The poster, printed by the Weiwu Park Promotion Association (WPPA), not only displayed the desire of the people of Kaohsiung for more greenery, it also marked the birth of a "green revolution."
Entering the basement of the "Life Eye Clinic" in Kaohsiung, you see a long and narrow room. In front are several desks, while the back half is a conference room. The layout and decor are simple; the mood is quiet.
Surprisingly, this is the headquarters of Kaohsiung's "green revolution," bringing together a number of environmental groups: the Takao Green Association for Ecology and Humane Studies, the Takao Hill Association for a Natural Park, The Green Association for Protection of the Kaoping River, the Love River Association for Culture and Ecology. . . . They are concerned about protecting the natural environment, city infrastructure, and culture and the arts. Activities cover everything from lobbying national-level legislative and executive officials and local government to planning events for broad citizen participation.
"We are all housed in the same place because these organizations are all offshoots from the WPPA. And by sharing office facilities, we can save resources," explains Huang Hui-jung.
Interestingly, there is no scent of gunpowder in the air at this revolutionary base. Huang tells us that this is because the group eschews tactics like large demonstrations and protests. Instead, it prefers persuasion and face-to-face dialogue.
Anyone familiar with the development of the environmental movement in Taiwan will know that their methods seem to violate the previous patterns of social movements in Kaohsiung. Look back, for example, to 1987, when the citizens of the Houchin District laid siege to an industrial site to protest the construction of a naphtha cracker by the China Petroleum Corporation. Later, in the townships of Linyuan and Tashe, villagers again went out en masse and surrounded sites to protest pollution from petrochemical plants. When residents of Yungan Rural Township were resisting the construction of a large electrical power plant, police were called in to clear the site of protesting residents, and a bloody clash resulted.
In contrast, the moderation of the WPPA and its affiliates often is a surprise to people.
Discovering green space
However, though their approach may be gentle, they are by no means less effective. You can see this by looking more closely at the WPPA, the oldest of these groups.
Camp Weiwu was a military training facility under the Ministry of National Defense. In 1979, it was decided that the location should be transferred to other uses. After the plan was revealed, this land-67 hectares of prime real estate right on the border of Kaohsiung City and Kaohsiung County-was seen to be worth a fortune.
Originally the Defense Ministry planned to use the land for residential housing. But the local governments, elected officials at all levels, and scholars and experts, all lobbied for different proposals. There were people calling for the land to be used for commercial real estate, for a trade center, for a new city government office complex, for a university. . . . The argument raged for years.
Tseng Kuei-hai, a doctor at Hsinyi Hospital in Kaohsiung, feeling that Kaohsiung seriously lacked green space, argued that Camp Weiwu should be turned into a nature park to improve the quality of the local environment, and he formed the WPPA. Lobbying by the organization was ultimately successful: Those in charge and other interested parties were persuaded to abandon concerns of profit and alter their plans.
This was surprising, because in the early 1990s, while social movements in Taiwan had already begun to take embryonic shape, it was still considered impossible for a civic group to change a government decision.
The WPPA targeted key ministries and decision-makers for lobbying. At first it was very difficult even to make contact with these people. "The Public Construction Commission, which is in fact the key decision-maker on public works, is nearly invisible. The Defense Ministry has always worn an awe-inspiring mask of mystery. And the Construction and Planning Administration is only an implementing body, which does whatever decision-makers tell it to," says Tseng. Just to reach these agencies, he had to win the support of elected officials at each level and of the city and county mayors. It was only by relying on their support that Tseng was able to win an opportunity to communicate with these agencies.
The departments on the organizational chart of the WPPA clearly reveals their strategies and methods for promoting their cause: information and publicity; public relations and lobbying; and public events.
Gentle pressure
Information includes leaflets, posters, stickers, and small booklets. There have been frequent high-impact press releases, reporting information and underlying goals related to WPPA events. Members of the WPPA and like-minded authors write articles for the media, extolling the organization's ideals. Last year, the Takao Green Association for Ecology and Humane Studies collected materials about the group's experiences and published them in books entitled The Green Revolution in Southern Taiwan and Takao Hill Ideology. These have attracted much public attention and have also been purchased by other environmental groups as reference material.
The Public Relations people mostly handle lobbying. The targets of their lobbying include the office of the mayor of Kaohsiung; elected officials at the municipal, county, provincial, and national level; and the Executive Yuan, especially the ministries of Interior and Defense. The Activities department holds press conferences, lectures, seminars, hearings, academic conferences, and events for the general public.
