Adaptive to the Host’s Need…

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As to the initiatives of regional activities and programs held in Taiwan, they are extra bonus for Taiwan’s public diplomacy. It is hardly to be replicated, for both timing and people are two essentials; as an old Chinese saying asserts “right people at right time and right place.”

Yet, it showed that regional activities are possible and doable aims.

Taiwan has a lot to offer in terms of soft power, which dwells in people, culture, and policy.

The limits model of PD also urges focus on influencing people’s preferences and setting agendas, not putting all efforts only on policy-decisions themselves, since Taiwan lacks channels of formal diplomatic ties. This research would like to advocate a more aggressively public diplomacy in Taiwan’s foreign policy, aiming on practical connections/networking with foreign people, not government. Thus, Taiwan needs more guerrilla diplomats with creativity, agility, adaptability, improvisation, self-sufficiency, and popular support to win hearts and minds of people, and to create a world value that shares the same mind-set as Taiwan’s people. (Copeland, 2009)

Most people agree that education is the most powerful measure of PD. But, its effect can take decades to produce. Within the context of Taiwan’s domestic politics, only a non-partisan organization can prevent political influence in the selection process. And, to quickly earn/build a merit-based reputation in academia, a governmental sponsored scholarship program can begin with cooperation with other long-lasting NGOs or INGOs. Currently, Taiwan Scholarship is operated by MOFA, MOE, and other government agencies which is often seen as a political reward. Regimes may change, but friendship is lasting; it is time to have a disruptive change of the Taiwan Scholarship. Two successful programs in EAP, Global Korean Scholarship (GKS) and The Japan Exchange and Teaching Programme (JET) are good examples for Taiwan.

II. Adaptive to the Host’s Need

The Fulbright Program started its operation in Asia, and the first three participating countries were Asian countries: China (ROC), Burma, and Philippines. Most current active

commissioned programs in EAP have long-lasting histories; 7 out of 9 binational

commissions were established by 1951. Also, the establishments of these nine commissions cross over the three phases of Fulbright history, first in Fulbright Act, then in Fulbright-Hays Act, and after cold war.

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Although these nine binational commissioned programs all are operated under the guidance of U.S. State Department, each program provides a unique case of operations and practices.

This research found variance among their legal charters, legal status in the host countries, compositions of the Boards of the binational commissions, funding resources, employment of EDs, relations with the governments of the host countries, and their programs. Fulbright’s hob-and-spoke system creates each Fulbright program in a host country as unique. Each has its own niche and challenges in the midst of the overall relations between the two nations.

In the context of a regional perspective, in East Asia and the Pacific, the Fulbright Taiwan went through upheaval in domestic and international politics. This was a mixed blessing of sorts. After 1979, Fulbright Taiwan operated extra-legally as a binational commission for thirty years. A re-born program was operated without legal status by the Foundation for Scholarly Exchange; an atypical program, but not an invisible one.

Openly recognized by Managing Director for Academic Program in ECA, Ms. Marianne Craven, “The Fulbright Taiwan program is a model for the region.” (FSE, 2015, p.

5) This research finds Fulbright Taiwan has gone through a very rough, upheaval history among other Fulbright programs in EAP; all these difficulties had made Fulbright Taiwan a striving, resilient, viable program with vitality.

Likewise, each Fulbright program has its special features and each host country has its purposes and focuses to support the exchange program. Of course, all these sustainable programs have their own success stories, their own difficulties, and their own challenges. In order to explore a good model of international educational exchange for public diplomacy, some distinguished practices of Fulbright programs in EAP were summed up.

The regional ED meetings provided a regular platform for EDs to share their thoughts and practices in managing programs, to tackle difficulties and challenges, and a retreat/arena of brainstorming new initiatives, envisioning future opportunities and possibilities. To some EDs, in particular newly employed, the regional ED’s networking could also serve a support system for counselling, and job shadowing/on-job training to learn practices from veteran EDs. Since, all EDs are colleagues who serves in parallel position in Fulbright Programs, and they work with the same American counterparts. Hence, similar situations or difficulties may happen within region. This research finds the networking could only provide support in spirit,

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but fell short of substance. For example, while an ED facing a conflict with the U.S.

