
In China, common names for the country include Zhōngguó (Chinese: 中国; literally "the Central State(s)") and Zhōnghuá (Chinese: 中华), although the country's official name has been changed numerous times by successive dynasties and modern governments. The term Zhongguo appeared in various ancient texts, such as the Classic of History of the 6th century BC,[34] and in pre-imperial times it was often used as a cultural concept to distinguish the Huaxia from the barbarians. The term, which can be either singular or plural, referred to the group of states in the central plain. It was only in the nineteenth century that the term emerged as the formal name of the country. The Chinese were not unique in regarding their country as "central", since other civilizations had the same view.[35]
History[link]
Main articles: History of China and Timeline of Chinese history
Prehistory[link]
Main article: Chinese prehistory
Archaeological evidence suggests that early hominids inhabited China between 250,000 and 2.24 million years ago.[36] A cave in Zhoukoudian (near present-day Beijing) exhibits fossils dated at between 300,000 and 780,000 BC.[37][38][39] The fossils are of Peking Man, an example of Homo erectus who used fire. There are also remains of Homo sapiens dating back to 18,000–11,000 BC found at the Peking Man site.[40]
Early dynastic rule[link]
See also: Dynasties in Chinese history
Chinese tradition names the first dynasty Xia, but it was considered mythical until scientific excavations found early Bronze Age sites at Erlitou in Henan Province in 1959.[41] Archaeologists have since uncovered urban sites, bronze implements, and tombs in locations cited as Xia's in ancient historical texts, but it is impossible to verify that these remains are of the Xia without written records from the period.
The first Chinese dynasty that left historical records, the loosely feudal Shang (Yin), settled along the Yellow River in eastern China from the 17th to the 11th century BC. The oracle bone script of the Shang Dynasty represent the oldest forms of Chinese writing found and the direct ancestor of modern Chinese characters used throughout East Asia. The Shang were invaded from the west by the Zhou, who ruled from the 12th to the 5th century BC, until their centralized authority was slowly eroded by feudal warlords. Many independent states eventually emerged out of the weakened Zhou state, and continually waged war with each other in the Spring and Autumn Period, only occasionally deferring to the Zhou king. By the time of the Warring States Period, there were seven powerful sovereign states, each with its own king, ministry and army.
Imperial China[link]
The first unified Chinese state was established by Qin Shi Huang of the Qin state in 221 BC. Qin Shi Huang proclaimed himself the "First Emperor" (始皇帝), and imposed many reforms throughout China, notably the forced standardization of the Chinese language, measurements, length of cart axles, and currency. The Qin Dynasty lasted only fifteen years, falling soon after Qin Shi Huang's death, as its harsh legalist and authoritarian policies led to widespread rebellion.[42][43]
The subsequent Han Dynasty ruled China between 206 BC and 220 AD, and created a lasting Han cultural identity among its populace that extends to the present day.[42][43] The Han Dynasty expanded the empire's territory considerably with military campaigns reaching Korea, Vietnam, Mongolia and Central Asia, and also helped establish the Silk Road in Central Asia. China was for a large part of the last two millennia the world's largest economy.[44] However, in the later part of the Qing Dynasty, China's economic development began to slow and Europe's rapid development during and after the Industrial Revolution enabled it to surpass China.
After the collapse of Han, another period of disunion followed, including the highly chivalric period of the Three Kingdoms.[45] Independent Chinese states of this period such as Wu opened diplomatic relations with Japan,[46] introducing the Chinese writing system there. In 580 AD, China was reunited under the Sui.[47] However, the Sui Dynasty was short-lived after a failure in the Goguryeo-Sui Wars (598–614) weakened it.[48][49]
Under the succeeding Tang and Song dynasties, Chinese technology and culture reached its zenith.[50] The Tang Empire was at its height of power until the middle of the 8th century, when the An Shi Rebellion destroyed the prosperity of the empire.[51] The Song Dynasty was the first government in world history to issue paper money and the first Chinese polity to establish a permanent standing navy.[52] Between the 10th and 11th centuries, the population of China doubled in size. This growth came about through expanded rice cultivation in central and southern China, and the production of abundant food surpluses.
Within its borders, the Northern Song Dynasty had a population of some 100 million people. The Song Dynasty was a culturally rich period for philosophy and the arts. Landscape art and portrait painting were brought to new levels of maturity and complexity after the Tang Dynasty, and social elites gathered to view art, share their own, and trade precious artworks. Philosophers such as Cheng Yi and Chu Hsi reinvigorated Confucianism with new commentary, infused Buddhist ideals, and emphasized a new organization of classic texts that brought about the core doctrine of Neo-Confucianism.
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In 1271, the Mongol leader and fifth Khagan of the Mongol Empire Kublai Khan established the Yuan Dynasty, with the last remnant of the Song Dynasty falling to the Yuan in 1279. Before the Mongol invasion, Chinese dynasties reportedly had approximately 120 million inhabitants; after the conquest was completed in 1279, the 1300 census reported roughly 60 million people.[53]
Late dynastic rule[link]
A peasant named Zhu Yuanzhang overthrew the Yuan Dynasty in 1368 and founded the Ming Dynasty.[54] Ming Dynasty thinkers such as Wang Yangming would further critique and expand Neo-Confucianism with ideas of individualism and innate morality that would have tremendous impact on later Japanese thought. Chosun Korea also became a nominal vassal state of Ming China and adopted much of its Neo-Confucian bureaucratic structure.
Under the Ming Dynasty, China enjoyed another golden age, developing one of the strongest navies in the world and a rich and prosperous economy amid a flourishing of art and culture. It was during this period that Zheng He led explorations throughout the world, possibly reaching America. During the early Ming Dynasty, China's capital was moved from Nanjing to Beijing. In 1644, Beijing was sacked by a coalition of rebel forces led by Li Zicheng, a minor Ming official turned leader of the peasant revolt. The last Ming Chongzhen Emperor committed suicide when the city fell. The Manchu Qing Dynasty then allied with Ming Dynasty general Wu Sangui and overthrew Li's short-lived Shun Dynasty, and subsequently seized control of Beijing, which became the new capital of the Qing Dynasty.
The Qing Dynasty, which lasted until 1912, was the last imperial dynasty of China. In the 19th century, the Qing Dynasty adopted a defensive posture towards European imperialism, even though it engaged in an imperialistic expansion of its own into Central Asia. At this time, China awoke to the significance of the rest of the world, the West in particular. As China opened up to foreign trade and missionary activity, opium produced by British India was forced onto Qing China. Two Opium Wars with Britain weakened the Emperor's control. European imperialism proved to be disastrous for China:
The Arrow War (1856–1860) [2nd Opium War] saw another disastrous defeat for China. The subsequent passing of the humiliating Treaty of Tianjin in 1856 and the Beijing Conventions of 1860 opened up more of the country to foreign penetrations and more ports for their vessels. Hong Kong was ceded over to the British. Thus, the "unequal treaties system" was established. Heavy indemnities had to be paid by China, and more territory and control were taken over by the foreigners.[55]
The weakening of the Qing regime, and the apparent humiliation of the unequal treaties in the eyes of the Chinese people had several consequences. One consequence[according to whom?] was the Taiping Rebellion, a civil war which lasted from 1851 to 1862. The rebellion was led by Hong Xiuquan, who was partly influenced by an idiosyncratic interpretation of Christianity. Hong believed himself to be the son of God and the younger brother of Jesus. Although the Qing forces were eventually victorious, the civil war was one of the bloodiest in human history, costing at least 20 million lives (more than the total number of fatalities in World War I), with some estimates of up to two hundred million. Other costly rebellions followed the Taiping Rebellion, such as the Punti-Hakka Clan Wars (1855–67), Nien Rebellion (1851–1868), Miao Rebellion (1854–73), Panthay Rebellion (1856–1873) and the Dungan revolt (1862–1877).[56][57]
These rebellions resulted in an estimated loss of several million lives each and led to disastrous results for the economy and the countryside.[58][59][60] The flow of British opium hastened the empire's decline. In the 19th century, the age of colonialism was at its height and the great Chinese Diaspora began; today, about 35 million overseas Chinese live in Southeast Asia.[61] Emigration rates were strengthened by domestic catastrophes such as the famine of 1876–79, which claimed between 9 and 13 million lives in northern China.[62] From 108 BC to 1911 AD, China experienced 1,828 famines,[63] or one per year, somewhere in the empire.[64]
While China was wracked by continuous war, Meiji Japan succeeded in rapidly modernizing its military, and set its sights on the conquest of Korea and Manchuria. At the request of the Korean emperor, the Qing government sent troops to aid in suppressing the Tonghak Rebellion in 1894. However, Japan also sent troops to Korea, leading to the First Sino-Japanese War, which resulted in Qing China's loss of influence in the Korean Peninsula as well as the cession of Taiwan (including the Pescadores) to Japan.
Following this series of defeats, a reform plan for the empire to become a modern Meiji-style constitutional monarchy was drafted by the Guangxu Emperor in 1898, but was opposed and stopped by the Empress Dowager Cixi, who placed Emperor Guangxu under house arrest in a coup d'état. Further destruction followed the ill-fated 1900 Boxer Rebellion against westerners in Beijing.
By the early 20th century, mass civil disorder had begun, and calls for reform and revolution were heard across the country. The 38-year-old Emperor Guangxu died under house arrest on 14 November 1908, suspiciously just a day before Cixi's own death. With the throne empty, he was succeeded by Cixi's handpicked heir, his two year old nephew Puyi, who became the Xuantong Emperor. Guangxu's consort became the Empress Dowager Longyu. In another coup de'tat, Yuan Shikai overthrew the last Qing emperor, and forced empress Dowager Longyu to sign the abdication decree as regent in 1912, ending two thousand years of imperial rule in China. She died, childless, in 1913.
Republic of China (1912–1949)[link]
Main articles: Republic of China (1912–1949) and History of the Republic of China
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On 1 January 1912, the Republic of China was established, heralding the end of Imperial China. Sun Yat-sen of the Kuomintang (the KMT or Nationalist Party) was proclaimed provisional president of the republic. However, the presidency was later given to Yuan Shikai, a former Qing general, who had ensured the defection of the entire Beiyang Army from the Qing Empire to the revolution. In 1915, Yuan proclaimed himself Emperor of China, but was forced to abdicate and reestablish the republic in the face of popular condemnation, not only from the general population but also from among his own Beiyang Army and its commanders.
After Yuan Shikai's death in 1916, China was politically fragmented, with an internationally recognized but virtually powerless national government seated in Beijing. Regional warlords exercised actual control over their respective territories. In the late 1920s, the nationalist Kuomintang, under Chiang Kai-shek, was able to reunify the country under its own control with a series of deft military and political maneuverings, known collectively as the Northern Expedition. The Kuomintang moved the nation's capital to Nanjing and implemented "political tutelage", an intermediate stage of political development outlined in Sun Yat-sen's San-min program for transforming China into a modern democratic state. Effectively, political tutelage meant one-party rule by the Kuomintang, but the party was politically divided into competing cliques. This political division made it difficult for Chiang to battle the Communists, which the Kuomintang had been warring against since 1927 in the Chinese Civil War. This war continued successfully for the Kuomintang, especially after the Communists were forced to retreat in the Long March, until the Xi'an Incident and Japanese aggression forced Chiang to confront Imperial Japan.
The Second Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945), a part of World War II, forced an uneasy alliance between the Kuomintang and the Communists. The Japanese "three-all policy" in northern China—"kill all, burn all and destroy all"—led to numerous war atrocities being committed against the civilian population; in all, as many as 20 million Chinese civilians were killed.[65][66] An estimated 200,000 Chinese were massacred in the city of Nanjing alone during the Japanese occupation.[67] Japan unconditionally surrendered to China in 1945. Taiwan, including the Pescadores, was retroceded. China emerged victorious but war-ravaged and financially drained. The continued distrust between the Kuomintang and the Communists led to the resumption of the Chinese Civil War. In 1947, constitutional rule was established, but because of the ongoing Civil War many provisions of the ROC constitution were never implemented in mainland China.[citation needed]
People's Republic of China (1949–present)[link]
Main article: History of the People's Republic of China
Major combat in the Chinese Civil War ended in 1949 with the Communist Party in control of mainland China, and the Kuomintang retreating offshore, reducing the ROC's territory to only Taiwan, Hainan, and their surrounding islands. On 1 October 1949, Mao Zedong proclaimed the People's Republic of China,[68] which was commonly known in the West as "Communist China" or "Red China" during the Cold War.[69] In 1950, the People's Liberation Army succeeded in capturing Hainan from the ROC, occupying Tibet, and defeating the majority of the remaining Kuomintang forces in Yunnan and Xinjiang provinces, though some Kuomintang holdouts survived until much later.
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Mao encouraged population growth, and under his leadership the Chinese population almost doubled from around 550 million to over 900 million.[70] However, Mao's Great Leap Forward, a large-scale economic and social reform project, resulted in an estimated 45 million deaths between 1958 and 1961, mostly from starvation.[71] In 1966, Mao and his allies launched the Cultural Revolution, which would last until Mao's death a decade later. The Cultural Revolution, motivated by power struggles within the Party and a fear of the Soviet Union, led to a major upheaval in Chinese society. In October 1971, the PRC replaced the Republic of China in the United Nations, and took its seat as a permanent member of the Security Council. In that same year, for the first time, the number of countries recognizing the PRC surpassed those recognizing the ROC in Taipei as the government of China.[72] In February 1972, at the peak of the Sino-Soviet split, Mao and Zhou Enlai met Richard Nixon in Beijing. However, the U.S. did not officially recognise the PRC as China's sole legitimate government until 1 January 1979.
After Mao's death in 1976 and the arrest of the Gang of Four, who were blamed for the excesses of the Cultural Revolution, Deng Xiaoping quickly wrested power from Mao's anointed successor Hua Guofeng. Although he never became the head of the party or state himself, Deng was in fact the Paramount Leader of China at that time, his influence within the Party led the country to significant economic reforms. The Communist Party subsequently loosened governmental control over citizens' personal lives and the communes were disbanded with many peasants receiving multiple land leases, which greatly increased incentives and agricultural production. This turn of events marked China's transition from a planned economy to a mixed economy with an increasingly open market environment, a system termed by some "market socialism";[73] the Communist Party of China officially describes it as "socialism with Chinese characteristics". China adopted its current constitution on 4 December 1982.
The death of pro-reform official Hu Yaobang helped to spark the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989, during which students and others campaigned for several months, speaking out against corruption and in favour of greater political reform, including democratic rights and freedom of speech. However, they were eventually put down on 4 June when PLA troops and vehicles entered and forcibly cleared the square, resulting in numerous casualties. This event was widely reported and brought worldwide condemnation and sanctions against the government.[74][75] The "Tank Man" incident in particular became famous.
President Jiang Zemin and Premier Zhu Rongji, both former mayors of Shanghai, led the nation in the 1990s. Under Jiang and Zhu's ten years of administration, China's economic performance pulled an estimated 150 million peasants out of poverty and sustained an average annual gross domestic product growth rate of 11.2%.[76][77] The country formally joined the World Trade Organization in 2001.
Although rapid economic growth has made the Chinese economy the world's second-largest, this growth has also severely impacted the country's resources and environment.[78] Another concern is that the benefits of economic development has not been distributed evenly, resulting in a wide development gap between urban and rural areas. As a result, under President Hu Jintao and Premier Wen Jiabao, the Chinese government initiated policies to address these issues of equitable distribution of resources, though the outcome remains to be seen.[79] More than 40 million farmers have been displaced from their land,[80] usually for economic development, contributing to the 87,000 demonstrations and riots across China in 2005.[81] Living standards have improved significantly but political controls remain tight.[82]
Geography[link]
Main article: Geography of the People's Republic of China
See also: Geography of Taiwan
A composite satellite image showing the topography of China.
Longsheng Rice Terrace in Guangxi.
The Li River in Guangxi.
Political geography[link]
The People's Republic of China is the second-largest country in the world by land area after Russia[13] and is either the third- or fourth-largest by total area, after Russia, Canada and, depending on the definition of total area, the United States.[83] China's total area is generally stated as being approximately 9,600,000 km2 (3,700,000 sq mi).[84] Specific area figures range from 9,572,900 km2 (3,696,100 sq mi) according to the Encyclopædia Britannica,[85] 9,596,961 km2 (3,705,407 sq mi) according to the UN Demographic Yearbook,[86] to 9,596,961 km2 (3,705,407 sq mi) according to the CIA World Factbook,[87] and 9,640,011 km2 (3,722,029 sq mi) including Aksai Chin and the Trans-Karakoram Tract, which are controlled by China and claimed by India.[88] None of these figures include the 1,000 square kilometres (386.1 sq mi) of territory ceded to China by Tajikistan following the ratification of a Sino-Tajik border agreement in January 2011.[89]
According to the Encyclopædia Britannica, the total area of the United States, at 9,522,055 km2 (3,676,486 sq mi), is slightly smaller than that of China. Meanwhile, the CIA World Factbook states that China's total area was greater than that of the United States until the coastal waters of the Great Lakes was added to the United States' total area in 1996.[90]
China has the longest combined land border in the world, measuring 22,117 km (13,743 mi) from the mouth of the Yalu River to the Gulf of Tonkin. China borders 14 nations, more than any other country except Russia, which also borders 14. China extends across much of East Asia, bordering Vietnam, Laos, and Burma in Southeast Asia; India, Bhutan, Nepal and Pakistan[91] in South Asia; Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan in Central Asia; a small section of Russian Altai and Mongolia in Inner Asia; and the Russian Far East and North Korea in Northeast Asia.
Additionally, China shares maritime boundaries with South Korea, Japan, Vietnam and the Philippines. The PRC and the Republic of China (Taiwan) make mutual claims over each other's territory and the frontier between areas under their respective control is closest near the islands of Kinmen and Matsu, off the Fujian coast, but otherwise run through the Taiwan Strait. The PRC and ROC assert identical claims over the entirety of the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea, and the southern-most extent of these claims reach Zengmu Ansha (James Shoal), which would form a maritime frontier with Malaysia.
Landscape and climate[link]
Mount Everest, the world's highest mountain, in Tibet.
The South China Sea coast at Hainan.
The territory of China lies between latitudes 18° and 54° N, and longitudes 73° and 135° E. China's landscapes vary significantly across its vast width. In the east, along the shores of the Yellow Sea and the East China Sea, there are extensive and densely populated alluvial plains, while on the edges of the Inner Mongolian plateau in the north, broad grasslands predominate. Southern China is dominated by hills and low mountain ranges, while the central-east hosts the deltas of China's two major rivers, the Yellow River and the Yangtze River. Other major rivers include the Xi, Mekong, Brahmaputra and Amur. To the west, major mountain ranges, most notably the Himalayas, and high plateaus feature among the more arid landscapes of the north, such as the Taklamakan and the Gobi Desert. China's highest point, Mt. Everest (8848m), lies on the Sino-Nepalese border. The country's lowest point is the dried lake bed of Ayding Lake (−154m) in the Turpan Depression.
A major environmental issue in China is the continued expansion of its deserts, particularly the Gobi Desert, which is currently the world's fifth-largest desert.[92][93] Although barrier tree lines planted since the 1970s have reduced the frequency of sandstorms, prolonged drought and poor agricultural practices have resulted in dust storms plaguing northern China each spring, which then spread to other parts of East Asia, including Korea and Japan. According to China's environmental watchdog, Sepa, China is losing a million acres (4,000 km²) per year to desertification.[94] Water quality, erosion, and pollution control have become important issues in China's relations with other countries. Melting glaciers in the Himalayas could potentially lead to water shortages for hundreds of millions of people.[95]
China's climate is mainly dominated by dry seasons and wet monsoons, which lead to a pronounced temperature differences between winter and summer. In the winter, northern winds coming from high-latitude areas are cold and dry; in summer, southern winds from coastal areas at lower latitudes are warm and moist. The climate in China differs from region to region because of the country's extensive and complex topography.
Biodiversity[link]
Main article: Wildlife of China
China is one of 17 megadiverse countries,[96] lying in two of the world's major ecozones: the Palearctic and the Indomalaya. In the Palearctic zone, mammals such as the horse, camel, tapir, and jerboa can be found. Among the species found in the Indomalaya region are the Leopard Cat, bamboo rat, treeshrew, and various monkey and ape species. Some overlap exists between the two regions due to natural dispersal and migration; deer, antelope, bears, wolves, pigs, and numerous rodent species can all be found in China's diverse climatic and geological environments. The famous giant panda is found only in a limited area along the Yangtze River. China suffers from a continuing problem with trade in endangered species, although there are now laws to prohibit such activities.
China also hosts a variety of forest types. Cold coniferous forests predominate in the north of the country, supporting animal species such as moose and the Asian black bear, along with over 120 bird species. Moist conifer forests can have thickets of bamboo as an understorey, replaced by rhododendrons in higher montane stands of juniper and yew. Subtropical forests, which dominate central and southern China, support as many as 146,000 species of flora. Tropical and seasonal rainforests, though confined to Yunnan and Hainan Island, contain a quarter of all the plant and animal species found in China.
Environmental issues[link]
Main article: Environment in the People's Republic of China
In recent decades, China has suffered from severe environmental deterioration and pollution.[97] While regulations such as the 1979 Environmental Protection Law are fairly stringent, enforcement of them is poor, as they are frequently disregarded by local communities and government officials in favour of rapid economic development.
Environmental campaigners such as Ma Jun have warned of the danger that water pollution poses to Chinese society.[98] According to the Chinese Ministry of Water Resources, roughly 300 million Chinese do not have access to safe drinking water, and 40% of China’s rivers have been polluted by industrial and agricultural waste as of late 2011.[99] This crisis is compounded by the perennial problem of water shortages, with 400 out of 600 surveyed Chinese cities reportedly short of drinking water.[100][101]
However, China is the world's leading investor in renewable energy technologies, with $34.6 billion invested in 2009 alone.[102][103] China produces more wind turbines and solar panels than any other country,[104] and renewable energy projects, such as solar water heating, are widely pursued at the local level.[105] By 2009, over 17% of China's energy was derived from renewable sources – most notably hydroelectric power plants, of which China has a total installed capacity of 197 GW.[106] In 2011, the Chinese government announced plans to invest four trillion yuan (US$618.55 billion) in water infrastructure projects over a ten-year period, and to complete construction of a flood prevention and anti-drought system by 2020.[107]
Politics[link]
Main article: Politics of the People's Republic of China
See also: Politics of the Republic of China
The People's Republic of China, along with Vietnam, North Korea, Laos, and Cuba, is one of the five remaining official Communist states in the world.[108][109] but simple characterizations of China's political structure since the 1980s are no longer possible.[10] The Chinese government has been variously described as communist and socialist, but also as authoritarian, with heavy restrictions remaining in many areas, most notably on the Internet, the press, freedom of assembly, reproductive rights, and freedom of religion.[110] Its current political/economic system has been termed by its leaders as "Socialism with Chinese characteristics".
Compared to its closed-door policies until the mid-1970s, the liberalization of China has resulted in the administrative climate being less restrictive than before. China is far different from liberal democracy or social democracy that exists in most of Europe or North America, and the National People's Congress (highest state body) has been described as a "rubber stamp" body.[111] China's incumbent President is Hu Jintao, who is also the General Secretary of the Communist Party of China, and its Premier is Wen Jiabao, who is also a senior member of the CPC Politburo Standing Committee.
The country is ruled by the Communist Party of China (CPC), whose power is enshrined in China's constitution.[112] The Chinese electoral system is hierarchical, whereby local People's Congresses are directly elected, and all higher levels of People's Congresses up to the National People's Congress (NPC) are indirectly elected by the People's Congress of the level immediately below.[113] The political system is partly decentralized,[114] with limited democratic processes internal to the party and at local village levels, although these experiments have been marred by corruption. There are other political parties in China, referred to in China as democratic parties, which participate in the National People's Congress and the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC).
There have been some moves toward political liberalization, in that open contested elections are now held at the village and town levels,[115][116] and that legislatures have shown some assertiveness from time to time. However, the Party retains effective control over government appointments: in the absence of meaningful opposition, the CPC wins by default most of the time. Political concerns in China include lessening the growing gap between rich and poor and fighting corruption within the government leadership.[117]
The level of support to the government action and the management of the nation is among the highest in the world, with 86% of people who express satisfaction with the way things are going in their country and with their nation's economy according to a 2008 Pew Research Center survey.[118]
Administrative divisions[link]
Main articles: Administrative divisions of the People's Republic of China, Districts of Hong Kong, and Municipalities of Macau
The People's Republic of China has administrative control over 22 provinces, and considers Taiwan to be its 23rd province, although Taiwan is currently governed by the Republic of China, which disputes the PRC's claim.[119] China also has five subdivisions officially termed autonomous regions, each with a designated minority group; four municipalities; and two Special Administrative Regions (SARs), which enjoy a degree of political autonomy. These 22 provinces, five autonomous regions, and four municipalities can be collectively referred to as "mainland China", a term which usually excludes the SARs of Hong Kong and Macau.
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Foreign relations[link]
Main article: Foreign relations of the People's Republic of China
China has diplomatic relations with 171 countries and maintains embassies in 162.[120] Its legitimacy is disputed by the Republic of China and a few other countries; it is thus the largest and most populous state with limited recognition. Sweden was the first western country to establish diplomatic relations with the People's Republic on 9 May 1950.[121] In 1971, the PRC replaced the Republic of China as the sole representative of China in the United Nations and as one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council.[122] China was also a former member and leader of the Non-Aligned Movement, and still considers itself an advocate for developing countries.[123]
Under its interpretation of the One-China policy, China has made it a precondition to establishing diplomatic relations that the other country acknowledges its claim to Taiwan and severs official ties with the government of the Republic of China. Chinese officials have protested on numerous occasions when foreign countries have made diplomatic overtures to Taiwan,[124] especially in the matter of armament sales.[125] Political meetings between foreign government officials and the 14th Dalai Lama are also opposed by China, as it considers Tibet to be formally part of China.[126]
Much of China's current foreign policy is reportedly based on the Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence of Zhou Enlai—non-interference in other states' affairs, non-aggression, peaceful coexistence, equality and mutual benefits. China's foreign policy is also driven by the concept of "harmony without uniformity", which encourages diplomatic relations between states despite ideological differences. This policy has led China to support states that are regarded as dangerous or repressive by Western nations, such as Zimbabwe, North Korea, and Iran.[127] Conflicts with foreign countries have occurred at times in China's recent history, particularly with the United States; for example, the US bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade during the Kosovo conflict in May 1999 and the US-China spy plane incident in April 2001. China's foreign relations with many Western nations suffered for a time following the military crackdown on the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989, although in recent years China has improved its diplomatic links with the West.[128][129]
Trade relations[link]
In recent decades, China has played an increasing role in calling for free trade areas and security pacts amongst its Asia-Pacific neighbors. In 2004, China proposed an entirely new East Asia Summit (EAS) framework as a forum for regional security issues, pointedly excluding the United States.[130] The EAS, which includes ASEAN Plus Three, India, Australia and New Zealand, held its inaugural summit in 2005. China is also a founding member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), along with Russia and the Central Asian republics.
