The French Centre for Research on Contemporary China (CEFC), Taipei Office organise the following conference:
10:00 – 12:30 | Morning Session
« From Earthquakes to China Factor: Taiwanese Society and the Perception of Multiple Risks »
Speaker: Paul Jobin (Associate Research Fellow, Institute of Sociology, Academia Sinica)
« The Defence of Taiwan through the Lens of Geography »
Speaker: Tanguy Lepesant (Associate Professor, National Central University)
12:30 – 13:30 | Lunch Break
13:30 – 15:30 | Afternoon Session
« Taiwan’s Engagement in International Organizations for Global Health Risk Management »
Speaker: Vincent Rollet (Associate Professor, Graduate Institute of European Studies, Wenzao Ursuline University)
« Making Sense of History Today. Rethinking China’s Two-Fronts Contribution to European Modernity »
Speaker: Jean-Yves Heurtebise (Director, Department of French Language and Culture, Fu Jen Catholic University)
15:30 | Coffee
The conference will be chaired by:
Kristina Kironska
Assistant Professor & Key Researcher of EUVIP & Head of Myanmar Studies Center, Palacky University Olomouc
Co-Director & Head of HUREA, Central European Institute of Asian Studies (CEIAS)
Chair of the Board, Amnesty International Slovakia
Board Member, European Association of Taiwan Studies (EATS)
Deputy Editor-in-Chief, International Journal of China Studies (IJCS)
Zsuzsa Anna Ferenczy
Assistant Professor, National Dong-Hwa University, Hualien, Taiwan
Affiliated Scholar, Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB)
Associated Research Fellow, Institute for Security & Development Policy (ISDP)
Head of Associates Network, 9DASHLINE
Fellow, Agora Strategy, Munich
Non-resident Fellow, Taiwan NextGen, Taipei
Consultant, Human Rights Without Frontiers, Brussels
Abstracts:
Paul Jobin « From Earthquakes to China Factor: Taiwanese Society and the Perception of Multiple Risks »
This study examines how Taiwanese society perceives multiple risks, from natural disasters to geopolitical threats. Survey data reveal high public concern over earthquakes, typhoons, and climate change, alongside anxiety over potential military conflict with China. While many Taiwanese express willingness to defend their country, they lack structured preparedness. Civil defense initiatives, such as wartime training and disaster response drills, are increasingly seen as complementary. Comparative insights from Ukraine highlight the role of citizen engagement in national resilience. Public opinion on military service reforms, including extending conscription to women, reflects shifting attitudes. Energy security debates, particularly nuclear power reliance, intersect with national defense considerations. Pierre Bourdieu’s critique of public opinion polls raises questions about the reliability of risk perception data. Strengthening local communities enhances both disaster response and national defense capabilities. Ultimately, fostering civilian preparedness is key to Taiwan’s broader security strategy.
Tanguy Lepesant “The Defence of Taiwan through the Lens of Geography”
The role played by climate, weather, distances to be covered, road conditions and even mud, which greatly contributed to stopping the Russian invasion of Ukraine, reminded us that even in modern warfare, technologically-laden armies still face a simple reality: geography matters, a lot. Any battlefield’s natural environment creates physics-based advantages and disadvantages that influence the use and effectiveness of weapons and, therefore, the objectives that joint military commands on both sides set, how they intend to achieve them using available resources, and if war ultimately takes place, whether these goals can actually be achieved or not. Through a multi-scalar analysis of the influence of space, geomorphology, landscape, seabed landforms, climate and weather conditions on weapons, tactics and strategies, this talk will be a reflection on the development of Taiwan’s asymmetric defence capabilities, understood as the combination of deterrence, resistance and resilience capabilities in the face of the broad spectrum of current and possible Chinese aggressions.
Vincent Rollet « Taiwan’s Engagement in International Organizations for Global Health Risk Management »
Traditional studies on Taiwan’s participation in international organizations (IOs) in the health sector have primarily focused on its limited interactions with the World Health Organization (WHO), its attempts to gain WHO membership, or its brief participation in the World Health Assembly (WHA). While the WHO remains a key player in global health governance, this narrow perspective overlooks the broader transformation of global health governance and the emergence of other influential actors with more stable relationships with Taiwan.
Among these actors, the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE) stands out as a critical case. Taiwan has been a member of the OIE since 1954, benefiting from its role in safeguarding animal health and preventing against health risks such as zoonotic diseases like rabies, avian flu, Ebola, and COVID-19. This engagement offers valuable insights into Taiwan’s role in international health risk governance beyond the WHO framework.
This presentation examines Taiwan’s participation in the OIE, highlighting its significance in shaping Taiwan’s global health involvement. Additionally, it explores a broader question in international relations: what functions does participation in an IO serve for its members? By assessing the practical benefits of Taiwan’s engagement with the OIE, this study contributes to the ongoing debate on the value of IO membership, particularly in an era of increasing skepticism toward multilateral institutions and Taiwan’s persistent efforts to expand its international presence.
Jean-Yves Heurtebise « Making Sense of History Today. Rethinking Chinese two-fronts contribution to European Modernity »
Macbeth, the eponymous character of Shakespeare’s play, famously said (Act 5, scene 5): “Life’s but […] a tale / Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, / Signifying nothing.” What Macbeth said about Life can also be said about History, as Hegel already reminded us: “When we look at this display of passions, and the consequences of their violence; when we see the evil, the vice, the ruin that has befallen the most flourishing kingdoms which the mind of man ever created; we can scarce avoid being filled with sorrow at this universal taint of corruption […] We endure in beholding it a mental torture, allowing no defence or escape but the consideration that what has happened could not be otherwise; that it is a fatality which no intervention could alter. ” Contemplating the horrors of History is depressing but feeling its inevitability even more so. Making Sense of History is almost a survival task for the mind faced with world absurdities. Hegel’s answer is that History indeed has a goal: Spiritual liberation from Matter or Freedom: “The inquiry into the essential destiny of Reason – as far as it is considered in reference to the World – is identical with the question, what is the ultimate design of the World? […] The History of the world is none other than the progress of the consciousness of Freedom […] the Eastern nations knew only that one is free [the τύραννος]; the Greek and Roman world only that some are free [the ἄριστοι]; while we know that all men absolutely (man as man) are free [the δῆμος]” This answer to the question of the march of History has been ours for centuries. In one way or another we believe that Freedom as an Ideal should guide History in its course. Because of this belief, we think that Freedom is something worth fighting for if threatened. However, recent historical developments have made us wary about its upcoming realization. According to EIU’s 2024 Democracy Index: “The overall global Democracy Index score has fallen from 5.52 in 2006 to an historic low of 5.17 in 2024, when 130 countries of the total 167 covered by the index either registered a decline in their score or made no improvement.” The fact that the threat to Democracy comes no more from Russia or China but from within Liberal Regimes themselves, from Trump’s United States, is the most distressing signal of all. When Techno-Authoritarism is not only the Present of “Oriental Despotism” but the Future of “Occidental Liberalism”, when the US is not only aligning with Russia over the dead body of Ukraine but also mimicking China in in the crackdown on political journalists and environmental scientists, can we still make sense of the Earth in the perspective of the History of Europe, can we still make sense of Europe in the perspective of the Geopolitics of the Earth and how and why this dual making of sense concerns Taiwan? Faced with the loss of meaning regarding History as History of Liberation, we strive to make sense of the existence of Formosa faced by an existential threat echoing our own.
