Who Governed Taiwan Before the Chinese Dynasties?
Indigenous sovereignty, colonial rule and the origins of Taiwan's political identity.
Taiwan's history did not begin with Chinese imperial rule, the Republic of China (ROC) or the People's Republic of China (PRC). Long before any Chinese dynasty established an administration on the island, Taiwan was home to Indigenous Austronesian peoples whose communities developed their own languages, social structures, systems of authority, trading networks and relationships with the land.
That history raises a fundamental question: Can the sovereignty of a territory be determined primarily by the history of the states that later claimed or governed it, or must the political rights of its earlier inhabitants also be considered?
The question matters because Taiwan's past includes several distinct political arrangements: Indigenous societies, European colonial settlements, the Zheng regime, Qing imperial administration, Japanese colonial rule and the modern ROC government. These were not simply successive versions of the same state. They differed in their sources of authority, their territorial reach and their relationships with the people living on the island.
A careful investigation must distinguish three issues:
Historical presence: who inhabited Taiwan and developed societies there?
Political administration: which authorities governed particular areas, and during which periods?
Sovereign title and political rights: what legal consequences, if any, follow from those histories today?
These questions overlap, but they are not interchangeable.
Before Chinese dynasties: Taiwan's Indigenous societies
For thousands of years, Taiwan was inhabited by Indigenous peoples belonging to the Austronesian cultural and linguistic world. Archaeological evidence documents human settlement on the island long before the establishment of Chinese imperial administration there.
Taiwan's Indigenous peoples were never one single political unit. Different communities developed distinct languages, territorial relationships, leadership structures, customs and economic systems.
Some organized authority around villages, kinship networks and community leaders. Others developed more complex arrangements involving alliances, trade, warfare and relationships with neighbouring communities.
Their political systems did not necessarily resemble a centralized European or Chinese state. That does not mean they lacked political authority, territorial relationships or established rules governing their communities.
Why this history matters
The Indigenous history of Taiwan challenges the assumption that political authority over the island can be understood exclusively through the succession of Chinese governments.
If a community inhabited and governed a territory before a later empire arrived, several questions arise:
Did the later empire exercise authority over the whole island or only particular regions?
Did Indigenous communities recognize that authority, resist it, negotiate with it or retain their own institutions?
Were lands acquired through agreements, conquest, settlement, administrative expansion or other processes?
What rights, if any, survived subsequent changes in government?
These questions are important not only to Taiwan. They appear in discussions of Indigenous rights, colonialism and territorial sovereignty around the world.
However, an important distinction must be maintained: being the earliest known inhabitants does not automatically establish an exclusive, permanent and legally uncontestable claim to every part of a territory. Indigenous peoples' historical presence, political institutions, land rights, self-determination and contemporary legal status must be examined on their own terms.
The historical timeline: who controlled Taiwan, and when?
The following timeline distinguishes Indigenous societies from later administrations that exercised control over parts or all of the island.
Before the 17th century — Indigenous Taiwan
Indigenous communities inhabited Taiwan for millennia before European colonial governments arrived. Their societies maintained their own political and territorial arrangements. Archaeology and linguistic research help reconstruct this period, although the written historical record is much thinner than for later centuries.
1624–1662 — Dutch colonial administration
The Dutch established a base in southwestern Taiwan in 1624. Their colonial administration developed trade, taxation, missionary activities and agricultural production, particularly around present-day Tainan. It relied partly on Indigenous communities and increasingly on Han Chinese migration and labour. Dutch authority was not uniform across the island.
1626–1642 — Spanish presence in northern Taiwan
Spanish forces established settlements in northern Taiwan, including the Keelung area, seeking strategic, commercial and missionary opportunities. Dutch forces expelled the Spanish in 1642. Spanish administration was geographically limited and did not amount to rule over the entire island.
1662–1683 — The Zheng regime
Zheng Chenggong, commonly known as Koxinga, expelled the Dutch in 1662. His successors governed a regime centred in southwestern Taiwan and used the island as a base for resistance to Qing rule on the mainland. The regime established administrative institutions and promoted settlement, but it lasted only about two decades before surrendering to Qing forces in 1683.
