Taiwan’s Democratization: Reading Suggestions

• Taiwan’s Electoral Politics and Democratic Transition: Riding the Third Wave. 1996. ed. Hung-mao Tien. Armonk, N.Y.: M.E. Sharpe.
• Chao, Linda, and Ramon H. Myers. 1998. The First Chinese Democracy: Political Life in the Republic of China on Taiwan. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press.
• Cheng, Tun-jen, and Stephan Haggard. Eds. 1992. Political Change in Taiwan. Boulder, Colo.: Lynne Rienner.
• Chu, Yun-han. 1992. Crafting Democracy in Taiwan. Taipei: Institute for National Policy Research.
• Dickson, Bruce J. 1998. Democratization in China and Taiwan: The Adaptability of Leninist Parties. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Rigger, Shelley. 1999. Politics in Taiwan: Voting for Democracy. London: Routledge.
• Tien, Hung-mao. 1989. The Great Transition: Political and Social Change in the Republic of China. Stanford, Calif.: Hoover Institution Press.
• Wachman, Alan. 1994. Taiwan: National Identity and Democratization. Armonk, N.Y.: M.E. Sharpe.
• Wu, Jaushieh Joseph. 1995. Taiwan’s Democratization: Forces Behind the New Momentum. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

I’ve chosen these sources because they were written during the democratization process, and they explicitly apply theoretical perspectives from the democratization literature to the Taiwan case. There are other, more recent, histories of Taiwan’s transition that you can read. For a very quick summary, you can read chapter 4 in my book Why Taiwan Matters.