Over the course of 50 years how have the values of Taiwanese society changed? In these post-modern times what ideals does this generation of Taiwanese have and how do people strike a balance in their lives? Let us look for answers in the vast sea of books.

In the media the amount of time and space devoted to financial news is growing, and it's more and more professional. The music accompanying the stock listings at the end of every television news show is now familiar to everyone in Taiwan. Equally ubiquitous are political news reports, which have been especially numerous over the course of the last three months with newspapers carrying two or three pages every day just about changes to the constitution. There may be more emotion in them than constitutional analysis, but the phenomenon itself pricks one's curiosity. In the decade since the repeal of martial law, people have gone from avoiding all discussion of politics to being the "masters" whom the "public servant" politicians serve. But exactly what perspectives on politics do these "masters" have?

In recent years Taiwan has also witnessed a great wave of spiritual searching. Everything from astrological readings and fortune tellings to seven-day Zen Buddhist retreats are on the religious market, and one can choose among them as one pleases. But what to make of the growing number of charlatan masters whose fraudulent money-making schemes have been exposed? When discussing personal finance, politics or spiritualism, everything eventually returns to practical issues involving everyday life. Life these days makes people anxious. Can work be nothing more than earning one's daily bread?

Last issue, we looked at Taiwan society's views on reading, love, marriage and beauty as expressed in the TV program "Conversations About Books." In this issue we are teaming up once again with host Lai Kuo-chou to explore Taiwan's changing views on personal finance, religion, politics and work.

Between earning and spending

When people merely wanted to keep themselves warm and well fed, the lack of spare cash also meant not having to worry about what to do with it. But slowly the economy developed to the point where people had more money than they needed for the bare essentials, and the age of personal finance had arrived. At first, people innocently used their money for down payments on homes, or ferreted it away in fixed deposit plans at banks, or else bought land. "Those who did buy land have become the 'landed gentry' that everyone talks about today," said Lai Kuo-chou.

Taiwan's conception of personal finance has changed a lot. Chang Shui-chiang, editor-in-chief of the Commercial Times, said when he was a guest on the program that during the "golden age" of the last decade, the middle class has risen, government restrictions have been relaxed, and there have been ample business opportunities. A conception of personal finance has become one of the foundations of economic life.

During this time, people have become much wealthier, competition between financial institutions has increased, and financial services have become more diverse and complex. Another guest, Ku Pei-hua, who heads up Citibank's operations in Taiwan, said "Conceptions about personal finance have largely developed just over the last 15 years. Whereas savings used to represent 40 percent of annual income, now it is only 25 percent." The new emphasis on consumption is seen in the 9 million credit cards that Taiwanese now carry. What used to be a status symbol is now accepted in such plebeian locales as movie theaters and night markets.

Currently, 30% of all credit card transactions involve revolving credit, in which one first buys, and then pays in installments with a little interest tacked on. So even consumption has become another rung in the chain of personal finance. A conception of personal finance has thoroughly permeated the lives of modern people, and its pervasiveness is seen in the great variety of books on personal finance to hit the market.

Yet Ku Pei-hua reminded everyone that most of the finance books on the market teach you how to play the stock market and engage in short-term speculation where the risk is correspondingly great. Few books instruct readers from different economic levels about how to plan their finances. She concluded, "The willingness we Taiwanese have to take great financial risks is really quite amazing."

Chang Shui-chiang has the same sort of feeling. He emphasized that this is an age of strict division of labor. Investors ought to respect the experts, turning their money over to them and stepping back into a supervisory role, rather than trying to engage in short-term stock speculation themselves.

Attitudes toward money are changing fast. Although there now are adequate insurance and social welfare systems, we must teach ourselves and our youth to be far-sighted, so that future generations won't have to pay our debts. Ku Pei-hua used to be a hippie, and her parents worried about her future just as parents of the "new, new youth" do today. On the program she suggested that people shouldn't be too worried about the consumerism of the younger generation. After all, the spenders, not the savers, are the ones really creating wealth, because flowing water has more force than stagnant water. Spending can be transformed into a force for promoting social and economic development.

Ku expressed hope that the media can provide more basic skills to investors, transmitting information and a sense of values, instead of encouraging short-term speculation. Chang Shui-chiang, as a member of the media, noted that those putting out the stock pages for newspapers used to intentionally try to stir up speculation for certain stocks, but the quality of their reports has improved greatly in recent years.

Investors ought to make progress in step with this, and the two experts both suggested various books on the market that can serve as excellent financial tools. They also advised people to read more periodicals and form as broad an understanding of finance as they could before devising their own long-term personal finance plans.

The ideal vs. the practical

Striking a balance between what is ideal and what is practical is another difficulty of modern times. Such considerations crop up every day in the realm of politics. Taiwan has passed through a period of protest and suppression and now has entered a phase in which hundreds of political points of view are flowering. On another installment of "Conversations About Books," Chang Mei-hui, an associate professor at Shih Chien University who served for many years as a reporter, and Huang Hwei-chen, publisher and editor-in-chief of the Central Daily News, discussed the history of freedom of expression in Taiwan in terms of three separate post-war periods.

Just after retrocession, while Chiang Kai-shek still ruled, the political climate was closed and conservative, and books about politics were largely propagandistic in nature. The February 28 Incident symbolizes that era of strictly controlled political discussion.

