Why did Ke Wenzhe fail?

The first time I learned about Ke Wenzhe was in 2019, when I watched his speech "Negative Power Can't Make a Country Great After All". Later, I also watched "One Day on the Mayor's Staff" and "Things I Learned Between Life and Death". These videos have millions of views on Youtube, some even exceeding 10 million.

It must be admitted that Ke is a good evangelist + diligent manager. But today, it is basically clear that the political reform path he envisioned is not feasible - he tried to imitate Chiang Weishui 100 years ago and change Taiwan's political culture through political parties and social movements. This path will not work.

This conclusion has nothing to do with personal likes and dislikes and can be derived from some basic political judgments. I will write out this reasoning process below and look forward to your public comments.

1. "Rationality, pragmatism, and science" are a set of internally contradictory concepts

"When did you switch from Ke fan to Ke Hei?" Such posts appear from time to time on the social forum PTT. Most of them lost their fans because Ke Wenzhe's position gradually moved closer to the center and away from the early "dark green" camp. Many people therefore think that Ke Wenzhe is "fickle" and criticize him as a chameleon and untrustworthy.

This criticism is actually unjustified. As a political amateur, it is normal for Ke to have a change of perception after entering the political arena and then adjust his position. What really matters is not the change of views on specific matters, but that there is a big problem with his philosophy itself.

The core of politics is two things: How to distribute it better? And who will distribute it?

Ke Wenzhe has always advocated "rationality, pragmatism, and science" in an attempt to answer the first question. But these three words don’t go together. "Reason" expresses an attitude, as opposed to impulse and emotion, "science" is based on facts, and "pragmatism" is a value judgment. Facts are not subject to human will, but values ​​vary from person to person. Equally rational people may make different value judgments on the same facts . Mixing these three concepts together sowed the seeds of contradiction from the source.

Of these three words, the ones that conflict most with each other are "pragmatic" and "scientific."

In accordance with the principle of "scientific", in 2019, Lin Zhoumin, the director of urban development of Shike City Government, publicly opposed the rash advancement of the construction of the Arena without conducting evacuation safety simulations. As a result, Ke City Government continued to promote the construction in accordance with the principle of "pragmatism" and dismissed Lin Zhoumin from his post. From a pragmatic point of view, it is certainly not appropriate to let the Dome rot because of safety issues, but once you choose to be pragmatic, you may deviate from science .

This is also the case with the "statistical error" that has been causing a lot of trouble recently. According to science, the so-called "±x%" in statistical error originally refers to the upper and lower twice the range. This matter is not difficult to clarify. However, neither party followed a scientific approach when interpreting the statistical results. The Kuomintang regarded the "error of the gap" as "the error of the gap", thereby expanding the scope of the error and creating a "concession of 6%." Ke did not confront the issue based on science. Instead, he forcibly interpreted the statistical error as "a 3% margin." After all, if there is really a "Vice-President Hou Zhengke", Ke's supporters will lose a lot, and in the end Blue and White may not win the election even if they unite.

Like the Dome case, when science and pragmatism conflicted, Ke Wenzhe finally chose pragmatism and abandoned science.

For white power, "rationality and science" are originally the most attractive parts of its philosophy, so highly educated people are willing to support Ke. If this concept is sacrificed and "pragmatism" begins to be emphasized, then the People's Party will be almost the same as the Kuomintang and the Progressive Party.

What's more terrible is that although Professor Ke has made great achievements in the fields of rationality and science, his practical ability in political operation still needs to be honed. The essence of politics is the distribution of interests, and interest disputes will inevitably touch the dark side of human nature. But Ke Wenzhe said, "Don't think so bad of others." This is not kindness, but naivety. As a politician with an amateur background, this naivety to some extent helped him become an Internet celebrity and gain a large number of fans with his fresh style. However, power struggle and backroom politics have always been unfamiliar territory to him.

Politics can never be separated from the secret room. The glamorous stage and the dressing room behind it together constitute the entire performance. No matter how much he emphasized openness and transparency, Ke Wenzhe finally walked into the secret room of Lan Baihe, and he lacked combat experience on this battlefield. So after signing on November 15th, I came out with a face full of frustration.

I failed to hold on to scientific beliefs and had shortcomings in pragmatic abilities, which made it difficult to choose.

2. White power is a branch of the local faction, and it is difficult to turn away from the local faction.

The core of politics is distribution. Since Ke Wenzhe has obvious deficiencies in distribution principles and distribution skills, why can he still get more than 20% of public support in Taiwan? This involves another topic: who will distribute it .

Different groups will prefer different spokespersons. You only need to briefly sort out the demographic structure of Taiwanese society to understand where Ke Wenzhe's votes come from.

From the perspective of population migration, Taiwanese can be very roughly divided into the locals who settled before 1949, and those from other provinces who came to Taiwan with the Kuomintang regime later. The supporters of the Kuomintang are basically from other provinces, while many of the supporters of the People's Party come from local groups.

