Glimpse #1: Taiwan vs Covid-19
Taiwan weathered the Covid storm arguably better than any other nation, with the second lowest death rate anywhere in the world, without ever going into full lockdown, and sustaining high levels of public trust throughout. This success was the result of applying three explicit principles, which translate as “Fast, Fair, and Fun”: government would move quickly, aiming to keep ahead of the spread of the virus, and ensure everyone was supported, but crucially they would also invite everyone to get involved in the work — and even make it joyful to do so.
In essence, Taiwan crowdsourced its Covid response.
This included setting challenges to the tech community to create apps that would track the availability of personal protective equipment, for example, and even setting up a telephone hotline that anyone could call into with ideas to improve the national response.
My favourite story-within-the-story is that a young boy rang in, concerned that the boys in his class did not want to wear their standard issue face masks, because they were pink and they thought they were girly. He had a suggestion: work with the baseball team, and make pink facemasks cool. Three days after he left his message, the little boy found himself on the national televised press conference, alongside half the Taiwanese baseball team and President Tsai Ing-wen — all resplendent in their pink facemasks.
Even in the face of outright emergency, tapping into the energy, ideas and resources of everyone — rather than imposing command or serving self interest — proved the most effective strategy.
The backstory: the Gov Zero movement
The real lesson I would have campaigners and organisers learn around the world, though, is drawn from the origins of this response.
They lie in a hacker movement known as Gov Zero, which began in 2012, in response to a government campaign called “The Economic Power Up Plan.” This was classic Consumer government: essentially, “shush little people, we’ll get on with growing the economy, you get on with your lives.”
The Gov Zero response was to start developing parallel websites to government sites (all with URLs ending g0v.tw, hence the name of the movement). These sites demonstrated the relationship between state and citizen that Gov Zero members aspired to, rooted in transparency and participation.
At first the movement grew gradually. But then in 2014, the government tried to rush through a trade bill with mainland China, and an Occupy-style protest broke out. Protesters occupied the parliament — and once inside, started debating the trade bill among themselves. The Gov Zero team got a broadband connection in, and ensured that the whole country could see what was happening via social media, then broadcast news.
The critical moment came when the speaker of the parliament chose to endorse the protest, promising protesters that the trade bill would get due scrutiny in defiance of the government. It did, and was defeated. At the next local elections, candidates who had stood by the protest were elected all over Taiwan. After the next presidential election, Audrey Tang, one of the key figures in Gov Zero was invited to become a minister — and in 2020, Audrey played a key role in designing and leading the Covid response.
The reason Gov Zero is so fascinating is because they adopted neither of the conventional strategies of working for political change: either from inside the existing system, creating a new party or working with existing politicians; or campaigning against it from outside, petitioning and mobilising. Instead, in the spirit of Buckminster Fuller’s famous quote, they simply set about imagining and building the kind of relationship between government and citizens that they believed should exist.
Where are they now?
What the Taiwanese achieved with their Covid response is truly astounding and should not be underestimated… but it is also important to acknowledge that even this is not an unmitigated success story.
Taiwan was the site of the first major national election of this packed-out year, and the incumbent government, which has been in power while all this has happened, did achieve re-election. But only just, and with no real visibility for these processes and approaches. A Daily Beast article towards the end of 2023 even went so far as to argue that digital democracy in Taiwan was “a huge flop.”
I think that assessment is too harsh: the Covid response in particular was a very real achievement for a participatory approach. But it does seem to me that, even after that, Citizen Democracy hasn’t fully taken hold in Taiwan. When I met with representatives of a Taiwanese thinktank to discuss their vision of open government a few months before the election, they were downcast: too few politicians had fully embraced the participatory philosophy, seeing involving citizens as a nice-to-do not a core part of their role. Old habits, it seems, die hard — even in as young, vibrant, and defiant a democracy as Taiwan.
This set me searching for evidence of more structural approaches…
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This is the sixth piece in a writing exercise I’m undertaking at the start of 2024 to figure out what I see as the work that needs doing in the world, and the work I need to do. Check out the Introduction for a little more framing, Clarity Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3 for the first steps in the logic, and Imagination Part 1 for the reason why I’m looking for Glimpses of Citizen Democracy. If any of it sparks something in you, post a comment or email me, I’d love your thoughts. If you want to stay in touch, you can join my mailing list here.
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