During the rule of Chiang Ching-kuo, because the economy started to take off and the social structure began to loosen a bit, a political opposition surged forward. This combined with local elections caused underground periodicals to flourish.

The era of Lee Teng-hui, who came to power just after martial law was repealed, has been an era of loud voices and free airing of views. Many books of a critical nature and expressing personal agendas have hit the market.

Over the course of five decades, freedom of speech has gradually emerged. Host Lai Kuo-chou recalled that when he was at university, few kinds of political books were available. Those he read were largely translated works that introduced political philosophies and models of governance. Chang Mei-hui stated that these works helped to foster understanding about overall political structures, but did little to engender practical discussion. In the era when underground publications were popular, those publications served the exact opposite function, of criticizing actual policies. Chang described that era as one when the authorities were "reluctant to clamp down and also reluctant to open up," which is to say that the authorities didn't dare to prohibit these works completely but also wouldn't allow them to publish openly. It was a time of great anxiety yet great stimulation.

While anxiety isn't good in itself, it can cause beneficial phenomena. Some people only cared about what went on in their own lives and gave short shrift to politics, missing out on the many good underground publications that encouraged people to reflect and reach balanced judgments. For those people who never read those underground publications, when they suddenly came into contact with books presenting new political ideas after complete press freedom, it was easy to fall into extremist positions.

Lai brought up another point that has people worried. Political works are being crafted more like literary works of fiction. Simultaneously, facts are becoming less and less important and the intellectual standard is dropping. Just look at the call-in talk shows that are now all the rage. In an era of openness, as long as someone is willing to give voice to an opinion, the media is willing to carry it, and anyone can become a political theorist or broadcaster. "Today's media ought to have clear positions," Huang Hwei-chen said, "and not cover up their position under the false pretense of being fair and objective." He suggested that readers ought to read several newspapers. If they only read one, they will definitely be misled.

Religious mystery and thought

Another episode of the show focused on religion. Go to any big bookstore in Taipei and look at its best-seller list. Books about religion and spirituality are often near the front of the list. There used to be few books about religion, and most of those analyzed religious doctrine. Now religious books have expanded in scope and include works that deal with spirituality. These books are adopting a more popular style. Their changes reflect the religious transformation in Taiwan over the last 50 years. They provide a record of how religion has turned from withdrawing from the world to engaging it.

Open up a history of Chinese religion covering the last half century, said program guest Li Chen-ying, a professor of Fujen Catholic University, and you see how it experienced attacks and suppression during the ROC's "new culture movement" and mainland China's Cultural Revolution. For religion in China, the early-mid 20th century was a period of hardship and turmoil. By comparison, the present era is one of great openness. Although religions have been afforded great space in which to move, intellectuals' critiques have largely disappeared, leaving a bit of a vacuum.

Lai Kuo-chou expressed worry about end-of-the-century religious fanaticism in Taiwan. Guest Chung Hui-min, editor-in-chief at a publishing house which has published many translations of foreign religious books, cited America as an example: "Over the last decade, many more students there have choosen courses in religion, and in Taiwan, too, one university after another has been introducing religious studies curriculums."

Recently several influential Taiwanese religious masters have already put their own works onto the market, and there are also many books dealing with religious theory and comparative religions. Lai Kuo-chou reckoned that the rise of the study of comparative religion reveals that religion in Taiwan has moved into a new period of toleration and religious dialogue. Chung said that major religious figures such as the Pope and the Dalai Lama have all explored other religions from the perspective of their own. Over the last century numerous new religions and sects have appeared, and thus there is greater need for communication among them.

"This is a very good phenomenon. Although each religion is unique, they are all working toward the same end," Li Chen-ying said. In particular, religion has constantly stressed the practice of morality, which fits in well with traditional Chinese Confucian thinking. In Taiwan the Buddhists, Taoists, Catholics, Protestants and Yiguandao devotees all stress the importance of morality.

Pressing on with one's work

In the age of manual labor being able and willing to toil endlessly in the fields was very important. Now being happy with one's work is most valued. One executive once said that you shouldn't bury your head in your work, because only by raising your head can you see where you are aiming. Values about work have changed greatly.

The titles on psychology and interpersonal relations that line the shelves of bookstores show that modern people put great stress on the search for self-realization, remarked Chan Hou-sheng, a professor of Sociology at National Taiwan University who is also the assistant Chairman of the Council of Labor Affairs. In speaking of women's self-fulfillment, Hung Hsiou-luan, who is general manager of an accounting firm and also a writer, held that although it is already quite common for women to enter the labor market, where many have reached the upper levels of management, the very highest of executive positions are still all held by men.

Lai Kuo-chou noted that stay-at-home mothers have always been voracious readers, but recently there has also been a growing number of career-women readers. Men are lagging behind. "Perhaps men go out on too many business dinners!" Chan Hou-sheng said laughing. Men are less motivated to seek personal growth, Chan argued, and hence it is even more important for them to push themselves to do it.

(The show's website: http://www.kcstudio.com.tw)

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Taiwan's various religions have recently been embracing religious dialogue and shifting their focus from withdrawing from the world to engagement with it.

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Working at home is a new trend in employment, and such workers often stress the importance of creativity in their jobs. Most illustrators of children's books have home studios.