The (PR) Chinese politics thread

[Purgatio]

....no, because if you represent the State, that means you enjoy that State's legal rights and obligations. You can't be a government of China for one issue but not the government of China for another issue. That makes no sense. The government of China means you've assumed the legal personhood of the Chinese State, and you enjoy the Chinese State's legal rights and obligations. You can't segment a State's legal personality and say entity A represents the State on commercial issues but entity B represents the State on military issues. That is completely absurd.

That implies one entity can bind the State in an extradition treaty but a completely-different entity can bind the State in a mutual defense treaty. No. The entity that binds the State is the State's representative agent, and that agent cannot be two different entities simultaneously because its a logical contradiction.

No it means you CLAIM the legal rights and obligations. You get the obligations but not the necessarily full rights in all cases.
Because your claim is not necessarily binding on other things parties in all cases, although it is binding on you.

Your claim was that Beijing can be the representative government of the Chinese State in commercial contracts but not other matters. This isn't possible. Either Beijing is the representative government of China, or it is not, but it cannot be the government in some matters but not others.

[Novus America]

You are the one doing the conflating, assuming that it means the PRC is the one true government.
Something that is in dispute.

Yes the PRC and ROC can BOTH enter into legal contracts and treaties. Something I never denied.

Which makes them both states in the legal sense of the word. However, the lack of control by the ROC means that the PRC is the legal representative of the Chinese government, in regards to the law of the matter.

The ROC does not lack complete control and the PRC does have complete control. Hence the complexity. Hence why both are legal states in the contractual sense.

[Novus America]

No it means you CLAIM the legal rights and obligations. You get the obligations but not the necessarily full rights in all cases.
Because your claim is not necessarily binding on other things parties in all cases, although it is binding on you.

Your claim was that Beijing can be the representative government of the Chinese State in commercial contracts but not other matters. This isn't possible. Either Beijing is the representative government of China, or it is not, but it cannot be the government in some matters but not others.

The PRC can be A representative in commercial contracts. And yes it is bound to behave as the state of the land it controls for all purposes, but other countries do not have to be bound to accept it as such.
It is a one way street.

[Purgatio]

Which makes them both states in the legal sense of the word. However, the lack of control by the ROC means that the PRC is the legal representative of the Chinese government, in regards to the law of the matter.

The ROC does not lack complete control and the PRC does have complete control. Hence the complexity. Hence why both are legal states in the contractual sense.

The second prong of the Montevideo Convention requires the State to have territorial title to a specific area of land. The Chinese State, under the PRC's efficacious control, has territorial title, minimally, to Mainland China (that part's not contested, I hope). The question then is 1) what State is the ROC the representative government of and 2) what territory does the ROC's State have title to such that it fulfills the Montevideo Convention criteria?

Both these questions are hard to answer in Taiwan's favour for the reasons I've discussed exhaustively as to why its hard to argue there exists a separate State with separate territorial title to Taiwan, independent of the rest of the Chinese State.

[Novus America]

Because you have tied yourself up so badly. I never denied the PRC has the ability to enter into treaties and legally bring contracts.
But again as you admit that does not make it automatically the SOLE legal government of ALL historic China.

The ROC has equal ability to enter into contracts and treaties. Which it does.

So the fact that both are legal entities for that particular purpose does not determine which of the entities deserves to control all historic China (something not agreed on anyways).

True Taiwan does not legally claim de jure independence, it is not de jure Independent but is DE FACTO.
UNGA 1514 is not the only way a government can gain de jure, let alone de facto independence. Taiwan could claim independence if it wanted to by a variety of methods, but of course international law in this area is a contradictory mess. National Sovereignty, Uti possidetis, and Self Determination, all valid legal principles cannot be completely reconciled.

Cannot be reconciled? Of course it can, I'll do it now.

