How Taiwan Is Building Its Cultural Soft Power — Jay Chau

Cultural outreach is not simply about showcasing a society’s history and artistic traditions. It is also an important means of engaging with the world and shaping international perceptions. In recent years, Taiwan has attracted growing attention on the global cultural stage through the development of its cultural soft power, while making its own contribution to international cultural exchange.

Songshan Cultural and Creative Park has become a key platform for Taipei’s cultural and creative industries. Through the adaptive reuse of historic buildings and sustained cultural policy support, it has evolved into a public cultural space that brings together creative businesses, cultural exchange, and international engagement.

The site was formerly the Songshan Tobacco Factory, one of Taipei’s historic industrial complexes. Its transformation has provided physical space for local creative talent while bringing together a wide range of creative disciplines and encouraging cross-sector collaboration. Designers, artists, technologists and other creative professionals are able to interact and exchange ideas in the same environment. Through policy support and the integration of resources, the park has also helped local Taiwanese creative projects develop and reach wider markets.

Taiwan’s historical and cultural landscape has been shaped by multiple influences, including those from mainland China, Japan and the West, creating a distinctive multicultural environment. This cultural hybridity provides the creative industries with a rich source of inspiration and resources, while encouraging collaboration across different cultural backgrounds.

Compared with places where traditional culture is treated primarily as something to be preserved, Taipei’s cultural policies have generally taken a more open and flexible approach. Cultural policy is not limited to presentation and preservation; greater emphasis is placed on commercialization and outward cultural exchange. New forms of artistic expression and creative experimentation are encouraged, creating more possibilities for the cultural and creative industries. Through international exhibitions, partnerships and market-oriented promotional activities, local creative work can be introduced to audiences and markets around the world.

Adjusting Policy Quickly to Market Demand

One of the notable features of Taipei’s cultural policy is its flexibility. The city government has demonstrated an ability to adjust policies in response to changing market conditions, ensuring that the creative industries receive appropriate support at different stages of development.

Small and medium-sized creative enterprises, in particular, have benefited from targeted measures such as rental subsidies, tax incentives and financing support. These policies help creative businesses manage the financial and resource constraints they often face during their early stages. The flexibility of the system also allows policies to evolve in response to market changes and feedback from businesses, helping the sector maintain its competitiveness and vitality.

At the same time, the government works with universities, training institutions and creative enterprises to develop a steady pipeline of talent. Universities offer courses tailored to the needs of the creative industries, while working professionals can access government-supported workshops and management programmes designed to strengthen their skills. Entrepreneurship programmes also provide start-ups with practical guidance and opportunities to learn from the experience of others, helping them navigate the risks of building a new business.

Taipei’s cultural policy also illustrates what can emerge from close collaboration between government and the private sector.

Eslite, one of Taiwan’s most recognizable cultural brands, has become an important cultural window for the island. Beyond selling books and cultural products, it organizes cultural events and exhibitions, and has established a distinctive lifestyle-oriented hotel within Songshan Cultural and Creative Park. Its 24-hour bookstore in the park has itself become a popular destination for international visitors to Taipei.

For start-ups operating within the park, the market provides a natural process of selection. Some businesses eventually leave, while others survive and continue to grow. Creative products that demonstrate strong market potential may subsequently be introduced through Eslite’s network of stores, giving them access to broader markets across Asia.

Through collaboration with emerging creative businesses, Eslite expands the range of cultural products available to consumers while helping Taiwanese creative ideas reach a wider audience. The relationship creates a mutually reinforcing ecosystem between creative production and commercial distribution.

An Independent Public Broadcasting System Helps Taiwanese Drama Go Global

In recent years, acclaimed television productions backed and produced by Taiwan’s Public Television Service (PTS), including *The World Between Us*, have demonstrated how television can become an important vehicle for Taiwan’s cultural influence. By addressing social issues, promoting diversity and experimenting with new forms of storytelling, such productions have helped introduce Taiwan’s cultural perspectives to international audiences.

To some extent, Taiwanese drama has developed an international profile comparable to that of Korean drama.

One of PTS’s greatest strengths lies in its institutional independence from both political and commercial pressures. This enables it to address sensitive social issues without being driven solely by market considerations.

PTS is operated by the Public Television Service Foundation, which receives government funding as well as social donations. This funding structure reduces its dependence on advertising revenue and gives it greater capacity to produce programmes in the public interest over the long term. Independent mechanisms for content oversight also help safeguard quality and diversity.

Such an institutional structure does more than support ambitious productions. It allows public broadcasting to fulfil a broader social responsibility by providing space for diverse perspectives and encouraging public discussion.

