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Homenavigate_nextIssuesnavigate_nextBackissuesnavigate_nextVolume 31, No.1navigate_nextFarmers' associations and local politics: the cases of Taichung county and Kaohsiung county
Farmers' associations and local politics: the cases of Taichung county and Kaohsiung county
Farmers' Associations are meant to be self-government associations dedicated to the service of farmers. However, in reality Farmers' associations have taken on strong political overtones, and their effect-tiveness has been affected by this. In elections for all levels of public officials, Farmers' Association have actively campaigned for political parties and/or local factions. In elections for officers of the Farmers' associations, political forces have used bribery and violence to try to gain control of the associations. This has causes the Farmers' associations to become the site of political struggles, and in the process the welfare of farmers has become merely an empty slogan. How have Farmers' Associations evolved into political bodies? What is the goal of the political forces associated with Farmers' Associations? How do Farmers' Associations use their originations to mobilize support? Have the recent runs on Farmers' Associations credit unions been related to politics? These are the main questions that this paper will address. The political overtones of Farmers' Associations dates to the Japanese era. The colonial government treated Farmers' Associations as a tool to control political attitudes and recover capital from farmers' villages. The post-war KMT government overhauled the system, but the basic idea of controlling farmers through Farmers' Associations did not change. The KMT used the Farmers' Associations' credit unions to gain the support for local factions, which gained a local monopoly of politi-cal and financial resources. These abundant financial resources and the well developed orginational resources the Farmers' Association pos-sessed assured that local political forces would compete to participate in the system. The Taichung County and Kaohsiung County examples prove that both pro-KMT and anti-KMT factions strove to gain control of the Farmers' Associations. However, the involvement of politics in Farmers' Associations has downgraded the original mission to serve farmers. Recification of this problem would require a process of depo-liticization and the independence of credit unions from the Farmers' associations.