The WPPA enhances the persuasiveness of its positions by drawing on expert advice and the experience of other nations. Chen Shun-sheng, director of neurology and internal medicine at Kaohsiung Hospital, often goes abroad for medical conferences. Everywhere he goes, he procures a city map and marks out the green space in a clear and detailed way. This material can later be used to help persuade the government and the public to accept WPPA recommendations.
The methods of the WPPA have left a deep impression on agencies and people they have come in contact with. Kaohsiung mayor Wu Tun-yi avers that through the process of the genesis of the WPPA one can see the maturing of citizen participation in politics. "It is something rare in the history of local self-government here, in the history of the local environmental movement, and even in the history of urban development."
The WPPA worked to give Kaohsiung its "left lung." Its "right lung," meanwhile, was preserved for the city by the Takao Hill Association for a Natural Park (THA).
Takao Hill covers 1000 hectares along the northeast edge of Kaohsiung. In the Japanese occupation era, it was listed as protected woodland, and logging, hunting, and development were banned. After the ROC government took over from the Japanese in 1945, the area was placed under military jurisdiction, and the area remained in its natural condition, leaving it as virtually the only oasis of green in the city.
In 1989, the city government opened up the eastern part of the mountain below 250 meters for recreational use. This created a huge inflow of visitors. However, with visitors having little regard for the environment, Takao Hill's environment quickly suffered serious damage. Garbage was strewn everywhere. The trails widened as more and more people used them. And rare flora and fauna were vicimtized; for example, the Formosan rock monkey was hunted and trapped.
In 1993, a group of WPPA members formed the THA. In cooperation with the Kaohsiung Bird Watching Society and other groups, they trained park guides. Through guided tours they educated people to change their recreational habits, steadily restoring the pristine appearance of the mountain.
A torn mosquito net
"The terrible environment has been the main factor motivating the environmental movement in Kaohsiung," says Wu Chin-fa of The Commons Daily, Kaohsiung's main local paper. Since the beginning-from the industrial sieges and the street demonstrations-Kaohsiung's citizens have participated more intensely in environmental actions than people in other places.
Compared to elsewhere, the condition of the Kaohsiung environment is really enough to anger local residents. From Takao Hill, in the city's northeast section, you can see the city stretched out, long and narrow, from north to south. To the immediate right are densely packed grey residential buildings and high-rises in the downtown. Electrical power stations and petrochemical and metal industry plants are crowded along the coast and the Kaoping River. Oil tanks, incinerator towers, and smokestacks look like pillars to a wall surrounding the city. To the left is a low mountain, which has been half shaved away for material to make concrete; bald and grey, it has an eerie appearance. Looking slightly upward into the sky, you see layers of dark clouds, covering this southern city like a ratty old mosquito net.
Because Kaohsiung harbor has a huge capacity, and is a pivotal spot for routes to southeast Asia, in the Japanese occupation era the authorities made it a concentration point for heavy industry and petroleum refining. After the outbreak of the war in the Pacific, Japan used Kaohsiung as a base for advancing southward, and established many military facilities there. Ever since, Kaohsiung has been heavily tinted with heavy industry and military uses.
Inheriting its foundations and traditions from the Japanese era, Kaohsiung continued to have the onerous duty of being a center for electrical power, petrochemicals, iron and steel, and processing. By the beginning of the 1990s, there were nearly 6000 factories located within the city, which is an average of 60 to 80 per square kilometer. This figure is many times higher than the average of five to ten per square kilometer in other locations in Taiwan.
While industrialization brought wealth to Kaohsiung, and made it the foremost metropolis in southern Taiwan, it has had a very serious impact on the environment.
Kaohsiung's air quality is poor due to emissions from industrial plants. In a number of the serious protests that have occurred within the past decade, the trigger has been the release or escape of toxic gases from factories.
Even more renowned is the poor quality of Kaohsiung's water. The main source of drinking water, the Kaoping River, has been heavily polluted by wastes from the industry and aquaculture farms along its banks. Residents dare not consume the water, but instead buy from outlying cities and counties. One professor of environmental engineering joked that in Taipei, you have to boil the water for an extra five minutes to make sure it is safe; in Kaohsiung, you have to boil it until it evaporates completely.
Where are our parks?