In 2000, the U.S. Congress approved "permanent normal trade relations" (PNTR) with China, allowing Chinese exports in at the same low tariffs as goods from most other countries.[131] Both Bill Clinton and George W. Bush asserted that free trade would gradually open China to democratic reform.[132] Bush was furthermore an advocate of China's entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO).[133] China has a significant trade surplus with the United States, its most important export market.[134] In the early 2010s, U.S. politicians argued that the Chinese yuan was significantly undervalued, giving China an unfair trade advantage.[135]
Sinophobic attitudes often target Chinese minorities and nationals living outside of China. Sometimes, such anti-Chinese attitudes turn violent, as occurred during the 13 May Incident in Malaysia in 1969 and the Jakarta riots of May 1998 in Indonesia, in which more than 2,000 people died.[136] In recent years, a number of anti-Chinese riots and incidents have also occurred in Africa and Oceania.[137][138] Anti-Chinese sentiment is often rooted in socio-economics.[139]
Territorial disputes[link]
Main article: Foreign relations of the People's Republic of China#International territorial disputes
China has been involved in a number of international territorial disputes, mostly resulting from the legacy of unequal treaties imposed on China during the historical period of New Imperialism. Since the 1990s, China has been entering negotiations to resolve its disputed land borders, usually by offering concessions and accepting less than half of the disputed territory with each party. China's only remaining land border disputes are a disputed border with India and an undefined border with Bhutan. China is additionally involved in more minor multilateral disputes over the ownership of several small islands in the East and South China Seas.[140][141]
Sino-Japanese relations[link]
Main article: Sino-Japanese relations
The relationship between China and Japan has been strained at times by Japan's refusal to acknowledge its wartime past to the satisfaction of China. Revisionist comments made by prominent Japanese officials and some Japanese history textbooks regarding the 1937 Nanjing Massacre have been a focus of particular controversy. Sino-Japanese relations warmed considerably after Shinzo Abe became the Prime Minister of Japan in September 2006, and a joint historical study conducted by China and Japan released a report in 2010 which pointed toward a new consensus on the issue of World War 2-era atrocities.[142] However, in the early 2010s, relations cooled once more, with Japan accusing China of withholding its reserves of valuable rare earth elements.[143]
China and the developing world[link]
China is heavily engaged, both politically and economically, with numerous nations in the developing world. Most notably, they have followed a policy of engaging with African nations for trade and bilateral co-operation.[144][145] Xinhua, China's official news agency, states that there are no less than 750,000 Chinese nationals working or living in Africa.[146] China has furthermore strengthened its ties with major South American economies, becoming the largest trading partner of Brazil and building strategic links with Argentina.[147][148] Along with Brazil, Russia, India and South Africa, China is a member of the BRICS group of emerging major economies, and hosted the group's third official summit at Sanya in Hainan Province in April 2011.[149]
Emerging superpower status[link]
China is regularly hailed as a potential new superpower, with certain commentators citing its rapid economic progress, growing military might, very large population, and increasing international influence as signs that it will play a prominent global role in the 21st century. Others, however, warn that economic bubbles and demographic imbalances could slow or even halt China's growth as the century progresses.[150][151][152][153][154]
Sociopolitical issues and reform[link]
See also: Human rights in the People's Republic of China, Hukou system, Social welfare in China, Elections in the People's Republic of China, and Feminism in the People's Republic of China
The Chinese democracy movement, social activists, and some members of the Communist Party of China have all identified the need for social and political reform. While economic and social controls have been greatly relaxed in China since the 1970s, political freedom is still tightly restricted. The Constitution of the People's Republic of China states that the "fundamental rights" of citizens include freedom of speech, freedom of the press, the right to a fair trial, freedom of religion, universal suffrage, and property rights. However, in practice, these provisions do not afford significant protection against criminal prosecution by the State.[155][156][157]
As the Chinese economy expanded following Deng Xiaoping's 1978 reforms, tens of millions of rural Chinese who have moved to the cities[158] find themselves treated as second-class citizens by China's hukou household registration system, which controls state benefits.[159] Property rights are often poorly protected, and eminent domain land seizures have had a disproportionate effect on poorer peasants.[158] In 2003, the average Chinese farmer paid three times more taxes than the average urban dweller, despite having one-sixth of the annual income.[159] However, a number of rural taxes have since been reduced or abolished, and additional social services provided to rural dwellers.[160][161][162]
Censorship of political speech and information, most notably on the Internet,[163] is openly and routinely used in China to silence criticism of the government and the ruling Communist Party.[164][165] In 2005, Reporters Without Borders ranked China 159th out of 167 states in its Annual World Press Freedom Index, indicating a very low level of perceived press freedom.[166] The government has suppressed demonstrations by organizations that it considers a potential threat to "social stability", as was the case with the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989. The Communist Party has had mixed success in controlling information: a powerful and pervasive media control system faces equally strong market forces, an increasingly educated citizenry, and technological and cultural changes that are making China more open to the wider world, especially on environmental issues.[167][168] However, attempts are still made by the Chinese government to control public access to outside information, with online searches for politically sensitive material being blocked by the so-called Great Firewall.[169]
A number of foreign governments and NGOs routinely criticize China's human rights record, alleging widespread civil rights violations, including systematic use of lengthy detention without trial, forced confessions, torture, mistreatment of prisoners, and restrictions of freedom of speech, assembly, association, religion, the press, and labor rights.[110] China executes more people than any other country, accounting for 72% of the world's total in 2009, though it is not the largest executioner per capita.[170] This high execution rate is partly due to the fact that numerous white-collar crimes, such as fraud, are punishable by death in China. However, in the early 2010s, China began restricting the application of capital punishment for some such crimes.[171]
The Chinese government has responded to foreign criticism by arguing that the notion of human rights should take into account a country's present level of economic development, and focus more on the people's rights to subsistence and development in poorer countries.[172] The rise in the standard of living, literacy, and life expectancy for the average Chinese since the 1970s is seen by the government as tangible progress made in human rights.[173] Improvements in workplace safety, and efforts to combat natural disasters such as the perennial Yangtze River floods, are also portrayed in China as progress in human rights for a still largely poor country.[172][174]
Some Chinese politicians have spoken out in favor of reforms, while others remain more conservative. In 2010, Premier Wen Jiabao stated that China needs "to gradually improve the democratic election system so that state power will truly belong to the people and state power will be used to serve the people." Despite his status, Wen's comments were later censored by the government.[175]
As the social, cultural and political consequences of economic growth and reform become increasingly manifest, tensions between the conservatives and reformists in the Communist Party are sharpening. Zhou Tianyong, the vice director of research of the Central Party School, argues that gradual political reform as well as repression of those pushing for overly rapid change over the next thirty years will be essential if China is to avoid an overly turbulent transition to a democratic, middle-class-dominated polity.[176][177]
Military[link]
Main article: People's Liberation Army
With 2.3 million active troops, the People's Liberation Army (PLA) is the largest standing military force in the world, commanded by the Central Military Commission (CMC).[178] The PLA consists of the People's Liberation Army Ground Force (PLAGF), the People's Liberation Army Navy (PLAN), the People's Liberation Army Air Force (PLAAF), and a strategic nuclear force, the Second Artillery Corps. According to SIPRI, China's military expenditure in 2011 totalled US$129.2 billion (923 billion yuan), constituting the world's second-largest military budget.[179] However, other nations, such as the United States, have claimed that China does not report its real level of military spending, which is allegedly much higher than the official budget.[180]
As a recognised nuclear weapons state, China is considered both a major regional military power and a potential military superpower.[181] As of August 2011, China's Second Artillery Corps is believed to maintain at least 195 nuclear missiles, including 75 ICBMs.[182] Nonetheless, China is the only member of the UN Security Council to have relatively limited power projection capabilities.[183] To offset this, it has begun developing power projection assets, such as aircraft carriers, and has established a network of foreign military relationships that has been compared to a string of pearls.
China has made significant progress in modernizing its military since the early 2000s. It has purchased advanced Russian fighter jets, such as the Sukhoi Su-30, and has also produced its own modern fighters, most notably the Chengdu J-10 and Shenyang J-11.[184] China is furthermore engaged in developing an indigenous stealth aircraft, the Chengdu J-20.[185][186][187] China's ground forces have also undergone significant modernisations, replacing its ageing Soviet-derived tank inventory with numerous variants of the modern Type 99 tank, and upgrading its battlefield C3I systems to enhance its network-centric warfare capabilities.[188] China has furthermore acquired and improved upon the Russian S-300 surface-to-air missile system.[189] Russia later produced the next-generation S-400 Triumf system, with China reportedly having spent $500 million on a downgraded export version of it.[190] A number of indigenous missile technologies have also been developed – in 2007, China conducted a successful test of an anti-satellite missile,[191] and its first indigenous land-attack cruise missile, the CJ-10, entered service in 2009. In 2011, the Pentagon reported that China was believed to be testing the JL-2 missile, a submarine-launched nuclear ICBM with multiple-warhead delivery capabilities.[182]
In recent years, much attention has been focused on enhancing the blue-water capabilities of the People's Liberation Army Navy.[192] In August 2011, China's first aircraft carrier, the refurbished Soviet vessel Varyag, began sea trials.[193] China furthermore maintains a substantial fleet of submarines, including several nuclear-powered attack and ballistic missile submarines.[194] On 13 March 2011, the PLAN missile frigate Xuzhou was spotted off the coast of Libya, marking the first time in history a Chinese warship sailed into the Mediterranean. The ship's entrance into the Mediterranean was officially part of a humanitarian mission to rescue Chinese nationals from the 2011 Libyan civil war, though analysts such as Fareed Zakaria viewed the mission as also being an attempt to increase China's global military presence.[195]
Little information is available regarding the motivations supporting China's military modernization. A 2007 report by the US Secretary of Defense noted that "China's actions in certain areas increasingly appear inconsistent with its declaratory policies".[196] For its part, China claims it maintains an army purely for defensive purposes.[197]
Economy[link]
Main articles: Economy of the People's Republic of China and List of Chinese administrative divisions by GDP
As of 2012, China has the world's second-largest economy in terms of nominal GDP, totalling approximately US$7.298 trillion according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF).[6] However, China's 2011 nominal GDP per capita of US$5,184 puts it behind around ninety countries (out of 183 countries on the IMF list) in global GDP per capita rankings.[6] If PPP is taken into account in total GDP figures, China is again second only to the United States—in 2011, its PPP GDP reached $11.316 trillion, corresponding to $8,394 per capita.[6] In 2009, China's primary, secondary, and tertiary industries contributed 10.6%, 46.8%, and 42.6% respectively to its total GDP.
From its founding in 1949 until late 1978, the People's Republic of China was a Soviet-style centrally planned economy, without private businesses or capitalism. To propel the country towards a modern, industrialized communist society, Mao Zedong instituted the Great Leap Forward in the early 1960s, although this had decidedly mixed economic results.[199] Following Mao's death in 1976 and the consequent end of the Cultural Revolution, Deng Xiaoping and the new Chinese leadership began to reform the economy and move towards a more market-oriented mixed economy under one-party rule. Collectivization of the agriculture was dismantled and farmlands were privatized to increase productivity. Modern-day China is mainly characterized as having a market economy based on private property ownership,[200][201] and is one of the leading examples of state capitalism.[202][203]
Under the post-Mao market reforms, a wide variety of small-scale private enterprises were encouraged, while the government relaxed price controls and promoted foreign investment. Foreign trade was focused upon as a major vehicle of growth, leading to the creation of Special Economic Zones (SEZs), first in Shenzhen and then in other Chinese cities. Inefficient state-owned enterprises (SOEs) were restructured by introducing western-style management systems, with unprofitable ones being closed outright, resulting in massive job losses. By the latter part of 2010, China was reversing some of its economic liberalization initiatives, with state-owned companies buying up independent businesses in the steel, auto and energy industries.[204]
Since economic liberalization began in 1978, China's investment- and export-led[205] economy has grown almost a hundredfold[206] and is the fastest-growing major economy in the world.[207] According to the IMF, China's annual average GDP growth between 2001 and 2010 was 10.5%, and the Chinese economy is predicted to grow at an average annual rate of 9.5% between 2011 and 2015. Between 2007 and 2011, China's economic growth rate was equivalent to all of the G7 countries' growth combined.[208] According to the Global Growth Generators index announced by Citigroup in February 2011, China has a very high 3G growth rating.[209]
China is the third-most-visited country in the world, with 55.7 million inbound international visitors in 2010.[210] It is a member of the WTO and is the world's second-largest trading power behind the US, with a total international trade value of US$3.64 trillion in 2011.[211] Its foreign exchange reserves reached US$2.85 trillion by the end of 2010, an increase of 18.7% over the previous year, making its reserves by far the world's largest.[212][213] China owns an estimated $1.6 trillion of US securities.[214] China, holding US$1.16 trillion in US Treasury bonds,[215] is the largest foreign holder of US public debt.[216][217] China is the world's third-largest recipient of inward foreign direct investment (FDI), attracting $115 billion in 2011 alone, marking a 9% increase over 2010.[218][219] China also increasingly invests abroad, with a total outward FDI of $68 billion in 2010.[220]
| <timeline>
ImageSize = width:300 height:140 PlotArea = left:60 bottom:20 top:10 right:0 AlignBars = justify DateFormat = yyyy Period = from:0 till:16000 TimeAxis = orientation:horizontal Colors = id:gray value:gray(0.5) id:line1 value:gray(0.9) id:line2 value:gray(0.7) ScaleMajor = unit:year increment:5000 start:0 gridcolor:line2 ScaleMinor = unit:year increment:1000 start:0 gridcolor:line1 BarData = bar:USA text:USA bar:China text:China bar:Japan text:Japan bar:Germany text:Germany bar:France text:France PlotData= color:tan1 width:10 bar:USA from:start till:15094 text:15,094 color:yellow width:10 bar:China from:start till:7298 text:7,298 color:tan1 width:10 bar:Japan from:start till:5869 text:5,869 bar:Germany from:start till:3577 text:3,577 bar:France from:start till:2776 text:2,776 TextData = pos:(5,1) textcolor:gray fontsize:S text:US$ bn </timeline> |
| A graph comparing the 2011 nominal GDPs of major economies in US$ billions, according to IMF data.[221] |
China's success has been primarily due to manufacturing as a low-cost producer. This is attributed to a combination of cheap labor, good infrastructure, relatively high productivity, favorable government policy, and a possibly undervalued exchange rate. The latter has been sometimes blamed for China's huge trade surplus (US$262.7 billion in 2007)[222] and has become a major source of dispute between China and its major trading partners—the US, EU, and Japan—despite the yuan having been de-pegged and having risen in value by 20% against the US dollar since 2005.[223] China is moreover widely criticised for manufacturing large quantities of counterfeit goods—in 2005, the Asia Business Council alleged that the counterfeiting industry accounted for 8% of China's GDP at the time.[224][225]
The state still dominates in strategic "pillar" industries (such as energy and heavy industries), but private enterprise (composed of around 30 million private businesses)[226] has expanded enormously; in 2005, it accounted for anywhere between 33%[227] to 70%[228] of national GDP, while the OECD estimate for that year was over 50%[229] of China's national output, up from 1% in 1978.[230] The Shanghai Stock Exchange has raised record amounts of IPOs, and its benchmark Shanghai Composite index has doubled since 2005. SSE's market capitalization reached US$3 trillion in 2007, making it the world's fifth-largest stock exchange.
China now ranks 29th in the Global Competitiveness Index,[231] although it is only ranked 135th among the 179 countries measured in the Index of Economic Freedom.[232] 46 Chinese companies made the list in the 2010 Fortune Global 500 (Beijing alone with 30).[233] Measured using market capitalization, four of the world's top ten most valuable companies are Chinese. Some of these include first-ranked PetroChina, third-ranked Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (the world's most valuable bank), fifth-ranked China Mobile (the world's most valuable telecommunications company) and seventh-ranked China Construction Bank.[234]
Although a middle-income country by Western standards, China's rapid growth has pulled hundreds of millions of its people out of poverty since 1978. Today, about 10% of the Chinese population live below the poverty line of US$1 per day (down from 64% in 1978), while life expectancy has increased to 73 years. More than 93% of the population is literate,[235] compared to only 20% in 1950.[236] Urban unemployment in China reportedly declined to 4% by the end of 2007, although true overall unemployment may be as high as 10%.[237]
China's middle-class population (defined as those with annual income of at least US$17,000) has reached more than 100 million as of 2011,[238] while the number of super-rich individuals worth more than 10 million yuan (US$1.5 million) is estimated to be 825,000, according to Hurun Report.[239] Based on the Hurun rich list, the number of US dollar billionaires in China doubled from 130 in 2009 to 271 in 2010, giving China the world's second-highest number of billionaires.[240] China's retail market was worth RMB 8.9 trillion (US$1.302 trillion) in 2007, and is growing at 16.8% annually.[241] China is also now the world's second-largest consumer of luxury goods behind Japan, with 27.5% of the global share.[242]
In recent years, China's rapid economic growth has contributed to severe consumer inflation,[243] causing the prices of basic goods to rise steeply. Food prices in China increased by over 21% in the first four months of 2008 alone.[244] To curb inflation and moderate rising property prices, the Chinese government has instituted a number of fiscal regulations and amendments, raising interest rates and imposing limits on bank loans. In September 2011, consumer prices rose by 6.1% compared to a year earlier, marking a reduction in inflation from the peak of 6.5% in July 2011.[245] A side-effect of increased economic regulation was a slowdown in overall growth – China's quarterly GDP growth fell to 9.1% in October 2011, down from 9.5% in the previous quarter,[245] and sank to 8.1% in April 2012.[246]
The Chinese economy is highly energy-intensive and inefficient—on average, industrial processes in China between 20% and 100% more energy than similar ones in OECD countries.[247] China became the world's largest energy consumer in 2010,[248] but still relies on coal to supply about 70% of its energy needs.[249] Coupled with lax environmental regulations, this has led to massive water and air pollution, leaving China with 20 of the world's 30 most polluted cities.[247] Consequently, the government has promised to use more renewable energy, planning to make renewables constitute 30% of China's total energy production by 2050.[250] In 2010, China became the largest wind energy provider in the world, with a total installed wind power capacity of 41.8 GW.[251] In January 2011, Russia began scheduled oil shipments to China, pumping 300,000 barrels of oil per day via the Eastern Siberia – Pacific Ocean oil pipeline.[252]
Science and technology[link]
Main article: Science and technology in the People's Republic of China
 |
| History of science and technology in China |
|---|
| Inventions |
| Discoveries |
| By era |
| Han Dynasty |
| Tang Dynasty |
| Song Dynasty |
| People's Republic of China |
| Present-day China |
China was a world leader in science and technology until the Ming Dynasty. Ancient Chinese discoveries and inventions, such as papermaking, printing, the compass, and gunpowder (the Four Great Inventions), contributed to the economic development of Asia and Europe. However, Chinese scientific activity entered a prolonged decline in the fourteenth century. Unlike European scientists, medieval Chinese thinkers did not attempt to reduce observations of nature to mathematical laws, and they did not form a scholarly community offering peer review and progressive research. There was an increasing concentration on literature, the arts, and public administration, while science and technology were seen as trivial or restricted to limited practical applications.[253] The causes of this Great Divergence continue to be debated.
After repeated military defeats by Western nations in the 19th century, Chinese reformers began promoting modern science and technology as part of the Self-Strengthening Movement. After the Communist victory in 1949, efforts were made to organize science and technology based on the model of the Soviet Union. However, Mao Zedong's Cultural Revolution of 1966-76 had a catastrophic effect on Chinese research, as academics were persecuted and the training of scientists and engineers was severely curtailed for nearly a decade. After Mao's death in 1976, science and technology was established as one of the Four Modernizations, and the Soviet-inspired academic system was gradually reformed.[253]
In modern China, science and technology are seen as vital for achieving economic and political goals, and are held as a source of national pride to a degree sometimes described as "techno-nationalism".[254] Almost all of the members of the Politburo Standing Committee of the Communist Party of China have engineering degrees.[255] Since the end of the Cultural Revolution, China has become one of the world's leading technological powers, spending over US$100 billion on scientific research and development in 2011 alone.[256] China is also rapidly developing its education system with an emphasis on science, mathematics and engineering; in 2009, it produced over 10,000 Ph.D. engineering graduates, and as many as 500,000 BSc graduates, more than any other country.[257] China is also the world's second-largest publisher of scientific papers, producing 121,500 in 2010 alone, including 5,200 in leading international scientific journals.[258]
The Chinese space program is one of the world's most active, and is a major source of national pride.[259] In 1970, China launched its first satellite, Dong Fang Hong I. In 2003, China became the third country to independently send humans into space, with Yang Liwei's spaceflight aboard Shenzhou 5. In 2008, China conducted its first spacewalk with the Shenzhou 7 mission. In 2011, China's first space station module, Tiangong-1, was launched, marking the first step in a project to assemble a large manned station by 2020.[260] The active Chinese Lunar Exploration Program includes a planned lunar rover launch in 2013, and possibly a manned lunar landing in 2025.[261] Experience gained from the lunar program may be used for future programs such as the exploration of Mars and Venus.[262]
Infrastructure[link]
Communications[link]
Main article: Telecommunications in the People's Republic of China
China currently has the most cellphone users of any country in the world, with over 1 billion users as of May 2012.[263][264] It also has the world's largest number of internet and broadband users.[265] By December 2010, China had around 457 million internet users, an increase of 19% over the previous year, and by the end of 2011 the number of internet users had exceeded 500 million.[266][267][268] According to the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC), China's average internet connection speed is 100.9 kbit/s, less than half of the global average of 212.5 kbit/s.[269]
China Telecom and China Unicom, the country's two largest broadband providers, accounted for 20% of global broadband subscribers, whereas the world's ten largest broadband service providers combined accounted for 39% of the world's broadband customers. China Telecom alone serves 55 million broadband subscribers, while China Unicom serves more than 40 million. The massive rise in internet use in China continues to fuel rapid broadband growth, whereas the world's other major broadband ISPs operate in the mature markets of the developed world, with high levels of broadband penetration and rapidly slowing subscriber growth.[270]
Transport[link]
Main article: Transport in the People's Republic of China
Transportation in mainland China has undergone intense state-led development since the late 1990s. The national road network has been significantly expanded through the creation of a network of expressways, known as the National Trunk Highway System (NTHS). By the end of 2011, China's expressways had reached a total length of 85,000 km (53,000 mi), second only to the network of the United States.[271] Private car ownership is growing rapidly in China, which surpassed the United States as the world's largest automobile market in 2009, with total car sales of over 13.6 million.[272] Analysts predict that annual car sales in China may rise as high as 40 million by 2020.[273]
China also possesses the world's longest high-speed rail network, with over 9,676 km (6,012 mi) of service routes. Of these, 3,515 km (2,184 mi) serve trains with top speeds of 300 km/h (190 mph).[274] In 2011, China unveiled a prototype train capable of reaching speeds of 310 mph (500 km/h), the first ultra-high-speed train developed solely by its domestic railway industry.[275] China intends to operate approximately 16,000 km (9,900 mi) of high-speed rail lines by 2020.[276]
As of 2012, China is the world's largest constructor of new airports, and the Chinese government has begun a US$250 billion five-year project to expand and modernize domestic air travel.[277] However, long-distance transportation remains dominated by railways and charter bus systems. Railways are the vital carrier in China; they are monopolized by the state, divided into various railway bureaux in different regions. Due to huge demand, the system is regularly subject to overcrowding, particularly during holiday seasons, such as Chunyun during the Chinese New Year. The Chinese rail network carried an estimated 1.68 billion total passengers in 2010 alone.[276]
Rapid transit systems are also rapidly developing in China's major cities, in the form of networks of underground or light rail systems. Hong Kong has one of the most developed transport systems in the world, while Shanghai has a high-speed maglev rail line connecting the city to its main international airport, Pudong International Airport. China is additionally developing its own satellite navigation system, dubbed Beidou, which began offering commercial navigation services in mainland China in 2011, and is planned to offer global coverage by 2020.[278]
Demographics[link]
Main article: Demographics of the People's Republic of China
As of July 2010, the People's Republic of China has an estimated total population of 1,338,612,968. About 21% of the population (145,461,833 males; 128,445,739 females) are 14 years old or younger, 71% (482,439,115 males; 455,960,489 females) are between 15 and 64 years old, and 8% (48,562,635 males; 53,103,902 females) are over 65 years old. The population growth rate for 2006 was 0.6%.[279]
By end of 2010, the proportion of mainland Chinese people aged 14 or younger was 16.60%, while the number aged 60 or older grew to 13.26%, giving a total proportion of 29.86% dependents. The proportion of the population of workable age was thus around 70%.[280]
With a population of over 1.3 billion and dwindling natural resources, China is very concerned about its population growth and has attempted, with mixed results,[281] to implement a strict family planning policy. The government's goal is one child per family, with exceptions for ethnic minorities and a degree of flexibility in rural areas. It is hoped that population growth in China will stabilize in the early decades of the 21st century, though some projections estimate a population of anywhere between 1.4 billion and 1.6 billion by 2025. China's family planning minister has indicated that the one-child policy will be maintained until at least 2020.[282]
The one-child policy is resisted, particularly in rural areas, because of the need for agricultural labour and a traditional preference for boys (who can later serve as male heirs). Families who breach the policy often lie during the census.[283] Official government policy opposes forced sterilization or abortion, but allegations of coercion continue as local officials, who are faced with penalties for failing to curb population growth, may resort to forcible measures, or manipulation of census figures.[citation needed]
The decreasing reliability of China population statistics since family planning began in the late 1970s has made evaluating the effectiveness of the policy difficult.[283] Data from the 2010 census implies that the total fertility rate may now be around 1.4.[284] The government is particularly concerned with the large imbalance in the sex ratio at birth, apparently the result of a combination of traditional preference for boys and family planning pressure, which led to a ban on using ultrasound devices in an attempt to prevent sex-selective abortion.
According to the 2010 census, there were 118.06 boys born for every 100 girls, which is 0.53 points lower than the ratio obtained from a population sample survey carried out in 2005.[285] However, the gender ratio of 118.06 is still beyond the normal range of around 105 percent, and experts warn of increased social instability should this trend continue.[286] For the population born between the years 1900 and 2000, it is estimated that there could be 35.59 million fewer females than males.[287] Other demographers argue that perceived gender imbalances may arise from the underreporting of female births.[288][289][290][291] A recent study suggests that as many as three million Chinese babies are hidden by their parents every year.[291] According to the 2010 census, males accounted for 51.27 percent of the total population, while females made up 48.73 percent of the total.[285]
Ethnic groups[link]
Main articles: List of ethnic groups in China, Ethnic minorities in China, and Ethnic groups in Chinese history
| Ethnic composition (2000)[292] | |
|---|---|
| Han | 91.59% |
| Zhuang | 1.28% |
| Manchu | 0.84% |
| Hui | 0.78% |
| Miao | 0.71% |
| Uyghur | 0.66% |
| Tujia | 0.63% |
| Other | 3.51% |
China officially recognizes 56 distinct ethnic groups, the largest of which are the Han Chinese, who constitute about 91.51% of the total population.[293] The Han Chinese—the world's largest single ethnic group—outnumber other ethnic groups in every province, municipality and autonomous region except Tibet and Xinjiang, and are descended from ancient Huaxia tribes living along the Yellow River.
Ethnic minorities account for about 8.49% of the population of China, according to the 2010 census.[293] Compared with the 2000 population census, the Han population increased by 66,537,177 persons, or 5.74%, while the population of the 55 national minorities combined increased by 7,362,627 persons, or 6.92%.[293]
The 2010 census recorded a total of 593,832 foreign citizens living in China. The largest such groups were from South Korea (120,750), the United States (71,493) and Japan (66,159).[294]
Languages[link]
Main articles: Languages of China and List of endangered languages in China
The languages most spoken in China belong to the Sino-Tibetan language family. There are also several major linguistic groups within the Chinese language itself. The most spoken varieties are Mandarin (spoken by over 70% of the population), Wu (includes Shanghainese), Yue (includes Cantonese and Taishanese), Min (includes Hokkien and Teochew), Xiang, Gan, and Hakka. Non-Sinitic languages spoken widely by ethnic minorities include Zhuang, Mongolian, Tibetan, Uyghur, Hmong and Korean.[295] Standard Mandarin, a variety of Mandarin based on the Beijing dialect, is the official national language of China and is used as a lingua franca between people of different linguistic backgrounds.
