Wang Daohan (), (27 March 1915 – 24 December 2005) was a Chinese politician who was president of the

Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits The Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Straits (ARATS; ; often abbreviated as 海协会 / 海協會) is an organization set up by the People's Republic of China for handling technical and business matters with the Republic of ...

(ARATS) from 1991 to 2005.

Biography

Wang was born in Jiashan County (present day

Mingguang Mingguang (), formerly Jiashan County (), is a county-level city in the northeast of Anhui Province, China, bordering Jiangsu province to the northeast and east. It is under the administration of Chuzhou city. Geography Mingguang City is on the n ...

City) in China's

Anhui Anhui , (; formerly romanized as Anhwei) is a landlocked province of the People's Republic of China, part of the East China region. Its provincial capital and largest city is Hefei. The province is located across the basins of the Yangtze River ...

province in 1915 and joined the

Communist Party of China The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), officially the Communist Party of China (CPC), is the founding and sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Under the leadership of Mao Zedong, the CCP emerged victorious in the Chinese Civil ...

in 1938. During his early career within the government of the People's Republic of China, he focused on trade and investment issues. In 1965 he was the deputy minister of the State Commission for Foreign Economic Relations with Foreign Countries and in 1979 he was appointed vice-chair of the State Foreign Investment Commission and vice-chair of the State Import-Export Commission. Later Wang came to greater prominence when, after a year as vice-mayor, he was appointed mayor of Shanghai in 1981. As mayor, Wang contributed to the success of

Deng Xiaoping Deng Xiaoping (22 August 1904 – 19 February 1997) was a Chinese revolutionary leader, military commander and statesman who served as the paramount leader of the People's Republic of China (PRC) from December 1978 to November 1989. After CCP ...

's economic reforms by actively encouraging foreign investment and joint ventures. When he retired in 1985, Wang convinced the party authorities to name his protégé

Jiang Zemin Jiang Zemin (17 August 1926 – 30 November 2022) was a Chinese politician who served as general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) from 1989 to 2002, as chairman of the Central Military Commission from 1989 to 2004, and as pr ...

as his successor. On 16 December 1991 Wang was named the president of

(ARATS), a semi-official organization created to correspond with the

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...

-based

Straits Exchange Foundation The Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF; ; often abbreviated as 海基會) is a semiofficial organization set up by the Government of the Republic of China (Taiwan) to handle technical and/or business matters with the People's Republic of China (P ...

(SEF). The following year Wang and SEF chairman

Koo Chen-fu Koo Chen-fu (, 6 January 1917 – 3 January 2005), also known as C.F. Koo, was a Taiwanese businessman and diplomat. He led the Koos Group of companies from 1940 until his death. As a chairman of the Straits Exchange Foundation (SEF), Koo arrange ...

held preliminary talks in Hong Kong which resulted in the so-called " 1992 Consensus" and facilitated negotiations of practical matters. However, the content and the very existence of this "1992 Consensus" is still widely disputed. In April 1993, Koo and Wang met in Singapore to hold the Wang-Koo summit. A second round of talks followed in 1998, in Shanghai, but no further talks have taken place since. Beijing called off talks in 1999, after Republic of China President Lee Teng-hui proposed his two-states theory. Wang died in Shanghai on the morning of 24 December 2005.

References

"Economic Policy after the 16th Party Congress"
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, - {{DEFAULTSORT:Wang, Daohan 1915 births 2005 deaths Mayors of Shanghai People from Mingguang People's Republic of China politicians from Anhui Chinese Communist Party politicians from Anhui Politicians from Chuzhou People of the Republic of China