Identity Conformity in Taiwan and South Korea

Autor(en)

Steven Denney, H. Christoph Steinhardt, Lisa Bhowmick

Abstrakt

To what extent do social and political pressures in divided societies compel individuals to exaggerate allegiance to a dominant national identity? This study examines how conformity pressures shape expressions of national pride in Taiwan and South Korea, two structurally similar democracies whose national identity norms diverged during democratization. Using list experiments to mitigate social desirability bias, we compare direct and indirect measures of national pride across subgroups defined by identity strength, identity content, and background. We find evidence of pride inflation in both societies, with larger and more pervasive effects in South Korea. In Taiwan, individuals who weakly identify as Taiwanese or hold dual Taiwanese and Chinese identities modestly overstate Taiwanese pride, while those of native-origin majority background also inflate pride and Mainland-origin minorities do not. We find no evidence that Chinese identity is suppressed. In South Korea, weak identifiers substantially overstate national pride, and migrants from North Korea markedly exaggerate pride in being South Korean while concealing pride in their origin. We argue that these patterns reflect more pluralistic identity norms in Taiwan and more stringent, state-reinforced norms in South Korea.

Organisation(en)

Institut für Ostasienwissenschaften

Externe Organisation(en)

Leiden University

Journal

Nationalism and Ethnic Politics

Seiten

1-27

ISSN

1353-7113

DOI

https://doi.org/10.1080/13537113.2026.2616954

Publikationsdatum

02-2026

Peer-reviewed

Ja

ÖFOS 2012

506014 Vergleichende Politikwissenschaft

Schlagwörter

ASJC Scopus Sachgebiete

Geography, Planning and Development, Political Science and International Relations

Link zum Portal

https://ucrisportal.univie.ac.at/de/publications/055c66be-b54a-4303-8465-e06c2a777eb2