Classical Chinese was the written standard in China for thousands of years, and allowed for written communication between speakers of various unintelligible languages and dialects in China. Written vernacular Chinese, or baihua, is the written standard, based on the Mandarin dialect and first popularized in Ming Dynasty novels. It was adopted, with significant modifications, during the early 20th century as the national standard. Classical Chinese is still part of the high school curriculum, and is thus intelligible to some degree to many Chinese. Since their promulgation by the government in 1956, Simplified Chinese characters have become the official standardized written script used to write the Chinese language within mainland China, supplanting the use of the earlier Traditional Chinese characters.
Urbanization[link]
See also: List of cities in the People's Republic of China, List of cities in the People's Republic of China by population, and Metropolitan regions of China
Since 2000, China's cities have expanded at an average rate of 10% annually. It is estimated that China will add 400 million people to its urban population by 2025.[296] The country's urbanization rate increased from 17.4% to 46.8% between 1978 and 2009, a scale unprecedented in human history.[297] Between 150 and 200 million migrant workers work part-time in the major cities, returning home to the countryside periodically with their earnings.[298][299]
Today, the People's Republic of China has dozens of cities with one million or more long-term residents, including the three global cities of Beijing, Hong Kong, and Shanghai. The figures in the table below are from the 2008 census, and are only estimates of the urban populations within administrative city limits; a different ranking exists when considering the total municipal populations (which includes suburban and rural populations). The large "floating populations" of migrant workers make conducting censuses in urban areas difficult;[300] the figures below do not include the floating population, only long-term residents.
|
Largest cities or towns of the People's Republic of China Sixth National Population Census of the People's Republic of China (2010) |
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|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rank | City name | Province | Pop. | Rank | City name | Province | Pop. | ||
 Shanghai |
1 | Shanghai | Shanghai | 22,315,426 | 11 | Shenyang | Liaoning | 5,743,718 |  Tianjin |
| 2 | Beijing | Beijing | 18,827,000 | 12 | Hangzhou | Zhejiang | 5,695,313 | ||
| 3 | Tianjin | Tianjin | 11,090,314 | 13 | Chongqing | Chongqing | 5,402,721 | ||
| 4 | Guangzhou | Guangdong | 11,070,654 | 14 | Harbin | Heilongjiang | 4,517,549 | ||
| 5 | Shenzhen | Guangdong | 10,357,938 | 15 | Suzhou | Jiangsu | 4,074,000 | ||
| 6 | Dongguan | Guangdong | 8,220,937 | 16 | Jinan | Shandong | 3,922,180 | ||
| 7 | Chengdu | Sichuan | 7,123,697 | 17 | Xi'an | Shaanxi | 3,890,098 | ||
| 8 | Hong Kong | Hong Kong | 7,055,071 | 18 | Wuxi | Jiangsu | 3,542,319 | ||
| 9 | Nanjing | Jiangsu | 6,852,984 | 19 | Hefei | Anhui | 3,352,076 | ||
| 10 | Wuhan | Hubei | 6,434,373 | 20 | Changchun | Jilin | 3,341,700 | ||
Education[link]
Main article: Education in the People's Republic of China
In 1986, China set the long-term goal of providing compulsory nine-year basic education to every child. As of 2007, there were 396,567 primary schools, 94,116 secondary schools, and 2,236 higher education institutions in China.[301] In February 2006, the government advanced its basic education goal by pledging to provide completely free nine-year education, including textbooks and fees.[302] Free compulsory education in China consists of elementary school and middle school, which lasts for 9 years (ages 6–15); almost all children in urban areas continue with three years of high school.
As of 2007[update], 93.3% of the population over age 15 are literate.[279] In 2000, China's literacy rate among 15-to-24-year-olds was 98.9% (99.2% for males and 98.5% for females).[303] In March 2007, the Chinese government declared education a national "strategic priority"; the central budget for national scholarships was tripled between 2007 and 2009, and 223.5 billion yuan (US$28.65 billion) of extra state funding was allocated between 2007 and 2012 to improve compulsory education in rural areas.[304]
In 2009, Chinese students from Shanghai achieved the world's best results in mathematics, science and literacy, as tested by the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), a worldwide evaluation of 15-year-old school pupils' scholastic performance.[305]
The quality of Chinese colleges and universities varies considerably across the country. The consistently top-ranked universities in mainland China are:[306][307]
- Beijing: Peking University, Tsinghua University, Renmin University of China, Beijing Normal University
- Shanghai: Fudan University, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Tongji University, East China Normal University
- Harbin: Harbin Institute of Technology
- Tianjin: Nankai University, Tianjin University
- Xi'an: Xi'an Jiaotong University
- Nanjing: Nanjing University
- Hefei: University of Science and Technology of China
- Hangzhou: Zhejiang University
- Wuhan: Wuhan University
- Guangzhou: Sun Yat-sen University (aka Zhongshan University)
Health[link]
Main article: Public health in the People's Republic of China
The Ministry of Health, together with its counterparts in the provincial health bureaux, oversees the health needs of the Chinese population.[308] An emphasis on public health and preventive medicine has characterized health policy since the early 1950s. At that time, the Communist Party started the Patriotic Health Campaign, which was aimed at improving sanitation and hygiene, as well as treating and preventing several diseases. Diseases such as cholera, typhoid and scarlet fever, which were previously rife in China, were nearly eradicated by the campaign.
After Deng Xiaoping began instituting economic reforms in 1978, the health of the Chinese public improved rapidly due to better nutrition, although many of the free public health services provided in the countryside disappeared along with the People's Communes. Healthcare in China became mostly privatised, and experienced a significant rise in quality. The national life expectancy at birth rose from about 35 years in 1949 to 73.18 years in 2008,[309][310] and infant mortality decreased from 300 per thousand in the 1950s to around 23 per thousand in 2006.[39][311] Malnutrition as of 2002[update] stood at 12% of the population, according to United Nations FAO sources.[312] In 2009, the government began a large-scale healthcare provision initiative worth US$124 billion, which is expected to eventually cover 90% of China's population.[313]
Despite significant improvements in health and the construction of advanced medical facilities, China has several emerging public health problems, such as respiratory illnesses caused by widespread air pollution[314] and hundreds of millions of cigarette smokers,[315][316] a possible future HIV/AIDS epidemic, and an increase in obesity among urban youths.[317][318] China's large population and densely populated cities have led to serious disease outbreaks in recent years, such as the 2003 outbreak of SARS, although this has since been largely contained.[319]
Estimates of excess deaths in China from environmental pollution (apart from smoking) are placed at 760,000 people per annum from air and water pollution (including indoor air pollution).[320] In 2007, China overtook the United States as the world's biggest producer of carbon dioxide.[321] Some 90% of China's cities suffer from some degree of water pollution,[322] and nearly 500 million people lacked access to safe drinking water in 2005.[323] Reports by the World Bank and the New York Times have claimed industrial pollution, particularly of the air, to be a significant health hazard in China.[324]
Religion[link]
Main article: Religion in China
In mainland China, the government allows a degree of religious freedom to members of state-approved religious organizations. An accurate number of religious adherents is hard to obtain because of a lack of official data, but there is a general consensus that religion has been enjoying a resurgence in China since the late 1980s.[325] A 1998 survey by Adherents.com found that 59% (over 700 million) of the population was irreligious.[326] A later survey, conducted in 2007, found that there were 300 million religious believers in China, constituting 23% of the population, as distinct from an official figure of 100 million.[325]
Despite the surveys' varying results, most agree that China's traditional religions—Buddhism, Taoism, and Chinese folk religions—are the dominant faiths. According to various sources, Buddhism in China accounts for between 660 million (~50% of the population) and over 1 billion (~80%),[327][328][329][330] while Taoists number as many as 400 million (~30%).[331][332] However, because of the fact that one person may subscribe to two or more of these traditional beliefs simultaneously, and the difficulty in clearly differentiating Buddhism, Taoism, and Chinese folk religions, there is likely a strong degree of overlap in the number of adherents of these religions. In addition, some who subscribe to Buddhism and Taoism follow their philosophies in principle but stop short of believing in any kind of deity or divinity.[333][334][335]
Most Chinese Buddhists are merely nominal adherents, because only a small proportion of the population (around 8% or 100 million)[337][338] may have taken the formal step of going for refuge.[339][340] Even then, it is still difficult to estimate accurately the number of Buddhists, because they do not have congregational memberships and often do not participate in public ceremonies.[341] Mahayana Buddhism (大乘, Dacheng) and its subsets Pure Land (Amidism), Tiantai and Chán (better known in English by its Japanese pronunciation Zen) are the most widely practiced denominations of Buddhism. Other forms, such as Theravada and Tibetan Buddhism, are practiced largely by ethnic minorities along the geographic fringes of the Chinese mainland.[342]
Christianity was first introduced to China during the Tang Dynasty, with the arrival of Nestorian Christianity in 635 AD. This was followed by Franciscan missionaries in the 13th century, Jesuits in the 16th century, and finally Protestants in the 19th century. Of China's minority religions, Christianity is one of the fastest-growing. The total number of Christians is difficult to determine, as many belong to unauthorized house churches, but estimates of their number have ranged from 40 million (3% of the total population)[325][343] to 54 million (4%)[344] to as many as 130 million (10%).[345] Official government statistics put the number of Christians at 25 million, but these count only members of officially sanctioned church bodies.[346] China is believed to now have the world's second-largest evangelical Christian population—behind only the United States—and is also experiencing a surge in mainstream Christian publishing.[347][348] In 2011, it was reported that more people attended Sunday church services in China than in all of Europe.[346]
Islam in China dates to a mission in 651, only 18 years after the death of the Prophet Muhammad. Muslims initially came to China for trade, becoming prominent in the trading ports of the Song Dynasty.[349][350] Later, Muslims such as Zheng He, Lan Yu and Yeheidie'erding became influential in government circles, and Nanjing became an important center of Islamic study.[351] Accurate statistics on China's Muslim population are hard to find; most estimates give a figure of between 20 and 30 million Muslims (1.5% to 2% of the total population).[352][353][354][355][356]
China also plays host to numerous minority religions, including Hinduism, Dongbaism, Bön, and a number of more modern religions and sects (particularly Xiantianism). In July 1999, the Falun Gong spiritual practice was officially banned by the authorities,[357] and many international organizations have criticized the government's treatment of Falun Gong that has occurred since then.[358] There are no reliable estimates of the number of Falun Gong practitioners in China,[359] although informal estimates have given figures as high as 70 million.[360][361]
Culture[link]
Main articles: Culture of the People's Republic of China and Chinese culture
A traditional Beijing opera being performed.[362]
Beijing's Forbidden City, showing its classical Chinese architectural style.
Since ancient times, Chinese culture has been heavily influenced by Confucianism and conservative philosophies. For centuries, opportunities for social advancement could be provided by high performance in the prestigious Imperial examinations, which were instituted in 605 AD to help the Emperor select skilful bureaucrats. The literary emphasis of the exams affected the general perception of cultural refinement in China, such as the belief that calligraphy and literati painting were higher forms of art than dancing or drama.
A number of more authoritarian and rational strains of thought were also influential, with Legalism being a prominent example. There was often conflict between the philosophies – for instance, the individualistic Song Dynasty neo-Confucians believed that Legalism departed from the original spirit of Confucianism. Examinations and a culture of merit remain greatly valued in China today. In recent years, a number of New Confucians have claimed that modern democratic ideals and human rights are compatible with traditional Confucian values.[363]
The first leaders of the People's Republic of China were born into the traditional imperial order, but were influenced by the May Fourth Movement and reformist ideals. They sought to change some traditional aspects of Chinese culture, such as rural land tenure, sexism, and the Confucian system of education, while preserving others, such as the family structure and culture of obedience to the state.
Some observers see the period following the establishment of the PRC in 1949 as a continuation of traditional Chinese dynastic history, while others claim that the Communist Party's rule has damaged the foundations of Chinese culture, especially through political movements such as the Cultural Revolution of the 1960s, where many aspects of traditional culture were destroyed, having been denounced as 'regressive and harmful' or 'vestiges of feudalism'. Many important aspects of traditional Chinese morals and culture, such as Confucianism, Chinese art, literature, and performing arts like Peking opera, were altered to conform to government policies and propaganda at the time.
Today, the Chinese government has accepted numerous elements of traditional Chinese culture as being integral to Chinese society. With the rise of Chinese nationalism and the end of the Cultural Revolution, various forms of traditional Chinese art, literature, music, film, fashion and architecture have seen a vigorous revival,[364][365] and folk and variety art in particular have sparked interest nationally and even worldwide.[366]
Prior to the beginning of maritime Sino-European trade in the 16th century, medieval China and the European West were linked by the Silk Road, which was a key route of cultural as well as economic exchange. Artifacts from the history of the Road, as well as from the natural history of the Gobi desert, are displayed in the Silk Route Museum in Jiuquan.[367]
Cuisine[link]
![[icon]](http://web.archive.org./web/20121215143307/http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Wiki_letter_w_cropped.svg){kind=small} |
This section requires expansion. |
Main article: Chinese cuisine
Chinese cuisine is highly diverse, drawing on several millennia of culinary history. The dynastic emperors of ancient China were known to host banquets with over 100 dishes served at a time,[368] employing countless imperial kitchen staff and concubines to prepare the food. Such royal dishes gradually became a part of wider Chinese culture. China's staple food is rice, but the country is also well known for its meat dishes. Spices are endemic to Chinese cuisine.
Numerous foreign offshoots of Chinese food, such as Hong Kong cuisine and American Chinese food, have emerged in the various nations which play host to the Chinese diaspora.
Sports[link]
Main article: Sport in the People's Republic of China
China has one of the oldest sporting cultures in the world. There is evidence that a form of association football was played in China around 1000 AD.[369] Today, some of the most popular sports in the country include martial arts, basketball, football, table tennis, badminton, swimming and snooker. Board games such as go (weiqi), xiangqi, and more recently chess, are also played at a professional level.[370]
Physical fitness is widely emphasized in Chinese culture. Morning exercises are a common activity, with elderly citizens encouraged to practice qigong and t'ai chi ch'uan. Young people in China are also keen on basketball, especially in urban centers with limited space and grass areas. The American National Basketball Association has a huge following among Chinese youths, with Chinese players such as Yao Ming being held in high esteem.[371]
Many more traditional sports are also played in China. Dragon boat racing occurs during the annual nationwide Dragon Boat Festival, and has since gained popularity abroad. In Inner Mongolia, sports such as Mongolian-style wrestling and horse racing are popular. In Tibet, archery and equestrianism are a part of traditional festivals.[372]
China has participated at the Olympic Games since 1932, although it has only participated as the PRC since 1952. China hosted the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing, and received 51 gold medals – the highest number of gold medals of any participating nation that year.[373] China will host the 2013 East Asian Games in Tianjin and the 2014 Youth Olympic Games in Nanjing.
See also[link]
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Geography portal |
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Hong Kong portal |
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- Outline of China
- Index of China-related articles
- International rankings of the People's Republic of China
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- ^ a b HDRstats.undp.org (2009). UNHD.
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- ^ a b c Communiqué of the National Bureau of Statistics of People's Republic of China on Major Figures of the 2010 Population Census (No. 1). Retrieved 4 October 2011.
- ^ "Major Figures on Residents from Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan and Foreigners Covered by 2010 Population Census". National Bureau of Statistics of China, 29 April 2011. Retrieved 4 October 2011.
- ^ Languages. 2005. GOV.cn. URL accessed 3 May 2006.
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- ^ Zhou Qun, Lin Yanhua. Nov. 2005/14441.html China's urbanization encounters "urban disease"[dead link], Chinanews.cn (中国新闻网), 11 November 2005. Retrieved 21 April 2005.
- ^ Harney, Alexandra (3 February 2008). "Migrants are China's 'factories without smoke'". CNN. http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/asiapcf/02/01/china.migrants/index.html. Retrieved 27 March 2009.
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- ^ Francesco Sisci, "China's floating population a headache for census", The Straits Times, 22 September 2000.
- ^ Factbox: Education in China (2008). China-Arab Education Information Network
- ^ China pledges free 9-year education in rural west (21 February 2006). China Economic Net.
- ^ "Where And Who Are The World's Illiterates: China". UNESCO. http://portal.unesco.org/education/en/file_download.php/b44872c5f2dfd9c825236194562a2b7fRoss_China.doc. Retrieved 14 July 2009.
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- ^ "Population Growth in China : The Basic Characteristics of China's Demographic Transition" (PDF). http://www.globalgeografia.it/temi/Population%20Growth%20in%20China.pdf. Retrieved 1 November 2011.
- ^ "China". CIA World Factbook, 16 May 2008
- ^ China’s Infant Mortality Rate Down. 11 September 2001. CHINA.ORG.CN. URL accessed 3 May 2006.
- ^ "Nutrition country profiles: China summary". Archived from the original on 15 September 2007. http://web.archive.org/web/20070915190801/http://www.fao.org/ag/agn/nutrition/cpr-e.stm. Retrieved 22 July 2007.
- ^ Noam N. Levey (12 May 2012). "Global push to guarantee health coverage leaves U.S. behind". Los Angeles Times. http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-global-health-reform-20120512,0,4695600.story. Retrieved 15 May 2012.
- ^ McGregor, Richard (2 July 2007). "750,000 a year killed by Chinese pollution". Financial Times. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/8f40e248-28c7-11dc-af78-000b5df10621.html. Retrieved 22 July 2007.
- ^ "Smoking 'will kill one third of young Chinese men'". 16 August 2001. Honolulu Community College. Retrieved 17 April 2006.
- ^ "China's Tobacco Industry Wields Huge Power" article by Didi Kirsten Tatlow in The New York Times 10 June 2010
- ^ "Serving the people?". 1999. Bruce Kennedy. CNN. Retrieved 17 April 2006.
- ^ "Obesity Sickening China's Young Hearts". 4 August 2000. People's Daily. Retrieved 17 April 2006.
- ^ "China’s latest SARS outbreak has been contained, but biosafety concerns remain". 18 May 2004. World Health Organization. Retrieved 17 April 2006.
- ^ "China 'buried smog death finding'". BBC News. 3 July 2007. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6265098.stm. Retrieved 1 November 2011.
- ^ John Vidal and David Adam (19 June 2007). "China overtakes US as world's biggest CO2 emitter". The Guardian (London). http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2007/jun/19/china.usnews. Retrieved 1 November 2011.
- ^ "China says water pollution so severe that cities could lack safe supplies". China Daily. 7 June 2005. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2005-06/07/content_449451.htm. Retrieved 1 November 2011.
- ^ Kahn, Joseph (26 August 2007). "As China Roars, Pollution Reaches Deadly Extremes". The New York Times (China). http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/26/world/asia/26china.html. Retrieved 1 November 2011.
- ^ "Air Pollution in Yixian". Air Pollution in Yixian. 1900-1-0. http://7ride.com/rides/cycling-china-2009/day-6-fangshan-to-yixian.aspx. Retrieved 25 May 2010.
- ^ a b c "Asia-Pacific | Survey finds 300 m (980 ft) China believers". BBC News. 7 February 2007. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/6337627.stm. Retrieved 15 June 2009.
- ^ "Nonreligious, continued...". Adherents.com. http://www.adherents.com/Na/Na_473.html. Retrieved 15 June 2009.
- ^ "China Beliefs". Justchina.org. http://www.justchina.org/china/china-beliefs.asp. Retrieved 1 November 2011.
- ^ Buddhism in China. ForeignerCN.com, 22 April 2009. Retrieved 15 January 2012.
- ^ "China culture exploring assistant". Chinabusinessinterpreter.com. http://www.chinabusinessinterpreter.com/Dasiy/16.aspx. Retrieved 1 November 2011.
- ^ "Buddhists in the world". Vipassanafoundation.com. http://www.vipassanafoundation.com/Buddhists.html. Retrieved 15 June 2009. [dead link]
- ^ "How Now Tao?". Asia Sentinel. 27 April 2007. http://asiasentinel.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=468&Itemid=34. Retrieved 15 June 2009.
- ^ "Alliance of Religions and Conservation (ARC)" (PDF). http://www.arcworld.org/downloads/SCMP%20Daoism%2030%20April%202007.pdf. Retrieved 14 July 2009.
- ^ "Religions and Beliefs in China". Travelchinaguide.com. http://www.travelchinaguide.com/intro/religion/. Retrieved 14 July 2009.
- ^ "Society for Anglo Chinese Understanding". SACU. http://www.sacu.org/religion.html. Retrieved 14 July 2009.
- ^ "Index-China Chinese Philosophies and religions". Index-china.com. http://www.index-china.com/index-english/people-religions-s.html. Retrieved 14 July 2009.
- ^ "Memories of Dr. Wu Lien-teh, plague fighter". Yu-lin Wu (1995). World Scientific. p.68. ISBN 981-02-2287-4
- ^ "Buddhism". Adherents.com. http://adherents.com/largecom/com_buddhist.html. Retrieved 15 June 2009.
- ^ "International Religious Freedom Report 2007 – China (includes Tibet, Hong Kong, and Macau)". State.gov. http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2007/90133.htm. Retrieved 14 July 2009.
- ^ "Buddhism in China". AskAsia. http://www.askasia.org/teachers/essays/essay.php?no=16. Retrieved 14 July 2009.
- ^ "TheAmericanForum For Global Education". Globaled.org. http://www.globaled.org/curriculum/china/bessay1.htm. Retrieved 14 July 2009.
- ^ "US Department of States – International Religious Freedom Report 2006: China (includes Tibet, Hong Kong, and Macau)". State.gov. http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2006/71338.htm. Retrieved 14 July 2009.
- ^ Macintosh, R. Scott. China's prosperity inspires rising spirituality (9 March 2006). Retrieved 15 April 2006.
- ^ Watts, Jonathan (7 February 2007). "Christian population in China". The Guardian (London). http://www.guardian.co.uk/china/story/0,,2007690,00.html. Retrieved 27 August 2007.
- ^ "China Survey Reveals Fewer Christians than Some Evangelicals Want to Believe". Assistnews.net. 1 October 2007. http://www.assistnews.net/STORIES/2007/s07100011.htm. Retrieved 15 June 2009.
- ^ "Sons of heaven". The Economist. 2 October 2008. http://www.economist.com/node/12342509.
- ^ a b "Christians in China: Is the country in spiritual crisis?" BBC News, 12 September 2011. Retrieved 2012-04-18.
- ^ God and Caesar in China: policy implications of church-state tensions. Google Books. http://books.google.com/books?id=5jfVmF6MX7IC&pg=PA2&dq=China+now+has+the+world's+second-+largest+evangelical+Christian+population+%E2%80%94+behind+only+the+Unired+Stares+%E2%80%94+and+if+current+growth+rates+continue,+China+will+become+a+global+center+of+evangelical+Christianity+in+coming+decades&hl=en&ei=vfJrTfXYF8at8AP9sK3yBw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCcQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=China%20now%20has%20the%20world's%20second-%20largest%20evangelical%20Christian%20population%20%E2%80%94%20behind%20only%20the%20Unired%20Stares%20%E2%80%94%20and%20if%20current%20growth%20rates%20continue%2C%20China%20will%20become%20a%20global%20center%20of%20evangelical%20Christianity%20in%20coming%20decades&f=false. Retrieved 1 November 2011.
- ^ "Discipling the Dragon: Christian Publishing Finds Success in China". Christianity Today, 20 January 2012. Retrieved 5 February 2012.
- ^ "BBC Islam in China (650–present)". BBC News. 2 October 2002. http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/islam/history/china_1.shtml. Retrieved 14 July 2009.
- ^ Islamic culture in China – amended 1958 text. Religion-Online.org. Retrieved 15 January 2012.
- ^ "Looking East: The challenges and opportunities of Chinese Islam". http://www.hsais.org/2essay0405_4.htm. [dead link]
- ^ Counting up the number of people of traditionally Muslim nationalities who were enumerated in the 1990 census gives a total of 17.6 million, 96% of whom belong to just three nationalities: Hui 8.6 million, Uyghurs 7.2 million, and Kazakhs 1.1 million. Other nationalities that are traditionally Muslim include Kyrghyz, Tajiks, Uzbeks, Tatars, Salar, Bonan, and Dongxiang. See Dru C. Gladney, "Islam in China: Accommodation or Separatism?", Paper presented at Symposium on Islam in Southeast Asia and China, Hong Kong, 2002. Available at islamsymposium.cityu.edu.hk. The 2000 census reported a total of 20.3 million members of Muslim nationalities, of which again 96% belonged to just three groups: Hui 9.8 million, Uyghurs 8.4 million, and Kazakhs 1.25 million.
- ^ "CIA – The World Factbook – China". Cia.gov. https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ch.html. Retrieved 15 June 2009.
- ^ "China (includes Hong Kong, Macau, and Tibet)". State.gov. http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2006/71338.htm. Retrieved 15 June 2009.
- ^ "NW China region eyes global Muslim market". China Daily. 9 July 2008. http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/bizchina/2008-07/09/content_6831389.htm. Retrieved 14 July 2009.
- ^ "Muslim Media Network". Muslim Media Network. 24 March 2008. http://muslimmedianetwork.com/mmn/?p=1922. Retrieved 14 July 2009.
- ^ Xinhua, China Bans Falun Gong, People's Daily, 22 July 1999
- ^ Mary-Anne Toy, Underground existence for Falun Gong faithful, The Age, 26 July 2008.
"The US State Department, US Congress, the United Nations and human rights groups such as Amnesty say persecution of Falun Gong practitioners in China is a continuing abuse of human rights." - ^ Xu Jiatun, Cultural Revolution revisited in crackdown, Taipai Times, 8 September 1999.
- ^ Seth Faison, "In Beijing: A Roar of Silent Protestors," New York Times, 27 April 1999
- ^ "Falun Gong said to total tens of millions". United Press International, 24 April 2009. Retrieved 4 October 2011.
- ^ "Tour Guidebook: Beijing". China National Tourism Administration. http://en.cnta.gov.cn.
- ^ Bary, Theodore de. "Constructive Engagement with Asian Values".[dead link] Columbia University.
- ^ ""China: Traditional arts". Library of Congress – Country Studies". Lcweb2.loc.gov. http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?frd/cstdy:@field(DOCID+cn0133). Retrieved 1 November 2011.
- ^ "China: Cultural life: The arts". Britannica.com. http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-258942/China. Retrieved 1 November 2011.
- ^ ""China: Folk and Variety Arts". Library of Congress – Country Studies". Lcweb2.loc.gov. http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?frd/cstdy:@field(DOCID+cn0138). Retrieved 1 November 2011.
- ^ "Silk Route Museum". Silk Route Museum. http://www.silkroutemuseum.com. Retrieved 14 July 2009.
- ^ Kong, Foong, Ling. [2002]. The Food of Asia. Tuttle Publishing. ISBN 0-7946-0146-4
- ^ "Origins of the Great Game". Athleticscholarships.net. http://athleticscholarships.net/history-of-soccer.htm. Retrieved 1 November 2011.
- ^ "Chinese players dominate at Malaysia open chess championship". TheStar.com, 2 September 2011. Retrieved 24 September 2011.
- ^ Beech, Hannah (28 April 2003). "Yao Ming". Time Magazine. http://www.time.com/time/asia/2003/heroes/yao_ming.html. Retrieved 30 March 2007.