The production of *The World Between Us*, for example, was supported by Taiwan’s Forward-looking Infrastructure Development Program. Its budget represented only a tiny fraction—roughly one-thousandth—of the NT$43.4 billion in digital infrastructure subsidies under the programme. Yet the series generated an unexpectedly strong response.

Had the project depended entirely on advertising revenue, a drama dealing so directly with difficult social issues might have struggled to secure commercial backing. The relative independence of public broadcasting, however, gave its creators the freedom to explore uncomfortable realities without sacrificing depth in pursuit of mass-market appeal.

The series not only generated extensive discussion in Taiwan but also received international recognition. It was eventually acquired for broadcast in 22 countries and territories and received a rating of 9.4 on Douban, a major Chinese-language film and television review platform.

PTS also demonstrates a willingness to accommodate diverse perspectives. Unlike purely commercial broadcasters, public television has greater room to explore politically sensitive subjects and portray the complexities of society.

*Wave Makers*, for example, is a political drama that examines Taiwan’s electoral culture and the work of political staffers. Through its portrayal of elections, it explores the workings of Taiwan’s democratic system and the tensions between political ideals and political reality.

The series also examines the difficulties faced by politicians and the differing understandings of democracy across social groups, offering audiences a more nuanced perspective on the strengths and contradictions of democratic politics.

Its treatment of the death penalty, for instance, was widely interpreted as an allusion to the Democratic Progressive Party and then-President Tsai Ing-wen. The DPP’s party platform supports the abolition of the death penalty, yet after returning to power it repeatedly argued that there was not yet sufficient social consensus to pursue legislative reform.

The series’ depiction of workplace sexual harassment, together with the line “We can’t just let this go, can we?”, also resonated strongly with Taiwan’s #MeToo movement, which spread across different sectors of society in 2023.

Another defining feature of Taiwan’s public broadcasting system is its encouragement of creative experimentation. Filmmakers and writers are given room to explore unconventional narrative structures and difficult social questions.

*Imperfect Us*, for example, examines the choices ordinary people make when confronted with moral dilemmas. By exploring the complexity of everyday life and the blurred boundaries between right and wrong, the series challenges conventional television storytelling and invites audiences to participate in the moral questions raised by the narrative.

The value of PTS productions therefore extends beyond entertainment. They seek to stimulate reflection and public discussion, enriching Taiwan’s television culture while giving Taiwanese productions greater visibility on the international stage.

Bringing the World In—and Taking Taiwan Out

Taiwanese museums have also played an important role in both cultural exchange and international outreach. Led by institutions such as the National Palace Museum in Taipei and the privately run Chimei Museum in Tainan, Taiwan has pursued a two-way cultural strategy: bringing Western civilization into Taiwan while taking Chinese civilization and Taiwan’s cultural perspectives abroad.

The National Palace Museum, one of the world’s leading museums, holds nearly 700,000 works of art and cultural artefacts. Over the past decade, it has organized overseas exhibitions and collaborations with major museums in countries including Japan, Italy, the United States and Australia.

It is also planning an exhibition at the National Museum in the Czech Republic next year, featuring selected treasures from the museum’s collection under the title *100 Treasures from the National Palace Museum and Their Stories*. Such international collaborations do more than create opportunities for audiences abroad to encounter Chinese art and culture. They also provide platforms for dialogue between Chinese and Western cultural traditions, while strengthening Taiwan’s presence on the international cultural stage.

The National Palace Museum’s international engagement has also encouraged other Taiwanese museums to expand their own international partnerships.

Chimei Museum, for example, is home to one of the world’s largest collections of string instruments and regularly lends instruments to leading musicians, including Yo-Yo Ma, for performance.

This year, Chimei Museum joined forces with the National Gallery in London to present *From Raphael to Van Gogh: Masterpieces from the National Gallery, London*. Featuring 52 original works by 50 masters, the exhibition attracted enormous public attention across Taiwan, drawing more than 425,000 visitors and setting a new attendance record.

Other institutions, including Fubon Museum and the Kaohsiung Museum of Fine Arts, have also collaborated with leading international museums to stage major exhibitions. Such exchanges not only give ordinary citizens greater access to international art but also contribute to the development of Taiwan’s urban cultural identity.

Through years of investment by both the public and private sectors in the creative industries, public broadcasting and international museum collaboration, Taiwan has gradually developed a distinctive form of cultural soft power.

Its experience suggests that cultural influence is rarely built through a single flagship project. It emerges from an ecosystem in which public policy, creative industries, independent cultural institutions, commercial platforms and international exchange reinforce one another over time.

That may be Taiwan’s most valuable lesson: cultural soft power is not simply something a government declares or promotes. It is built through institutions that give culture room to create, experiment, circulate and connect with the world.

*Originally published in Chinese by Lianhe Zaobao (Singapore) on 6 November 2024.*

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