Taiwan’s Government is Ill-Equipped to Hold Elections in a Prolonged Crisis

For a nation on the precipice of an open conflict with China, Taiwan is badly unprepared to keep its democratic processes intact in a military scenario. Taiwan’s archaic voting infrastructure is one major aspect that leaves the island vulnerable if a contingency plays out. Since 1994, the people of Taiwan have elected their president by direct popular vote, and the nation has received full marks for Electoral Process from Freedom House’s 2025 Global Freedom Score. The exercise of that universal right, however, is restricted by unnecessary barriers.

There is no absentee voting in Taiwan. Citizens must vote in person at a designated district assigned at birth under Taiwan’s stringent huji household registration system, which ties citizens to their permanent addresses for access to public services including elections and some social benefits. With voting taking place between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. on a single Election Day, this locational limitation poses significant challenges.

As one journalist pointed out in 2020, the current system disproportionately affects young people and those from lower socioeconomic backgrounds. For them, the financial, logistical, and administrative costs of traveling to their registered district or changing their huji to their rental address are prohibitive. Poll workers, active-duty service members, students, voters with disabilities, and incarcerated people are among the primary groups that suffer.

Why Taiwan Needs a Plan B for Its Elections

Despite longstanding calls for Taiwan to address voter disenfranchisement and underrepresentation, there has been little political will to introduce absentee ballots. One reason is voter turnout in general elections remains high, with 71.86% recorded in the 2024 presidential election—a number that would make many democracies jealous. But with unanticipated and off-cycle elections attracting significantly fewer voters, turnout falls to 59.86% in the 2022 local elections and a mere 29.53% in the 2025 nuclear referendum. 

In a healthy democracy, citizens engage in political participation with low transaction costs, and expanding voter access falls in line with democratization. One need not look further than Ukraine to know the idea that Taiwanese could one day vote during a crisis is hardly far-fetched. Democratic governments make themselves vulnerable to questions of legitimacy when they suspend elections during war, a reality Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is now forced to contend with amid growing distrust from outsiders, including Washington. 

If sovereignty is put at risk, the president of Taiwan also has the legal authority to call for a vote on national security matters under Article 16 of the Referendum Act. If they were to invoke that right, every voting-age citizen should be afforded the means to cast their ballot.

A Path Forward for Electoral Reform 

Beyond considerations for crises, pluralizing voting will help reflect public opinion more accurately and reverse the systemic underrepresentation of groups who face high transaction costs to vote. Voting practices in the U.S. show possible models for implementation in Taiwan. With federalism and the decentralization of voting in America allowing states to experiment with varying election laws, states have sought to expand voter access through early, absentee, or mail-in voting. 

In 1998, Oregon adopted universal vote-by-mail, which researchers at MIT’s Election Data and Science Lab found “increases turnout modestly in midterm and presidential elections but may increase turnout more in primaries, local elections, and special elections.” In other states, early in-person voting and no-excuse absentee voting are permitted. On a federal level, the Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act guarantees the right of U.S. citizens residing abroad to vote. 

Critics, however, say adopting modern voting practices will enable Taiwan’s adversaries to exploit loopholes in the system and manipulate elections outcomes. Taiwan is vulnerable to foreign interference, and its national security interests prohibit the counting of absentee ballots mailed in from abroad, as international mail can expose elections to interference, coercion, or forgery. While this makes voting from overseas—particularly from China, where many Taiwanese live—unfeasible, it does not mean there should be blanket resistance to alternative domestic polling methods.

Stress Testing Alternative Voting Methods

For overseas citizens, Taiwan can strive towards allowing in-person voting through its 12 embassies abroad. In the absence of formal relations, host countries' decisions to allow voting through Taiwan’s unofficial representative offices may imply official recognition of Taiwan in contradiction with their foreign policy. But having already assumed the risks of recognizing Taipei and not Beijing, Taiwan’s 12 diplomatic allies have committed to supporting embassy functions, which overseas voting would simply be an extension of.

Taiwan’s three outlying island constituencies, Kinmen, Lienchiang, and Penghu, are particularly apt to test early absentee voting. They could serve as “laboratories of democracy” where new policies are tested before impacting the entire population, preventing reforms from overwhelming the administration.

To account for the extra administrative burden new voting methods will create, the Central Election Commission should expand the capacity of its 22 regional election commissions. Extending the voting period requires increased capacity to distribute, receive, process, and count absentee and early ballots. This necessitates stronger intragovernmental coordination, funding, and upgrades to the technology used by Taiwan’s traditional polling facilities to allow for the secure storage and tracking of ballots across multiple election days. 

A recent study by Brookings Institution found that mail voting in the U.S. increased overall voter turnout, improved voter access, and led to cost savings for universal vote-by-mail systems, while finding no evidence that it increased electoral fraud. Anti-fraud protections built into the process can be designed to make it difficult to impersonate voters or steal ballots. Taiwan could adopt similar techniques, such as signature matching, to minimize risks.

Taiwan should pursue aggressive reform, revise election laws, and design anti-fraud protections while it still has the luxury of time to make corrections. By refusing to take the necessary steps towards a nation-wide roll-out of absentee and early in-person voting, Taiwan is losing precious opportunity to build capacity for alternative voting methods in preparation for a crisis.

Many Taiwanese celebrate Taiwan’s transition from authoritarianism with eagerness to exercise their electoral rights as a part of their culture. Some cherish a trip home to vote as an integral part of their way of life. But as Taipei prepares its citizens for crises, it should not dismiss the need to secure the fundamental democratic processes it holds as core values.

This article was previously published on CommonWealth Magazine on January 23, 2026.