The ideas of civil society in mainland China and Taiwan, 1986-92

Analyzes political innovations associated with, and democratic implications of, the conceptual changes of civil society both in mainland China and Taiwan. These conceptual changes can be identified as a shift from the idea of the totalitarian society to the liberal idea of civil society before June 4, 1989, to the antagonist model of civil society as a democratic strategy among some intellectuals overseas after 1989, and then to the mutual support model between the state and civil society since 1992 in mainland China. These changes also involve a shift from the antagonist model of civil society, which was popular in 1986-87, to the Habermasian version of civil society on Taiwan. -from Author