- ^ Qinfa, Ye. Sports History of China. About.com. Retrieved 21 April 2006.
- ^ "China targets more golds in 2012". BBC Sport, 27 August 2008. Retrieved 27 November 2011.
Further reading[link]
- Chang, Jung (1992). Wild Swans. Doubleday. ISBN 0-385-42547-3.
- Meng, Fanhua (2011). Phenomenon of Chinese Culture at the Turn of the 21st century. Singapore: Silkroad Press. ISBN 978-981-4332-35-4.
- Farah, Paolo, Five Years of China’s WTO Membership. EU and US Perspectives on China’s Compliance with Transparency Commitments and the Transitional Review Mechanism, Legal Issues of Economic Integration, Kluwer Law International, Volume 33, Number 3, pp. 263–304, 2006. Abstract.
- Heilig, Gerhard K., China Bibliography – Online. 2006, 2007.
- Lynch, Michael (1998). People’s Republic of China 1949–90. Trafalgar Square Publishing. ISBN 0-340-68853-X.
- Murphey, Rhoads (1996). East Asia: A New History. University of Michigan Press. ISBN 0-321-07801-2.
- Sang Ye (2006). China Candid: The People on the People's Republic. University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-24514-8.
- Selden, Mark (1979). The People's Republic of China: Documentary History of Revolutionary Change. New York: Monthly Review Press. ISBN 0-85345-532-5.
- Terrill, Ross (2003). The New Chinese Empire, And What It Means For The United States. New York: Basic Books. ISBN 0-465-08412-5.
- Thurston, Anne F. (1994). China Bound: A Guide to Academic Life and Work in the PRC. Washington: National Academies Press. ISBN 0-309-04932-6.
External links[link]
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- Overviews
- China at a Glance from People's Daily
- BBC News – Country Profile: China
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- Modern China: A Primer—slideshow by Life magazine
- "Rethinking ‘Capitalist Restoration’ in China" by Yiching Wu
- Key Development Forecasts for China from International Futures
- Documentaries
- "China on the Rise" PBS Online NewsHour, October 2005
- China in the Red PBS Frontline, 1998–2001
- China From the Inside A documentary series co-produced by KQED Public Television and Granada Television
- Government
- The Central People's Government of People's Republic of China (English)
- China Internet Information Center (English)—Authorized government portal site to China
- Studies
- Assertive Pragmatism: China's Economic Rise and Its Impact on Chinese Foreign Policy Minxin Pei, IFRI Proliferation Papers n°15, 2006
- The Dragon's Dawn: China as a Rising Imperial Power, 11 February 2005
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- Google Maps—China
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For other people named Michael Jackson, see Michael Jackson (disambiguation).
| Michael Jackson | |
|---|---|
 Jackson at the White House in 1984 |
|
| Background information | |
| Birth name | Michael Joseph Jackson[1] |
| Also known as | King of Pop, MJ |
| Born | (1958-08-29)August 29, 1958 Gary, Indiana, U.S. |
| Died | June 25, 2009(2009-06-25) (aged 50) Los Angeles, California, U.S. |
| Genres | R&B, pop, rock, soul, dance, funk, disco, new jack swing |
| Occupations | Singer-songwriter, musician, composer, dancer, choreographer, record producer, actor, businessman, philanthropist |
| Instruments | Vocals |
| Years active | 1964–2009 |
| Labels | Motown, Epic, Legacy, MJJ Productions |
| Associated acts |
 Michael Jackson's Signature |
| Website | www.michaeljackson.com |
Michael Joseph Jackson[1] (August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009) was an American recording artist, entertainer, and businessman. Often referred to as the King of Pop, or by his initials MJ,[2] Jackson is recognized as the most successful entertainer of all time by Guinness World Records. His contribution to music, dance, and fashion, along with a much-publicized personal life, made him a global figure in popular culture for over four decades. The seventh child of the Jackson family, he debuted on the professional music scene along with his brothers as a member of The Jackson 5 in 1964, and began his solo career in 1971.
In the early 1980s, Jackson became a dominant figure in popular music. The music videos for his songs, including those of "Beat It", "Billie Jean", and "Thriller", were credited with transforming the medium into an art form and a promotional tool, and the popularity of these videos helped to bring the relatively new television channel MTV to fame. Videos such as "Black or White" and "Scream" made him a staple on MTV in the 1990s. Through stage performances and music videos, Jackson popularized a number of complicated dance techniques, such as the robot and the moonwalk, to which he gave the name. His distinctive musical sound and vocal style influenced numerous hip hop, post-disco, contemporary R&B, pop and rock artists.
Jackson's 1982 album Thriller is the best-selling album of all time. His other records, including Off the Wall (1979), Bad (1987), Dangerous (1991), and HIStory (1995), also rank among the world's best-selling. Jackson is one of the few artists to have been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame twice. He was also inducted into the Dance Hall of Fame as the first (and currently only) dancer from the world of pop and rock 'n' roll. Some of his other achievements include multiple Guinness World Records; 13 Grammy Awards (as well as the Grammy Legend Award and the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award); 26 American Music Awards (more than any other artist, including the "Artist of the Century"); 13 number-one singles in the United States in his solo career (more than any other male artist in the Hot 100 era); and the estimated sale of over 750 million records worldwide. Jackson won hundreds of awards, which made him the most-awarded recording artist in the history of popular music.[3] He was also one of the world's most prominent humanitarians and philanthropists; personally, and through his Heal the World Foundation, he donated more than $300 million in charity, and held the Guinness World Record for having supported the most charities out of any pop star.[4][5]
Aspects of Jackson's personal life, including his changing appearance, personal relationships, and behavior, generated controversy. In 1993, he was accused of child sexual abuse, but the case was settled out of court and no formal charges were brought. In 2005, he was tried and acquitted of further child sexual abuse allegations and several other charges after the jury found him not guilty on all counts. While preparing for his concert series titled This Is It, Jackson died of acute propofol and benzodiazepine intoxication on June 25, 2009, after suffering from cardiac arrest. The Los Angeles County Coroner ruled his death a homicide, and his personal physician was convicted of involuntary manslaughter. Jackson's death triggered a global outpouring of grief, and as many as one billion people around the world reportedly watched his public memorial service on live television. In March 2010, Sony Music Entertainment signed a $250 million deal with Jackson's estate to retain distribution rights to his recordings until 2017, and to release seven posthumous albums over the decade following his death.[6]
Contents
|
Life and career[link]
Early life and The Jackson 5 (1958–1975)[link]
Michael Jackson was born on August 29, 1958, the eighth of ten children in an African American working-class family who lived in a small 3-room house in Gary, Indiana,[7] an industrial city near Chicago. His mother, Katherine Esther Scruse, was a devout Jehovah's Witness, and his father, Joseph Walter "Joe" Jackson, was a steel mill worker who performed with an R&B band called The Falcons. Jackson had three sisters: Rebbie, La Toya, and Janet, and five brothers: Jackie, Tito, Jermaine, Marlon, and Randy.[8] A sixth brother, Brandon, died shortly after birth.[9]
Jackson had a troubled relationship with his father, Joe.[10][11][12] Joseph acknowledged in 2003 that he regularly whipped Jackson as a boy.[12] Jackson stated that he was physically and emotionally abused during incessant rehearsals, though he also credited his father's strict discipline with playing a large role in his success.[10] Jackson first spoke openly about his childhood abuse in an interview with Oprah Winfrey, broadcast in February 1993. He admitted that he had often cried from loneliness and he would vomit on the sight of his father. Jackson's father was also said to have verbally abused Jackson, saying that he had a fat nose on numerous occasions.[13] In fact, Michael Jackson's deep dissatisfaction with his appearance, his nightmares and chronic sleep problems, his tendency to remain hyper-compliant especially with his father, and to remain child-like throughout his adult life are in many ways consistent with the effects of this chronic maltreatment he endured as a young child.[14]
In an interview with Martin Bashir, later included in the 2003 broadcast of Living with Michael Jackson, Jackson acknowledged that his father hurt him when he was a child, but was nonetheless a "genius", as he admitted his father's strict discipline played a huge role in his success. When Bashir dismissed the positive remark and continued asking about beatings, Jackson put his hand over his face and objected to the questions. He recalled that Joseph sat in a chair with a belt in his hand as he and his siblings rehearsed, and that "if you didn't do it the right way, he would tear you up, really get you".[15][16]
In 1964, Michael and Marlon joined the Jackson Brothers—a band formed by brothers Jackie, Tito, and Jermaine—as backup musicians playing congas and tambourine. Jackson later began performing backup vocals and dancing. When he was eight, Jackson began sharing the lead vocals with his older brother Jermaine, and the group's name was changed to The Jackson 5.[8] The band toured the Midwest extensively from 1966 to 1968, frequently performing at a string of black clubs known as the "chitlin' circuit", where they often opened stripteases and other adult acts. In 1966, they won a major local talent show with renditions of Motown hits and James Brown's "I Got You (I Feel Good)", led by Michael.[17]
The Jackson 5 recorded several songs, including "Big Boy", for the local record label Steeltown in 1967, before signing with Motown Records in 1968.[8] Rolling Stone magazine later described the young Michael as "a prodigy" with "overwhelming musical gifts," writing that he "quickly emerged as the main draw and lead singer."[18] The group set a chart record when its first four singles ("I Want You Back", "ABC", "The Love You Save", and "I'll Be There") peaked at number one on the Billboard Hot 100.[8] Between 1972 and 1975, Michael released four solo studio albums with Motown, among them Got to Be There and Ben, released as part of the Jackson 5 franchise, and producing successful singles such as "Got to Be There", "Ben", and a remake of Bobby Day's "Rockin' Robin".
The Jackson 5 "became a cutting-edge example of black crossover artists... five working-class black boys with afros and bell bottoms, and they really didn't have to trade any of that stuff in order to become mainstream stars."[19]
The group's sales began declining in 1973, and the band members chafed under Motown's strict refusal to allow them creative control or input. Although they scored several top 40 hits, including the top 5 disco single "Dancing Machine" and the top 20 hit "I Am Love", the Jackson 5 left Motown in 1975.[20]
[edit] Move to Epic and Off the Wall (1975–81)
In June 1975, the Jackson 5 signed with Epic Records, a subsidiary of CBS Records[20] and renamed themselves the Jacksons. Younger brother Randy formally joined the band around this time, while Jermaine left to pursue a solo career.[21] They continued to tour internationally, releasing six more albums between 1976 and 1984, during which Michael was the lead songwriter, writing hits such as "Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground)", "This Place Hotel", and "Can You Feel It".[17] In 1978, he starred as the scarecrow in the musical, The Wiz, a box-office disaster. It was here that he teamed up with Quincy Jones, who was arranging the film's musical score. Jones agreed to produce Jackson's next solo album, Off the Wall.[22] In 1979, Jackson broke his nose during a complex dance routine. His subsequent rhinoplasty was not a complete success; he complained of breathing difficulties that would affect his career. He was referred to Dr. Steven Hoefflin, who performed Jackson's second rhinoplasty and subsequent operations.[23]
Jones and Jackson produced the Off the Wall album together. Songwriters for the album included Jackson, Rod Temperton, Stevie Wonder, and Paul McCartney. Released in 1979, it was the first solo album to generate four U.S. top 10 hits, including the chart-topping singles "Don't Stop 'til You Get Enough" and "Rock with You".[24][25] It reached number three on the Billboard 200 and eventually sold over 20 million copies worldwide.[26] In 1980, Jackson won three awards at the American Music Awards for his solo efforts: Favorite Soul/R&B Album, Favorite Soul/R&B Male Artist, and Favorite Soul/R&B Single for "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough".[27][28] That year, he also won Billboard Year-End for Top Black Artist and Top Black Album and a Grammy Award for Best Male R&B Vocal Performance, also for "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough".[24] Jackson again won at the American Music Awards in 1981 for Favorite Soul/R&B Album and Favorite Soul/R&B Male Artist.[29] Despite its commercial success, Jackson felt Off the Wall should have made a much bigger impact, and was determined to exceed expectations with his next release.[30] In 1980, he secured the highest royalty rate in the music industry: 37 percent of wholesale album profit.[31]
[edit] Thriller and Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, Forever (1982–83)
In 1982, Jackson contributed the song "Someone In the Dark" to the storybook for the film E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial; the record won a Grammy for Best Recording for Children in 1984. In the same year he won another seven Grammys and eight American Music Awards (including the Award of Merit, the youngest artist to win it), making him the most awarded in one night for both award shows.[32][33] These awards were thanks to the Thriller album, released in late 1982, which was 1983's best-selling album worldwide[34][35] and became the best-selling album of all time in the United States,[36] as well as the best-selling album of all time worldwide, selling an estimated 110 million copies so far.[37] The album topped the Billboard 200 chart for 37 weeks and was in the top 10 of the 200 for 80 consecutive weeks. It was the first album to have seven Billboard Hot 100 top 10 singles, including "Billie Jean", "Beat It", and "Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'".[38] Thriller was certified for 29 million shipments by the RIAA, giving it Double Diamond status in the United States. The album won also another Grammy for Best Engineered Recording – Non Classical in 1984, awarding Bruce Swedien for his work.[39] Jackson's attorney John Branca noted that Jackson had the highest royalty rate in the music industry at that point: approximately $2 for every album sold. He was also making record-breaking profits from sales of his recordings. The videocassette of the documentary The Making of Michael Jackson's Thriller sold over 350,000 copies in a few months. The era saw the arrival of novelties like dolls modeled after Michael Jackson, which appeared in stores in May 1984 at a price of $12.[40] Biographer J. Randy Taraborrelli writes that, "Thriller stopped selling like a leisure item—like a magazine, a toy, tickets to a hit movie—and started selling like a household staple."[41] In 1985, The Making of Michael Jackson's Thriller won a Grammy for Best Music Video, Longform.[32] In December 2009, the music video for "Thriller" was selected for the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress, "Thriller" is the first music video ever to be inducted.[42][43][44]
Time described Jackson's influence at that point as "Star of records, radio, rock video. A one-man rescue team for the music business. A songwriter who sets the beat for a decade. A dancer with the fanciest feet on the street. A singer who cuts across all boundaries of taste and style and color too".[40] The New York Times wrote that, "in the world of pop music, there is Michael Jackson and there is everybody else".[45]
On March 25th 1983, Michael Jackson reunited with his brothers for a legendary live performance which was taped for a Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, Forever television special. The show aired on May 16, 1983, to an audience of 47 million viewers, and featured the Jacksons and a number of other Motown stars. It is best remembered for Jackson's solo performance of "Billie Jean". Wearing a distinctive black sequin jacket and golf glove decorated with rhinestones, he debuted his signature dance move, the moonwalk, which former Soul Train dancer and Shalamar member Jeffrey Daniel had taught him three years before. The Jacksons' performance drew comparisons to Elvis Presley's and The Beatles' appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show.[46] Anna Kisselgoff of The New York Times later wrote, "The moonwalk that he made famous is an apt metaphor for his dance style. How does he do it? As a technician, he is a great illusionist, a genuine mime. His ability to keep one leg straight as he glides while the other bends and seems to walk requires perfect timing."[47]
Pepsi, "We Are the World" and business career (1984–85)[link]
On January 27, 1984, Michael and other members of the Jacksons filmed a Pepsi Cola commercial, overseen by executive Phil Dusenberry,[48] from ad agency BBDO and Pepsi's Worldwide Creative Director, Alan Pottasch at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles. In front of a full house of fans during a simulated concert, pyrotechnics accidentally set Jackson's hair on fire. He suffered second-degree burns to his scalp. Jackson underwent treatment to hide the scars on his scalp, and he also had his third rhinoplasty shortly thereafter.[23] Jackson never recovered from this injury. Pepsi settled out of court, and Jackson donated his $1.5 million settlement to the Brotman Medical Center in Culver City, California, which now has a "Michael Jackson Burn Center" in honor of his donation.[49] Dusenberry later recounted the episode in his memoir, Then We Set His Hair on Fire: Insights and Accidents from a Hall of Fame Career in Advertising.
On May 14, 1984, Jackson was invited to the White House to receive an award from President Ronald Reagan for his support of charities that helped people overcome alcohol and drug abuse.[50] Jackson won eight awards during the Grammys that year. Unlike later albums, Thriller did not have an official tour to promote it, but the 1984 Victory Tour, headlined by The Jacksons, showcased much of Jackson's new solo material to more than two million Americans. He donated all the funds (around $8 million) raised from the Victory Tour to charity.[51] He also co-wrote the charity single "We Are the World" in 1985 with Lionel Richie, which was released worldwide to aid the poor in the U.S. and Africa. It became one of the best-selling singles of all time, with nearly 30 million copies sold and millions of dollars donated to famine relief. In 1986, "We Are the World" won four Grammys (one for Jackson for Song of the Year). American Music Award directors removed the charity song from the competition because they felt it would be inappropriate, but recognized it with two special honors (one for the creation of the song and one for the USA for Africa idea). They are the only AMAs that Jackson won as non-solo artist.[52][53][54][55]
In 1984, ATV Music Publishing, which had the copyrights to nearly 4000 songs, including the Northern Songs catalog that contained the majority of the Lennon–McCartney compositions recorded by The Beatles, was put up for sale by Robert Holmes à Court.[56] Jackson had become interested in owning music catalogs after working with Paul McCartney in the early 1980s: Jackson had learned McCartney made approximately $40 million a year from other people's songs.[57] In 1981,[58] McCartney was offered the ATV music catalog for £20 million ($40 million).[57][59] According to McCartney, he contacted Yoko Ono about making a joint purchase by splitting the cost equally at £10 million each, but Ono thought they could buy it for £5 million each.[57][59] When they were unable to make the joint purchase, McCartney let the offer fall through, not wanting to be the sole owner of the Beatles' songs.[58][59]
According to a negotiator for Holmes à Court in the 1984 sale, "We had given Paul McCartney first right of refusal but Paul didn't want it at that time."[60] Also, an attorney for McCartney assured Jackson's attorney, John Branca, that McCartney was not interested in bidding: McCartney reportedly said "It's too pricey".[57][58] But there were several other companies and investors bidding. In September 1984, Jackson was first informed about the sale by Branca and sent a bid of $46 million on November 20, 1984.[56] Jackson's agents thought they had a deal several times, but encountered new bidders or new areas of debate.[56] In May 1985, Jackson's team walked away from talks after having spent over $1 million on four months of due diligence and on the negotiations.[56]
In June 1985, Jackson and Branca learned that Charles Koppelman's and Marty Bandier's The Entertainment Co. had made a tentative agreement with Holmes à Court to buy ATV Music for $50 million.[56] But in early August, Holmes à Court's team contacted Jackson and talks resumed. Jackson raised his bid to $47.5 million and it was accepted because he could close the deal more quickly, having already completed due diligence of ATV Music.[56] He also agreed to visit Holmes à Court in Australia, where he would appear on the Channel Seven Perth Telethon.[56][60] Jackson's purchase of ATV Music was finalized August 10, 1985.[56]
[edit] Appearance, tabloids, Bad, films, autobiography and Neverland (1986–90)
See also: Michael Jackson's health and appearance
File:Michael Jackson King of Pop 1988.jpg
Jackson two years after he was diagnosed with vitiligo, here in the early stages of the disease
Jackson's skin had been a medium-brown color for the entire duration of his youth, but starting in the mid 1980s, it gradually grew paler. The change gained widespread media coverage, including rumors that he might be bleaching his skin.[61] According to J. Randy Taraborrelli's biography, in 1986, Jackson was diagnosed with vitiligo and lupus; the vitiligo partially lightened his skin, and the lupus was in remission; both illnesses made him sensitive to sunlight. The treatments he used for his condition further lightened his skin tone, and, with the application of pancake makeup to even out blotches, he could appear very pale.[62] Jackson was also diagnosed with vitiligo in his autopsy.[63] By the mid 1990s several surgeons speculated that he had undergone various nasal surgeries, a forehead lift, thinned lips, and cheekbone surgery—although Jackson denied this and insisted that he only had surgery on his nose.[64] Jackson claimed that he had only two rhinoplasties and no other surgery on his face, although at one point he mentioned having a dimple created in his chin.[65] Jackson lost weight in the early 1980s because of a change in diet and a desire for "a dancer's body".[65] Witnesses reported that he was often dizzy and speculated that he was suffering from anorexia nervosa; periods of weight loss would become a recurring problem later in life.[66]
During the course of his treatment, Jackson made two close friends: his dermatologist, Dr. Arnold Klein, and Klein's nurse Debbie Rowe. Rowe eventually became Jackson's second wife and the mother of his two eldest children. Long before becoming romantically involved with her, Jackson relied heavily on Rowe for emotional support. He also relied heavily on Klein, for medical and business advice.[67]
Jackson became the subject of increasingly sensational reports. In 1986, the tabloids ran a story claiming that Jackson slept in a hyperbaric oxygen chamber to slow the aging process; he was pictured lying down in a glass box. Although the claim was untrue, according to tabloid reports that are widely cited, Jackson had disseminated the fabricated story himself.[68][69] When Jackson bought a chimpanzee called Bubbles from a laboratory, he was reported to be increasingly detached from reality.[70] It was reported that Jackson had offered to buy the bones of Joseph Merrick (the "elephant man") and although untrue, Jackson did not deny the story.[68][69] Although initially he saw these stories as opportunities for publicity, he stopped leaking untruths to the press as they became more sensational. Consequently the media began making up their own stories.[69][71][72] These reports became embedded in the public consciousness, inspiring the nickname "Wacko Jacko", which Jackson came to despise.[73] Responding to the gossip, Jackson remarked to Taraborrelli:
Why not just tell people I'm an alien from Mars? Tell them I eat live chickens and do a voodoo dance at midnight. They'll believe anything you say, because you're a reporter. But if I, Michael Jackson, were to say, "I'm an alien from Mars and I eat live chickens and do a voodoo dance at midnight," people would say, "Oh, man, that Michael Jackson is nuts. He's cracked up. You can't believe a single word that comes out of his mouth."[74]
Jackson collaborated with George Lucas and Francis Ford Coppola on the 17-minute 3-D film Captain EO, which debuted in September 1986 at both the original Disneyland and at EPCOT in Florida, and in March 1987 at Tokyo Disneyland. The $30 million movie was a popular attraction at all three parks. A Captain EO attraction was later featured at Euro Disneyland after that park opened in 1992. All four parks' Captain EO installations stayed open well into the 1990s: Paris' installation was the last one to close, in 1998.[75] The attraction would later return to Disneyland in 2010 after Jackson's death.[76]
In 1987, Jackson disassociated himself from the Jehovah's Witnesses, in response to their disapproval of the Thriller video.[77] With the industry expecting another major hit, Jackson's first album in five years, Bad (1987), was highly anticipated.[78] It did not top Thriller as a commercial or artistic triumph, but Bad was still a substantial success in its own right.
The Bad album spawned seven hit singles in the U.S., five of which ("I Just Can't Stop Loving You", "Bad", "The Way You Make Me Feel", "Man in the Mirror" and "Dirty Diana") reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100 charts. This was a record for most number one Hot 100 singles from any one album, including Thriller.[79] Although the title track's video was arguably derivative of the video for the earlier single "Beat It", the "Bad" video still proved to be one of Jackson's iconic moments. It was a gritty but colorful epic set against the backdrop of the New York City Subway system, with costuming and choreography inspired by West Side Story. As of 2012, the album sold between 30 and 45 million copies worldwide.[80][81][82][83][84][85][86] Thanks to the Bad album, Bruce Swedien and Humberto Gatica won one Grammy in 1988 for Best Engineered Recording – Non Classical and Michael Jackson won one Grammy for Best Music Video, Short Form for "Leave Me Alone" in 1989.[32][39] In the same year, Jackson won an Award of Achievement at the American Music Awards because Bad is the first album ever to generate five number one singles in the US, the first album to top in 25 countries and the best-selling album worldwide in 1987 and in 1988.[87][88][89][90] In 1988, "Bad" won an American Music Award for Favorite Soul/R&B Single.[91]
The Bad World Tour began on September 12 that year, finishing on January 14, 1989.[92] In Japan alone, the tour had 14 sellouts and drew 570,000 people, nearly tripling the previous record of 200,000 in a single tour.[93] Jackson broke a Guinness World Record when 504,000 people attended seven sold-out shows at Wembley Stadium. He performed a total of 123 concerts to an audience of 4.4 million people. The Bad Tour turned out to be the last of Jackson's concert tours to include shows in the continental United States, although later tours did make it to Hawaii.