1683–1895 — Qing imperial rule
The Qing dynasty incorporated Taiwan into its imperial domain after defeating the Zheng regime. Administration initially concentrated on western and northern coastal areas, with the reach of government varying considerably across regions. Qing rule expanded over time, and Taiwan became a separate province in 1887. Indigenous communities continued to maintain distinct forms of authority, particularly in areas beyond effective Qing administration.
Two points emerge from this timeline.
First, Taiwan was not governed continuously by a Chinese dynasty from ancient times. Qing imperial incorporation began in 1683, following earlier Indigenous political histories and the relatively brief Dutch, Spanish and Zheng periods.
Second, the fact that a government exercised control over some parts of Taiwan does not establish that it exercised identical authority over every region or Indigenous community. The geographical limits of actual administration matter when interpreting historical claims.
Did historical administration create permanent sovereign rights?
This is the central legal question.
Historical administration can provide evidence relevant to a territorial claim, but international law does not apply a simple rule that whoever governed a territory first—or governed it for the longest period—automatically possesses permanent sovereignty.
Several principles are relevant.
Principle | Application to Taiwan's history |
|---|---|
Historical title | Earlier administration may support a claim, depending on the circumstances and applicable law. |
Effective control | Actual, sustained governmental authority may be relevant evidence of sovereignty, but its legal weight depends on the case. |
Treaties and territorial transfers | Agreements can transfer or recognize territorial title, subject to their terms and legal validity. |
Indigenous rights | Earlier inhabitants may retain rights to traditional lands, resources, culture and self-government even after a new state exercises sovereignty. |
Self-determination | The rights and expressed wishes of peoples matter, but their legal implications depend on the context and applicable international law. |
These principles should not be collapsed into a single test.
For example, Qing administration is relevant to the history of Chinese sovereignty claims over Taiwan. But establishing that the Qing ruled Taiwan from 1683 to 1895 does not, by itself, answer every question about the legal effects of the 1895 cession to Japan, the postwar settlement, the ROC's subsequent administration or the PRC's present claim.
Likewise, Indigenous peoples' prior presence does not automatically establish that all modern sovereignty claims are invalid. It does, however, make it necessary to examine whether their territorial, cultural and political rights have been recognized, restricted or displaced.
The Indigenous question: rights that survive changes of government
One of the most important implications of Taiwan's Indigenous history is that a discussion about sovereignty should not treat Indigenous peoples merely as historical background.
Their rights are relevant to present-day governance, land management and political participation.
Taiwan's Indigenous Peoples Basic Law recognizes Indigenous peoples' rights to land and natural resources, provides for the development of Indigenous self-governance, and establishes consultation and consent requirements for certain activities affecting Indigenous territories.
However, statutory recognition does not mean that all historical grievances have been resolved. The US State Department's 2023 human rights report noted that Indigenous rights advocates continued to raise concerns about the loss and privatization of traditional lands and the resulting limitations on participation in development decisions.
This produces three important questions.
A. Who owns or controls traditional Indigenous lands?
Traditional territories do not necessarily correspond to modern administrative boundaries, registered property titles or protected areas.
A serious policy would need to address historical dispossession, land registration, resource management, compensation and the role of Indigenous communities in decisions affecting their territories.
B. Who should participate in decisions about Taiwan's future?
Taiwan's political future is commonly discussed in terms of the preferences of its current population, the ROC government, the PRC government and international actors.
But Indigenous communities have their own collective rights and historical relationships with the island. Their participation should not be reduced to assuming that they all share a single political position.
The relevant questions include how Indigenous peoples can participate meaningfully in constitutional debates, land policy, cultural protection and decisions affecting their communities.
C. Can self-determination coexist with the sovereignty of a larger state?
The answer depends on the rights and arrangements involved. Self-determination does not invariably require the creation of a separate independent state. It can also involve political participation, autonomy, cultural protection and self-government within an existing state.
The United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples recognizes Indigenous peoples' rights concerning traditional lands, territories and resources, as well as their ability to pursue their own political, economic, social and cultural development. Its provisions must be interpreted alongside the wider international legal framework.
For Taiwan, the challenge is to ensure that discussions of national sovereignty do not erase the rights of the peoples who inhabited the island long before modern state claims emerged.
Does Taiwan's Indigenous history weaken China's claim?
A careful answer requires distinguishing between two arguments.
Argument one: Taiwan existed before Chinese imperial rule.
