The Tiger Leading the Dragon: How Taiwan Propelled China's Economic Rise

237 Pages·2021·1.037 MB·English

by  Shelley Rigger

The Tiger Leading
the Dragon

The Tiger Leading
the Dragon
How Taiwan Propelled
China’s Economic Rise
SHELLEY RIGGER
ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD
Lanham • Boulder • New York • London
Published by Rowman & Littlefield
An imprint of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc.
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Copyright © 2021 by The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by
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systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who
may quote passages in a review.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Rigger, Shelley, 1962– author.
Title: The tiger leading the dragon : how Taiwan propelled China’s economic rise /
Shelley Rigger.
Description: Lanham : Rowman & Littlefield, [2021] | Includes bibliographical references
and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2021005855 (print) | LCCN 2021005856 (ebook) | ISBN
9781442219588 (cloth) | ISBN 9781442219595 (paperback) | ISBN 9781442219601
(epub)
Subjects: LCSH: Taiwan—Foreign economic relations—China. | China—Foreign
economic relations—Taiwan. | China—Commerce—Taiwan. | Taiwan—
Commerce—China. | Taiwan—Economic conditions—1975- | China—Economic
conditions—1949-
Classification: LCC HF1606.Z4 C6825 2021 (print) | LCC HF1606.Z4 (ebook) | DDC
337.51249051—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021005855
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021005856
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of
American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper
for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.
This book is dedicated to the memory of
Kelly Ann Chaston-Ameri, 1961–2010
Nancy Bernkopf Tucker, 1948–2012
Alan M. Wachman, 1958–2012
and
Rebecca R. Rigger, 1927–2013

Contents
Preface: The Umbrella King ix
Acknowledgments xv
1 How Mao’s China became the “Factory to the World” 1
2 Taiwan’s “Economic Miracle” 9
3 “Second Spring”: Taiwan’s Traditional Manufacturers
Discover Mainland China 29
4 From SME to ODM: Taiwan’s Integration into
Global Manufacturing Networks 47
5 The 1990s: From Umbrellas to iPhones 63
6 The Rise of the Red Supply Chain 85
7 “Borrowing a Boat to Go to Sea”: Taiwanese Business
Practices in China 109
8 Affordable Luxury: Changing the Way China Eats (and More) 129
9 Beyond Business: How Taiwanese Are Reshaping Chinese Society 149
10 The End of an Era? 177
References 199
Index 207
vii

Preface
The Umbrella King
You probably know that your iPhone, notebook computer, and running
shoes were most likely manufactured by companies headquartered in Tai-
wan. If you follow international business news, you may even have heard of
the companies that make those products, companies like Foxconn, Quanta,
and Yue Yuen. But unless you’ve spent your life in the desert, you’ve almost
certainly owned a product made by a company you’ve almost certainly never
heard of: the Fu Tai Umbrella Group. Fu Tai doesn’t have the name recogni-
tion or glamor of a high-tech company, but the humble umbrella is some-
thing almost everyone needs, and Fu Tai makes a lot of umbrellas—more
than any other company in the world.
Fu Tai founder Chen Tian-fu was born on a farm in 1926 when Taiwan
was part of the Japanese empire. The story of his life is both extraordinary
and ordinary. His achievements are exceptional, but at the same time, his
personal trajectory mirrors the path his country took over decades. Telling his
story allows us to trace the narrative of Taiwan’s economic development from
agriculture to industry, from export manufacturing to overseas investment,
mostly in mainland China. Chen grew his business by grasping opportunities
made possible by a succession of state policies and market trends, so his story
also tells us much about Taiwan’s policy makers as well as the global economy
in which it developed.
ix