The Sunflower Movement, Ten Years On: Taiwan’s January 6 Insurrection?

Written by Leon Kunz.

Image credit: 2021 storming of the United States Capitol DSC09254-2 (50820534063) (retouched) by Tyler Merbler from USA/ Wikimedia Commons, license: CC BY 2.0 DEED.

The Sunflower Movement was a student-led occupation of Taiwan’s parliament in early 2014 that claimed to “protect democracy”. Critics have compared it to the January 6 storming of the U.S. Capitol by supporters of U.S. President Trump that occurred in 2021 in support of his efforts to overturn the results of a democratic election. Was the Sunflower Movement a similar insurrection?

I have asked U.S. students to contrast the two legislative protests in the past to pique their interest in Taiwan Politics in the classroom. While some analysts may, for good reason, reject the comparison outright, the tenth anniversary of Taiwan’s occupation is a fitting occasion to assess the two very different “incidents” from the perspective of social movement studies. Johnston identifies broadly three “dimensions of social movement analysis”: the “structural sphere” (who are the actors involved?), the “ideational-interpretative sphere” (what are the driving ideas and values?), and the “performative sphere” (what is the protest repertoire?). Even a quick comparison based on this framework shows that the two mobilisations shared no commonalities other than that they each disrupted parliamentary proceedings. Whereas what occurred on January 6 was a violent assault on democratic institutions, the Sunflower Movement was a nonviolent civil disobedience movement in support of liberal democracy.

First, with regard to the structural sphere, Taiwan’s parliamentary occupation was a stage of a broader movement against a controversial trade deal with China. While student groups led the spontaneous occupation of the legislative chamber, the encampment involved citizens from all walks of life. Although the opposition party supported the Sunflowers, many of the occupiers did not fully trust politicians and kept a distance to avoid overt partisanism. Instead, student leaders coordinated strategic decisions with a coalition of NGOs and university professors who had long spearheaded the struggle against the trade pact. Over time, they set up elaborate representative leadership structures that provided a degree of legitimacy to strategic decision-making. The relatively high degree of organisation and cohesion enabled a peaceful withdrawal after 23 days following the shelving of the trade deal.

The insurrection, by contrast, was the sudden storming of Congress by disgruntled Trump supporters seeking to halt the certification of the 2020 presidential elections that formed the culmination of Trump’s campaign to remain in power. The reluctantly outgoing president played a key role in instigating the attack that proceeded from his rally near the Capitol building, a behaviour for which Trump was later impeached. The mob of insurrectionists was largely composed of white men from Trump’s hardcore base from across the country. It involved extreme right-wing groups such as the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers, but the assault did not turn into a sustained occupation and develop organised leadership structures. The building was cleared by law enforcement within a couple of hours and the counting of the election results was completed.

Second, in terms of ideas, the Sunflowers’ main slogan was to “protect democracy and retract the trade deal.” There were concerns about the potential negative impacts that a trade pact with authoritarian China, which has long sought to absorb its smaller neighbour, could have on Taiwan’s hard-won democracy, security, and economy. The occupation was sparked by the extraordinary attempt of a legislator of the ruling party to conclude the parliamentary review of the deal within 30 seconds. Participants voiced a nuanced procedural critique focused on the alleged “Black Box”-style in which the trade deal had been negotiated behind closed doors and was later pushed through the ratification process by an overreaching executive without adequate review. They developed detailed proposals for comprehensive oversight legislation for trade bills to avoid such controversies in the future.

Despite Chinese claims that the Sunflower Movement constituted a U.S.-instigated “colour revolution”, the self-organised occupiers did not stage a coup to overthrow the Taiwanese government but instead narrowly focused on the trade pact and its ratification process. The Sunflower occupation was a response to the attempted circumvention of established democratic norms of parliamentary deliberation by the ruling party. The January 6 Capitol storming, by contrast, was a clear coup attempt that directly challenged the fundamental and routine democratic tradition of a peaceful transfer of power. The insurrectionists were mobilised by the president’s false claims that the election had been “stolen” through widespread voter fraud. Underpinning the attack was an authoritarian mixture of Trumpism, white nationalism, as well as conspiracy theories such as QAnon. This is an ideology that was prominently represented by the so-called “QAnon Shaman,” a protester who stood out due to face paint and a horned headdress.

Third, the protest repertoire of the two parliamentary mobilisations could not have been more different. The Sunflower protesters engaged in civil disobedience as a legitimate form of political expression in a democratic country. The legislature was slightly damaged to gain entry. The unarmed protesters, however, went to great lengths to maintain an orderly occupation to maximise safety and legitimacy. They self-organised picket teams, safety lanes, medical teams, and even recycling. It was only because of these efforts that the occupation could be maintained for 23 days. While an attempt by some protesters to storm the Executive Yuan to raise pressure on the government was cleared by the police, the Sunflower Movement was overwhelmingly disciplined and nonviolent. It was a remarkably cheerful and humorous movement that involved rallies, public deliberations, music, and art creation. Ultimately, the occupiers withdrew peacefully and even cleaned up after themselves. In 2018, Taiwan’s High Court subsequently ruled that leading activists were rightly acquitted through the justice system and affirmed that the Sunflower protest represented “an expression of democracy”.

The January 6 mobilisation, by contrast, was a violent mob attack on parliamentary democracy. The insurrectionists, some of whom carried weapons including pepper spray, stun guns, baseball bats, and even firearms, assaulted police officers who tried to protect the building and the unfolding democratic process. Around 140 police officers were injured during the confrontation, four of whom committed suicide in the aftermath of the traumatic event. Four rioters died on January 6, including one who was shot by law enforcement outside the house chamber. The day before the event, a pipe bomb was placed outside the headquarters of the democratic and republican parties. During the breach of parliament, there were chants to “hang” Vice President Mike Pence, who refused to follow Trump’s order to interfere with the certification. Other lawmakers, such as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, whose office was breached during the assault, were also threatened. The right-wing insurrection posed a clear threat to the safety of elected officials and staff from both sides of the aisle, necessitating the hasty evacuation of the affected premises. Over 1265 insurrectionists later faced a range of criminal charges, and many received prison sentences.

In sum, even a cursory comparison shows that claims that Taiwan’s Sunflower Movement was an insurrection akin to the January 6 riot are baseless. The storming of the U.S. Capitol was a violent attack on parliamentary democracy that was a symptom of the rise of authoritarian populism and political dysfunction in an increasingly polarised society. The Sunflower Movement, by contrast, was an instance of nonviolent civil disobedience that is a non-routine component of the political process in a democratic system. It was a hopeful moment in Taiwanese history that underlined the island state’s status as a resilient democracy situated in a challenging geopolitical environment—a nation where freedom of expression is valued, and political differences can be resolved peacefully.

Leon N. Kunz is affiliated with the Department of Government at the University of Texas at Austin, where he helped build a new Center for Taiwan Studies as a Postdoctoral Fellow. His PhD thesis, completed at SOAS University of London, explored how participants in Taiwan’s Sunflower and Hong Kong’s Umbrella Movements conceived and practised democracy in order to reflect on broader questions of strategy, prefiguration, and deliberation. His research on the two movements was supported by SOAS, the CCKF, and the CCS of Taiwan’s National Central Library. Leon’s wider research interests include deliberative democracy, the politics of memory, queer politics, and East Asian international relations.

This article was published as part of a special issue on ‘Tenth Anniversary of the Sunflower and Umbrella Movements‘.