1992 Consensus

The 1992 Consensus is a political term referring to the alleged outcome of a meeting in 1992 between the semiofficial representatives of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)-led People's Republic of China (PRC) of mainland China, and the Kuomintang (KMT)-led Republic of China (ROC) of Taiwan. They are often credited as creating a diplomatic basis for semi-official cross-strait exchanges which began in the early 1990s and is a precondition set by the PRC for engaging in cross-strait dialogue.^[1][2]

Whether the meetings truly resulted in a consensus is disputed in the ROC. The KMT understanding of the consensus is "one China, different interpretations" (一中各表, 一個中國各自表述), i.e. that the ROC and PRC "agree" that there is One China, but disagree about what "China" means (i.e. ROC vs. PRC). The PRC's position is that there is one China (including Taiwan), of which PRC is the sole legitimate representative of China.^[3] This discrepancy has been criticized by Taiwan's Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) who is now in power in ROC politics. The DPP has never acknowledged the existence of the so-called "1992 Consensus" ever achieved by the semi-official meetings, and also rejects any claim that both sides of the Taiwan Strait are "One China".^[4]

Critics have also stated that the term was not used contemporaneously during the meeting: the term was invented in April 2000 by former National Security Council secretary-general Su Chi, eight years after the 1992 meetings.^[5] The President of ROC in 1992, Lee Teng-hui, denied the existence of the 1992 Consensus in 2006.^[6] The 1992 Consensus was rejected by then-incumbent ROC president, Tsai Ing-wen, who associated it with one country, two systems in a 2019 speech.^[7][8]