Some Reflections on the Intervention in the Land Expropriation Law Amendment, State Violence, and Related Matters

Lead photo/ Munch  Elderly farmer friends monitored the land expropriation law amendment outside the Legislative Yuan all day on 12/13

Dear friends:

Although I am still on the front line, and have been sorting out my own emotions as well as the many practical matters that follow days of heated action, a phone call yesterday afternoon (12/14) made me want to sit down and write a few brief words first.

The afternoon call came from my third-grade niece. She said: Auntie, it is so scary, where are you?

She had seen the television news footage after class and could not help calling me. Since her home does not have cable television, it is likely she was watching one of the four terrestrial channels. One can roughly imagine the footage showed pushing and shoving, flames, tearful complaints and shouting. Yet in the real world, that pushing and shoving perhaps lasted only two minutes, and the whole episode was no more than seven or eight minutes. Through the media, it instantly became everything.

Perhaps that is just how media operates. Still, we can always find channels to share our thoughts on taking part in it:

The amendment of the land expropriation law is a process of social contestation. What we face is not only vicious partisan strife between blue and green, nor merely Kuomintang legislators turning completely into voting machines. They did not even know the content of the land expropriation amendment, yet they voted it down one vote after another, rejecting the civil-society version.
 
I believe the real problem lies in the evil essence of "collusion between political power and financial conglomerates." From the Rural Regeneration Act, the Industrial Innovation Act, the Land Expropriation Act, the vicious land development in eastern Taiwan, to the endless violence of urban renewal in urban areas, one can sense that within our state apparatus there is a dark, land-devouring force of money and power getting its way, selling off national assets while using the legal system to cloak everything it does in a splendid legal framework.

With this understanding, I have always believed that our actions cannot escape legal and institutional reform. Even if there is no chance of winning, even if the times are perilous, we can only step forward to meet them.

On the other hand, we also know that institutional reform is a long, long road, and that the power of the people is the foundation for firmly grounding change. The power of the people is probably not something that can be enhanced merely through briefings or group dynamics. Through one concrete action after another, whether mobilizing within villages, debating local officials, or contending on the streets……, people (including, of course, many young people and ourselves) are, through harsh reality, polishing and tempering their inner depth. Only when the people unite and recognize reality will the good society we hope for perhaps appear on the horizon we can gaze toward.

Regarding the conflict on 12/13, I must admit it and take responsibility at the same time. I was too careless. Because we had already informed the police at noon about the content of this symbolic action, and the officer in charge on site told us that we could light and burn the three paintings of the Presidential Office, the Executive Yuan and the Legislative Yuan, and that they would then use fire extinguishers to spray them. From noon to midnight, I explained this matter to at least three different groups of officers with different roles on site and reached a tacit understanding, so we never thought of putting the disciplinary team on the front line. The student who lit the fire was also a female student from an art college. (At this point, everyone may be laughing silently in front of their computers -- how could these people be so naive?)
 
Really, we never expected that just as the fire was lit, the police pushed in from behind, and it was an all-out encirclement and shoving. Even the photojournalists were pushed toward the fire. Those of us in the front row linked arms and tried as much as possible to hold them back. In less than two minutes, the fully encircling police broke through. Amid the clouds of dry extinguisher powder, the crowd's emotions became even more grief-stricken and indignant. I truly thank the farmers and young people for their self-restraint. We sat down first and at the same time asked the police to leave. As the police left, I pointed out directly that our adversaries are in the Presidential Office, the Executive Yuan and the Legislative Yuan, not the rank-and-file police, trying to calm everyone and prevent the scene from becoming a confrontation between the people and frontline officers.
 
From the footage, everyone can see the rationality and self-possession within the grief and indignation of all those present, as well as respect for others. Dear friends, this is democracy. On 12/13, democracy was not in the Legislative Yuan; democracy was on the streets.

 Photo/ Chung Sheng-hsiung  Police, trying to put out the farmers' group "burning" street theater, became locked in fierce pushing and shoving with farmers and students near the fire, and the process was full of danger.

I do not want to glorify street action. After all, this is only one part of it. The dense work of the agrarian movement includes expanding farmer and youth organizations, developing a discourse with farmers as the subject, linking production and consumption, political law-reform action……, and so on. Every step is not easy. Fortunately, although progress is halting and obstacles are many, through the participation of many elder farmers and the self-reflection of many young people involved, we truly feel the momentum to move forward, and we truly see what solid grassroots energy can achieve.
 
Dear friends, thank you for patiently reading through this somewhat long-winded confession of a participant. The road is still long. Let us keep working hard together, striving in our respective positions for a better future, and not forgetting to support each other, encourage each other and act together whenever possible.
 
In addition, I would like to ask everyone to take more time to look at the records and writing of many friends on the front line. Fortunately, in an open society there can always be many different chroniclers and many different media channels.
 
On the scene after the amendment was finalized
Citizen journalist Yang Mi-li recorded the complete process. Starting from the 11th minute, seven minutes with no editing at all.