Identity Changes in Taiwan during Japanese Colonial Rule 1895-1945: Content and Contestation

English literature on colonial era Taiwanese identity is underrepresented in contemporary scholarship. In order to shed further light on the topic I will analyze: How did the identity of the people living on Taiwan transform during the Japanese colonial period, 1895-1945? I conduct my analysis using comparative method based on the framework put forth by Abdelal, Herrera, Johnston and McDermott in their Identity as a Variable. The paper defines collective identity as a social category that varies around two dimensions, content and contestation. The content describes the meaning of a collective identity. Contestation refers to the degree of agreement of the content of the identity. The content can be divided into four non-mutually-exclusive types: constitutive norms, social purposes, relational comparisons, and cognitive models. During the Japanese period I argue that three constitutive norms changed on Taiwan. The Japanese transformed the Taiwanese into law-abiding citizens; they created a norm of sanitation and hygiene on the island; and they transformed the status of Women. The key forces in implementing change were the threat of punishment and education. In social purposes I argue that during the colonial era the Taiwanese elites developed a goal of improving the rights and opportunities for the Taiwanese people. The elites were divided between liberal and Marxist influence, and among the degree of acceptance for a political society within the Japanese Empire. During the colonial period, the relational comparison to the Japanese created the notion of Taiwanese as a collective unit. Japanese police changed the structure of Taiwanese society. The new structure broke down existing cleavages between different groups of Taiwanese. Over time the collective discrimination of Taiwanese by the Japanese, created a notion of Taiwanese as a single unit. In cognitive models I argue that the Japanese policies created a single community on Taiwan. The Japanese brought the modern state to Taiwan. The Japanese modernization policies created a single community on the island