Did Everyone Understand What The Demands Of The Movement Were?

Very probably, not all of the participants within the movement understood what the demands of the movement were, what the CSSTA was, or why they opposed the CSSTA. It is not always that all participants have a complete understanding as to why they participating in the movement. Sometimes participants opposed the CSSTA out of a basic sense of right and wrong far moreso than because they knew all the provisions of the trade agreement or what it’s pros and cons would be. 

Nevertheless, this is not anything against the movement either. Rather, it is inherently a part of political participation in a mass movement that not all individuals have a complete and total knowledge of why they are compelled to take certain action in order to stand for something or to oppose something. The same is true of politics writ large. In voting for a political candidate over another or opposing a political candidate, after all, probably most voters have not drawn up a table of the pros and cons of supporting one candidate or another or do not have fully fleshed out reasons as to why they may support one candidate but oppose another. Indeed, some question whether the CSSTA was important at all, or whether the agreement really would have had the effects some claimed.

For many, it may be that the single issue of the CSSTA came to stand in for a large host of issues regarding Taiwanese identity, the efforts of the KMT to facilitate the political unification of Taiwan and China through economic means, and the poor economic conditions facing Taiwanese young people today, all at once.

Read More About The Demands Of The Movement:

• What were the differences in thinking among the occupiers?

• What was the “black box” and why were occupiers opposed to it?

• What was the CSSTA?

• Was the Sunflower Movement an anti-China movement?

• Was the Sunflower Movement an anti-free trade movement?

Photo credit: Brian Hioe