Performing Statehood, Securing Competitiveness: The Transformation of Sustainability Disclosure and Transnational Dynamics in Taiwan

• In Event: Political Economy of the World-System Section Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Roundtable II: Statecraft, Future Economies, and Survival

Abstract

Sustainable finance has become a crucial arena for addressing climate change, encompassing measures ranging from directing corporate behavior in capital markets to channeling financing for mitigation and adaptation. States, corporations, investors, and consumers are all deeply engaged in these transformations. This paper investigates how national-level sustainable finance disclosure regulations are shaped by transnational pressures from international organizations and global value chains, and how these dynamics reconfigure local governance. Focusing on Taiwan, the study traces the evolution of non-financial information disclosure regulations in its capital market. The state has played a central role in this process: developmental bureaucrats have historically steered reform, and policy frameworks have gradually shifted from improving corporate governance to aligning with global net-zero emissions. The drivers of regulatory transformation have moved from domestic political pressures to increasingly international forces. As a developmental and contested state deeply dependent on global trade, Taiwan seeks to connect with the world by engaging in international exchanges, participating in global governance networks, and adopting foreign institutional models. Through gaining membership in transnational regulatory “clubs,” financial regulators and stock exchanges have accessed normative resources and policy ideas that could guide local reform. Meanwhile, external pressures from global supply chains and foreign investors have further compelled the state to actively draw upon transnational private regulation in constructing domestic rules. However, the grounding of international regulations is not a process of simple adoption; rather, it produces frictions with local social political structures and semantic differences in regulation meanings, resulting in co-constructed of governance between transnational and domestic power. The paper argues that as a developmental state and a contested state, Taiwan’s case illustrates how transnational dynamics are mediated by state, producing a locally embedded yet globally oriented regime of sustainable disclosure regulation.

Author

• Chun-Ching Tu, Rutgers University