As tensions between Beijing and Taipei rise, academia and the education sector reveal how each side is changing to adapt to – or shape – the new environment. In the second of a two-part series, we look at the situation for mainland students in Taiwan. 

As a mainland Chinese student in Taiwan, John Wang felt apprehensive only once during his five months on exchange.

It was December 20 and he was passing the parliament building in Taipei on his way back from a social gathering.

Thousands of protesters had massed on the road outside, waving signs and giving speeches, watched on by security guards at the gates.

It was part of the Bluebird Movement – a series of pro-Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) protests that erupted over parliamentary reforms giving the opposition more power to scrutinise the government. The opposition Kuomintang and Taiwan People’s Party hold a majority in Taiwan’s legislature.

Wang said the atmosphere was tense and anti-mainland China sentiment was strong. He recalled one student protester telling the crowd that he was against mainland China, even though his mother was from the mainland.

“I didn’t dare say a word,” Wang said. “I was afraid that my [mainland Chinese] accent would be recognised and I’d get into trouble.”

He feared the protesters might think he was a spy and report him to the police, and that he could end up being sent back to the mainland.

Friendlier days

Students like Wang – and others on cultural exchanges – were once seen as an important part of efforts to improve communication and cooperation across the Taiwan Strait.

In December, Wang was one of a dwindling number of mainland students in Taiwan. Amid the pandemic, Taiwan had announced in February 2020 that mainland residents, including students, were not allowed to enter the island. In April, in a move seen by some as retaliation, the mainland’s Ministry of Education said it was stopping applications for mainland students to study in Taiwan. Taiwan lifted its ban in November 2022 but the mainland still does not allow students to enrol in full-time university degrees on the island.

It was a different story in 2011, when there were 12,155 exchange and university students from the mainland studying in Taiwan, according to its Mainland Affairs Council.

That number peaked at 41,975 in 2016 – the year Tsai Ing-wen became the self-ruled island’s leader – but it has gradually declined since then, as Beijing saw Tsai’s policies as pro-independence and tensions around the issue grew. There were just 3,852 mainland students in Taiwan last year.

Those who were already studying for a bachelor’s degree before the ban can continue on to higher studies in Taiwan. But if there are none still around next year then this summer could see the last enrolments of master’s and PhD students from the mainland.

Tensions have worsened across the strait since William Lai Ching-te became Taiwan’s leader last year, and Beijing has ramped up military pressure on the island in response to Lai’s remarks and policies that Beijing sees as provocative. Observers fear the diminishing student exchanges and communication between the two sides will only make the situation worse.

Wang sees himself as a “Taiwan lover”. He said there was a familiarity to the island given that its language and culture were similar to the mainland’s, and he had immersed himself in Taiwanese music, television and politics. He described an international news channel in Taiwan as “eye-opening”.

Other mainland Chinese students also point to Taiwanese culture, especially those from the east coast like Lin Zihao, who is doing a PhD in Taiwan. Lin said he was able to watch Taiwanese television from his hometown in Fujian province – directly across the strait from Taiwan – when he was young.

“In Fujian province, we are so close to Kinmen and we can search for their signals,” he said, referring to the outlying Taiwanese islands also known as Quemoy that are 10km (6.2 miles) away from the mainland city of Xiamen.

Lin said he also went to school with Taiwanese children whose parents had moved to mainland China for work or business.

Mainland students apply to study in Taiwan for reasons including curiosity or interest in the island and its culture, or because of a university’s reputation. For Lin it was “another path” in his education that opened up when representatives from Taiwanese universities came to his school.

Mainland students were first allowed to pursue a degree in Taiwan in 2011, under a cross-strait agreement. At the time, Ma Ying-jeou was the island’s leader and pushing for closer economic ties with Beijing. Mainland authorities initially limited applications to the provinces of Fujian, Guangdong, Jiangsu and Zhejiang as well as the cities of Beijing and Shanghai. In 2013, the programme was expanded to add Liaoning and Hubei.

It was a development that raised hopes on both sides of the strait.

