Understanding the Stakes in Taiwan’s 2024 Elections

How will the results of the elections in Taiwan impact future relations between Taipei and Beijing? Inés Arco Escriche, a Research Fellow at CIDOB, explains that regardless of their divergent campaign retoric, the three candidates to the elections share a similar position on maintaining peaceful cross-Strait relations: “It is a strategy to try to differentiate themselves. Instead, they are more similar in many of their policy options than they would like to admit, not only the DPP and the KMT, but also the TPP.” First, they all agree on maintaining Taiwan’s status quo. “They also all agree on continuing cooperation with the United States and strengthening defense capabilities,” Arco Escriche underlines, “none of them will move toward de jure independence in the next four years.”