Around 1990, because of over-development, the amount of green space in Kaohsiung fell dramatically. "It only accounted for about 5% of the city's area, or an average of only 1.2 square meters per person. By comparison, the figure in London is 22.8, and in New York it is 19.2. Even in crowded Taipei, it is just over 3," notes Huang Hui-jung.
The health risks of such a poor environment are shocking. Cancer became the leading cause of death in Kaohsiung in the early 1980s, two years earlier than in Taiwan Province.
Having taken all he could take of the deteriorating environment, Dr. Tseng decided to dedicate himself to environmental work, and organized the WPPA. A lover of literature and a well-known poet and essayist, he grew up as a child of nature in the countryside in Pingtung County. Tseng was invited to go to the US in the summer of 1990 for a conference on Taiwanese literature. While there, he took the opportunity to see a few parks, and was impressed. In particular, a lily pond in a park near Philadelphia left a deeply beautiful impression.
"When I put my face up against the lilies floating in the pond, I was so moved that I found it hard to contain myself. The beauty of the soulful colors and shapes of the petals left me transfixed by the side of the pond for a long time, unable to leave." Besides being impressed with the surroundings, he was also moved to ask: "Where are our parks?"
After returning to Taiwan, when he heard about the Camp Weiwu planning debate, he immediately jumped into the fray, advocating that the area be made into a park. Arguing that a park would benefit citizens' health and the city's appearance, he first won a positive response from the medical and arts and literary communities. Quickly turning his words into action, on March 28 of the following year, he organized the Weiwu Park Promotion Association, and launched information, writing, and lobbying activities. In less than a month, stickers with the slogan "Green Dream-Weiwu Park" were spread into every corner of the city and in the back windows of many cars as well.
The black highway
Another leading figure in the WPPA is Wang Chia-hsiang, who is also the editor of the literary page at the Taiwan Times. When he got involved in environmental protection, he lived in Kangshan, outside the city. Each day driving to work at dawn he had to take the Kaonan Highway. "It would be no exaggeration to describe this highway as a world of darkness," he wrote in an essay of his experiences. "Ever since I first came to this area to work, it has been the same-being broadened and constantly dug up and filled back in, with the most potholes and accidents of any road, it is a road of death." In particular, motorcyclists have to fight for road space with tractor-trailers and gravel trucks, squeezed into a narrow space between the fast lane and a ditch at the side of the road. After two years of enduring this, he finally bought a jeep to drive to work, because only a jeep-being so high off the ground-can cope with the appalling condition of the highway.
What's really depressing about this highway is the desolate vista presented by the heavy industry lining both sides. Whatever kind of grey and ugly industrial form you can think of-concrete factories, petroleum refineries, rusting old oil drums, discarded tire dumps, corrugated-steel structures put up without regard to building codes, construction machinery parks, steel smelters, chemical companies, oil pipeline, huge storage towers-they are all here. There's only one thing you can't find, in fact: a tall green tree.
However, on a side road near the highway, outside of a refinery there is a "green Great Wall" of vegetation, courtesy of compensation funds paid by China Petroleum after the movement to protest the Fifth Naphtha Cracker. There is also a wall specially built to shut out the dismal view of the plant. In addition, they have done a great job "greenifying" the employee housing and putting in strips of greenery all around. Amidst flowers and trees, one certainly doesn't feel like one is at a polluted petrochemical site.
Comparing this road to the Kaonan Highway, Wang Chia-hsiang says with a sigh: "On both roads there are refineries. Over here, the residents got the treatment they deserve, albeit only because they protested. Over there, it is a desolate highway, and has become a ghostly stretch of land. The Kaonan Highway seems to just cry out the unhappy feelings of the people of Kaohsiung."
Besides dissatisfaction with the local environment, Kaohsiung people have also long felt that the central government gives more attention to cities in the north of Taiwan.
For example, the people of Taipei didn't even have to protest and they got themselves Yangmingshan National Park. And, whereas water in Kaohsiung is undrinkable, the water quality in Taipei's Feitsui Reservoir is ranked highest in Taiwan. Feeling that things are out of balance, the people of Kaohsiung have been especially active in political and social movements. And it's not only Taipei that gets favored treatment: "It's also better in Taichung, which gets special treatment as the seat of the provincial government. So Taichung has been well-known for many years for its green streets and parks, the science museum, and art museums. In Kaohsiung, the sole art museum was only secured after street protests by residents," notes Wang.
