The sovereignty dispute in the Indo-Pacific: The impact of U.S.-China conflictual relations on Taiwan's status quo

Abstract

Historically, the Indo-Pacific area has been a region where conflicts and clashes between regional actors, besides being conditioned by the interests of these same actors, have been influenced by the surrounding countries and by the interests of the great powers. Among the diversity of confrontation scenarios occurring in the area and, more specifically, in the Asia-Pacific region, we find the dispute over the sovereignty of Taiwan as one of the main sources of conflict in the region. The different dimensions of Taiwan's dispute, and mainly its constitution as an internationally recognized sovereign state, are affected by the foreign policies of the main actors in the area. In the first place, the sovereignty and development of the activities of the government of Taipei are limited by the annexation attempts of the island by the People's Republic of China. These aspirations result in permanent military tension in the Taiwan Strait and third parties not officially recognizing Taiwan as a sovereign state for fear of worsening diplomatic and trade relations with Beijing. Along with Chinese demands on Taiwan, the recognition of this territory as a sovereign state is conditioned by the foreign and security policy of the United States in the area. This policy assumes Taiwan's territorial defense in the frame of possible Chinese military aggression, while maintaining an ambivalent position on the international recognition of Taiwan as a sovereign state. Although the United States maintains sovereign state relations with the government of Taipei, since 1979 it has not officially recognized Taiwan because of the implications that recognition of the territory would have on its relations with Beijing. The purpose of this article is to analyze and understand how disputes between the United States and China determine the various dimensions of sovereignty and to measure the impact that these disputes currently have on the normalized development of Taiwan's sovereignty. Through the study of Taiwan, we will analyze the impact that clashes of interests between great powers have on the normalized development of state sovereignty in Taiwan and the Indo-Pacific countries. The article will start with a complex analysis of the concept of sovereignty linked to states and territory. Secondly, we will analyze the evolution of the different dimensions of Taiwan's sovereignty from the constitution of its government in 1949 to the present day. We will also measure the influence that the disputes between the United States and China have had on these dimensions. Finally, by way of a conclusion, we will study the elements that determine and condition the development of Taiwan's sovereignty today. This analysis is aimed at understanding how disputes between great powers impact the normalized development of sovereignty in Indo-Pacific countries. The article will start with a complex analysis of the concept of sovereignty linked to states and territory. In this section, we will address the basis of the sovereign conception of states, focusing our approach mainly on the international dimension of sovereignty. Following this perspective, we will detail the conditions that a state must have in order to be considered a sovereign subject from the perspective of International Relations and International Law. These elements will be analyzed mainly through the requirements established in the Convention on the Rights and Duties of States signed by the Organization of American States (OAS), which provides a basic legal framework to understand the characteristics that states have as sovereign subjects. Second, we will analyze the evolution of the different dimensions of Taiwan's sovereignty from the establishment of its government in 1949 to the present. We will start by analyzing Taiwan's evolution as an administrative territory and the transformation that its political-administrative claims have undergone since the establishment of the Taipei government as the international political context has evolved. We will unravel its struggle with the People's Republic of China to be recognized as the legitimate government that emerged from the Xinhai Revolution during the Cold War period. In this section we will focus our approach on the evolution experienced by Taiwan's political-administrative claims during this period and how, after the China-US rapprochement, the international recognition of the Taipei government is decreasing and generating a territorial and sovereign status quo that conditions Taiwan's development as a normalized sovereign entity. We will analyze the adaptation of its strategy, mainly after the democratization process, where Taiwan, aware of its lack of international recognition, claims itself as a separate subject from the People's Republic of China. After observing the evolution of the strategy of successive governments in Taipei, we will analyze how the major powers with a presence in the Indo-Pacific condition the normalized development of Taiwanese sovereignty. In this section, we will measure the conditioning that Chinese and U.S. foreign policy have on the development of the dimensions of Taiwan's sovereignty and the influence that U.S.-China disputes have had on these dimensions. We will address the claims and the position of successive governments in Beijing vis-à-vis the Taiwanese dispute. For this task, we will synthesize China's claims over Taiwan and analyze official documents detailing the Beijing government's current strategy for dealing with this dispute, which is based on the historical claim of reunification of Taiwan and mainland China. After analyzing the limitations that the People's Republic of China's policy places on the development of Taiwan's sovereignty, we will observe how U.S. foreign policy and its projection of power in the Indo-Pacific region has conditioned Taiwan's sovereignty over the years. To measure the impact of U.S. foreign policy, we will begin with an analysis of U.S. military involvement in the First and Second Cross-Strait Crises (1954 and 1958, respectively), continue with the China-U.S. rapprochement between 1971 and 1979, and then move on to the Taiwan Relations Act and the Six Assurances established by the Reagan administration. To conclude, we will unpack the Pivot to Asia strategy initiated by the Obama administration, along with the National Security and Indo-Pacific strategies that detail the U.S. position on the Taiwan dispute. After integrating the strategies and visions of the three actors that determine the development of Taiwan's sovereignty today, we will detail the conclusions of our work. Finally, we will conclude with the elements that determine and condition the development of Taiwan's sovereignty today. This analysis is aimed not only at understanding how disputes between great powers condition the normalized development of sovereignty in Indo-Pacific countries.