In 1988, Jackson released his first and only autobiography, Moonwalk, which took four years to complete and sold 200,000 copies.[94] Jackson wrote about his childhood, The Jackson 5, and the abuse he had suffered.[95] He also wrote about his facial appearance, saying he had had two rhinoplastic surgeries and a dimple created in his chin.[65] He attributed much of the change in the structure of his face to puberty, weight loss, a strict vegetarian diet, a change in hair style, and stage lighting.[65] Moonwalk reached the top position on The New York Times best sellers' list.[96] The musician then released a film called Moonwalker, which featured live footage and short films that starred Jackson and Joe Pesci. The film was originally intended to be released to theaters but due to financial issues, the film was released direct-to-video. It saw a theatrical release in Germany, though. It debuted atop the Billboard Top Music Video Cassette chart, staying there for 22 weeks. It was eventually knocked off the top spot by Michael Jackson: The Legend Continues.[97]
In March 1988, Jackson purchased land near Santa Ynez, California, to build Neverland Ranch at a cost of $17 million. He installed Ferris wheels, a menagerie, and a movie theater on the 2,700-acre (11 km2) property. A security staff of 40 patrolled the grounds. In 2003, it was valued at approximately $100 million.[18][98] In 1989, his annual earnings from album sales, endorsements, and concerts was estimated at $125 million for that year alone.[99] Shortly afterwards, he became the first Westerner to appear in a television ad in the Soviet Union.[97]
His success resulted in his being dubbed the "King of Pop".[100][101][102][103] The nickname was popularized by Elizabeth Taylor when she presented him with the Soul Train Heritage Award in 1989, proclaiming him "the true king of pop, rock and soul."[104] President George H. W. Bush designated him the White House's "Artist of the Decade".[105] From 1985 to 1990, he donated $500,000 to the United Negro College Fund, and all of the profits from his single "Man in the Mirror" went to charity.[106][107] Jackson's live rendition of "You Were There" at Sammy Davis Jr.'s 60th birthday celebration received an Emmy nomination.[97]
[edit] Dangerous, Heal the World Foundation and Super Bowl XXVII (1991–93)
In March 1991, Jackson renewed his contract with Sony for $65 million, a record-breaking deal at the time,[108] displacing Neil Diamond's renewal contract with Columbia Records.[109] He released his eighth album Dangerous in 1991. As of 2008, Dangerous had shipped seven million copies in the U.S. and had sold 32 million copies worldwide. The Dangerous album was co-produced by Teddy Riley, one of the pioneers of "new jack swing" which convinced Michael to feature a rapper on his album for the first time, the act worked and it turned out to be the best-selling album associated with that movement.[110][111][112] In the United States, the album's first single "Black or White" was its biggest hit, reaching number one on the Billboard Hot 100 and remaining there for seven weeks, with similar chart performances worldwide.[113] The album's second single "Remember the Time" spent eight weeks in the top five in the United States, peaking at number three on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart.[114] At the end of 1992, Dangerous was awarded 1992's best-selling album worldwide and "Black or White" was awarded 1992's best-selling single worldwide at the Billboard Music Awards. Additionally, he won an award as best-selling artist of the '80s.[115] In 1993, Jackson performed the song at the Soul Train Music Awards in a chair, saying he had suffered an injury in rehearsals.[116] In the UK and other parts of Europe, "Heal the World" was the biggest hit from the album; it sold 450,000 copies in the UK and spent five weeks at number two in 1992.[114]
Jackson founded the Heal the World Foundation in 1992. The charity organization brought underprivileged children to Jackson's ranch to enjoy theme park rides that Jackson had built on the property. The foundation also sent millions of dollars around the globe to help children threatened by war, poverty, and disease. In the same year Jackson published his second book, the bestselling collection of poetry, Dancing the Dream. While it was a commercial success and revealed a more intimate side to Jackson's nature, the collection was mostly critically unacclaimed at the time of release. In 2009, the book was republished by Doubleday and was more positively received by some critics in the wake of Jackson's untimely death. The Dangerous World Tour grossed $100 million. The tour began on June 27, 1992, and finished on November 11, 1993. Jackson performed to 3.5 million people in 67 concerts.[114][117] He sold the broadcast rights to his Dangerous world tour to HBO for $20 million, a record-breaking deal that still stands.[118]
Following the illness and death of Ryan White, Jackson helped draw public attention to HIV/AIDS, something that was still controversial at the time. He publicly pleaded with the Clinton Administration at Bill Clinton's Inaugural Gala to give more money to HIV/AIDS charities and research.[119][120] In a high-profile visit to Africa, Jackson visited several countries, among them Gabon and Egypt.[121] His first stop to Gabon was greeted with a sizable and enthusiastic reception of more than 100,000 people, some of them carrying signs that read, "Welcome Home Michael."[121] In his trip to Côte d'Ivoire, Jackson was crowned "King Sani" by a tribal chief.[121] He then thanked the dignitaries in French and English, signed official documents formalizing his kingship and sat on a golden throne while presiding over ceremonial dances.[121]
In January 1993, Jackson made a memorable appearance at the halftime show at Super Bowl XXVII. The performance began with Jackson catapulting onto the stage as fireworks went off behind him. As he landed on the canvas, he maintained a motionless "clenched fist, standing statue stance", dressed in a gold and black military outfit and sunglasses; he remained completely motionless for a minute and a half while the crowd cheered. He then slowly removed his sunglasses, threw them away and sang four songs: "Jam", "Billie Jean", "Black or White" and "Heal the World". It was the first Super Bowl where the audience figures increased during the half-time show, and was viewed by 135 million Americans alone; Jackson's Dangerous album rose 90 places up the album chart.[61] Jackson was given the "Living Legend Award" at the 35th Grammy Awards in Los Angeles. "Black or White" was Grammy-nominated for best vocal performance. "Jam" gained two nominations: Best R&B Vocal Performance and Best R&B Song.[114] The Dangerous album won a Grammy for Best Engineered – Non Classical, awarding the work of Bruce Swedien and Teddy Riley. In the same year, Michael Jackson won three American Music Awards for Favorite Pop/Rock Album (Dangerous), Favorite Soul/R&B Single ("Remember the Time") and was the first to win the International Artist Award, for his global performances and humanitarian concerns. This award will bear his name in the future.[32][39][122]
First child sexual abuse allegations and first marriage (1993–94)[link]
Jackson gave a 90-minute interview to Oprah Winfrey on February 10, 1993, his second television interview since 1979. He grimaced when speaking of his childhood abuse at the hands of his father; he believed he had missed out on much of his childhood years, admitting that he often cried from loneliness. He denied tabloid rumors that he had bought the bones of the Elephant Man, slept in a hyperbaric oxygen chamber, or bleached his skin, stating for the first time that he had vitiligo. The interview was watched by an American audience of 90 million. Dangerous re-entered the album chart in the top 10, more than a year after its original release.[16][61][114]
In the summer of 1993, Jackson was accused of child sexual abuse by a 13-year-old boy named Jordan Chandler and his father, Dr. Evan Chandler, a dentist.[123][124][125] The Chandler family demanded payment from Jackson, and the singer initially refused. Jordan Chandler eventually told the police that Jackson had sexually abused him.[126] Dr. Chandler was tape-recorded discussing his intention to pursue charges, saying, "If I go through with this, I win big-time. There's no way I lose. I will get everything I want and they will be destroyed forever ... Michael's career will be over". Jordan's mother was, however, adamant that there had been no wrongdoing on Jackson's part.[125] Jackson later used the recording to argue that he was the victim of a jealous father whose only goal was to extort money from the singer.[125]
Later that year, on December 20, Jackson's home was raided by the police, and Jackson submitted to a 25-minute strip search.[127] Jordan Chandler had reportedly given police a description of Jackson's intimate parts, notably claiming that his bleach-damaged penis was circumcised; the strip search revealed, to the contrary, that Jackson was actually uncircumcised,[128] a fact confirmed in his autopsy.[129] His friends said he never recovered from the humiliation of the strip search. The investigation was inconclusive and no charges were ever filed.[130][131] Jackson described the search in an emotional public statement, and proclaimed his innocence.[123][127][132] On January 1, 1994, Jackson's insurance carrier settled with the Chandlers out of court for $22 million. A Santa Barbara County grand jury and a Los Angeles County grand jury disbanded on May 2, 1994 without indicting Jackson.[133] After which time the Chandlers stopped co-operating with the criminal investigation around July 6, 1994.[134][135][136] The out-of-court settlement's documentation specifically stated Jackson admitted no wrongdoing and no liability; the Chandlers and their family lawyer Larry Feldman signed it without contest.[137] The Chandlers' lawyer Mr. Feldman also explicitly stated "nobody bought anybody's silence".[138] A decade after the fact, during the second round of child abuse allegations, Jackson's lawyers would file a memo stating that the 1994 settlement was done without his consent.[135]
In May 1994, Jackson married the daughter of Elvis Presley, Lisa Marie Presley. They had first met in 1975, when a seven-year-old Presley attended one of Jackson's family engagements at the MGM Grand Hotel and Casino, and were reconnected through a mutual friend.[139] According to a friend of Presley's, "their adult friendship began in November 1992 in L.A."[140] They stayed in contact every day over the telephone. As the child molestation accusations became public, Jackson became dependent on Presley for emotional support; she was concerned about his faltering health and addiction to drugs.[141] Presley explained, "I believed he didn't do anything wrong and that he was wrongly accused and yes I started falling for him. I wanted to save him. I felt that I could do it."[142] She eventually persuaded him to settle the allegations out of court and go into rehabilitation to recover.[141]
Jackson proposed to Presley over the telephone towards the fall of 1993, saying, "If I asked you to marry me, would you do it?"[141] They married in the Dominican Republic in secrecy, denying it for nearly two months afterwards.[143] The marriage was, in her words, "a married couple's life ... that was sexually active".[144] At the time, the tabloid media speculated that the wedding was a ploy to prop up Jackson's public image.[143] The marriage lasted less than two years and ended with an amicable divorce settlement.[145] In a 2010 interview with Oprah, Presley admitted that they spent four more years after the divorce "getting back together and breaking up", until she decided to stop.[146]
[edit] HIStory, second marriage and fatherhood (1995–99)
In 1995, Jackson merged his ATV Music catalog with Sony's music publishing division creating Sony/ATV Music Publishing. Jackson retained half-ownership of the company, earned $95 million upfront as well as the rights to even more songs.[147][148] He then released the double album HIStory: Past, Present and Future, Book I. The first disc, HIStory Begins, was a 15-track greatest hits album, and was later reissued as Greatest Hits: HIStory, Volume I in 2001, while the second disc, HIStory Continues, contained 15 new songs. The album debuted at number one on the charts and has been certified for seven million shipments in the US.[149] It is the best-selling multiple-disc album of all-time, with 20 million copies (40 million units) sold worldwide.[113][150] HIStory received a Grammy nomination for Album of the Year.[151]
The first single released from the album was the double A-side "Scream/Childhood". "Scream" was a duet, performed with Jackson's youngest sister Janet. The song fights against the media, mainly for what the media made him out to be during his 1993 child abuse allegations. The single had the highest debut on the Billboard Hot 100 at number five, and received a Grammy nomination for "Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals".[151] "You Are Not Alone" was the second single released from HIStory; it holds the Guinness World Record for the first song ever to debut at number one on the Billboard Hot 100 chart.[99] It was seen as a major artistic and commercial success, receiving a Grammy nomination for "Best Pop Vocal Performance".[151] In late 1995, Jackson was rushed to a hospital after collapsing during rehearsals for a televised performance; the incident was caused by a stress-related panic attack.[152] "Earth Song" was the third single released from HIStory, and topped the UK Singles Chart for six weeks over Christmas 1995; it sold a million copies, making it Jackson's most successful single in the UK.[151] The track "They Don't Care About Us" became controversial when the Anti-Defamation League and other groups criticized its allegedly antisemitic lyrics. Jackson quickly put out a revised version of the song without the offending lyrics.[153] In 1996, Jackson won a Grammy for Best Music Video, Short Form for "Scream" and an American Music Award for Favorite Pop/Rock Male Artist.[32][154]
The album was promoted with the successful HIStory World Tour. The tour began on September 7, 1996, and finished on October 15, 1997. Jackson performed 82 concerts in 58 cities to over 4.5 million fans, and grossed up a total of $165 million. The show, which visited five continents and 35 countries, became Jackson's most successful in terms of audience figures.[92] During the tour, Jackson married his longtime friend Deborah Jeanne Rowe, a dermatology nurse, in an impromptu ceremony in Sydney, Australia. Rowe was approximately six months pregnant with the couple's first child at the time. Originally, Rowe and Jackson had no plans to marry, but Jackson's mother Katherine persuaded them to do so.[155] Michael Joseph Jackson Jr (commonly known as Prince) was born on February 13, 1997; his sister Paris-Michael Katherine Jackson was born a year later on April 3, 1998.[145][156] The couple divorced in 1999, and Jackson got full custody of the children. The divorce was relatively amicable, but a subsequent custody suit was not settled until 2006.[157][158]
In 1997, Jackson released Blood on the Dance Floor: HIStory in the Mix, which contained remixes of hit singles from HIStory and five new songs. Worldwide sales stand at 6 million copies as of 2007, it is the best selling remix album ever released.[159] It reached number one in the UK, as did the title track.[159][160] In the US, the album was certified platinum, but only reached number 24.[110][151] Forbes placed his annual income at $35 million in 1996 and $20 million in 1997.[98] Throughout June 1999, Jackson was involved in a number of charitable events. He joined Luciano Pavarotti for a benefit concert in Modena, Italy. The show was in support of the nonprofit organization War Child, and raised a million dollars for the refugees of Kosovo, FR Yugoslavia, as well as additional funds for the children of Guatemala.[161] Later that month, Jackson organized a set of "Michael Jackson & Friends" benefit concerts in Germany and Korea. Other artists involved included Slash, The Scorpions, Boyz II Men, Luther Vandross, Mariah Carey, A. R. Rahman, Prabhu Deva Sundaram, Shobana, Andrea Bocelli and Luciano Pavarotti. The proceeds went to the Nelson Mandela Children's Fund, the Red Cross and UNESCO.[162]
[edit] Label dispute, Invincible and third child (2000–03)
At the turn of the century, the American Music Awards honored Jackson as Artist of the '80s.[163] Throughout 2000 and 2001, Jackson worked in the studio with Teddy Riley and Rodney Jerkins, as well as other collaborators. These sessions would result in the album Invincible, released in October 2001. Invincible was Jackson's first full-length album in six years, and it would be the last album of new material he released while still alive. The release of the album was preceded by a dispute between Jackson and his record label, Sony Music Entertainment. Jackson had expected the licenses to the masters of his albums to revert to him sometime in the early 2000s. Once he had the licenses, he would be able to promote the material however he pleased and he would also be able to keep all the profits. However, due to various clauses in the contract, the revert date turned out to be many years away. Jackson discovered that the attorney who represented him in the deal was also representing Sony.[160] Jackson was also concerned about the fact that for a number of years, Sony had been pressuring him to sell his share in their music catalog venture. Jackson feared that Sony might have a conflict of interest, since if Jackson's career failed he would have to sell his share of the catalog at a low price.[164] Jackson sought an early exit from his contract.[160] Just before the release of Invincible, Jackson informed the head of Sony Music Entertainment, Tommy Mottola, that he was leaving Sony.[160] As a result, all singles releases, video shootings and promotions concerning the Invincible album were suspended.
In September 2001, two 30th Anniversary concerts were held at Madison Square Garden to mark the singer's 30th year as a solo artist. Jackson appeared onstage alongside his brothers for the first time since 1984. The show also featured performances by Mýa, Usher, Whitney Houston, 'N Sync, Destiny's Child, Monica, Luther Vandross, and Slash, among other artists.[165] The second of the two shows took place the night before the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.[166] After 9/11, Jackson helped organize the United We Stand: What More Can I Give benefit concert at RFK Stadium in Washington, D.C. The concert took place on October 21, 2001, and included performances from dozens of major artists, including Jackson, who performed his song "What More Can I Give" as the finale.[164] Jackson's solo performances were omitted from the televised version of the benefit concert, although he could still be seen singing background vocals. This omission happened because of contractual issues related to the earlier 30th Anniversary concerts: those concerts were boiled down into a two-hour TV special titled Michael Jackson: 30th Anniversary Celebration: The Solo Years which debuted in November 2001.
In spite of the events preceding its release, Invincible came out in October 2001 to much anticipation. Invincible proved to be a hit, debuting atop the charts in 13 countries and going on to sell approximately 13 million copies worldwide. It received double-platinum certification in the US.[110][113][167] However, the sales for Invincible were lower than those of his previous releases, due in part to a lack of promotion, no supporting world tour and the label dispute. The album also came out at a bad time for the music industry in general.[164] The album cost $30 million to record, not including promotional expenditures.[168] Invincible spawned three singles, "You Rock My World", "Cry" and "Butterflies", the latter without a music video. Jackson alleged in July 2002 that Mottola was a "devil" and a "racist" who did not support his African-American artists, using them merely for his own personal gain.[164] He charged that Mottola had called his colleague Irv Gotti a "fat nigger".[169] Sony refused to renew Jackson's contract, and claimed that a $25 million promotional campaign had failed because Jackson refused to tour in the United States.[168]
In 2002, Michael Jackson won his 22nd American Music Award for Artist of the Century.[170] In the same year, Jackson's third child, Prince Michael Jackson II (nicknamed "Blanket") was born.[171] The mother's identity is unknown, but Jackson has said the child was the result of artificial insemination from a surrogate mother and his own sperm.[157] On November 20 of that year, Jackson brought his newborn son onto the balcony of his room at the Hotel Adlon in Berlin, as fans stood below, holding him in his right arm, with a cloth loosely draped over the baby's face. The baby was briefly extended over a railing, four stories above ground level, causing widespread criticism in the media. Jackson later apologized for the incident, calling it "a terrible mistake".[172] Sony released Number Ones, a compilation of Jackson's hits on CD and DVD. In the US, the album was certified triple platinum by the RIAA; in the UK it was certified six times platinum for shipments of at least 1.2 million units.[110][173]
Second child sexual abuse allegations and acquittal (2003–05)[link]
Further information: Living with Michael Jackson and People v. Jackson
Beginning in May 2002, Jackson allowed a documentary film crew, led by British TV personality Martin Bashir, to follow him around just about everywhere he went. Bashir's film crew was with Jackson during the "baby-dangling incident" in Berlin. The program was broadcast in March 2003 as Living with Michael Jackson, and painted an extraordinarily unflattering portrait of the singer.
In a particularly controversial scene, Jackson was seen holding hands and discussing sleeping arrangements with a young boy.[174] As soon as the documentary aired, the Santa Barbara county attorney's office began a criminal investigation. Jackson was arrested in November 2003, and was charged with seven counts of child molestation and two counts of administering an intoxicating agent in relation to the 13 year old boy shown in the film.[174] Jackson denied the allegations, saying the sleepovers were not sexual in nature. The People v. Jackson trial began on January 31, 2005, in Santa Maria, California, and lasted five months, until the end of May. On June 13, 2005, Jackson was acquitted on all counts.[175][176][177] After the trial, in a highly publicized relocation he moved to the Persian Gulf island of Bahrain, as a guest of Sheikh Abdullah.[178] Bahrain was also where the family intended to send Jackson if he was convicted (though Jackson did not know about the plan), according to a statement by Jermaine Jackson printed in The Times of London in September 2011.[179]
[edit] Closure of Neverland, final years and This Is It (2006–09)
In March 2006, the main house at the Neverland Ranch was closed as a cost-cutting measure.[180] There were numerous reports around that time that Jackson was having financial problems. Jackson had been delinquent on his repayments of a $270 million loan secured against his music publishing holdings, even though those holdings were reportedly making him as much as $75 million a year.[181] Bank of America sold the debt to Fortress Investments. Sony reportedly proposed a restructuring deal which would give them a future option to buy half of Jackson's stake in their jointly owned publishing company (leaving Jackson with a 25% stake).[148] Jackson agreed to a Sony-backed refinancing deal in April 2006, although the exact details were not made public.[182] Jackson did not have a recording contract in place with Sony or any other major record label at the time.
In early 2006, there was an announcement that Jackson had signed a contract with a Bahrain-based startup called Two Seas Records. However, nothing ever came of that deal, and the CEO of Two Seas, Guy Holmes, later stated that the deal had never been finalized.[183][184] Throughout 2006, Sony repackaged 20 singles from the 1980s and 1990s as the Michael Jackson: Visionary series, which subsequently became a box set. Most of those singles returned to the charts as a result. In September 2006, Jackson and his ex-wife Debbie Rowe confirmed reports that they had settled their long-running child custody suit. The terms were never made public. Jackson continued to be the custodial parent of the couple's two children.[158] In October 2006, Fox News entertainment reporter Roger Friedman said that Jackson had been recording at a studio in rural Westmeath, Ireland. It was not known at the time what Jackson might be working on, or who might be paying for the sessions, since his publicist had recently issued a statement claiming that he had left Two Seas.[184][185]
In November 2006, Jackson invited an Access Hollywood camera crew into the studio in Westmeath, and MSNBC broke the story that he was working on a new album, produced by will.i.am of The Black Eyed Peas.[113] Jackson performed at the World Music Awards, in London on November 15, 2006, and accepted a Diamond Award for selling over 100 million records.[113][186] Jackson returned to the United States after Christmas 2006 to attend James Brown's funeral in Augusta, Georgia. He gave one of the eulogies, saying that "James Brown is my greatest inspiration."[187] In the spring of 2007, Jackson and Sony teamed up to buy yet another music publishing company: Famous Music LLC, formerly owned by Viacom. This deal gave him the rights to songs by Eminem, Shakira and Beck, among others.[188] Jackson recorded extensively during this period in New York with songwriter and producer will.i.am and also in Las Vegas with producers Akon and RedOne.[189][190] In March 2007, Jackson gave a brief interview to the Associated Press in Tokyo, where he said, "I've been in the entertainment industry since I was 6 years old, and as Charles Dickens would say, 'It's been the best of times, the worst of times.' But I would not change my career ... While some have made deliberate attempts to hurt me, I take it in stride because I have a loving family, a strong faith and wonderful friends and fans who have, and continue, to support me."[191]
In September 2007, Jackson was reportedly still working with will.i.am, but the album was apparently never completed.[192] However, in 2008, Jackson and Sony released Thriller 25 to mark the 25th anniversary of the original Thriller. This album featured the previously unreleased song "For All Time" (an outtake from the original sessions) as well as remixes, where Jackson collaborated with younger artists who had been inspired by his work.[193] Two of the remixes were released as singles with only modest success: "The Girl Is Mine 2008" (with will.i.am) and "Wanna Be Startin' Somethin' 2008" (with Akon). The first single was based on an early demo version, without Paul McCartney. The album itself was a hit, however.[193][194][195][196] In anticipation of Jackson's 50th birthday, Sony BMG released a series of greatest-hits albums called King of Pop. Slightly different versions were released in various countries, based on polls of local fans.[197] King of Pop reached the top 10 in most countries where it was issued, and also sold well as an import in other countries (such as the United States.)[198][199]
In the fall of 2008, Fortress Investments threatened to foreclose on Neverland Ranch, which Jackson used as collateral for loans running into many tens of millions of dollars. However, Fortress opted to sell Jackson's debts to Colony Capital LLC. In November, Jackson transferred Neverland Ranch's title to Sycamore Valley Ranch Company LLC, which was a joint venture between Jackson and Colony Capital LLC. This deal cleared Jackson's debt, and he reportedly even gained an extra $35 million from the venture. At the time of his death, Jackson still owned a stake in Neverland/Sycamore Valley, but it is unknown how large that stake was.[200][201][202] In September 2008, Jackson entered negotiations with Julien's Auction House to display and auction a large collection of memorabilia amounting to approximately 1,390 lots. The auction was scheduled to take place between April 22 and April 25.[203] An exhibition of the lots opened as scheduled on April 14, but the actual auction was eventually cancelled at Jackson's request.[204]
In March 2009, Jackson held a press conference at London's O2 Arena and announced a series of comeback concerts titled This Is It. The shows would be Jackson's first major series of concerts since the HIStory World Tour finished in 1997. Jackson suggested possible retirement after the shows; he said it would be his "final curtain call". The initial plan was for 10 concerts in London, followed by shows in Paris, New York City and Mumbai. Randy Phillips, president and chief executive of AEG Live, stated that the first 10 dates alone would earn the singer approximately £50 million.[205] The London residency was increased to 50 dates after record breaking ticket sales: over one million were sold in less than two hours.[206] Jackson rehearsed in Los Angeles in the weeks leading up to the tour under the direction of choreographer Kenny Ortega. Most of these rehearsals took place at the Staples Center, which was owned by AEG.[207] The concerts would have commenced on July 13, 2009, and finished on March 6, 2010. Less than three weeks before the first show was due to begin in London and with all concerts being sold out, Jackson died after suffering cardiac arrest.[208] Some time before his death, it was widely stated that he was starting a clothing line with Christian Audigier; due to his death, the current status of the label remains unknown.[209][210]
Jackson's first posthumous single was a song titled "This Is It" which Jackson cowrote in the 1980s with Paul Anka. It was not on the set lists for the concerts, and the recording was based on an old demo tape. The surviving brothers reunited in the studio for the first time since 1989 to record backing vocals. On October 28, 2009, a documentary film about the rehearsals titled Michael Jackson's This Is It was released.[211] Even though it ran for a limited two-week engagement, it became the highest grossing documentary or concert movie of all time, with earnings of more than $260 million worldwide.[212] Jackson's estate received 90% of the profits.[213] The film was accompanied by a compilation album of the same name. Two versions of the new song appear on the album, which also featured original masters of Jackson's hits in the order in which they appear in the movie, along with a bonus disc with previously unreleased versions of more Jackson hits as well as a spoken-word poem titled "Planet Earth".[214] At the 2009 American Music Awards Jackson won four posthumous awards, two for him and two for his album Number Ones, bringing his total American Music Awards to 26.[215][216]
Death and memorial[link]
Main articles: Death of Michael Jackson and Michael Jackson memorial service
File:MJ's tomb.jpg
Michael Jackson's Tomb in the Great Mausoleum at Forest Lawn Memorial Park, Glendale
On June 25, 2009, Jackson died while in his bed at his rented mansion at 100 North Carolwood Drive in the Holmby Hills district of Los Angeles. Attempts at resuscitating him by Conrad Murray, his personal physician, were unsuccessful.[217] Los Angeles Fire Department paramedics received a 911 call at 12:22 (PDT, 19:22 UTC), arriving three minutes later at Jackson's location.[218][219] He was reportedly not breathing and CPR was performed.[220] Resuscitation efforts continued en route to the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, and for more than an hour after arriving there at 1:13 (20:13 UTC). He was pronounced dead at 2:26 local time (21:26 UTC).[221][222] Jackson's death triggered a global outpouring of grief.[217]
The news spread quickly online, causing websites to slow down and crash from user overload. Both TMZ and the Los Angeles Times suffered outages.[223] Google initially believed that the input from millions of people searching for "Michael Jackson" meant that the search engine was under DDoS attack, and blocked searches related to Michael Jackson for 30 minutes. Twitter reported a crash, as did Wikipedia at 3:15 p.m. PDT (22:15 UTC).[224] The Wikimedia Foundation reported nearly a million visitors to Jackson's biography within one hour, probably the most visitors in a one-hour period to any article in Wikipedia's history.[225] AOL Instant Messenger collapsed for 40 minutes. AOL called it a "seminal moment in Internet history", adding, "We've never seen anything like it in terms of scope or depth."[226]
Around 15% of Twitter posts—or 5,000 tweets per minute—reportedly mentioned Jackson after the news broke,[227][228] compared to the 5% recalled as having mentioned the Iranian elections or the flu pandemic that had made headlines earlier in the year.[228] Overall, web traffic ranged from 11% to at least 20% higher than normal.[227][229] MTV and Black Entertainment Television (BET) aired marathons of Jackson's music videos.[230] Jackson specials aired on multiple television stations around the world. The British soap opera EastEnders added a last-minute scene, in which one character tells another about the news, to the June 26 episode.[231] Jackson was the topic of every front-page headline in the daily British tabloid The Sun for about two weeks following his death.[232] During the same period, the three major U.S. networks' evening newscasts—ABC World News, CBS Evening News, and NBC Nightly News—devoted 34% of their broadcast time to him.[233] Magazines including Time published commemorative editions.[234] A scene that had featured Jackson's sister La Toya was cut from the film Brüno out of respect toward Jackson's family.[235]
