Yuan-Ming Chiao

Exposé zum Dissertationsvorhaben von Yuan-Ming Chiao:

Discourse Framing and the Formation of Trade Policy vis-à-vis Antagonizing States: Comparing the Role of Parties and Corporate Actors in Germany, South Korea and Taiwan

This doctoral research project aims to address the interaction between state and business elites in the formulation of trade policy  between divided, antagonizing states. Drawing upon the political divisions among China (PRC) and Taiwan (ROC), the Democratic Republic of Germany (GDR, former East Germany) and the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG, former West Germany) as well as between South (ROK) and North Korea (DPRK), it will analyze and evaluate the process in which corporate actors leverage their influence on trade issues between hostile states in the absence of normal and formalized diplomatic relations. This project builds on the theoretical assumptions of discourse hegemony, indicating how the treatment of economic links between antagonized states have largely been delegated to the security dimensions of statecraft. In order to highlight the articulation of hegemonic discourses of state and business elites in West Germany, South Korea and Taiwan, party politics and transition of power will be analyzed comparatively. It also seeks to contribute to critical theories of International Political Economy (IPE) by taking a Neo-Gramscian approach with regards to the relationship between party and business elites in the formation of trade policy. Finally, it intends to expand upon the concept of “double hegemony” (Scherrer, 2001) by examining the effects of the competing and complementary globalization discourses and the role of domestic elites in the framing of national identity and economic sovereignty issues with regard to trade with their respective antitheses.