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Absolute Power Indeed Abuses Power Absolutely

icon2018/01/30
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  Absolute Power Indeed Abuses Power Absolutely

 

China Times Editorial (Taipei, Taiwan)

January 25, 2018

 Translation of an Excerpt

 

The election of a new president for National Taiwan University (NTU) has elicited a series of incidents. In the end, Kuan Chung-ming was elected unexpectedly, but on the eve of his investiture, however, a question emerged about a possible conflict of interest, as Richard Tsai, vice chairman of Taiwan Mobile, was a member of the selection committee, while Kuan Chung-ming was an independent member of that company. The DPP legislative caucus introduced a binding motion, demanding that the Ministry of Education (MOE) desist from the procedure of the NTU presidential appointment before the question was clarified.

 

"Political parties should withdraw from the campuses" is a founding ideal of the DPP;  after assuming power, it has intervened in the autonomy of universities, surprisingly in a naked manner, leaving people bewildered. Whether or not universities can be truly autonomous is an important indicator of whether Taiwan is truly democratic; if society cannot respect the autonomy of NTU, allowing the parliament to behave out of bounds at will, Taiwan's democracy would retrogress several decades, having nothing to be proud of, just like third world countries.

 

It is hard to imagine that this kind of thing could happen in an advanced democratic country; the public is actually very clear, in democratic countries such as the United States, even in public universities, the government agencies in charge of education will not interfere in the selection process of presidents, fully respecting the university. Even if the process or result creates doubts in the outside world, it is at most left to the selection committee itself to handle, and it will not be intervened by the government  or the parliament, which has utterly nothing to do with the matter, to demand such and such, otherwise the appointment should not be made. The legislative power intervenes in the statutory autonomy of academic institutions to such a degree, and yet claims to be a democratic country worthy of pride; this is truly unimaginable.

 

Moreover, the NTU president selection committee has formally clarified that, in accordance with the selection norms of NTU, no questions concerning conflicts of interest exist. The Legislative Yuan, however, still does not respect NTU, going right ahead to strangle the neck of the Ministry of Education (MOE), insisting that the MOE do what the Legislative Yuan demands. We remind the Education Ministry it is high time that universities had their independence and autonomy.

 

The DPP legislative caucus must exercise self-restraint, and never allow itself to become a caveat for posterity that "absolute power is absolute corruption and abuse of power."

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