Good Protesters and Bad Protesters: A Comparison Between Taiwan's Demonstrations and Europe's Anti-Austerity Movement
A few days after the beginning of Taiwan's protests against a planned trade agreement with mainland China, I am still struggling to admit to myself that I am not caught in the general euphoria. I am going to say something very unpopular, but I think the hype around these protests shows again how schizophrenic media coverage and popular perception can be. First, I shall briefly summarise the events that led to this crisis. In June 2010, Taiwan and mainland China signed the Cross-Strait Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement (ECFA), a general agreement that strengthened economic cooperation between the two countries. The follow-up to this agreement was the Cross-Strait Services Trade Agreement (CSSTA), signed in June 2013 ( note ). This pact would open 80 sectors of China's service industry to Taiwanese investors and 64 sectors of the Taiwanese economy to China. Among these areas are finance, healthcare, transportation, and tourism ( note ). Given that the fortu