Zhu Songling, a professor at the Institute of Taiwan Studies at Beijing Union University, said cross-strait educational and people-to-people exchanges were seen at the time as a pathway towards mutual understanding and cooperation.

Educators saw it as a means for students on both sides of the Taiwan Strait to learn from each other in a way that could have a far-reaching impact, a magazine run by Taiwan’s semi-official Straits Exchange Foundation reported.

In 2012, then-Chinese president Hu Jintao even called it a “major transition” in relations between the two sides.

For the students, it was more a chance to experience something different. In her early days in Taipei in 2018, mainland exchange student Dong Ying had the chance to interact with a politician in the street who had waved to her in the lead-up to the local elections.

She had never seen anything like it in mainland China, where representatives are elected to the national legislature in a multilayered system in which ordinary voters elect the lowest level of grass-roots lawmakers who in turn vote for lawmakers on the next rung, and so on until it gets to the top.

It is rare for members of the public to know who their local representatives are, let alone that they would get a chance to meet face-to-face.

“I didn’t know who that person waving to me was. I didn’t know how their work might affect me, but I just teared up,” Dong said. “They were so undisguised and friendly.”

Mainland students also find university life quite different in Taiwan. Lin, the PhD student, said lecturers and tutors respected diversity and encouraged students to “be ourselves”.

“They keep saying that mainland students have too much on our minds and that we can’t loosen up,” he said. “They want us to go crazy while we’re young and finish everything we want to do … to live in the moment.”

Tseng Yu-chen, an assistant professor at Fo Guang University in Yilan, Taiwan, has written about the friendship and trust built by student exchanges, and how that can reduce negative impressions on both sides of the strait.

But differences – including language, customs and politics – can also create negative impressions, she wrote in a 2020 paper published in Prospect and Exploration magazine run by the justice ministry’s Investigation Bureau.

“Regrettably, the complexity and bitter history of cross-strait relations have placed the political burden of strained ties on mainland students in Taiwan,” Tseng wrote.

“Especially during election periods, the divisive rhetoric and polarisation often make these students the frontline emotional scapegoats.”

Caught in the middle

Dong recalls how the mood changed in 2018 after a controversial speech at the Golden Horse awards in Taipei. Taiwanese director Fu Yue, who won the best documentary award, said in her acceptance speech that she hoped Taiwan could be “seen as a truly independent entity” – remarks that drew criticism from mainland film stars and authorities.

Beijing sees Taiwan as part of its territory and has never renounced the use of force to bring the island under its control. Most countries do not recognise Taiwan as an independent state but oppose any forcible change to the status quo.

After Fu’s remarks, Dong said the atmosphere had changed overnight, and even though she did not experience any overt hostility she felt like she was caught in the middle.

“In reality, you are being swayed by external forces,” she said. “You are merely an insignificant individual, easily influenced by policies and the big picture.”

The student exchange programme was always subject to the vagaries of politics. Taiwan capped the number of mainland students who could take part and they were not allowed to work or join the health insurance scheme – moves to quell concerns that mainlanders could take the jobs of locals and harm national security.

Mainland students who apply are said to be meticulously background-checked. Wang said he waited months while various mainland Chinese government and university departments approved his Taiwan entry certificate and checked the details in his application.

“It almost seemed like a technique to stop you from going to Taiwan – making it more complicated,” he said.

It is not just mainland students who are caught in the middle. In March, three mainland Chinese women – all married to Taiwanese men – were ordered to leave the island because of their support for a military takeover of the island, raising concerns over freedom of speech.

Zhu, from Beijing Union University, said it appeared that the ruling DPP was trying to reduce cross-strait interactions.

He said it was unlikely that the once-flourishing economic and cultural exchanges between the two sides would be restored any time soon.

Wang, who was at the Taipei protest in December, said it could be tricky to navigate conversations with his Taiwanese friends.

He said he had a tacit understanding with one of them, from the DPP, that they would change the subject if they were heading for an argument. His friend wants Taiwan to be independent, but Wang believes that path will lead to war.

“Personally, I find this a bit of a pity because, in the past, people at least sought common ground or a basis for dialogue,” he said.

The names of the students in this story have been changed to protect their privacy.

— SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST