Understanding Taiwan's International Affairs through Metis Diplomacy

Taiwan, since losing its UN membership in 1971, has lost most of its diplomatic allies and has become what experts have called a ‘contested state’. Despite their awkward status in the international arena, the Taiwanese government have made various attempts in order to seek more international recognition. This paper will make use of the conceptual framework of ‘metis diplomacy’, first coined by Gezim Visoka in his analysis of Kosovo, to understand how and whether Taiwan has been able to achieve more international recognition. In addition to testing the suitability of this framework on a state like Taiwan, it will, through understanding the everyday discourse, everyday practice and everyday entanglements of Taiwan, explore how Taiwan managed to expand its international presence of sovereign statehood, even though it is considered to be a "contested state". Through the use of discourse analysis and practice tracing as its main methods, This paper will argue that ‘metis diplomacy’, while less successful in allowing Taiwan to participate in international organisations, was quite successful in strengthening Taiwan’s de facto sovereignty and that the framework has been useful and applicable for the case of Taiwan.