Within a few years of the end of World War Two Christianity had spread to every Taiwanese aboriginal group. Nowadays a variety of Christian churches play an important role in aboriginal society. This study is about conversion to Christianity and its aftermath in an aboriginal village. Fieldwork was conducted among the Ami (one of the nine Taiwanese aboriginal groups), in Iwan, a village on the eastern coastal of Taiwan. In this study the individual interests of social actors are emphasised. I suggest that not only political leaders had special motives (i.e. to pursue political power) in conversion, but also ordinary people had their own interests too (i.e. to pursue a better life in the future). In this sense we might say that the meanings, functions, purposes and aims imputed to religion by converts are arrived at through local dialogues. Religious conversion happened against a historical background of long and sustained contact with colonising immigrants (e.g. Japanese and Chinese). During colonial rule. Ami social life expanded radically and mass conversion took place, in the 1950s, when a common dissatisfaction with life was felt. I argue that relative deprivation was an important factor in this conversion and it became significant because of the emphasis put on it by local political leaders. The adoption of different Christian churches is best understood from the perspective of internal political relations and the careers of political leaders. In general I argue that through the articulations of prominent Ami leaders various external phenomena have been integrated into Ami life and successful articulations have also helped certain political leaders to pursue or maintain their authority.

Strategic Ambiguity: U.S. Policy Towards Taiwan since 1987 Jana Sehnálková Abstract This dissertation focuses on U.S.-Taiwan relations in the context of U.S.-China relations. It examines the development of mutual ties since the end of the 1980s when Taiwan started its transition towards democracy, which changed the dynamics of the relationship among Washington, Beijing, and Taipei. The dissertation also analyzes which events and issues impacted the development of mutual relations and examines U.S. reaction to such phenomena. These include, for example, the Beijing Massacre of 1989, Taiwan Strait crisis of 1995-1996, or the rise of China, which influenced the position, politics, and international space of Taiwan and with which the United States has to cope. The dissertation particularly focuses on the following questions: What motivates the United States to continue its support of Taiwan? How does Beijing react to such support and how does this impact the U.S.-China relations? The analysis concludes that the United States continuing support for Taiwan is motivated by ideological and strategic goals. Using the analytical frame of "pivotal deterrence", the dissertation shows that the United States takes a pivotal position and by its careful balancing between the PRC and Taiwan, Washington supports the existing...

Thesis (M.B.A.)--University of Hong Kong, 1992.

Univ., Diss.--Hannover, 2006.

From the 1990s, welfare state and civil society in Taiwan were confronted with challenges and opportunities brought by population ageing. The author chooses NPOs with "Active Ageing" programs for the elderly, a group thriving as a consequence of Taiwan's unique transitional democratization and privatization under Neoliberalism, as a case to systematically investigate the governance structure. Four core NPOs of various scales and capacities are sampled while their stakeholders are also interviewed. Findings reveal that after the pension reform made possible by social movement and electoral politics, these institutionalized social forces secure their position in the welfare delivery system. However, problems remain unresolved because of structural inertia while NPOs operate under the changing field frame and conflicting institutional logics between the welfare state and civil society. Though partially impeded, NPOs develop an East-Asian way of solution with various counterplots. Contrasting rationales of networking explain NPOs' diverse achievements while quasi-subordination and structural loop consolidate respective constituency. Four patterns of perceived relational social capital relate to NPOs' networking practices and institutional settings. The connection among institutions, networking configurations, and relations further crystalizes the tripartite governance structure composed of the institutional, technical, and social environment. Legitimation of means functions mainly within the institutional environment while legitimation of ends through technical and social environment also justifies NPOs' social appropriateness. Various types of legitimacy are conferred to NPOs at different development stages while both formal and informal norms guide NPOs' behavior in the two-dimensional governing kinetics. Through this case study, the author also demonstrates how a meso-level approach of organizational study, integrating Sociological Institutionalism and Organizational Social Capital Theory, possibly sheds lights on the different areas of Sociology, especially those of social movement, NPOs, and ageing society.