Jackson's memorial was held on July 7, 2009, at the Staples Center in Los Angeles, preceded by a private family service at Forest Lawn Memorial Park's Hall of Liberty. Jackson's casket was present during the memorial but no information was released about the final disposition of the body. While some unofficial reports claimed a worldwide audience as high as one billion people,[236][237] the U.S. audience was estimated by Nielsen to be 31.1 million, an amount comparable to the estimated 35.1 million that watched the 2004 burial of former president Ronald Reagan, and the estimated 33.1 million Americans who watched the 1997 funeral for Princess Diana.[238]
Mariah Carey, Stevie Wonder, Lionel Richie, John Mayer, Jennifer Hudson, Usher, Jermaine Jackson, and Shaheen Jafargholi performed at the event. Berry Gordy and Smokey Robinson gave eulogies, while Queen Latifah read "We had him", a poem written for the occasion by Maya Angelou.[239] The Reverend Al Sharpton received a standing ovation with cheers when he told Jackson's children, "Wasn't nothing strange about your daddy. It was strange what your daddy had to deal with. But he dealt with it anyway."[240] Jackson's 11-year-old daughter, Paris Katherine, cried as she told the crowd, "Ever since I was born, Daddy has been the best father you could ever imagine ... I just wanted to say I love him ... so much."[166] Reverend Lucious Smith provided a closing prayer.[241] On August 24, several news outlets quoted anonymous sources as stating that the Los Angeles coroner had decided to treat Jackson's death as a homicide; this was later confirmed by the coroner on August 28.[242][243] At the time of death, Jackson had been administered propofol, lorazepam and midazolam.[244] Law enforcement officials conducted a manslaughter investigation of his personal physician, Conrad Murray.[245] On February 8, 2010, Murray was charged with involuntary manslaughter by prosecutors in Los Angeles.[246] Jackson was entombed on September 3, 2009, at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California.[247]
On June 25, 2010, the first anniversary of Jackson's death, fans traveled to Los Angeles to pay their tribute to him. They visited Jackson’s star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and his family’s home, as well as Forest Lawn Memorial Park. Many of the fans were carrying sunflowers and other tribute items to drop off at the sites. Members of the Jackson family and close friends arrived to pay their respects.[248][249] Katherine returned to Gary, Indiana to unveil a granite monument constructed in the front yard of the family home. The memorial continued with a candlelight vigil and a special performance of "We Are the World".[250][251] On June 26, there was a protest march in front of the Los Angeles Police Department's Robbery-Homicide Division at the old Parker Center building and a petition with thousands of signatures demanding justice was delivered.[252][253] The Jackson Family Foundation in conjunction with Voiceplate presented "Forever Michael", an event bringing together Jackson family members, celebrities, fans, supporters and the community to celebrate and honor his legacy. A portion of the proceeds were presented to some of Jackson's favorite charities. Katherine also introduced her new book "Never Can Say Goodbye".[254][255][256]
Death aftermath[link]
After his death, Jackson became the best-selling albums artist of 2009. In the United States selling over 8.2 million albums and a total of 35 million albums worldwide in the 12 months that followed his death.[257][258] Following this surge in sales, Sony announced that they had extended their relationship with his material. The distribution rights held by Sony Music were due to expire in 2015.[259] On March 16, 2010, Sony Music Entertainment, in a move spearheaded by its Columbia/Epic Label Group division, signed a new deal with the Jackson estate to extend their distribution rights to his back catalogue until at least 2017, as well as to obtain permission to release ten new albums with previously unreleased material and new collections of released work. On November 4, 2010 Sony announced the release of Michael, the first posthumous album set to be released on December 14, with the promotional single released to the radios on November 8, titled "Breaking News".[260] The deal was unprecedented in the music industry as it is the most expensive music contract pertaining to a single artist in history; it reportedly involved Sony Music paying $250 million for the deal, with the Jackson estate getting the full sum as well as its share of royalties for all works released.[259][261] Video game developer Ubisoft announced it would release a new dancing-and-singing game featuring Michael Jackson for the 2010 holiday season. The game titled Michael Jackson: The Experience will be among the first to use Kinect and PlayStation Move, the respective motion-detecting camera systems for Microsoft's Xbox 360 and Sony's PlayStation 3 due out later that year.[262]
On November 3, 2010, the theatrical performing company Cirque du Soleil announced that it would launch "Michael Jackson: The Immortal World Tour" in October 2011 in Montreal, while a permanent show will reside in Las Vegas.[263] The 90-minute US$57M production will combine Jackson's iconic musical oeuvre and choreography with the Cirque's signature artistry, dance and aerial displays involving 65 artists.[264] The tour was written and directed by Jamie King[265] and centers on Jackson's "inspirational Giving Tree – the wellspring of creativity where his love of music and dance, fairy tale and magic, and the fragile beauty of nature are unlocked."[266] On October 3, 2011, the accompanying compilation soundtrack album Immortal was announced to have over 40 Jackson’s original recordings re-produced by Kevin Antunes.[267]
In April 2011, Jackson's longtime friend and billionaire businessman Mohamed Al-Fayed, chairman of Fulham F.C., unveiled a statue of Jackson outside the club's stadium, Craven Cottage.[268] Fulham fans were however bemused by the statue and failed to understand the relevance of Jackson to the club.[269] Al Fayed however defended the statue and told the fans to 'go to hell' if they didn't appreciate the statue.[270]
Artistry[link]
Influences[link]
Jackson's music took root in R&B, pop and soul. He had been influenced by the work of contemporary musicians such as Little Richard, James Brown, Jackie Wilson, Diana Ross, David Ruffin, Gene Kelly, Fred Astaire, Sammy Davis, Jr., The Isley Brothers, the Bee Gees and the West Side Story dancers, to whom he made a tribute in "Beat It" and in the "Bad" video.[271] According to David Winters, who met and befriended Jackson while choreographing the 1971 Diana Ross TV Special "Diana!", (which was also Jackson's first solo debut outside of The Jackson 5), Jackson watched West Side Story almost every week and it was his favorite film.[272][273][274] While Little Richard had a substantial influence on Jackson,[275][276] James Brown was Jackson's greatest inspiration. In reference to Brown, Jackson declared: "Ever since I was a small child, no more than like six years old, my mother would wake me no matter what time it was, if I was sleeping, no matter what I was doing, to watch the television to see the master at work. And when I saw him move, I was mesmerized. I had never seen a performer perform like James Brown, and right then and there I knew that was exactly what I wanted to do for the rest of my life because of James Brown."[277]
The young Michael Jackson owed his vocal technique in large part to Diana Ross. Not only a mother figure to him, she was often observed in rehearsal as an accomplished performer. He later expressed: "I got to know her well. She taught me so much. I used to just sit in the corner and watch the way she moved. She was art in motion. I studied the way she moved, the way she sang – just the way she was." He told her: "I want to be just like you, Diana." She said: "You just be yourself."[278] But Jackson owed part of his enduring style—especially his use of the oooh interjection—to Ross. From a young age, Jackson often punctuated his verses with a sudden exclamation of oooh. Diana Ross had used this effect on many of the songs recorded with The Supremes.[279]
Musical themes and genres[link]
Unlike many artists, Jackson did not write his songs on paper. Instead he would dictate into a sound recorder, and when recording he would sing the lyrics from memory.[280] In most of his songs, such as "Billie Jean", "Who Is It", and "Tabloid Junkie", he would beatbox and imitate the instruments using his voice instead of playing the actual instruments, along with other sounds. Jackson noted that it is easier to sing a drum line, or sing a bass, instead of playing a drum line or a bass with an instrument. Several critics have said that Jackson's distinct voice was able to replace any instrument convincingly. Steve Huey of Allmusic said that, throughout his solo career, Jackson's versatility allowed him to experiment with various themes and genres.[281] As a musician, he ranged from Motown's dance fare and ballads to techno and house-edged new jack swing to work that incorporates both funk rhythms and hard rock guitar.[18][282][283]
According to Huey, Thriller refined the strengths of Off the Wall; the dance and rock tracks were more aggressive, while the pop tunes and ballads were softer and more soulful.[281] Notable tracks included the ballads "The Lady in My Life", "Human Nature" and "The Girl Is Mine"; the funk pieces "Billie Jean" and "Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'"; and the post-disco set "Baby Be Mine" and "P.Y.T. (Pretty Young Thing)".[281][282][283][284][285] With Thriller, Christopher Connelly of Rolling Stone commented that Jackson developed his long association with the subliminal theme of paranoia and darker imagery.[285] Allmusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine noted this is evident on the songs "Billie Jean" and "Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'".[283] In "Billie Jean", Jackson sings about an obsessive fan who alleges he has fathered a child of hers.[281] In "Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'" he argues against gossip and the media.[285] "Beat It" decried gang violence in an homage to West Side Story, and was Jackson's first successful rock cross-over piece, according to Huey.[18][281] He also observed that the title track "Thriller" began Jackson's interest with the theme of the supernatural, a topic he revisited in subsequent years.[281] In 1985, Jackson co-wrote the charity anthem "We Are the World"; humanitarian themes later became a recurring theme in his lyrics and public persona.[281]
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One of Jackson's signature pieces, "Thriller", released as a single in 1984, utilizes cinematic sound effects, horror film motifs and vocal trickery to convey a sense of danger.[22]
A single from the album Bad, released 1988, "Smooth Criminal" features digital drum sounds, keyboard-created bass lines and other percussion elements designed to give the impression of a pulsing heart.[286]
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In Bad, Jackson's concept of the predatory lover can be seen on the rock song "Dirty Diana".[290] The lead single "I Just Can't Stop Loving You" is a traditional love ballad, while "Man in the Mirror" is an anthemic ballad of confession and resolution.[78] "Smooth Criminal" was an evocation of bloody assault, rape and likely murder.[78] Allmusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine states that Dangerous presents Jackson as a very paradoxical individual.[291] He comments the album is more diverse than his previous Bad, as it appeals to an urban audience while also attracting the middle class with anthems like "Heal the World".[291] The first half of the record is dedicated to new jack swing, including songs like "Jam" and "Remember the Time".[292] The album is Jackson's first where social ills become a primary theme; "Why You Wanna Trip on Me", for example, protests against world hunger, AIDS, homelessness and drugs.[292] Dangerous contains sexually charged efforts such as the multifaceted love song, "In the Closet".[292] The title track continues the theme of the predatory lover and compulsive desire.[292] The second half includes introspective, pop-gospel anthems such as "Will You Be There", "Heal the World" and "Keep the Faith"; these songs show Jackson opening up about various personal struggles and worries.[292] In the ballad "Gone Too Soon", Jackson gives tribute to his friend Ryan White and the plight of those with AIDS.[293]
HIStory creates an atmosphere of paranoia.[294] Its content focuses on the hardships and public struggles Jackson went through just prior to its production. In the new jack swing-funk-rock efforts "Scream" and "Tabloid Junkie", along with the R&B ballad "You Are Not Alone", Jackson retaliates against the injustice and isolation he feels, and directs much of his anger at the media.[295] In the introspective ballad "Stranger in Moscow", Jackson laments over his "fall from grace", while songs like "Earth Song", "Childhood", "Little Susie" and "Smile" are all operatic pop pieces.[294][295] In the track "D.S.", Jackson launched a verbal attack against Tom Sneddon. He describes Sneddon as an antisocial, white supremacist who wanted to "get my ass, dead or alive". Of the song, Sneddon said, "I have not—shall we say—done him the honor of listening to it, but I've been told that it ends with the sound of a gunshot".[296] Invincible found Jackson working heavily with producer Rodney Jerkins.[281] It is a record made up of urban soul like "Cry" and "The Lost Children", ballads such as "Speechless", "Break of Dawn" and "Butterflies" and mixes hip-hop, pop and R&B in "2000 Watts", "Heartbreaker" and "Invincible".[297][298]
Vocal style[link]
Jackson sang from childhood, and over time his voice and vocal style changed noticeably. Between 1971 and 1975, Jackson's voice descended from boy soprano to high tenor.[299] His vocal range as an adult was F2-E♭6. Jackson first used a technique called the "vocal hiccup" in 1973, starting with the song "It's Too Late to Change the Time" from The Jackson 5's G.I.T.: Get It Together album.[300] Jackson did not use the hiccup technique— somewhat like a gulping for air or gasping— fully until the recording of Off the Wall: it can be seen in full force in the "Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground)" promotional video.[20] With the arrival of Off the Wall in the late 1970s, Jackson's abilities as a vocalist were well regarded. At the time, Rolling Stone compared his vocals to the "breathless, dreamy stutter" of Stevie Wonder. Their analysis was also that "Jackson's feathery-timbred tenor is extraordinarily beautiful. It slides smoothly into a startling falsetto that's used very daringly".[301][302] 1982 saw the release of Thriller, and Rolling Stone was of the opinion that Jackson was then singing in a "fully adult voice" that was "tinged by sadness".[285]
A distinctive deliberate mispronunciation of "come on", used frequently by Jackson, occasionally spelled "cha'mone" or "shamone", is also a staple in impressions and caricatures of him.[303] The turn of the 1990s saw the release of the introspective album Dangerous. The New York Times noted that on some tracks, "he gulps for breath, his voice quivers with anxiety or drops to a desperate whisper, hissing through clenched teeth" and he had a "wretched tone".[292] When singing of brotherhood or self-esteem the musician would return to "smooth" vocals.[292] When commenting on Invincible, Rolling Stone were of the opinion that—at the age of 43—Jackson still performed "exquisitely voiced rhythm tracks and vibrating vocal harmonies".[304] Nelson George summed up Jackson's vocals by stating "The grace, the aggression, the growling, the natural boyishness, the falsetto, the smoothness—that combination of elements mark him as a major vocalist".[286]
Music videos and choreography[link]
Jackson has also been referred to as the King of Music Videos,[305] Steve Huey of Allmusic observed how Jackson transformed the music video into an art form and a promotional tool through complex story lines, dance routines, special effects and famous cameo appearances; simultaneously breaking down racial barriers.[281] Before Thriller, Jackson struggled to receive coverage on MTV, allegedly because he was African American.[306] Pressure from CBS Records persuaded MTV to start showing "Billie Jean" and later "Beat It", leading to a lengthy partnership with Jackson, also helping other black music artists gain recognition.[307] MTV employees deny any racism in their coverage, or pressure to change their stance. MTV maintains that they played rock music, regardless of race.[308] The popularity of his videos on MTV helped to put the relatively young channel "on the map"; MTV's focus shifted in favor of pop and R&B.[309][307] His performance on Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, Forever changed the scope of live stage show; "That Jackson lip-synced 'Billie Jean' is, in itself, not extraordinary, but the fact that it did not change the impact of the performance is extraordinary; whether the performance was live or lip-synced made no difference to the audience" thus creating an era in which artists re-create the spectacle of music video imagery on stage.[310] Short films like Thriller largely remained unique to Jackson, while the group dance sequence in "Beat It" has frequently been imitated.[311] The choreography in Thriller has become a part of global pop culture, replicated everywhere from Indian films to prisons in the Philippines.[312] The Thriller short film marked an increase in scale for music videos, and has been named the most successful music video ever by the Guinness World Records.[99]
In the 19-minute music video for "Bad"—directed by Martin Scorsese—Jackson began using sexual imagery and choreography not previously seen in his work. He occasionally grabbed or touched his chest, torso and crotch. When asked by Oprah in the 1993 interview about why he grabbed his crotch, he replied, "I think it happens subliminally" and he described it as something that was not planned, but rather, as something that was compelled by the music. "Bad" garnered a mixed reception from both fans and critics; Time magazine described it as "infamous". The video also featured Wesley Snipes; in the future Jackson's videos would often feature famous cameo roles.[71][313] For "Smooth Criminal", Jackson experimented with an innovative "anti-gravity lean" in his performances. The maneuver required special shoes for which he was granted U.S. Patent No. 5,255,452.[314] Although the music video for "Leave Me Alone" was not officially released in the US, in 1989, it was nominated for three Billboard Music Video Awards;[315] the same year it won a Golden Lion Award for the quality of the special effects used in its production. In 1990, "Leave Me Alone" won a Grammy for Best Music Video, Short Form.[97]
He received the MTV Video Vanguard Award in 1988 and the MTV Video Vanguard Artist of the Decade Award in 1990 to celebrate his accomplishments in the art form in the 1980s; in 1991 the first award was renamed in his honor.[114] "Black or White" was accompanied by a controversial music video, which, on November 14, 1991, simultaneously premiered in 27 countries with an estimated audience of 500 million people, the largest viewing ever for a music video.[113] It featured scenes construed as having a sexual nature as well as depictions of violence. The offending scenes in the final half of the 14-minute version were edited out to prevent the video from being banned, and Jackson apologized.[316] Along with Jackson, it featured Macaulay Culkin, Peggy Lipton and George Wendt. It helped usher in morphing as an important technology in music videos.[317]
"Remember the Time" was an elaborate production, and became one of his longest videos at over nine minutes. Set in ancient Egypt, it featured groundbreaking visual effects and appearances by Eddie Murphy, Iman and Magic Johnson, along with a distinct complex dance routine.[318] The video for "In the Closet" was Jackson's most sexually provocative piece. It featured supermodel Naomi Campbell in a courtship dance with Jackson. The video was banned in South Africa because of its imagery.[114]
The music video for "Scream", directed by Mark Romanek and production designer Tom Foden, is one of Jackson's most critically acclaimed. In 1995, it gained 11 MTV Video Music Award Nominations—more than any other music video—and won "Best Dance Video", "Best Choreography", and "Best Art Direction".[319] The song and its accompanying video are a response to the backlash Jackson received from the media after being accused of child molestation in 1993.[320] A year later, it won a Grammy for Best Music Video, Short Form; shortly afterwards Guinness World Records listed it as the most expensive music video ever made at a cost of $7 million.[151][321]
"Earth Song" was accompanied by an expensive and well-received music video that gained a Grammy nomination for Best Music Video, Short Form in 1997. The video had an environmental theme, showing images of animal cruelty, deforestation, pollution and war. Using special effects, time is reversed so that life returns, wars end, and the forests re-grow.[151][322] Released in 1997 and premiering at the 1996 Cannes Film Festival, Michael Jackson's Ghosts was a short film written by Jackson and Stephen King and directed by Stan Winston. The video for Ghosts is over 38 minutes long and holds the Guinness World Record as the world's longest music video.[151][160][323][324]
Legacy and influence[link]
Jackson throughout his career transformed the art of the music video and paved the way for modern pop music. Daily Telegraph writer Tom Utley described Jackson in 2003 as "extremely important" and a "genius".[239] For much of his career, he had an "unparalleled" level of worldwide influence over the younger generation through his musical and humanitarian contributions.[153] Jackson's music and videos, such as Thriller, fostered racial diversity in MTV's roster, helped to put the relatively new channel into public awareness, and steered the channel's focus from rock to pop music and R&B, shaping the channel into a form that proved enduring. Jackson's work continues to influence numerous hip hop, rock, pop and R&B artists, including Patrick Stump,[325] Jennifer Lopez,[326] Beyoncé,[327] Mariah Carey,[328] Mýa,[329] Usher,[330] Adam Lambert,[331] Green Day,[332] Justin Timberlake,[333] Britney Spears,[334] Madonna,[335] Alien Ant Farm[164] and Ludacris, among others.[336]
Allmusic's Steve Huey describes Jackson as "an unstoppable juggernaut, possessed of all the skills to dominate the charts seemingly at will: an instantly identifiable voice, eye-popping dance moves, stunning musical versatility and loads of sheer star power".[281] In the mid-1980s, Time magazine's pop music critic, Jay Cocks, noted "Jackson is the biggest thing since The Beatles. He is the hottest single phenomenon since Elvis Presley. He just may be the most popular black singer ever".[40] In 1990, Vanity Fair cited Jackson as the most popular artist in the history of show business.[97] In 2007, Jackson said, "Music has been my outlet, my gift to all of the lovers in this world. Through it, my music, I know I will live forever."[337]
Shortly after Jackson's death, on June 25, 2009, MTV briefly returned to its original music video format to celebrate and pay tribute to his work.[338] The channel aired many hours of Jackson's music videos, accompanied by live news specials featuring reactions from MTV personalities and other celebrities. The temporary shift in MTV's programming culminated the following week in the channel's live coverage of Jackson's memorial service.[339] At the memorial service on July 7, 2009, founder of Motown Records Berry Gordy proclaimed Jackson as "the greatest entertainer that ever lived".[340][341][342]
In 2010, two university librarians found that Jackson's influence extended into academia, and was detectable in scholarly literature pertaining to a range of subject matter.[343][344] The two researchers combed through various scholars' writings, and compiled an annotated bibliography of those writings that appeared to meet at least one of several criteria. Among these criteria were appearance in a peer-reviewed journal, and the provision of insight into the nature of "popular icons including Jackson".[345] The bibliography located references to Jackson in research reports concerning music, popular culture, and an array of other topics. The bibliographers identified as their most peculiar finding an argument that certain aspects of chemistry can be effectively taught by altering and imitating elements of Jackson's singing.[346] One of the research librarians later reflected that "the fact that someone would take a Michael Jackson song and co-opt it as a means to convey chemistry concepts just shows the pervasiveness of Jackson's influence".[343]
Honors and awards[link]
Michael Jackson was inducted onto the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1980 as member of The Jacksons and in 1984 as solo artist. Throughout his career he received numerous honors and awards, including the World Music Awards' Best-Selling Pop Male Artist of the Millennium, the American Music Award's Artist of the Century Award and the Bambi Pop Artist of the Millennium Award.[165][347] He was a double-inductee of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, once as a member of The Jackson 5 in 1997 and later as a solo artist in 2001. Jackson was also inducted in several other hall of fames, including Vocal Group Hall of Fame (as The Jackson 5 member) in 1999, Songwriters Hall of Fame in 2002 and Hit Parade Hall of Fame (with his brothers) in 2009.[165][348] In 2010, Jackson was inducted into the Dance Hall of Fame as the first (and currently only) dancer from the world of pop and rock 'n' roll.[349] His awards include many Guinness World Records (eight in 2006 alone),[350] 13 Grammy Awards (as well as the Grammy Legend Award and the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award), 26 American Music Awards (24 only as a solo artist, including the "Artist of the Century", but not the poll of "Artist of the '80s")—more than any artist—, 13 number one singles in the US in his solo career—more than any other male artist in the Hot 100 era[351]—and estimated sales of up to 750 million records worldwide, making him the world's best selling male solo pop artist.[32][99][113][163][215][216][352][353][354][355][356] On December 29, 2009, the American Film Institute recognized Jackson's death as a "moment of significance" saying, "Michael Jackson's sudden death in June at age 50 was notable for the worldwide outpouring of grief and the unprecedented global eulogy of his posthumous concert rehearsal movie This Is It."[357] Michael Jackson also received a Doctor of Humane Letters Degree from the United Negro College Fund[358] and also an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from Fisk University.[359]
Lifetime earnings[link]
His total lifetime earnings from royalties on his solo recordings and music videos, revenue from concerts and endorsements have been estimated at US$500 million; some analysts have speculated that his music catalog holdings could be worth billions of dollars.[98][360] This speculation however is contradicted by financial documents obtained by the Associated Press, which showed that as of March 31, 2007, Jackson's 50 percent stake in the Sony/ATV Music Publishing catalog (his most prized asset) was worth $390.6 million and Michael Jackson's net worth was $236 million.[361] Billboard has estimated that Jackson has generated at least $1 billion in revenue in the year following his death.[362]
Discography[link]
Main articles: Michael Jackson albums discography, Michael Jackson singles discography, and Michael Jackson videography
See also: Jackson 5 discography
- Got to Be There (1972)
- Ben (1972)
- Music & Me (1973)
- Forever, Michael (1975)
- Off the Wall (1979)
- Thriller (1982)
- Bad (1987)
- Dangerous (1991)
- HIStory: Past, Present and Future, Book I (1995)
- Invincible (2001)
Filmography[link]
Main article: Michael Jackson videography
| Year | Film | Role | Director |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1978 | The Wiz[363] | Scarecrow | Lumet, SidneySidney Lumet |
| 1986 | Captain EO[364] | Captain EO | Coppola, Francis FordFrancis Ford Coppola |
| 1988 | Moonwalker[365] | Himself | Kramer, JerryJerry Kramer |
| 1997 | Michael Jackson's Ghosts[366] | Maestro/Mayor/Ghoul/Skeleton | Winston, StanStan Winston |
| 2002 | Men in Black II[367] | Agent M (cameo) | Sonnenfeld, BarryBarry Sonnenfeld |
| 2004 | Miss Cast Away and the Island Girls[368] | Agent MJ (cameo) | Stoller, Bryan MichaelBryan Michael Stoller |
| 2009 | Michael Jackson's This Is It[369] | Himself | Ortega, KennyKenny Ortega |
Tours[link]
- Bad World Tour (1987–89)
- Dangerous World Tour (1992–93)
- HIStory World Tour (1996–97)
- This Is It (2009–10) (cancelled)
See also[link]
 |
Book: Michael Jackson |
| Wikipedia books are collections of articles that can be downloaded or ordered in print. | |
- Honorific nicknames in popular music
- Michael Jackson-related games
- List of awards received by Michael Jackson
- List of best-selling albums
- List of best-selling music artists
- List of best-selling music artists in the United States
- List of most expensive music videos
- List of unreleased Michael Jackson material
- List of cover versions of Michael Jackson songs
References[link]
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- ^ Lewis, p. 47
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- ^ a b c Cocks, Jay (March 19, 1984). "Why He's a Thriller". Time. http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,950053-1,00.html. Retrieved April, 25 2010.
- ^ Taraborrelli, p. 226
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- ^ Alex Dobuzinskis (December 30, 2009). "Jackson "Thriller" film picked for U.S. registry". Reuters (Thomas Reuters). http://www.reuters.com/article/2009/12/30/us-thriller-idUSTRE5BT43W20091230?type=musicNews. Retrieved July 2, 2011.
- ^ Dave Itzkoff (December 30, 2009). "'Thriller' Video Added to U.S. Film Registry". The New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/31/arts/music/31arts-THRILLERVIDE_BRF.html. Retrieved April 28, 2010.
- ^ Pareles, John. Michael Jackson at 25: A Musical Phenomenon, The New York Times, January 14, 1984.
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- ^ Taraborrelli, pp. 279–287
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- ^ "Bruce shows who's Boss". The Montreal Gazette. (January 28, 1986). http://news.google.co.uk/newspapers?id=MRgiAAAAIBAJ&sjid=7aUFAAAAIBAJ&pg=1658,3425033&dq=american+music+awards&hl=en. Retrieved June 16, 2010.
- ^ Lisa D. Campbell (1993). Michael Jackson: the King of Pop. Branden Books. p. 114. ISBN 978-0-8283-1957-7. http://books.google.com/?id=BVC9zltjf-EC&pg=PA114&lpg=PA114&dq=Michael+Jackson+won+American+Music+Awards+Appreciation&q=Michael%20Jackson%20won%20American%20Music%20Awards%20Appreciation. Retrieved June 16, 2010.
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- ^ a b c "Paul McCartney refused an offer to buy the ATV Catalog for £20 million". Audio & transcript of McCartney at a 1990 press conference. November 13, 2010. http://mjjinfo.blogspot.com/2010/11/paul-mccartney-refused-to-buy-atv.html.
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- ^ a b c Campbell (1995), pp. 14–16
- ^ Taraborrelli, pp. 434–436
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- ^ a b Taraborrelli, pp. 355–361
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- ^ Goldberg, 1Michael; Handelman, David (September 24, 1987). "Is Michael Jackson for Real?". Rolling Stone (Wenner Media LLC).
- ^ a b Taraborrelli, pp. 370–373
- ^ "Newswatch Magazine – The Man, His Weird Ways". Newswatchngr.com. July 5, 2009. http://www.newswatchngr.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1080&Itemid=1. Retrieved October 24, 2009.
- ^ Jackson, Michael (September 12, 1997). Interview with Barbara Walters. 20/20. ABC.
- ^ Taraborrelli, p. vii
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- ^ "Captain EO is Back to Change the World – Movies News at IGN". Movies.ign.com. February 23, 2010. http://movies.ign.com/articles/107/1071393p1.html?RSSwhen2010-02-23_111800&RSSid=1071393. Retrieved August 22, 2010.
- ^ Ebony, Vol. 42, No. 11, September 1987, and Vol. 45, No. 12, October 1990.
- ^ a b c Cocks, Jay. The Badder They Come, Time, September 14, 1987.
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- ^ "50 fastest selling albums ever". NME.com. 2011. http://www.nme.com/photos/50-fastest-selling-albums-ever/213617/40/1. Retrieved May 25, 2012.
- ^ Gil Kaufman (2010). "Michael Jackson's New Album Cover Decoded Painting is packed with iconic MJ images". mtv.com. http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1651633/michael-jacksons-new-album-cover-decoded.jhtml. Retrieved May 25, 2012.
- ^ Piya Sinha-Roy (2012). "Michael Jackson is still "Bad," 25 years after". Reuters. http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/05/21/entertainment-us-michaeljackson-bad-idUSBRE84K0Z120120521. Retrieved May 22, 2012.
- ^ Piya Sinha-Roy (2012). "Michael Jackson is still "Bad", 25 years after album". Chicagotribune. http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2012-05-22/entertainment/sns-rt-us-michaeljackson-bad25bre84l17s-20120522_1_conrad-murray-dirty-diana-grammy-winning-album. Retrieved May 22, 2012.
- ^ "25th Anniversary Of Michael Jackson’s Landmark Album Bad Celebrated With September 18 Release Of New Bad 25 Packages". Yahoo. 2012. http://news.yahoo.com/25th-anniversary-michael-jackson-landmark-album-bad-celebrated-140242006.html. Retrieved May 24, 2012.
