Yung Lin receives Young Scholar Award 2026
Researcher Yung Lin received the Young Scholar Award at the annual conference of the European Association for Taiwan Studies (EATS). She obtained her PhD in 2025 on Taiwan’s public diplomacy.
The young academic was awarded for her innovative work on sovereignty, diplomacy, and Taiwan. In her PhD, ‘Public Diplomacy as a Contributing Factor to Solving Identity-based Conflict’, she examines how sovereignty can be understood beyond formal international recognition. While recognition is often treated as the foundation of sovereignty, contested cases such as Taiwan show that it also involves questions of identity, legitimacy, and security.
The EATS highlighted the originality of Lin’s conceptual framework, particularly the concept of Civic-Embedded Public Diplomacy (CEPD) to capture how states and societies jointly shape narratives of identity and international presence. In Taiwan’s case, diplomatic practices extend beyond managing external relations to also addressing identity-based tensions, linking domestic democratic development with international role performance.
By highlighting the interaction between internal legitimacy and external engagement, the research contributes to broader debates on how post-authoritarian states navigate sovereignty under conditions of uncertainty.
Lin feels honoured to receive this award. ‘It is particularly meaningful to see my work recognised in this way. I aim to show how CEPD can help us better understand how democratic societies navigate identity, legitimacy, and security.’ She further develops these ideas in an ongoing Substack series, where she explores conceptual approaches and empirical insights on Taiwan’s role in global politics and human-centered geopolitics.
The European Association for Taiwan Studies (EATS) is a leading academic network dedicated to the study of Taiwan in Europe, bringing together scholars from across disciplines. This year’s conference focused on Taiwan’s transformation of authority in the post-martial law era.