High-level Visit and National Security Policy: Evidence from A Quasi-Experiment in Taiwan

Great powers usually use high-level visits to reassure weaker states. The literature on public diplomacy shows that these visits can bring a number of advantages while overlooking their potential impact on increasing support for the great power’s security agenda and confidence in the host country’s defense policy and military. This note employed a quasi- experiment in Taiwan, in which three high-profile U.S. Senators visited Taiwan unexpectedly during a one-week national survey (n = 1500) in June 2021. Propensity score matching and regression discontinuity analysis showed that the visit significantly increased Taiwanese respondents’ confidence in their own military, the government’s security policy, and support for the security policy favored by the U.S. (strengthening the Taiwanese military). Limitations, scope conditions, and suggestions for future work were also discussed.