- ^ contactmusic (2012). "Michael Jackson - Michael Jackson's Bad To Get 25Th Anniversary Release". contactmusic. http://www.contactmusic.com/news/michael-jacksons-bad-to-get-25th-anniversary-release_1330641. Retrieved May 25, 2012.
- ^ "Michael, Travis top Music Award winners". Lodi News-Sentinel. (January 30, 1989). http://news.google.co.uk/newspapers?id=lZozAAAAIBAJ&sjid=lTIHAAAAIBAJ&pg=4477,3617735&dq=american+music+awards&hl=en. Retrieved June 16, 2010.
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- ^ Lisa D. Campbell (1993). Michael Jackson: the King of Pop. Branden Books. p. 251. ISBN 978-0-8283-1957-7. http://books.google.com/?id=BVC9zltjf-EC&pg=PA251&dq=Michael+Jackson+Moonwalker+251&q=Michael%20Jackson%20Moonwalker%20251. Retrieved July 5, 2010.
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- ^ a b Lewis, pp. 95–96
- ^ Harrington, Richard.Jackson to Make First Solo U.S. Tour, The Washington Post, January 12, 1988.
- ^ Shanahan, Mark and Golstein, Meredith (June 27, 2009). "Remembering Michael". The Boston Globe. http://www.boston.com/ae/celebrity/articles/2009/06/27/writer_stephen_davis_remembers_michael_jackson. Retrieved March 14, 2010.
- ^ Jackson, pp. 29–31
- ^ George, p. 42
- ^ a b c d e George, pp. 43–44
- ^ a b c Gunderson,, Edna (February 19, 2007). "For Jackson, scandal could spell financial ruin". USA Today (Gannett Co. Inc). http://www.usatoday.com/life/2003-11-24-jackson-finances_x.htm. Retrieved March 14, 2010.
- ^ a b c d "Jackson receives his World Records". Yahoo!. (November 14, 2006). http://uk.news.launch.yahoo.com/dyna/article.html?a=/14112006/344/jackson-receives-world-records.html&e=l_news_dm. Retrieved November 16, 2006. [dead link]
- ^ Press references to Jackson as a music "king" appeared as early as 1984 after he swept the Grammy Awards, and "king of pop" appeared as early as 1987. MTV and Fox used the title in joint press releases and ads for the "Black or White" video at Jackson's request, but MTV denied a report that VJs were required to use it on-camera. Writers described the title as self-proclaimed from then on.
- ^ Arar, Yardena (February 29, 1984). "Michael Jackson coronated latest king of rock 'n' roll". Boca Raton News: p. 7A.
- ^ Staff writer (July 27, 1987). "Is the thrill gone for singer Michael Jackson?". Sacramento Bee: p. B3.
- ^ Browne, David (November 29, 1991). "Michael Jackson's Black or White Blues". Entertainment Weekly.
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- ^ Jones, pp. 229, 259
- ^ Taraborrelli, pp. 355–356
- ^ Taraborrelli, pp. 413–414
- ^ Taraborrelli, p. 610
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- ^ Chaney, Jen (July 19, 2005). "'Miss Cast Away': You Know It's Bad". The Washington Post. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/18/AR2005071800641_pf.html. Retrieved February 7, 2009.
- ^ Le, Danny (August 11, 2009). "'Michael Jackson's "This Is It," to be Presented In Theaters Around The World". MichaelJackson.com. http://www.michaeljackson.com/us/news/michael-jacksons-it-be-presented-theaters-around-world. Retrieved August 11, 2009.
- Bibliography
- Brackett, Nathan; Christian Hoard (2004). The Rolling Stone Album Guide. Fireside. ISBN 0-7432-0169-8.
- Campbell, Lisa (1993). Michael Jackson: The King of Pop. Branden. ISBN 0-8283-1957-X.
- Campbell, Lisa (1995). Michael Jackson: The King of Pop's Darkest Hour. Branden. ISBN 0-8283-2003-9. http://books.google.ca/books?id=BVC9zltjf-EC&lpg=PP1&dq=michael%20jackson&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q&f=true.
- George, Nelson (2004). Michael Jackson: The Ultimate Collection booklet. Sony BMG.
- Guinness World Records (2003). Guinness World Records 2004. Guinness. ISBN 1-892051-20-6.
- Guinness World Records (2005). Guinness World Records 2006. Guinness. ISBN 1-904994-02-4.
- Jackson, Michael (2009) [First published 1988]. Moonwalk. Random House. ISBN 978-0-307-71698-9. http://books.google.ca/books?id=E9sGl5P8vQMC&lpg=PP1&dq=Moonwalk&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q&f=true.
- Ramage, John D.; Bean, John C.; Johnson, June (2001). Writing arguments: a rhetoric with readings. Allyn and Bacon. ISBN 0-205-31745-6.
- Taraborrelli, J. Randy (2009). Michael Jackson: The Magic, The Madness, The Whole Story, 1958–2009. Terra Alta, WV: Grand Central Publishing, 2009. ISBN 0-446-56474-5, 9780446564748.
Further reading[link]
- Dineen, Catherine (1993). Michael Jackson: In His Own Words. Omnibus Press. ISBN 0-7119-3216-6. http://books.google.ca/books?id=DEspWj_IN_UC&lpg=PP1&dq=Michael%20Jackson%3A%20In%20His%20Own%20Words&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q&f=true.
- Grant, Adrian (1994, 1997, 2002 and 2005). Michael Jackson: The Visual Documentary. Omnibus Press. ISBN 1-84449-432-2.
- Jackson, Michael (2006). My World, The Official Photobook, Vol. 1. Triumph International. ISBN 0-9768891-1-0.
- Jones, Bob (2005). Michael Jackson: The Man Behind the Mask. Select Books Inc. ISBN 1-59079-072-3. http://books.google.ca/books?id=8j4ILUllObsC&lpg=PP1&dq=Michael%20Jackson%3A%20The%20Man%20Behind%20the%20Mask&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q&f=true.
- Jefferson, Margo; Brown (2007). On Michael Jackson. Vintage Books. ISBN 978-0-307-27765-7. http://books.google.com/?id=WJiPk-3oPGkC&lpg=PP1&dq=Michael%20Jackson&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q&f=true.
- Noonan, Damien (1994) (Audio book). Michael Jackson. Carlton Books. ISBN 1-85797-587-1.
External links[link]
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| Persondata | |
|---|---|
| Name | Jackson, Michael Joseph |
| Alternative names | Jackson, Michael Joe; Jackson, Michael J. |
| Short description | Singer |
| Date of birth | August 29, 1958 |
| Place of birth | Gary, Indiana, United States |
| Date of death | June 25, 2009 |
| Place of death | Los Angeles, California, United States |
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The Communist Party of China (CPC), also known as the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), is the founding and ruling political party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Although nominally it exists alongside the United Front,[7] a coalition of governing political parties, in practice, the CPC is the only party in the PRC,[8] maintaining a unitary government and centralizing the state, military, and media.[9] The legal power of the Communist Party is guaranteed by the national constitution.[9] The current party leader is Hu Jintao, who holds the title of General Secretary of the Communist Party of China. Since becoming an institution of the state, aside from official commitment to communism and Marxism-Leninism, the party also has de facto unrecognized factions including consumerist and neoliberal figures including business people on the right who effectively support capitalism, as well as factions on the left that oppose the right in the party, and other factions.[10]
The party was founded in July 1921 in Shanghai.[11][12][13] After a lengthy civil war, the CPC defeated its primary rival, the Kuomintang (KMT), and assumed full control of mainland China by 1949.[14] The Kuomintang retreated to the island of Taiwan, where it still remains to this day.
The party has fluctuated between periods of reformism and political conservatism throughout its history. Both before and after the founding of the PRC, the CPC's history is defined by various power struggles and ideological battles, including destructive socio-political movements such as the Cultural Revolution. At first a conventional member of the international Communist movement, the CPC broke with its counterpart in the Soviet Union over ideological differences in the 1960s. The Communist Party's ideology was redefined under Deng Xiaoping to incorporate principles of market economics, and the corresponding reforms enabled rapid and sustained economic growth. [15]
The CPC is the world's largest political party,[16] claiming over 80 million members[17] at the end of 2010 which constitutes about 6.0% of the total population of mainland China. The vast majority of military and civil officials are members of the Party.[18] Since 1978, the Communist Party has attempted to institutionalize transitions of power and consolidate its internal structure. The modern party stresses unity and avoids public conflict while practicing a pragmatic and open democratic centralism within the party structure.
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Organization[link]
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The party's organizational structure was destroyed during the Cultural Revolution and rebuilt afterwards by Deng Xiaoping, who subsequently initiated "Socialism with Chinese characteristics" and brought all state apparatuses back under the rule of the CPC.
Theoretically, the party's highest body is the National Congress of the Communist Party of China, which meets at least once every five years. The primary organs of power in the Communist Party which is detailed in the party constitution include:
- Central Committee, which includes:
- The General Secretary, which is the highest ranking official within the Party and usually the Chinese paramount leader.
- The Politburo, presently consisting of 25 full members (including the members of the Politburo Standing Committee); see current members of the Politburo for a complete list.
- The Politburo Standing Committee, which currently consists of nine members; see current members of the Politburo Standing Committee for a complete list.
- The Secretariat, the principal administrative mechanism of the CPC, headed by the General Secretary of the Central Committee;
- The Central Military Commission (a parallel organization of the government institution of the same name);
- The Central Discipline Inspection Commission, which is directly under the National Congress and on the same level with the Central Committee, charged with rooting out corruption and malfeasance among party cadres.
Organizations under the Central Committee[link]
Other central organizations directly under the Party Central Committee include:
- General Office[19]
- Central Organization Department;
- Central Propaganda Department;
- Central International Liaison Department;
- Central United Front Work Department;
- Central Policy Research Office;
- Central Taiwan Work Office;
- Central External Publicity Office;
- Central Security Office;
- Central Party School;
- People's Daily;
- Seeking Truth From Facts;
- Party History Research Centre;
- Party Research Centre;
- Central Compilation and Translation Bureau.
In addition, there are numerous commissions and leading groups. Usually those commissions and leading groups have jurisdiction on both Party and State apparatus, and include ranking leaders up to the President of the People's Republic of China and the Premier of the State Council. The most important of them are:
- Central Political and Legislative Affairs Commission;
- Central Guidance Commission for Building Spiritual Civilization;
- Central Commission for Comprehensive Management of Social Order;
- State Commission for Public Sector Reform;
- Central Leading Group for Financial Work;
- Central Leading Group for Financial and Economic Affairs;
- Central Leading Group for Taiwan Affairs;
- Central Leading Group for Foreign Affairs;
- Central National Security Leading Group;
- Central Leading Group for Rural Work;
- Central Leading Group for Party Building;
- Central Leading Group for Propaganda and Ideological Work;
- Central Leading Group for Combating Pornography and Illegal Publications;
- Central Leading Group for Preventing and Handling the Problem of Heretical Organizations (related to Falun Gong);
- Central Leading Group for Preserving Stability;
- Central Leading Group for Cultural System Reform;
- Central Leading Group for Hong Kong and Macao Affairs;
- Central Leading Group for Combating Bribery;
- Central Leading Group for Protection of Party Secrets;
- Central Leading Group for Advancing Grass-roots Party Organization and Training Party Members;
- Central Leading Group for Tibet Work;
- Central Leading Group for Xinjiang Work;
- Central Anti-Corruption Guidance Group.
Every five years, the Communist Party of China holds a National Congress. The latest happened on October 19, 2007. Formally, the Congress serves two functions: to approve changes to the Party constitution regarding policy and to elect a Central Committee, about 300 strong. The Central Committee in turn elects the Politburo. In practice, positions within the Central Committee and Politburo are determined before a Party Congress, and the main purpose of the Congress is to announce the party policies and vision for the direction of China in the following few years.
The party's central focus of power is the Politburo Standing Committee. The process for selecting Standing Committee members, as well as Politburo members, occurs behind the scenes in a process parallel to the National Congress. The new power structure is announced obliquely through the positioning of portraits in the People's Daily, the official newspaper of the Party. The number of Standing Committee members varies and has tended to increase over time. The Committee was expanded to nine at the 16th Party National Congress in 2009.
There are two other key organs of political power in the People's Republic of China: the formal government and the People's Liberation Army. The Party's main bodies to oversee the PLA are the Central Military Commission and the General Political Department.
There are, in addition to decision-making roles, advisory committees, including the People's Political Consultative Conference. During the 1980s and 1990s there was a Central Advisory Commission established by Deng Xiaoping which consisted of senior retired leaders, but with their death this has been abolished since 1992.
Factions[link]
Political theorists have identified two groupings within the Communist Party[20] leading to a structure which has been called "one party, two factions".[21] The first is the "elitist coalition" or Shanghai clique which contains mainly officials who have risen from the more prosperous provinces. The second is the "populist coalition", the core of which are the tuanpai, or the "Youth League faction" which consists mainly of officials who have risen from the rural interior, through the Communist Youth League. Minor informal groupings include the reformist Qinghua clique, and the derogatorily termed Crown Prince Party of officials benefiting from nepotism. The interaction between the two main factions is largely complementary with each faction possessing a particular expertise and both committed to the continued rule of the Communist Party and not allowing intra-party factional politics threaten party unity. It has been noted that party and government positions have been assigned to create a very careful balance between these two groupings.
Within his "one party, two factions" model, Li Chen has noted that one should avoid labelling these two groupings with simplistic ideological labels, and that these two groupings do not act in a zero-sum, winner take all fashion. Neither group has the ability or will to dominate the other completely.[22]
Membership[link]
The party was small at first, but grew intermittently through the 1920s. Twelve voting delegates were seated at the 1st National Congress in 1921, as well as at the 2nd (in 1922), when they represented 195 party members. By 1923, the 420 members were represented by 30 delegates. The 1925 4th Congress had 20 delegates representing 994 members; then real growth kicked in. The 5th Congress (held in April–May 1927 as the KMT was cracking down on communists) comprised 80 voting delegates representing 57,968 members.
It was on October 3, 1928 6th Congress that the now-familiar ‘full’ and ‘alternate’ structure originated, with 84 and 34 delegates, respectively. Membership was estimated at 40,000. In 1945, the 7th Congress had 547 full and 208 alternate delegates representing 1.21 million members, a ratio of one representative per 1,600 members as compared to 1:725 in 1927.
After the Party defeated the Nationalists, participation at National Party Congresses became much less representative. Each of the 1026 full and 107 alternate members represented 9,470 party members (10.73 million in total) at the 1956 8th Congress. Subsequent congresses held the number of participants down despite membership growing to more than 60 million by 2000.[23]
History[link]
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Main article: History of the Communist Party of China
The CPC has its origins in the May Fourth Movement of 1919, where radical political systems like anarchism and Communism gained traction among Chinese intellectuals.[24] Stalin opposed the Chinese Communist Party in Xinjiang because he wanted to expand Soviet influence in the province.[25] The CPC's ideologies have significantly evolved since its founding and establishing political power in 1949. Mao's revolution that founded the PRC was nominally based on Marxism-Leninism with a rural focus based on China's social situations at the time. During the 1960s and 1970s, the CPC experienced a significant ideological breakdown with the Communist Party of the Soviet Union under Nikita Khrushchev, and later, Leonid Brezhnev. Since then Mao's peasant revolutionary vision and so-called "continued revolution under the dictatorship of the proletariat" stipulated that class enemies continued to exist even though the socialist revolution seemed to be complete, giving way to the Cultural Revolution. This fusion of ideas became known officially as "Mao Zedong Thought", or Maoism outside of China. It represented a powerful branch of communism that existed in opposition to the Soviet Union's "Marxist revisionism".
Following the death of Mao Zedong in 1976, however, the CPC under the leadership of Deng Xiaoping moved towards Socialism with Chinese characteristics and instituted Chinese economic reform.[26] In reversing some of Mao's "extreme-leftist" policies, Deng argued that a socialist country and the market economy model were not mutually exclusive. While asserting the political power of the Party itself, the change in policy generated significant economic growth.[27] The ideology itself, however, came into conflict on both sides of the spectrum with Maoists as well as progressive liberals, culminating with other social factors to cause the 1989 Tiananmen Square Protests. Deng's vision for economic success and a new socialist market model became entrenched in the Party constitution in 1997 as Deng Xiaoping Theory.
The "third generation" of leadership under Jiang Zemin, Zhu Rongji, and associates largely continued Deng's progressive economic vision while overseeing the re-emergence of Chinese nationalism in the 1990s. Nationalist sentiment has seemingly also evolved to become informally the part of the Party's guiding doctrine. As part of Jiang's nominal legacy, the CPC ratified the Three Represents into the 2003 revision of the Party Constitution as a "guiding ideology", encouraging the Party to represent "advanced productive forces, the progressive course of China's culture, and the fundamental interests of the people." There are various interpretations of the Three Represents. Most notably, the theory has legitimized the entry of private business owners and quasi-"bourgeoisie" elements into the party.
The insistent road of focusing almost exclusively on economic growth has led to a wide range of serious social problems. The CPC's "fourth generation" of leadership under Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao, after taking power in 2003, attempted reversing such a trend by bringing forth an integrated ideology that tackled both social and economic concerns. This new ideology was known as the creation of a Harmonious Society using the Scientific Development Concept.
The degree of power the Party had on the state has gradually decreased as economic liberalizations progressed. The evolution of CPC ideology has gone through a number of defining changes that it no longer bears much resemblance to its founding principles. Some believe that the large amount of economic liberalization starting from the late 1970s to present, indicates that the CPC has transitioned to endorse economic neoliberalism.[28][29][30][31] The CPC's current policies are fiercely rejected as capitalist by most communists, especially anti-revisionists, and by adherents of the Chinese New Left from within the PRC.
The Communist Party of China comprises a single-party state form of government; however, there are parties other than the CPC within China, which report to the United Front Department of the Communist Party of China and do not act as opposition or independent parties. Since the 1980s, as its commitment to Marxist ideology has appeared to wane, the party has begun to increasingly invoke Chinese nationalism as a legitimizing principle as opposed to the socialist construction for which the party was originally created. The change from socialism to nationalism has pleased the CPC's former enemy, the Kuomintang (KMT), which has warmed its relations with the CPC since 2003.[32]
Political ideology and stances[link]
Regional corruption and reform[link]
The leaders of the Communist Party of China realize that there are serious problems with political corruption within China and with maintaining the trust of the Chinese people because of it. However, attempts made in closed-door sessions at the Fourth Plenary Session of the 17th Communist Party of China's Central Committee in September 2009 to grapple with these problems produced inconclusive results, although a directive which requires disclosure of investments and property holdings by party and governmental officials was passed.[33]
Relationship with competing ideologies[link]
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Trotskyists argue that the party was doomed to its present character, that of petty-bourgeois nationalism in the 1920s, because of the near-annihilation of the workers' movement in the KMT betrayal of 1927, which was made possible by Stalin's order that the Communists join with the KMT in a centrist coalition, effectively disarming it, which opportunity the KMT swiftly exploited to defeat the communist revolution.[34] This slaughter forced the tiny surviving Party to switch from a workers' union- to a peasant, guerilla-based organization, and to seek the aid of the most heterodox sources: from "patriotic capitalists" to the dreaded KMT itself, with which it openly sought to participate in a coalition government, even after the Japanese general surrender in 1945.[35] Chinese Trotskyists from Chen Duxiu onward have called for a political revolution against what they see as an opportunist, capitalist leadership of the CPC.
Marxists also existed in the Kuomintang party. They viewed the Chinese revolution in different terms than the Communists, claiming that China already went past its feudal stage and in a stagnation period rather than in another mode of production. These Marxists in the Kuomintang opposed the Chinese communist party ideology.[36]
Maoists and other 'anti-revisionists' viciously attack the changes after Mao Zedong's death, calling them the precise "capitalist road" Mao had pledged to fight during the early existence of the PRC. They do not hold any allegiance to the CPC. An example of a well-known group, until recently armed, that looks to Mao's principles is the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) who the current CPC has publicly opposed. Also, some Maoist groupings attack even some of the shifts and changes that occurred while Mao was still alive and in leadership, like his 1972 welcoming of Richard Nixon (see lesser evil for more on this event). The Chinese New Left, which encompasses these Maoists and other postmodernists is a current within China that seeks to "revert China to the socialist road" – i.e., to return China to the socialist system that existed before Deng Xiaoping's reforms.
Some of the opponents of the Party within the Chinese democracy movement have tended not to argue that a strong Chinese state is inherently bad, but rather that the Communist leadership is corrupt.[clarification needed] The Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 represented a controversial point in criticism of the Chinese Communist Party by Chinese students within China.[37]
Another school of thought argues that the worst of the abuses took place decades ago, and that the current leaders were not only unconnected with them, but were actually victims of that era. They have also argued that, while the modern Communist Party may be flawed, it is comparatively better than previous regimes, with respect to improving the general standard of living, than any other government that has governed China in the past century and can be seen in a more favourable light compared with most governments of the developing nations. As a result, the CPC has recently taken sweeping measures to regain support from the countryside, with limited success.
In addition, some scholars contend that China has never operated under a decentralized democratic regime in its several thousand years of history, and therefore it can be argued that the present political structure, albeit not up to Western moral or political standards, is the best possible option when compared to the alternatives. A sudden transition to democracy, these experts contend, would result in the economic and political upheaval that occurred in the Soviet Union in the late 1980s, and that by focusing on economic growth, China is setting the stage for a more gradual but sustainable transition to a more politically liberal system. This group sees mainland China as being similar to Franco's Spain in the 1960s, and South Korea during the 1970s when South Korea was run by corrupt, authoritarian regimes. This school of thought also brings together some unlikely political allies. Not only do most intellectuals within the Chinese government follow this school of thinking, but it is also the common belief held amongst pro-free trade liberals in the West.
Many observers from both within and outside of China have argued that the CPC has taken gradual steps towards democracy and transparency, hence arguing that it is best to give it time and room to evolve into a better government that is more responsive to its people rather than forcing an abrupt change with all the deleterious effects such a loss of stability might entail.[38] However, other observers (like Minxin Pei) question whether these steps are genuine efforts towards democratic reform or disingenuous measures by the CPC to retain power.[39]
Religion[link]
The CPC is officially atheist, and prohibits party members from holding religious beliefs (though this ban is, in many cases, unenforceable).
The Party's United Front Work Department coordinates with the State Administration for Religious Affairs to manage the country's five officially sanctioned religions. Unregistered religious groups face varying degrees of suppression under the Communist Party.
Current leadership[link]
The Members of the Politburo Standing Committee of the Communist Party of China are:
- Hu Jintao: CPC General Secretary, PRC President, Chairman of the Central Military Commission.
- Wu Bangguo: Chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress
- Wen Jiabao: Premier of the State Council of the People's Republic of China
- Jia Qinglin: Chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference
- Li Changchun: Chairman of the CPC Central Guidance Commission for Building Spiritual Civilization
- Xi Jinping: Top-ranked Secretary of CPC Central Secretariat, Vice President of the People's Republic of China, Vice Chairman of the Central Military Commission
- Li Keqiang: First-ranked Vice Premier of the State Council of the People's Republic of China
- He Guoqiang: Secretary of Central Commission for Discipline Inspection
- Zhou Yongkang: Secretary of Political and Legislative Affairs Committee
Members of the Politburo of the CPC Central committee: Wang Lequan, Wang Zhaoguo, Hui Liangyu, Liu Qi, Liu Yunshan, Li Changchun, Wu Yi, Wu Bangguo, Wu Guanzheng, Zhang Lichang, Zhang Dejiang, Luo Gan, Zhou Yongkang, Hu Jintao, Yu Zhengsheng, He Guoqiang, Jia Qinglin, Guo Boxiong, Cao Gangchuan, Zeng Qinghong, Zeng Peiyan, Wen Jiabao.
Alternate member of the Politburo of the CPC Central Committee: Wang Gang
Members of the Secretariat of the CPC Central Committee: Zeng Qinghong, Liu Yunshan, Zhou Yongkang, He Guoqiang, Wang Gang, Xu Caihou, He Yong.
Historical leaders[link]
Main article: List of leaders of the Communist Party of China
Between 1921 and 1943 the Communist Party of China was headed by the General Secretary:
- Chen Duxiu, General Secretary 1921–1922 and 1925–1927
- Qu Qiubai, General Secretary 1927–1928
- Xiang Zhongfa, General Secretary 1928–1931
- Li Lisan, acting General Secretary 1929–1930
- Wang Ming, acting General Secretary 1931
- Bo Gu, a.k.a. Qin Bangxian, acting General Secretary 1932–1935
- Zhang Wentian a.k.a. Luo Fu, acting General Secretary 1935–1943
In 1943 the position of Chairman of the Communist Party of China was created.
- Mao Zedong, Chairman 1943–1976
- Hua Guofeng, Chairman 1976–1981
- Hu Yaobang, Chairman 1981–1982
In 1982, the post of Chairman was abolished, and the General Secretary, at this time held by the same man as the post of Chairman, once again became the supreme office of the Party.
- Hu Yaobang, General Secretary 1982–1987
- Zhao Ziyang, General Secretary 1987–1989
- Jiang Zemin, General Secretary 1989–2002
- Hu Jintao, General Secretary since 2002
Funding[link]
Though the CPC charges a limited due on its members for its expenditure, its total amount would be insignificant for the continued operation of this hegemony. The actual ratio of membership dues among the total amount is less than 1/11. While the budget constitutes of limited amount of donations and business operations owned by the party, its majority comes from the grant of national treasury,[40] the same way that supports the other 8 subordinative registered parties, which making a bizarre exception among modern political parties. However, unlike the governmental departments, there is not even a de jure procedure for legal supervision of such grants as for now. Proposals for reformation has since been put aside untouched.
See also[link]
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Policy |
conflicts |
Factions |
General |
References[link]
- ^ Peter R. Moody. Conservative Thought in Contemporary China. Plymouth, England, UK: Lexington Books, 2007. Pp. 1-2.
- ^ Politics in China: An Introduction. Oxford, England, UK: Oxford University Press, 2010. Pp. 159-161.
- ^ Politics in China: An Introduction. Oxford, England, UK: Oxford University Press, 2010. Pp. 159-161.
- ^ "State Building, Capitalist Development, and Social Justice Social Democracy in China’s Modern Transformation, 1921-1949" by Edmund S. K. Fung, Modern China July 2005 vol. 31 no. 3 318-352.
- ^ "State Building, Capitalist Development, and Social Justice Social Democracy in China’s Modern Transformation, 1921-1949" by Edmund S. K. Fung, Modern China July 2005 vol. 31 no. 3 318-352.
- ^ Politics in China: An Introduction. Oxford, England, UK: Oxford University Press, 2010. Pp. 159-161.
- ^ New Approaches to the Study of Political Order in China, by Donald Clarke, Modern China, 2009
- ^ Goodman, David S. G.; Segal, Gerald. China deconstructs: politics, trade, and regionalism. Psychology Press. pp. 48. ISBN 978-0-415-11833-0.
- ^ a b Ralph H. Folsom, John H. Minan, Lee Ann Otto, Law and Politics in the People's Republic of China, West Publishing (St. Paul 1992), pp. 76–77.
- ^ Politics in China: An Introduction. Oxford, England, UK: Oxford University Press, 2010. Pp. 159-161.
- ^ "China Information: The Communist Party of China (CPC)". China Today. http://www.chinatoday.com/org/cpc/. Retrieved October 29, 2010. "The Communist Party of China (CPC) was founded on July 1, 1921 in Shanghai, China."