To a certain extent, the Popular Party, like the forces of the times, is the product of localist divisions. Since the end of the authoritarian rule of Chiang Kai-shek and Chiang Kai-shek, the Kuomintang has been in decline, and now its presidential candidate has dropped to third place in support. Along with this trend, the main contradiction in Taiwan's political arena is gradually changing from the blue-green contradiction between people from other provinces and the local faction to the contradiction between various factions within the local faction.

Those currently in power within the local faction have basically been involved in politics since the 1990s. These people were willing to take risks in an era when the KMT's authoritarianism was still strong, and they represented the radical part of the local faction. Among the localists, those with a more stable political attitude are often reluctant to see the radicalization go too far, do not want to see Taiwan become a second Ukraine, and are not happy to see the establishment faction in the Democratic Progressive Party enjoying the cake exclusively. This group of people can easily differentiate and become supporters of the Bai camp.

Originally, the Kuomintang was the biggest enemy of the local faction. Of course, Ke Wenzhe was at odds with the Kuomintang. He even ranked it with mosquitoes and cockroaches as the things he hated most. But now that the Kuomintang has declined and the DPP has become a formidable enemy, keeping a low profile and flirting with the Kuomintang has become a scientific and pragmatic choice.

Compared with the previous bubbled third force parties, Ko Wenzhe believes that the greatest advantage of his own party is the spirit of " inclusion ". His idea is to take the road of "transcending blue and green" and try to bring in the middle voters. However, due to the People's Party's "localist" background, its ability to attract green camp supporters is far greater than that of blue camp supporters. And because those with vested interests in the green camp will not leave easily, those who support the white camp are often the relatively fringe groups of green camp supporters. In this case, it advocates integration and pluralism. If it is not executed properly, the People's Party will become a gathering place for three religions and nine streams.

The Popular Party emphasizes that it is pragmatic and capable of execution, which is not easy to achieve in real politics. In Taiwan's "winner-takes-all" political structure, if an electoral alliance between opposition parties agrees on detailed alliance conditions, it is likely to involve contract bribery. Without cooperation, it will be difficult for the opposition party alone to achieve anything major. And this structure cannot be changed for a while.

As time goes by, the foreign characteristics of the Kuomintang have gradually disappeared, and it must survive through localization. Hanguo Yu and Hou Youyi both represent the efforts of the Kuomintang to localize. The general trend of localization is likely to move Taiwan's political arena from a two-party system to a one-party system like Singapore and Japan. Interest disputes will no longer unfold through open party struggles, but through intra-party factional politics hidden behind the scenes. Solved through various "Qiao" methods within the system. Under such circumstances, the bubble formation of small parties may still be unavoidable.

3. “Exercise” is not a good idea

Ko Wenzhe often said, "Politics certainly has a secular side, but it also has an ideal side." "Ideal" is his key word to attract audiences, but this sentence can also be said in reverse: "Politics certainly has an ideal side, but it is often very secular." The secular world is nothing more than human nature, and human nature is generally the same under the sun. .

100 years ago, Jiang Weishui was influenced by communism and tried to launch a proletarian social movement. 100 years later, Ke Wenzhe will inherit his mantle and launch a social movement to change Taiwan's political culture. But the word "movement" is scary. Social movements need to mobilize as many people as possible to participate, and what can mobilize people most quickly is often polarized emotional reactions—the bad guys are going to come to power, no, we have to unite quickly.

This kind of emotional reaction can easily lead to extreme violence and deviate from science and rationality. For example, the French Revolution of 1789 wanted to completely overthrow the privileges of the nobility, which ultimately led to the massacre. The New Culture Movement in 1919 wanted to knock down all traditional culture, but in the end it failed to truly complete enlightenment. When emotions accumulate, even the initiator often cannot control them. Therefore, when the situation eases, Ke Wenzhe can still shout "transcend the blue and green", but when the election situation is tense, he can only openly "remove the DPP". This "knock you down and I'll do it" method is very pragmatic, but it is far from science .

To turn one's back on science would be to turn one's back on the most attractive part of the Popular Party's philosophy.

4. Science must stay away from power

Among the three words "rational, pragmatic and scientific", science, which ranks last, deserves special attention. In the long run, national policies must be consistent with science to bring long-term peace and stability. It's just that "science" shouldn't get involved in politics, because once it gets involved in politics, it will change.

Based on the historical experience of various countries around the world, if institutions that promote science want to be truly effective, they should stay away from real politics and regard fair judgment as their own goals and interests. If a person who talks about science is close to the center of power, he will selectively talk about science and gradually become unscientific. Therefore, third-party independent institutions such as universities and research institutes that are far away from power may be a more suitable place to promote science than the government. From the perspective of promoting science, being a freelance writer or independent Youtuber is better than participating in politics.

Ke Wenzhe often said that "politics is the art of persuasion." "Persuasion" may indeed be what he is best at and what he enjoys most. If he believes that convincing people that science is more important than power (the so-called "changing Taiwan"), in order to let more people think about issues in a rational and scientific way, it may be better to choose a non-political approach .

Based on the above judgment, the political failure of white power is probably inevitable. The Kuomintang is expected to announce the final results of the Blue and White elections this Wednesday (November 22). This result, as well as the results of the general election on January 13 next year, can be used to review and improve today's conclusions.

Criticisms and suggestions are also welcome.