Expert and rational
Compared to the early stages of environmental activism, the green revolution of the WPPA and its affiliates has had a broader impact, and those involved have stronger backgrounds and expertise than their predecessors.
"I have always thought that it could be said that this movement is an idealistic one of middle-class intellectuals," suggests Dr. Tseng. The backgrounds and party affiliations of WPPA members are different from those of the masses protesting pollution. Although there are less than 100 members of the WPPA, most are doctors, writers, artists, architects, and so on, who can contribute money and skills, and who are idealistic. With such backgrounds, naturally they adopt methods different from the street actions of the early period.
Some people suggest that the WPPA is less intense and confrontational in its green revolution because its members are not directly victimized by pollution. But Tseng gives different reasons why the organization was founded on the principles of eschewing confrontation and refusing to mobilize the public for protests. "In terms of public policy, if you want to start a mass demonstration, it's virtually an admission that you are defeated, that you have run out of options. We favor lobbying through reason, persuasion, and face-to-face discussion. Because we have a valid point to make, we are very confident when we lobby, and understand how to give our counterparts appropriate respect." The members identify with these ideals.
Within the Takao Green Association for Ecology and Humane Studies (TGA) there is a "lawyers' group" with 35 attorneys, modeled on the experience of environmental groups in the US. "There are more than 300 attorneys in one US environmental association. They provide legal services and constitute a highly expert, powerful force for monitoring events," explains Wu Chin-fa. The lawyers group at the TGA provides similar services. For example, when an illegal structure has been built on a protected site, damaging the land, the lawyers file a stream of legal documents, compelling the city to go out and tear the structure down.
Dr. Huang Wen-long, who founded the Life Eye Clinic, came to know Tseng Kuei-hai while studying in Kaohsiung Medical College. Huang has given over his office basement to the environmental groups free of charge. He says that, from the viewpoint of the larger environment, any appeals for reform must start from some practical problem to be dealt with, and find a foothold in the legal system.
The success of the efforts related to Weiwu Park and Takao Hill have led most other organizations which have developed in Kaohsiung since that time to follow the same model. One example is the Love River Association for Culture and Ecology (LRA).
Concern for mountains and rivers
The Ai River (Love River) is the only river within Kaohsiung's city limits. It was a renowned and favorite landmark. But starting in the 1960s, the pollution became increasingly severe, until the river water reeked and people came to be disgusted with it. To clean up the river and restore life to it, the LRA decided to adopt the role of a pressure group lobbying city government agencies and educating the public.
In February of 1996, once the LRA was established, they sponsored large-group bike-riding tours along the river. Guides who had been put through special training explained in detail the history and cultural traditions and the natural ecology of the river to participating citizens. This allowed many people to see first-hand how garbage and pollution was suffocating the river.
"First approach things from a cultural angle, to give people a sentimental affinity for the river. Then explain in analytical, rational terms the importance of the river's ecology," says LRA executive secretary Chen Ren-yeong. This logic is based on his own personal experience.
Born and raised in Kaohsiung, Chen left his home for a decade, coming to Taipei to attend university and graduate school and to work. He moved back to Kaohsiung only in 1993, and only then did he discover how much his old hometown had changed. To refamiliarize himself with the old stomping grounds, he signed up to be a guide with the Takao Hill Association. "The more I came to understand it, the more I treasured this piece of earth. And the more I treasured it, the more I wanted to understand it," he recalls. Thus, when the LRA was formed, he turned from volunteer into full-time staff, and dedicated himself wholly to the job of environmental protection.
One thing worth celebrating is that their efforts have preserved a section of river dike. The Ai River is 15 kilometers long, of which 10.5 kilometers flow through Kaohsiung City. To prevent floods, long ago the city government put up tall dikes on both banks. These upright, steep dikes not only cut people off from access to the river, they also stifle plant growth along the banks, adversely affecting the ecology. Fortunately, there were still 300 meters of river where no dikes had yet been built. The LRA persuaded the city to change its original plans and instead build more environmentally-friendly dikes with gradual inclines. "We hope that this section of dike can be a model, to encourage the city government to tear down the other perpendicular dikes and replace them with ones of moderate inclines," says Chen.
