CHINA-TAIWAN TENSIONS

Americans are increasingly worried about diplomacy breaking down in East Asia.

Taiwan's official name in English is the Republic of China. With the communist victory (People's Republic of China) in the Chinese civil war in 1949, the Nationalist-controlled Republic of China government and 2 million Nationalists fled to Taiwan. They continued to claim to be the legitimate government for mainland China and Taiwan based on a 1947 constitution drawn up for all of China. Until 1987, however, the Nationalist government ruled Taiwan under a civil war martial law declaration dating to 1948.

Beginning in the 1970s, Nationalist authorities gradually began to incorporate the native population into the governing structure beyond the local level. The democratization process expanded rapidly in the 1980s, leading to the then illegal founding of the Democratic Progressive Party (a center-left party generally described as progressive), Taiwan's first opposition party, in 1986. Martial law was lifted the following year.

Taiwan held legislative elections in 1992, the first in over 40 years, and its first direct presidential election in 1996. In the 2000 presidential elections, Taiwan underwent its first peaceful transfer of power with the

KMT (pro mainland China party) loss to the DPP and afterwards experienced two additional democratic transfers of power in 2008 and 2016.

Throughout this period, the island became one of East Asia's economic leaders.

Former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan in August and current Speaker Kevin McCarthy hosted Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen at the Reagan Library in March. Chinese Embassy members urged American lawmakers against both meetings.