Embassy’s CAO/PAO, sympathy and empathy may arise among other EDs but nothing can be done. For ED in host country, there seems no channel of appeal in the U.S. State

Department, nor in the systems of the Board or host government. Eventually, they themselves have to fight alone, and in most cases they may be defeated. I found many cases in EAP, and one just happened in Europe in 2020.

In terms of legal charters and governance of commissions, this research finds many variances among these 9 bilateral executive agreements. As an initial program, the Fulbright’s China program signed by the ROC government did not set an example for the rest of the Fulbright programs to follow, but became a benchmark for others as a leverage of negotiation. The China program started in 1948 was the only one with no local representation, with voting power, in ‘binational’ commission. Rather, “Advisors to the Board” were named as the Chinese representatives, who had no voices in vote on the Board of Directors. While Australia signed the Fulbright agreement in 1950, it made references to the cases of New Zealand and Great Britain to negotiate a better reciprocal treatment. Even the Philippines, the third signatory nation, has both American and Filipino members on its Board of Directors.

(Maurer, 1949, p. 105)

After the 1961 Fulbright-Hays Act, the U.S. State Department urged for a cost-sharing with host countries. Australia became the first country in EAP to sign the 50-50 cost-sharing agreement with the U.S., beginning in the financial year 1964-65. Since then, the Australian government has kept pace to fund Fulbright Australia at a level of at least 50% for core program’s funding. Furthermore, to not give funding pressure on U.S. side, the Fulbright Australia has created many programs solely funded by Australia government entities. This is one of the most extensive programs collaborations which is funded by a host country in EAP.

New Zealand and Japan followed, signing cost sharing agreements with the U.S.; while other governments, including Taiwan, agreed and continued to make financial contributions to their Fulbright programs in EAP. Without a basis of bilateral agreement or legitimation for

government budgeting, funding from a host country can be unsecured and easily be cut off when officials or regulations change. Taiwan’s case was a good example for that kind of risk and uncertainty. Since 1969, Taiwan’s National Science Council (NSC) first contributed its financial support to the USEF/C, which later became FSE. Later, in 1980, the Ministry of Education (MOE) joined NSC and began its funding to FSE. But, this long-term commitment

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was interrupted and discontinued in 2006 because of a new mid-level official’s interpretation of domestic regulations. After a long process of communications among government

agencies, Taiwan government’s commitment from NSC to FSE was moved to and inherited by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA). What a stressful drama to FSE!

Recently, the increasing ETA programs in EAP are most funded by host country, both from public and private sectors. One of the earliest programs, the ETA program in Korea was made available through Korean Government’s funding; while others receive private or government funding allowing them to increase the placement of ETAs. (Sun & DeMola, 2015, p. 4) Starting in 1992, Korean’s ETA program was first modeled on English teachers of the U.S. Peace Corps in Korea. It was a pioneer program in EAP, a model case for others to learn from, and also had been the largest ETA program in EAP until 2020. The later starting ETA program in Malaysia, beginning in 2006, was also based on an agreement signed between two governments, and as of 2019, Malaysia hosted the third largest ETAs in the world, after Germany and South Korea.

As initially planned, Taiwan would host 129 ETAs in 2020-2021, which was interrupted by COVID-19; and, FSE announced through the IIE website, a call for first year ETA

applications for 145 grants in Taiwan in 2021-2022. Both would have been the largest ETA program in EAP. Taiwan’s ETA program, started in 1995 on an experimental basis, has been self-funded by local governments and sponsored by private donors since its first fulltime program was implanted in Yilan in 2003.