When the scholar meets the soldier
Despite this, the various groups in the Takao Green Association have not by any means been without disappointments. Weiwu Park, planning for which has been ongoing for many years, still exists only on paper, and there are still many potential pitfalls. For example, originally the bulk of the budget was to come from the Construction and Planning Administration of the Ministry of the Interior, but the CPA has already put money into Hsichingpu Park in the city center, and doesn't want to pay for Weiwu as well. The CPA feels that funding of Weiwu Park should be the responsibility of local government. However, "given the reality that local governments have only very limited fiscal resources, plans for the Weiwu Park may have to be seriously scaled back," worries WPPA director Lu You-yi.
Two years ago, the Love River Association mapped out a plan for an Ai River Park on the stretch from the Kaohsiung Bridge to the Chungcheng Bridge. But, for a variety of reasons, residents there became a major obstacle. This district, Yencheng, is the old commercial center of Kaohsiung and was famous across Taiwan for its "underground street" shopping arcade. Sadly, however, a fire gutted the arcade. Meanwhile, eastern Kaohsiung was gradually taking over the role as the city's commercial center, and many businesses moved there. Commercial activity in Yencheng fell sharply. Given that there is little land in the area, and much of it is low-lying and subject to flooding from seawater, local residents want to use the land that exists to revive the area's attractiveness to shoppers (perhaps by building a shopping center or amusement park on the land). Thus the local residents have become an obstacle to the park.
The Kaoping River is another place that has left activists filled with a sense of frustration and powerlessness. Because the river basin is partly in Kaohsiung and partly in Pingtung County, and the river is closely connected to the lives of aboriginal people, plus the fact that gravel and aquaculture operators have long been exploiting the river, it is as if activists are facing a multi-headed monster. The group focusing on this area, called the Green Association for Protection of the Kaoping River, feels helpless.
"When we talk with businessmen and government agencies, when we cannot persuade them with reason, at times like that I think that maybe protest would be more useful after all," says Tsai Hsing-e, director of the Kaoping group.
Despite saying this, however, whenever she passes by the Weiwu Park site on her way to inspect the river, she thinks back on the origins of their revolution. Though morale was high in those days, in fact at the bottom of their hearts they were not really convinced that their dream could be realized. Today such dreams are more and more a practical reality, something they never anticipated at the beginning. "Maybe one day the green dream can come true for the Kaoping River, too!"
p.79
Kaohsiung is the largest metropolis in southern Taiwan. A center of heavy industrial development, it appears to be a jungle of iron and concrete. Environmental activists are endeavoring to mount a "green revolution" and break through the grey barrier.
p.80
Though living in a city, people still want some green in their environment. This desire of the little guy has bred great vibrancy into the environmental protection movement in Kaohsiung.
p.81
Camp Weiwu was a training center under the Ministry of National Defense. When news that the land would be given over to other purposes was made public, Dr. Tseng Kuei-hai and others formed the Weiwu Park Promotion Association, hoping to make real their green dream for Kaohsiung.
p.82
There are many Formosan rock monkeys on Takao Hill, which has long been nicknamed "Monkey Mountain." Even today you can still see happy scenes of interaction between monkey and human.
p.83
Often people on Takao Hill provide water for passers-by.
p.84
Before the 1970s, the Ai (Love) River in Kaohsiung was frequented by city residents, leaving many beautiful memories behind. Today, because of pollution, people keep their distance.
p.85
Chen Ren-yeong returned to his hometown of Kaohsiung after years away. To refamiliarize himself with the place, he joined in environmental protection work. He hopes to bring the Ai River back to its former state and revive those warm memories of yesteryear.
p.86
The Kaoping River is the main source of drinking water for the Kaohsiung-Pingtung area. Its severe pollution causes those who come within olfactory range to blanch.
p.87
Tsai Hsing-e looked on at the tree-planting activity at the mouth of the Kaoping River sponsored by her group last year. Do the growing trees symbolize that there is hope for the revival of the river as a whole?
Kaohsiung is the largest metropolis in southern Taiwan. A center of heavy industrial development, it appears to be a jungle of iron and concrete. Environmental activists are endeavoring to mount a "green revolution" and break through the grey barrier.
Though living in a city, people still want some green in their environment. This desire of the little guy has bred great vibrancy into the environmental protection movement in Kaohsiung.
Camp Weiwu was a training center under the Ministry of National Defense. When news that the land would be given over to other purposes was made public, Dr. Tseng Kuei-hai and others formed the Weiwu Park Promotion Association, hoping to make real their green dream for Kaohsiung.
@List.jpg?w=522&h=410&mode=crop&format=webp&quality=80)
@List.jpg?w=522&h=410&mode=crop&format=webp&quality=80)
