Rebel Island

It is the last surviving enclave of the Republic of China, a lost colony of Japan, and claimed by Beijing as a rogue province—merely the latest chapters in its long history as a refuge for pirates, rebels, settlers, and outcasts. Jonathan Clements examines the unique conditions of Taiwan’s archaeology and indigenous history, and its days as a Dutch and Spanish trading post. He delves into its periods as an independent kingdom, Chinese province, and short-lived republic, and the transformations wrought by 50 years as part of the Japanese Empire. He examines the traumatic effects of its role as a lifeboat in 1949 for two million refugees from Communism, and the conflicts emerging after the suspension of four decades of martial law, as its people debate issues of self-determination, independence, and home rule.