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TAIWAN'S president-elect, Ma Ying-jeou, campaigned on promises of a tightrope-like walk in relations with mainland China. Ma will be inaugurated in May, but already plans are being made to delicately position Taiwan in the space between seeking independence and unification with China.

Ma certainly will change the tone in Taipei. By winning 58 percent of Saturday's vote, he has a significant mandate for seeking a comfortable relationship with China while rejuvenating relations with the United States and other historic allies, which Ma and his party believe were unnecessarily strained by outgoing President Chen Shui-bian's bold pushes for independence.

Ma believes Taiwan and China can go back to a one-China — with differing interpretations — construct that was the status quo much of the 1990s. It's an agree-to-disagree on the finer points of what "one China” means. "Our basic policy is to pursue peace on the basis of ‘three nos': no unification, no independence and no use of force,” Ma said before the vote.

As tenuous as it seems, the tricky balance mostly worked before China began threatening forced unification while under Chen's leadership Taiwan talked of independence. Both failed, Ma said.

The question is whether Taiwan and China can go back. The United States hopes so. It has historic and strategic commitments to Taiwan but also growing economic ties with China.

Daily realities of economy and trade certainly argue for a workable, practical relationship between Taiwan and China. The two engage in about $125 billion a year in trade, and Taiwanese business investment on the mainland continues to grow.

Economic concerns over political principle? It has worked for people on both sides of the Taiwan Straits before, and there seems to be no good reason it couldn't again.