Taiwan needs to build soft power, generating attraction to its values, ideas and culture to overcome disabling international challenges confronting President-elect Lai Ching-te. Proactive external communications can help the new government increase global awareness, gain sympathy and win support from the international community.

Various initiatives have been devoted to this cause, such as opening Taiwan Academies abroad to promote traditional Chinese culture, investing in gastrodiplomacy to introduce Taiwanese cuisines to the world, setting up Sinology resource centres to increase the exposure of Taiwanese research and initiating a semiconductor study program to attract overseas talent.

Throughout its time in power, Lai’s Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) has emphasised democratic values in its external communications and engagement. It established the Taiwan Foundation for Democracy  in 2003 to connect with other democracies through international events, founded the Taiwan Democracy Quarterly in 2004 to encourage research on issues of Taiwan’s democratic politics and human rights and formed the Democratic Pacific Union in 2005 to promote cooperation between Pacific Rim nations.

Outgoing President Tsai Ing-wen once wrote that at the heart of Taiwanese identity is its ‘embrace of democracy’. Her successor echoed these sentiments in a post-election speech on 13 January 2024, promising an ‘unwavering commitment’ to democracy.

In 2021 the DPP established the Taiwan Center for Mandarin Learning (TCML) project to promote Mandarin with Taiwanese characteristics. Taiwan has established 66 TCMLs in association with its existing overseas compatriot schools in the United States and Europe. It aims to have 100 centres by 2025. The framing of the TCML project highlights ideals and values emanating from Taiwan’s liberal democracy.

As the Taiwanese government underlines, TCMLs adopt a teaching model that ‘shares Taiwan’s democracy and freedom and diverse and innovative culture’. These values are further engrained through an emphasis on independence, flexibility, diversity and cutting-edge technology.

By emphasising such values, Taiwan is drawing international attention to characteristics that make it an attractive place — a message addressed to audiences from Western democracies.

The appeal of Taiwan’s democracy in such contexts is manifest. As one American diplomat shared, ‘Taiwan has grown into a society that represents most of our important values that we try to promote elsewhere in the world’. But only 11 countries and the Holy See currently have formal diplomatic relations with Taiwan and it is not an official member of major international organisations such as the United Nations and World Health Organisation.

TCMLs can therefore contribute to Taiwan’s international visibility and status, especially given geopolitical tensions between Western democracies and the People’s Republic of China (PRC). While the PRC has heavily invested in promoting Chinese language and culture through Confucius Institutes (CIs) since the early 2000s, deteriorating relations with the West have prompted the closure of a large number of CIs due to their government links and ideological and political concerns.

Critics of CIs see them as ‘a way for Beijing to spread propaganda under the guise of teaching, interfere with free speech on campuses and even to spy on students’, despite a lack of proven instances in this regard.

Meanwhile, the number of TCMLs has grown rapidly in the past two years, with more centres planned in the United States and Europe. Australian universities have also demonstrated an interest opening new branches. Their development to date and prospects for further expansion seem to suggest that the DPP’s approach to international communications and engagement through TCMLs is increasing Taiwan’s international presence.

This is an important first step towards influencing other states and foreign publics through external communications. But the important question for TCMLs is how and to what extent they embody Taiwan’s democratic values and promote its democratic credentials through Mandarin teaching.

The authors of this piece found little evidence that teaching materials and activities highlight Taiwan’s democracy. For example, the three main textbooks used by TCMLs primarily focus on aspects of daily life, such as greetings, appellations, family, school, travel, cultural festivals, food and leisure activities. Such content is similar to that of many other widely used Chinese language textbooks.

TCMLs also deliver generic cultural activities including dance, music, calligraphy, cooking, kung fu and traditional art and craft lessons. Such content differs little from the PRC’s cultural promotion abroad and is similarly presented, at various levels, by CIs and China Cultural Centres run by the Beijing culture and tourism ministry.

Including such elements in TCMLs’ Mandarin teaching helps familiarise foreign learners with aspects of Taiwanese culture. But omitting Taiwan’s democratic values in TCML teaching materials and activities misses the opportunity for the island to tap into its rich soft power capital and define itself distinctively from the PRC as the first Chinese democracy.

This work was supported by Flinders University under the College of Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences (CHASS) Research Grant Scheme.

Minglei Wang is a PhD candidate and research assistant at Flinders University.

Jeffrey Gil is a Senior Lecturer in TESOL at Flinders University.

Nicholas Godfrey is a Senior Lecturer in Screen at Flinders University.