NOTE: I'm not certain if this letter was actually sent or not since I found no email headings. But the letter, whether a draft or actually sent, nonetheless summarizes issues related to the use of the Employment Law (compared to the Teacher's Law protecting Taiwan faculty) at National Cheng Kung University.
______________________________________________
04 September 2000
The President and Faculty
Columbia University
We address this letter to accord with the visit of the Republic of China’s
Minister of Education, Dr. Ovid Tzeng.
Although we applaud academic exchanges of the kind that is the occasion
of Dr. Tzeng’s visit to your prestigious university, as members of the
academic community in the Republic of China we must unfortunately report
problems concerning foreign teachers here that may endanger future exchanges
between representatives of Taiwan and the international academic community.
Recently, our government passed an Employment Law for foreign workers
in the ROC. Regardless how the law was intended, it has since been used in
a discriminatory manner against our foreign colleagues (mostly American),
capriciously depriving them of employment and other civil protections
guaranteed to native faculty by our Teacher’s Law.
Under the Employment Law, foreign faculty, regardless how long they
have taught at a Taiwan university, do not enjoy the same rights as native
faculty. For example, foreign faculty can be dismissed without cause or due
process. Moreover, the law has been applied, retroactively, against
professors teaching at their universities for many years before passage of
the law.
There are several issues concerning this law that we wish to highlight:
First, our national Teacher’s Law has guaranteed legal protections for
faculty. A democratic society, especially one touting the Confucian
principle of reciprocity, does not need a discriminatory law for foreign
faculty, as if they were laborers rather than colleagues.
In addition, the law creates an incongruous and demeaning situation
where foreign colleagues are subject to evaluation and dismissal by Review
committee members who may have followed them on the faculty.
The law not only compromises the dignity and equality of our foreign
colleagues. It threatens academic standards. For foreign faculty, faced
with uncertain employment, are potentially subject to intimidation or
manipulation by native faculty and students.
More grievously, deprived of the legal protections of the Teacher’s Law,
a foreign teacher is subject to arbitrary incrimination that threatens
democratic process. In fact, we currently know of a case at National Cheng
Kung University where an American professor, teaching more than ten years,
was capriciously incriminated to effect his dismissal. Despite winning an
appeal, this professor became subject, under the Employment Law, to further
review and double jeopardy. His rights severely attenuated, the professor
was dismissed.
Thus the law is discriminatory in itself and leads to further
discriminatory abuses that compromise human rights.
Dr. Tzeng did not, of course, pass the Employment Law. But as Minister
of Education, he must assume responsibility for human rights abuses that
occur in the application of that law.
Moreover, although Dr. Tzeng has been sufficiently informed concerning
abuses of the Employment Law, including documented human rights violations
against an American professor already referred to, he has affected an
irresponsible, "non-interventionist" policy that is morally dubious and
entirely inappropriate to the grievous nature of those abuses.
Principles of justice and equality, more than cultural exchanges, are
the lifeblood of an academic community. Without those binding and universal
moral principles, international exchanges of scholarship are a mere chasing
after wind.
In light of Dr. Tzeng’s moral and ministerial obligations to both the
Taiwan and international academic community, we appeal to the President and
faculty of Columbia University to address these issues to our Minister.
Perhaps if Dr. Tzeng is made aware of the moral and academic consequences
associated with discriminatory practices against foreign faculty he might,
upon his return to the Republic of China, begin to rectify abuses and effect
policy commensurate with sincerely equal and reciprocal exchanges in the
international academic community.
Respectfully yours,
No comments:
Post a Comment