In short, funding sources to Fulbright programs in EAP are now highly dependent on host countries’ contributions, as high as Taiwan’s 83% of annual budget in 2017. This was not new to Fulbright commissions in Europe, which marked as high as 90% financial support from a host country. However, this research finds the dynamic of the governance and the appointment of ED of Fulbright commission had remained unchanged. Partially, this is because the authority of ED appointment is stipulated in a binational agreement. It has not been reviewed or changed, in Taiwan’s case, is written into the 1964 Agreement, and has remained ever since. In the context of new funding sources to Fulbright program, the traditional role of the U.S. Embassy and its officials, who represent the U.S. State

Department, now looks over-weighted to their financial contributions. From the perspectives of host country and for the benefits for their public diplomacy, it is time to consider a change or re-structuring of the binational commissions to reflect the cost-sharing situation. The host

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country needs a strategic plan to effectively use this binational educational exchange for the purpose of public diplomacy, at least to gain a better cost-effectiveness result in mutual understanding.

Aiming international educational exchange for a public diplomacy purpose, the conceptual framework was based on two hypotheses: First, a contact theory suggests that “prejudice may be reduced by equal status contact between majority and minority groups in the pursuit of common goals.” However, contact alone is not necessarily an effective means of improving intergroup relations, the social psychologist Gordon W. Allport acknowledges. (Bettie M. , 2019, p. 213) Second, an opinion leader’s multiplier effects are expected; since they would pass on their personal experiences to others in their home community, even long after the end of the grant period. The elite participant of exchange is expected to become leaders of the target society; and their views will be shared with others and will influence and shape public opinions. Elites are believed to influence a larger audience than non-elites would. Through exchange, influencing elites will, in turn, influence the ideas of many others in the target society.

Based on these two assumptions, two factors will impact the outcomes of a program: the

‘grantees’ themselves and their experiences in the host countries. The Fulbright program has earned its reputation in the academic world globally for its merit-based selections in

educational exchange and for its independence from political interference. (Bettie M. , 2019, p. 217) It was not only regarded as highly competitive programs, but also a high-profile presence in a host country. Some new challenges that Fulbright now faces were far from the imagination when it was first established. For example, as there are many more government funded exchange programs available in the world, the Fulbright Program has been gradually losing its prestige status and financial incentives for recruiting good candidates. In Fulbright Taiwan, since 1979, grants to Taiwanese were mostly only partial grants as a measure to increase grantee numbers; and, this traditional policy faced a high rate of declining. In the early days, most Taiwanese grantees would receive supplementary grants from other sources, but now it seems a joint sponsorship is less possible. Also, stipends to American grantees in Taiwan are comparatively lower than in most commissions in EAP and especially in

mainland China.

Statistics in the region of East Asia and the Pacific showed American applications to awards for ETAs in 2013 to 2015 were in a ratio of 1022/306, 1249/305, and 796/317. To an

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individual country, the ratio of applications to awards for Taiwan ETAs were kept in a fairly stable in 3 to 1 from 2013 to 2020. The ETA program is growing quickly in EAP. In 2011, they were offered in 11 countries with 301 American participants, compared to 317

participants in 2015. And, in 2021-2022 program it was offered to 13 countries and areas, with a total of 422 grants available. Under the circumstance of COVID-19 pandemic not yet contained by late 2020, the real awards may be less than projected. Nevertheless, it is worth keeping watch on the ratio of applicants to award in this regard.

Last, the U.S. Fulbright alumni was founded in 1977 as the ‘Fulbright Association’, with financial support from U.S. State Department. Now, the relationships and networking of U.S.

alumni are one of the major tasks in ECA. Also, all binational commissions were encouraged to establish alumni association in their host countries, aiming for their financial support, networking, and other concerns. In EAP, Japan and Korea are two early successful cases in establishing alumni associations. They are not only generous in financial support but also provide great help in dealing with government agencies. In Philippines, there are four separated alumni groups. Indonesian alumni made its program move to a level of binational commission. Taiwan’s alumni association was not established until 1992, and it had taken more than a decade to realize the idea. Comparatively, Taiwan’s alumni association is weaker in financial contributions to Fulbright and less active. From the perspective of public

diplomacy, Taiwan government can get more involved in U.S. Fulbright alumni association, to establish a support networking of American grantees.