This is historically established. Indigenous peoples inhabited the island for millennia, and the first sustained European colonial administrations appeared in the 17th century. Qing incorporation followed in 1683.
Argument two: therefore, no Chinese government can have a valid sovereignty claim over Taiwan.
That conclusion does not automatically follow from the historical evidence.
A territory's earlier inhabitants do not, merely by virtue of being first, settle every subsequent question of territorial sovereignty. Later administration, treaties, historical title and other rules of international law must also be considered.
Nevertheless, the Indigenous record challenges narratives that portray Taiwan as having always been an integral part of a single, continuously administered Chinese state. Such narratives must account for the island's distinct political histories and the uneven extent of imperial control.
It is also important to distinguish the PRC from earlier Chinese dynasties. The Qing dynasty ruled Taiwan before Japan's colonial period, but it ceased to exist in 1912. The PRC was established in 1949. The legal relationship between the Qing Empire's territorial holdings and the PRC's contemporary claims is therefore a question of historical continuity and international law, not simply a matter of assuming that every former imperial territory automatically belongs to the modern Chinese state.
The same standard should be applied to all sides: historical presence is relevant evidence, but no single historical fact settles the entire dispute.
Three competing ways of interpreting Taiwan's past
Interpretation A — Taiwan within Chinese national history
This approach emphasizes Qing incorporation in 1683, the growth of Han Chinese settlement, Taiwan's integration into Qing administrative structures and the subsequent development of Chinese claims to the island.
Its strength is that it recognizes significant periods of Chinese imperial rule and the historical importance of migration from the mainland.
Its limitation is that it can understate the earlier Indigenous history, the geographical limits of imperial administration and the significance of later colonial transitions.
Interpretation B — Taiwan as a distinct historical and political community
This approach emphasizes Indigenous societies, European colonial rule, the Zheng regime, Japanese rule, the development of a distinct Taiwanese society and the island's subsequent democratization.
Its strength is that it highlights the historical experiences that cannot be explained solely through the history of mainland Chinese dynasties.
Its limitation is that a distinct historical experience does not, on its own, determine the island's precise legal status or conclusively resolve every sovereignty claim.
Interpretation C — A layered history with overlapping rights and claims
This approach treats Taiwan's past as a sequence of overlapping political systems, migrations, colonial administrations and Indigenous societies.
It distinguishes the question of which state holds sovereignty from questions concerning Indigenous land rights, cultural continuity, political participation and self-government.
Its analytical advantage is that it avoids assuming that a single historical period explains all aspects of modern Taiwan.
These interpretations are not necessarily mutually exclusive. Taiwan can be connected historically to China while also possessing a distinct political history and Indigenous peoples whose rights cannot be reduced to the sovereignty claims of later governments.
What should a fair discussion of Taiwan's future include?
A serious debate should address at least five questions:
Historical evidence: How much weight should be given to Indigenous political authority, Qing administration, Japanese rule and postwar governance?
Legal title: Which treaties and international legal principles determine the status of Taiwan, and what do those instruments actually say?
Democratic consent: How should the preferences and political rights of Taiwan's present population be considered?
Indigenous justice: How can traditional lands, languages, cultural practices and self-government be protected and, where appropriate, historical injustices remedied?
Peaceful resolution: How can competing claims be addressed without coercion and with meaningful consideration of the people whose lives would be affected?
These questions should be considered together, but one should not be used as a substitute for another. Indigenous land rights do not independently settle every question of international sovereignty; neither should a state's territorial claim be treated as automatically extinguishing Indigenous rights.
Taiwan's history began long before Chinese dynasties, and its Indigenous peoples remain part of its contemporary political and social reality.
The historical sequence—from Indigenous societies to European colonial administrations, the Zheng regime, Qing rule, Japanese colonialism and the modern ROC government—demonstrates that Taiwan's political history cannot be reduced to a single uninterrupted chain of Chinese administration.
At the same time, historical complexity does not automatically prove or disprove a modern state's sovereignty claim. The legal implications of each period must be evaluated separately.
The most important principle is this: a complete account of Taiwan's future must consider both the legal claims of states and the rights of the peoples who inhabit the island.
The question is not only who governed Taiwan in the past. It is also how historical evidence, international law, democratic consent and Indigenous rights should inform decisions about its future.
By Jugo Ikeji Uju
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