At first blush, the results of Taiwan’s national elections last month read like a clear rebuke of China’s coercive reunification agenda. Despite Beijing’s incessant branding of Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) as “separatist,” Taiwanese voters extended the DPP’s presidential reign for an unprecedented third consecutive term. International headlines hailed the election as a major “setback” for China, which had warned that casting a ballot for the DPP was tantamount to voting for war with the mainland. Some media even framed the DPP’s victory as an act of defiance by the Taiwanese people, rebuffing Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s assertion in his recent New Year’s address that reunification between China and Taiwan is “inevitable.”

At first blush, the results of Taiwan’s national elections last month read like a clear rebuke of China’s coercive reunification agenda. Despite Beijing’s incessant branding of Taiwan’s ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) as “separatist,” Taiwanese voters extended the DPP’s presidential reign for an unprecedented third consecutive term. International headlines hailed the election as a major “setback” for China, which had warned that casting a ballot for the DPP was tantamount to voting for war with the mainland. Some media even framed the DPP’s victory as an act of defiance by the Taiwanese people, rebuffing Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s assertion in his recent New Year’s address that reunification between China and Taiwan is “inevitable.”

But the political fallout following Taiwan’s election is more nuanced. Dig deeper, and Taiwan’s fractured electoral outcome foreshadows political divisions that China will exploit. It also suggests that Beijing’s pre-election meddling may have actually succeeded in advancing Xi’s dual-pronged strategy of undermining popular support for the DPP and sowing societal discord to reduce resistance to China’s reunification calls.

For starters, while the DPP’s presidential candidate, William Lai, won decisively, his victory did not translate into an overwhelming mandate because he secured only 40 percent of the vote in a three-way race. The two opposition candidates, representing the Kuomintang (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP), garnered the remaining 60 percent of ballots. Minor differences aside, both opposition parties set themselves apart from the DPP by pledging to stabilize cross-strait relations through dialogue with the mainland, a prospect China dismissed as impossible under a DPP-led administration.

Beijing undoubtedly took note of these distinctions. Before the election, Chinese-owned social media platforms popular in Taiwan, like TikTok, amplified content........

© Foreign Policy