Chinese President Xi Jinping and Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou recently met in Singapore. Never before has Beijing treated the island's government as an equal. It was a small step for peace, but the circle remains to be squared. China insists that Taiwan is a wayward province, while the vast majority of Taiwanese feel no allegiance to the People's Republic of China (PRC). If, as expected, Taiwan's opposition presidential candidate Tsai Ing-wen wins the election in January, relations between the two states are likely to shift into reverse.

The island of Formosa, or Taiwan, was an imperial Chinese territory, ceded to Japan in 1895 after the latter's victory in the First Sino-Japanese War. The island reverted to China with Tokyo's defeat in 1945, but four years later Taiwan separated from the mainland when the Kuomintang (KMT) government relocated to Taipei following the triumph of the Chinese Communist Party. For decades the Republic of China—ruled by KMT refugees—claimed to be the legitimate government of the mainland, but reality eventually forced Taiwan to abandon that pretense. In 1992 the two governments agreed that there was only one China, but disagreed on what that meant. Taipei continues to promote a separate identity, maintaining diplomatic relations with 21 countries and the Vatican.