- ^ Tatlow, Didi Kirsten (July 20, 2011). "On Party Anniversary, China Rewrites History". New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/21/world/asia/21iht-letter21.html?_r=1&emc=tnt&tntemail1=y. Retrieved July 21, 2011. "The party’s true founding date is July 23, 1921, according to official documents."
- ^ "Hu warns Chinese Communist Party". BBC. July 1, 2011. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-13985359. Retrieved July 21, 2011. "Although the Chinese are celebrating the anniversary on Friday, the party's first congress took place on July 23."
- ^ Gay, Kathlyn. [2008] (2008). 21st Century Books. Mao Zedong's China. ISBN 0-8225-7285-0. pg 7
- ^ "EPP". http://www.enrichprofessional.com/home/. Retrieved 18 April 2012.
- ^ The Communist Party of China
- ^ Xinhua – China's Communist Party members exceed 80 million
- ^ "CCP celebrates its 90th anniversary". Talking Points, July 10–20, 2011. USC US-China Institute. http://china.usc.edu/ShowArticle.aspx?articleID=2461. Retrieved July 24, 2011.
- ^ Images of GO CPC in Session
- ^ Uchicago.edu
- ^ Chinavitae.com
- ^ The Jamestown Foundation
- ^ Press centre of the 17th CPC National Congress
- ^ Dirlik, Arif (1993). Anarchism in the Chinese Revolution. University of California Press. p. 16.
- ^ Andrew D. W. Forbes (1986). Warlords and Muslims in Chinese Central Asia: a political history of Republican Sinkiang 1911–1949. Cambridge, England: CUP Archive. pp. 376. ISBN 0-521-25514-7. http://books.google.com/books?id=IAs9AAAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=warlords+and+muslims#v=snippet&q=fascist%20trotskyite%20plotters&f=false. Retrieved December 31, 2010.
- ^ "NewChina". http://www.enrichprofessional.com/home/. Retrieved 18 April 2012.
- ^ "ReformingChina". http://books.google.com/books?id=LuLYSAAACAAJ&dq=Enrich+Series+on+China%27s+Economic+Reform&hl=en&sa=X&ei=nDaPT-7aDMioiQKv8-X7Ag&ved=0CD0Q6AEwAQ. Retrieved 18 April 2012.
- ^ Harvey, David. 2005. A Brief History of Neoliberalism. Oxford, England, UK: Oxford University Press. Pp. 120
- ^ Greenhalgh, Susan; Winckler, Edwin A. 2005. Governing China's Population: From Leninist to Neoliberal Biopolitics. Stanford, California, USA: Stanford University Press.
- ^ Zhang, Xudong. Whither China?: Intellectual Politics in Contemporary China. Duke University Press. Pp. 52
- ^ Wong, John; Lai, Hongyi; Hongyi, Lai. China Into the Hu-Wen Era: Policy Initiatives and Challenges. Pp. 99 "...influence of neoliberalism has spread rapidly in China", "...neoliberalism had influenced not only college students but also economists and leading party cadres"...
- ^ See 2005 Pan-Blue visits to mainland China.
- ^ "Party’s Agenda in China Seems to Fall Flat" article by Michael Wines in The New York Times September 20, 2009
- ^ The tragedy of the 1925–1927 Chinese Revolution: Part 3 Article at a Trotskyist groupings website.
- ^ The death of China’s “red capitalist” and the 1949 revolution Article at a Trotskist groupings website.
- ^ T. J. Byres, Harbans Mukhia (1985). Feudalism and non-European societies. Psychology Press. p. 207. ISBN 0-7146-3245-7. http://books.google.com/books?id=usOMZjTWrJ0C&pg=PA207&dq=china+stagnated+feudalism+political#v=onepage&q=guomindang%20marxists&f=false. Retrieved November 28, 2010.
- ^ Zhang, L., Nathan, A. J., Link, P. & Schell O. The Tiananmen Papers: The Chinese Leadership's Decision to Use Force Against Their Own People – In Their Own Words. PublicAffairs, 2002. ISBN 978-1-58648-122-3.
- ^ Yang, Dali. Remaking the Chinese Leviathan. Stanford University Press, 2004.
- ^ An, Alex and An, David, China Brief, October 7, 2008. "Media control and the Erosion of an Accountable Party-State in China."
- ^ 孙国良. "建立规范的党务经费制度" (in Chinese). 中国选举与治理. http://www.chinaelections.org/newsinfo.asp?newsid=107807. Retrieved October 24, 2011.
External links[link]
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Communist Party of China |
- Official News of the Communist Party of China
- Official newspaper
- Ninety years since the founding of the CCP – a Trotskyist apraisal
- Join the Party – slideshow by The First Post
- The Communist Party of China—Council on Foreign Relations
- "A Struggle Within the Chinese Communist Party"—Monthly Review article from May 2002
- Partying With Communists in China — slideshow by Life magazine
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Internet censorship in the People's Republic of China is conducted under a wide variety of laws and administrative regulations. In accordance with these laws, more than sixty Internet regulations have been made by the People's Republic of China (PRC) government, implemented by provincial branches of state-owned ISPs, business companies, and organizations.[1][2] The apparatus of the PRC's Internet repression is considered more extensive and more advanced than in any other country in the world. The governmental authorities not only block website content but also monitor the Internet access of individuals.
Amnesty International notes that China “has the largest recorded number of imprisoned journalists and cyber-dissidents in the world.” The offences of which they are accused include communicating with groups abroad, signing online petitions, and calling for reform and an end to corruption.[3] The escalation of the government's effort to neutralize critical online opinion comes after a series of large anti-Japanese, anti-pollution, anti-corruption protests, and ethnic riots, many of which were organized or publicized using instant messaging services, chat rooms, and text messages. The size of the Internet police is rumored at more than 30,000.[4]
Contents |
Background[link]
The political and ideological background of the Internet censorship is considered to be one of Deng Xiaoping's favorite sayings in the early 1980s: "If you open the window for fresh air, you have to expect some flies to blow in." The saying is related to a period of the economic reform of China that became known as the "socialist market economy". Superseding the political ideologies of the Cultural Revolution, the reform led China towards a market economy and opened up the market for foreign investors. Nonetheless the economic freedom, values, and political ideas of the Communist Party of China have had to be protected from "swatting flies" of other unwanted ideologies.[5]
The Internet arrived in China in the year 1994 as an inevitable consequence of, and supporting tool for, the "socialist market economy." Since then, and with gradual increasing penetration, the Internet has become a common communication platform and an important tool for sharing information. In 1998 the Communist Party of China feared the China Democracy Party (CDP) would breed a powerful new network that the party elites might not be able to control.[6] The CDP was immediately banned followed by arrests and imprisonment.[7] That same year the "Golden Shield project" was started. The first part of the project lasted eight years and was completed in 2006. The second part began in 2006 and ended in 2008. On 6 December 2002, 300 people in charge of the Golden Shield project from 31 provinces and cities throughout China participated in a four-day inaugural “Comprehensive Exhibition on Chinese Information System”.[8] At the exhibition, many western high-tech products including Internet security, video monitoring and human face recognition were purchased. It is estimated that around 30–50,000 police are employed in this gigantic project.[9]
Legislative basis[link]
China started its Internet censorship with three regulations issued by China’s central government. The first regulation was called the Temporary Regulation for the Management of Computer Information Network International Connection. The regulation was passed in the 42nd Standing Convention of the State Council on 23 January 1996. It was formally announced on 1 February 1996, and updated again on the 20th of May 1997.[10] The content of the first regulation states requires that Internet service providers be licensed and that Internet traffic go through ChinaNet, GBNet, CERNET or CSTNET. The second regulation was the Ordinance for Security Protection of Computer Information Systems. It was issued on 18 February of 1994 by the State Council to give the responsibility of Internet security protection to the Ministry of Public Security.[11]
The Ordinance regulation further led to the Security Management Procedures in Internet Accessing issued by the Ministry of Public Security in December 1997. The regulation defines "harmful information" and "harmful activities" regarding Internet usage.[12] Section Five of the Computer Information Network and Internet Security, Protection, and Management Regulations approved by the State Council on 11 December 1997 states the following:
No unit or individual may use the Internet to create, replicate, retrieve, or transmit the following kinds of information:
- Inciting to resist or breaking the Constitution or laws or the implementation of administrative regulations;
- Inciting to overthrow the government or the socialist system;
- Inciting division of the country, harming national unification;
- Inciting hatred or discrimination among nationalities or harming the unity of the nationalities;
- Making falsehoods or distorting the truth, spreading rumors, destroying the order of society;
- Promoting feudal superstitions, sexually suggestive material, gambling, violence, murder;
- Terrorism or inciting others to criminal activity; openly insulting other people or distorting the truth to slander people;
- Injuring the reputation of state organizations;
- Other activities against the Constitution, laws or administrative regulations.[13]
In September 2000, the State Council Order No. 292 created the first content restrictions for Internet content providers. China-based Web sites cannot link to overseas news Web sites or distribute news from overseas media without separate approval. Only “licensed print publishers” have the authority to deliver news online. Non-licensed Web sites that wish to broadcast news may only publish information already released publicly by other news media. These sites must obtain approval from state information offices and from the State Council Information Agency. Article 11 of this order mentions that “content providers are responsible for ensuring the legality of any information disseminated through their services”.[14] Article 14 gives Chinese officials full access to any kind of sensitive information they wish from providers of Internet services.
Enforcement[link]
In December 1997, Public Security minister Zhu Entao released new regulations to be enforced by the ministry that inflict fines for "defaming government agencies," "splitting the nation," and leaking "state secrets." Violators could face a fine up to 15,000 Yuan ($1800).[15] Banning appears mostly coordinated and ad hoc, with some sites blocked, yet similar sites allowed or even blocked in one city and allowed in another. The blocks have often been lifted for special occasions. For example, The New York Times was unblocked when reporters in a private interview with Jiang Zemin specifically asked about the block and he replied that he would look into the matter. During the APEC summit in Shanghai during 2001, normally blocked media sources such as CNN, NBC, and the Washington Post became accessible. Since 2001, the content controls have been further relaxed on a permanent basis, and all three of the sites previously mentioned are now accessible from mainland China. However, access to the New York Times was briefly re-blocked as of 20 December 2008,[16] although it has been accessible for the first months of 2009 as of 17 May.
In the summer of 2005, the PRC purchased over 200 routers from an American company, Cisco Systems that allowed the PRC government a more advanced technological censoring ability.[17] In February 2006, Google made a significant concession to the Great Firewall of China, in exchange for equipment installation on Chinese soil, by blocking websites which the Chinese government deemed illegal.[18]
In May 2011 the State Council Information Office announced transfer of its offices which regulated the Internet to a new subordinate agency, the State Internet Information Office which would be responsible for regulating the Internet in the People's Republic of China. The relationship of the new agency to other agencies in the PRC which regulate the Internet was unclear from the announcement.[19]
Self-regulation[link]
Internet censorship in the PRC has been called "a panopticon that encourages self-censorship through the perception that users are being watched."[20] The enforcement (or threat of enforcement) of censorship creates a chilling effect where individuals and businesses willingly censor their own communications to avoid legal and economic repercussions. ISPs and other service providers are legally liable for customers' conduct. The service providers have assumed an editorial role with regard to customer content, thus became publishers, and legally responsible for libel and other torts committed by customers. Some hotels in China advise Internet users to obey local Chinese Internet access rules by leaving a list of Internet rules and guidelines near the computers. These rules, among other things, forbid linking to politically unacceptable messages, and inform Internet users that if they do, they will have to face legal consequences.[21]
On 16 March 2002, the Internet Society of China, a self-governing Chinese Internet industry body,[22] launched the Public Pledge on Self-Discipline for the Chinese Internet Industry, an agreement between the Chinese Internet industry regulator and companies that operate sites in China. In signing the agreement, web companies pledge to identify and prevent the transmission of information that Chinese authorities deem objectionable, including information that “breaks laws or spreads superstition or obscenity,” or that “may jeopardize state security and disrupt social stability.”[23][24][25] As of 2006, the pledge had been signed by more than 3,000 entities operating websites in China.[26]
Use of service providers[link]
Although the government does not have the physical resources to monitor all Internet chat rooms and forums, the threat of being shut down has caused Internet content providers to employ internal staff, colloquially known as "big mamas", who stop and remove forum comments which may be politically sensitive. In Shenzhen, these duties are partly taken over by a pair of police-created cartoon characters, Jingjing and Chacha, who help extend the online "police presence" of the Shenzhen authorities. These cartoons spread across the nation in 2007 reminding Internet users that they are being watched and should avoid posting "sensitive" or "harmful" material on the Internet.[15]
However, Internet content providers have adopted some counter-strategies. One is to post politically sensitive stories and remove them only when the government complains. In the hours or days in which the story is available online, people read it, and by the time the story is taken down, the information is already public. One notable case in which this occurred was in response to a school explosion in 2001, when local officials tried to suppress the fact the explosion resulted from children illegally producing fireworks.[27]
On 11 July 2003, the PRC government started granting licenses to businesses to open Internet cafe chains. Business analysts and foreign Internet operators regard the licenses as intended to clamp down on information deemed harmful to the PRC government. In July 2007, the city of Xiamen announced it would ban anonymous online postings after text messages and online communications were used to rally protests against a proposed chemical plant in the city. Internet users will be required to provide proof of identity when posting messages on the more than 100,000 Web sites registered in Xiamen.[28]
Arrests[link]
Fines and short arrests are becoming an optional punishment to whoever expresses undesirable information through the different Internet formats, as this is seen as a risk to social stability.[29]
In 2001, Wang Xiaoning and other Chinese activists were arrested and sentenced to 10 years in prison for using a Yahoo email account to post anonymous writing to an Internet mailing list.[30] On 23 July 2008, the family of Liu Shaokun was notified that he had been sentenced to one year re-education through labor for “inciting a disturbance”. As a teacher in Sichuan province, he had taken photographs of collapsed schools and posted these photos online.[31] On 18 July 2008, Huang Qi was formally arrested on suspicion of illegally possessing state secrets. Huang had spoken with the foreign press and posted information on his website about the plight of parents who had lost children in collapsed schools.[32]
Technical implementation[link]
Current methods[link]
The system blocks content by preventing IP addresses from being routed through. It consists of standard firewalls and proxy servers at the Internet gateways. The system also selectively engages in DNS poisoning when particular sites are requested. The government does not appear to be systematically examining Internet content, as this appears to be technically impractical.[33] Researchers at the University of California, Davis and at the University of New Mexico said that the censorship system is not a true firewall since banned material is sometimes able to pass through several routers or through the entire system without being blocked.[20] Details for some commonly used technical methods for censoring are:[34]
| Method | Description |
|---|---|
| IP blocking | The access to a certain IP address is denied. If the target Web site is hosted in a shared hosting server, all Web sites on the same server will be blocked. This affects all IP protocols (mostly TCP) such as HTTP, FTP or POP. A typical circumvention method is to find proxies that have access to the target Web sites, but proxies may be jammed or blocked. Some large Web sites allocated additional IP addresses to circumvent the block, but later the block was extended to cover the new addresses.[citation needed] |
| DNS filtering and redirection | Doesn't resolve domain names, or returns incorrect IP addresses.[35] This affects all IP protocols such as HTTP, FTP or POP. A typical circumvention method is to find a domain name server that resolves domain names correctly, but domain name servers are subject to blockage as well, especially IP blocking. Another workaround is to bypass DNS if the IP address is obtainable from other sources and is not blocked. Examples are modifying the Hosts file or typing the IP address instead of the domain name in a Web browser. |
| URL filtering | Scan the requested Uniform Resource Locator (URL) string for target keywords regardless of the domain name specified in the URL. This affects the Hypertext Transfer Protocol. Typical circumvention methods are to use escaped characters in the URL, or to use encrypted protocols such as VPN and SSL.[36] |
| Packet filtering | Terminate TCP packet transmissions when a certain number of controversial keywords are detected. This affects all TCP protocols such as HTTP, FTP or POP, but Search engine pages are more likely to be censored. Typical circumvention methods are to use encrypted protocols such as VPN and SSL, to escape the HTML content, or reducing the TCP/IP stack's MTU, thus reducing the amount of text contained in a given packet. |
| Connection reset | If a previous TCP connection is blocked by the filter, future connection attempts from both sides will also be blocked for up to 30 minutes. Depending on the location of the block, other users or Web sites may be also blocked if the communications are routed to the location of the block. A circumvention method is to ignore the reset packet sent by the firewall.[37] |
Other reported methods have included:
| Method | Description |
|---|---|
| Network enumeration | It has been reported that unknown entities within China, likely with deep packet inspection (DPI) capabilities, have initiated unsolicited TCP/IP connections to computers within the United States for the purported purpose of network enumeration of services, in particular TLS/SSL and Tor (anonymity network) services, with the aim of facilitating IP blocking.[38] |
Future projects[link]
The Golden Shield Project is owned by the Ministry of Public Security of the People's Republic of China (MPS). It started in 1998, began processing in November 2003, and the first part of the project passed the national inspection on 16 November 2006 in Beijing. According to MPS, its purpose is to construct a communication network and computer information system for police to improve their capability and efficiency. By 2002 the preliminary work of the Golden Shield Project had cost US$800 million (equivalent to RMB 6,400 million or €640 million).[39] Greg Walton, a free lance researcher, said that the aim of the Golden Shield is to establish a "gigantic online database" that would include "speech and face recognition, closed-circuit television... [and] credit records" as well as traditional Internet use records.[40]
A notice[41] issued by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology on 19 May stated that, as of 1 July 2009, manufacturers must ship machines to be sold in mainland China with the Green Dam Youth Escort software.[42] On 14 August 2009, Li Yizhong, minister of industry and information technology, announced that computer manufacturers and retailers were no longer obliged to ship the software with new computers for home or business use, but that schools, Internet cafes and other public use computers would still be required to run the software.
A senior official of the Internet Affairs Bureau of the State Council Information Office said the software's only purpose was "to filter pornography on the Internet". The general manager of Jinhui, which developed Green Dam, said: "Our software is simply not capable of spying on Internet users, it is only a filter."[43] Human rights advocates in China have criticized the software for being "a thinly concealed attempt by the government to expand censorship".[44] Online polls conducted on Sina, Netease, Tencent, Sohu, and Southern Metropolis Daily revealed over 70% rejection of the software by netizens.[45][46] However, Xinhua commented that "support [for Green Dam] largely stems from end users, opposing opinions primarily come from a minority of media outlets and businesses".[47][48]
Targeted platforms[link]
According to a Harvard study, at least 18,000 websites are blocked from within mainland China.[49] Out of the Top 100 Global Websites, 12 are currently blocked in mainland China.[50] According to the PRC-sponsored news agency, Xinhua, stated that censorship targets only "superstitious, pornographic, violence-related, gambling and other harmful information."[51] On the other hand, websites centered on the following political topics are often censored: Falun Gong,[52] police brutality, Tiananmen Square protests of 1989, freedom of speech, democracy,[53] Taiwan independence,[52] Tibetan independence movement,[52] and the Tuidang movement.[54] Foreign media websites such as BBC News, Yahoo! Hong Kong and the Voice of America are occasionally blocked.
Search engines[link]
One part of the block is to filter the search results of certain terms on Chinese search engines. These Chinese search engines include both international ones (for example, yahoo.com.cn and Google China) as well as domestic ones (for example, Baidu). Attempting to search for censored keywords in these Chinese search engines will yield few or no results. Previously, google.cn displayed the following at the bottom of the page: "According to the local laws, regulations and policies, part of the searching result is not shown." As was the case when searching for information about the 2011 uprising in Egypt.[55] When Google did business in the country, it set up computer systems inside China that try to access Web sites outside the country. If a site is inaccessible, then it is added to Google China's blacklist.[56]
In addition, a connection containing intensive censored terms may also be closed by The Great Firewall, and cannot be reestablished for several minutes. This affects all network connections including HTTP and POP, but the reset is more likely to occur during searching. Before the search engines censored themselves, many search engines had been blocked, namely Google and AltaVista. Technorati, a search engine for blogs, has been blocked.[57] Different search engines implement the mandated censorship in different ways. For example, the search engine Bing is reported to censor search results from searches conducted in simplified Chinese characters (used in the PRC), but not in traditional Chinese characters (used in Hong Kong, Taiwan and Macau).[58]
Discussion forums[link]
File:20090605dusanben.png
"For reason which everyone knows, and to suppress our extremely unharmonious thoughts, this site is voluntarily closed for technical maintenance between 3 and 6 June 2009..." Dusanben.com (translation)
Several Bulletin Board Systems in universities were closed down or restricted public access since 2004, including the SMTH BBS and the YTHT BBS.[59]
In September 2007, some data centers were shut down indiscriminately for providing interactive features such as blogs and forums. CBS reports an estimate that half the interactive sites hosted in China were blocked.[60]
Coinciding with the twentieth anniversary of the government suppression of the pro-democracy protests in Tiananmen Square, the government ordered Internet portals, forums and discussion groups to shut down their servers for maintenance between 3 and 6 June.[61] The day before the mass shut-down, Chinese users of Twitter, Hotmail and Flickr, among others, reported a widespread inability to access these services.[62]
Social media websites[link]
Although the government and media often use microblogging service Sina Weibo to spread ideas and monitor corruption, it is also supervised and self censored by 700 Sina censors.[63] After the 2011 Wenzhou train collision, the government started emphasizing the danger in spreading 'false rumors' (yaoyan), making the permissive usage of Weibo and social networks a public debate.[64]
In the second half of 2009 the social networking sites Facebook and Twitter were blocked, presumably because of containing social or political commentary (similar to LiveJournal in the above list). An example is the commentary on the July 2009 Ürümqi riots.[65][66] Another reason suggested for the block is that activists can utilize them to organize themselves.[67][68] In 2010 Chinese human rights activist Liu Xiaobo became a forbidden topic in Chinese media due to his winning the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize.
International influence[link]
Foreign content providers such as Yahoo!, AOL, and Skype must abide by PRC government wishes, including having internal content monitors, in order to be able to operate within mainland China. Also, in accordance with mainland Chinese laws, Microsoft began to censor the content of its blog service Windows Live Spaces, arguing that continuing to provide Internet services is more beneficial to the Chinese.[69] Michael Anti, a Chinese journalist whose blog on Windows Live Spaces was removed by Microsoft, agreed that the Chinese are better off with Windows Live Spaces than without it.[70]
The Chinese version of MySpace, launched in April 2007, has many censorship-related differences from other international versions of the service. Discussion forums on topics such as religion and politics are absent and a filtering system that prevents the posting of content about politically sensitive topics has been added.[71] Users are also given the ability to report the "misconduct" of other users for offenses including "endangering national security, leaking state secrets, subverting the government, undermining national unity, spreading rumors or disturbing the social order."[72]
Some media have suggested that China's Internet censorship of foreign websites may also be a means of forcing mainland Chinese users to rely on China's own e-commerce industry, thus self-insulating their economy from the dominance of international corporations.[73] On 7 November 2005 an alliance of investors and researchers representing 26 companies in the U.S., Europe and Australia with over US $21 billion in joint assets announced that they were urging businesses to protect freedom of expression and pledged to monitor technology companies that do business in countries violating human rights, such as China. On 21 December 2005 the UN, OSCE and OAS special mandates on freedom of expression called on Internet corporations to "work together ... to resist official attempts to control or restrict use of the Internet." Google finally responded when attacked by hackers rumoured to be hired by the Chinese government by threatening to pull out of China (Newsweek)
Reporters Without Borders suspects that regimes such as Cuba, Zimbabwe and Belarus have obtained surveillance technology from the People's Republic of China.[74]
Evasion[link]
Main article: Internet censorship circumvention
Internet censorship in China is circumvented by determined parties by using proxy servers outside the firewall.[75] VPN and SSH connections to outside mainland China are not blocked, so users may circumvent all of the censorship and monitoring of the Great Firewall if they have a secure connection method to a computer outside mainland China. However, disruptions of VPN services have been reported.[76] Rupert Murdoch famously proclaimed that advances in communications technology posed an “unambiguous threat to totalitarian regimes everywhere”[77] and Ai Weiwei argued that the Chinese “leaders must understand it's not possible for them to control the Internet unless they shut it off".[78]
As the Great Firewall of China gets more sophisticated, the users are getting increasingly creative in the ways they elude the censorship such as by using analogies to discuss topics. Furthermore, users are becoming increasingly open in their mockery of them by actively use homophone to avoid censorship. Deleted sites have "been harmonized", indicating President Hu Jintao's Internet censorship under the big picture of creating a "harmonious society". For example, censors are referred to as "river crabs", because in Chinese those two words together form a homophone for "harmony".[79] Since free hosting blog services like Blogger and Wordpress.com frequently face blockage,[80][81][82][83] some China-focused services explicitly offer to change a blog's IP address within 30 minutes if it is blocked by the authorities.[84] In July 2006, researchers at Cambridge University claim to have defeated the firewall by ignoring the TCP reset packets.[85]
The Tor anonymity network was and is subject to blocking by China's Great Firewall.[86][87][88][89] The Tor website is blocked when accessed over HTTP but it is reachable over HTTPS so it is possible for users to download the Tor Browser Bundle.[90] The Tor network maintains a public list of approximately 3000 relays which are almost all blocked.[90] In addition to the public relays, Tor maintains so called bridges which are non-public relays.[91] Their purpose is to help censored users reach the Tor network. The Great Firewall is dynamically blocking these bridges by looking for their TLS fingerprint.[92][90] According to a research paper published in April 2012, the block can be circumvented by using packet fragmentation or the Tor obfsproxy bundle in combination with private obfsproxy bridges.[90][93]
It was common in the past to use Google's cache feature to view blocked websites. However, this feature of Google seems to be under some level of blocking, as access is now erratic and does not work for blocked websites. Currently the block is mostly circumvented by using proxy servers outside the firewall, and is not difficult to carry out for those determined to do so. Some well-known proxy servers have also been blocked. Some Chinese citizens used the Google mirror elgooG after China blocked Google.[94]
Moreover, net surfers come up with many more technical ways to get around with the Great Wall of China. Haystack is "a free proxy-like system that hides the user's traffic inside a continuous stream of innocent-looking requests. It also uses encryption, so people can get at any site without drawing attention to themselves". Steganography is a "practice of embedding useful data in what looks like something irrelevant. The text of a document can be broken into its constituent bytes, which are added to the pixels of an apparently innocent picture. The effect is barely visible on the picture, but the recipient can extract it with the right software". [95]
See also[link]
- Censorship in the People's Republic of China
- Digital divide in the People's Republic of China
- Human rights in the People's Republic of China
- Media of the People's Republic of China
- Concerns and controversies over the 2008 Summer Olympics#Web and media censorship
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External links[link]
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Wikibooks has a book on the topic of |
- Cyberpolice.cn (网络违法犯罪举报网站) – Ministry of Public Security P.R. China Information & Network Security (Chinese) –
- Internet Enemies: China, Reporters Without Borders
- Freedom on the Net 2011: China-Freedom House: Freedom on the Net Report
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http://wn.com/Internet_censorship_in_the_People's_Republic_of_China
Related pages:
http://ru.wn.com/Интернет-цензура в Китайской Народной Республике
http://fr.wn.com/Censure de l'Internet en République populaire de Chine
http://nl.wn.com/The Great Firewall
http://de.wn.com/Internetzensur in der Volksrepublik China
http://pl.wn.com/Cenzura Internetu w Chińskiej Republice Ludowej
http://es.wn.com/Censura de Internet en la República Popular China
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This article is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License, which means that you can copy and modify it as long as the entire work (including additions) remains under this license.