1) National sovereignty is the principle that a State is protected from the illegal use of force on its territory by other States, and is sovereign on all matters falling within its lawful jurisdiction, the primary of which is territorial jurisdiction. Hence, a State has the sovereign right to impose rules governing its jurisdiction, which necessarily-implies that any territory to which a State has territorial title is not entitled to unilaterally-secede and override a State's sovereign laws over that territory.

2) Uti possidetis, 'as you possess', recognised by the ICJ in Frontier Dispute (Burkina Faso v. Mali) holds that when a territory with a right of external self-determination unilaterally-declares independence, the territorial borders of the new State shall follow from its preordinated, predrawn provincial borders

3) External self-determination is a recognised right of both non-self-governing territories (ie former colonies) in Western Sahara Case and former States under unlawful military occupation as recognised in Wall Advisory Opinion. In each of these cases, the reason these territories have a right to declare independence unilaterally is because their territory is not regarded as falling within the sovereign jurisdiction of the parent State, because the parent State lacks territorial title to the land in question and therefore its sovereignty does not entitle it to prohibit a unilateral secession. For example, it is clear from Wall Advisory Opinion that Israel lacks territorial title to the Palestinian territories, and hence Israel's national sovereignty does not extending to governing and imposing its rules on the Palestinian territories. Hence, there is no contradiction between Israel's national sovereignty and the external self-determination of the Palestinian territories.

Once properly understood, these three principles do not conflict at all and do not tie anyone up in knots.

"Because you have tied yourself up so badly. I never denied the PRC has the ability to enter into treaties and legally bring contracts.
But again as you admit that does not make it automatically the SOLE legal government of ALL historic China.

The ROC has equal ability to enter into contracts and treaties. Which it does."

No, no, no, nothing you've just said here is true. Whether Taiwan is a separate State is not determined based on whether the ROC is presently-concluding treaties, since that presupposes the conclusion before the analysis (since for the ROC to conclude an internationalised treaty presupposes that it is the valid representative government of an existing State, you've already presupposed two logical premises that make your conclusion inevitable, which is the hallmark of poor reasoning).

The PRC's ability to enter treaties has nothing to do with whether it is the sole legal government of all of China. Its the other way round. Being the representative government of an existing State is what confers the right to enter treaties on that State's behalf.

Except no, the Western Sahara case (which is explicitly NON-binding and merely advisory) is a mess, both sides claim it makes them right.
It resolved absolutely nothing.
The way a country can claim independence via self determination has never been completely resolved. Which is why it is such a contested matter!

Check out this clustefuck:
”It was of the opinion, by 14 votes to two, that there were legal ties of allegiance between this territory and the Kingdom of Morocco. Furthermore, it was of opinion, by 15 votes to one, that there were legal ties between this territory and the "Mauritanian entity". However, the Court defined the nature of these legal ties in the penultimate paragraph of its opinion, and declared that neither legal tie implied sovereignty or rightful ownership over the territory. These legal ties also did not apply to "self-determination through the free and genuine expression of the will of the peoples of the Territory." (ICJ Reports (1975) p. 68, para. 162)
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advisor ... ern_Sahara

And if being the representative government is what allows the state to enter into contracts and treaties then the ROC is the legitimate government as well, because it clearly has the ability to do so.

Again the only way this works is the claim is a one way street.
It fully binds you, but not everyone else.

[Novus America]

The ROC does not lack complete control and the PRC does have complete control. Hence the complexity. Hence why both are legal states in the contractual sense.

The second prong of the Montevideo Convention requires the State to have territorial title to a specific area of land. The Chinese State, under the PRC's efficacious control, has territorial title, minimally, to Mainland China (that part's not contested, I hope). The question then is 1) what State is the ROC the representative government of and 2) what territory does the ROC's State have title to such that it fulfills the Montevideo Convention criteria?

Both these questions are hard to answer in Taiwan's favour for the reasons I've discussed exhaustively as to why its hard to argue there exists a separate State with separate territorial title to Taiwan, independent of the rest of the Chinese State.

Yes both have effective control over only part of the claimed land.
So yes it is a very complicated situation.

That means you can make an argument either way.