政治經濟學之兩篇實證研究:貪污、所得與民主

Two Essays on Political Economics: Corruption, Income and Democracy

莊宗翰(Tsung-Han Chuang)

指導教授 ： 劉景添

國立臺灣大學/社會科學院/國家發展研究所/碩士(2010年)

https://doi.org/10.6342/NTU.2010.00213

摘要

此論文包含兩篇關於政治經濟學議題的實證文章:
第一部份: Corruption and Its Determinants
貪污一直是當代社會中重要的問題,想要有效的解決貪污,必須先瞭解影響 貪污的因素為何。本篇透過跨國資料來分析貪污的形成原因,我們以國際透明組織(TI) 所發布的貪腐映像指數(CPI) 作為主要的分析對象,再加上政治因素、經濟因素與文化因素三大類解釋變數來作討論; 其中最重要的議題是,本文將探討經濟發展與貪污的非線性關係。我們預期貪污問題會伴隨著經濟發展日漸惡化,然而當貪污問題惡化到某個程度後,由於經濟情況的提昇,貪污問題將慢慢的改善,此一過程在圖形上來看,將成為一倒U 字形的分佈。實證結果顯示,貪污程度與商業自由、貨幣自由、財務自由、投資自由、財產權的保障程度、國際連結度、通貨膨脹、教育程度與新教徒佔人口百分比呈現負向的關係。另一方面,政府規模愈大的國家與前共產國家則明顯地有著較嚴重的貪污問題。研究結果亦發現,隨著經濟成長,貪污問題將持續惡化直到人均所得1808.04美元後開始獲得改善。

第二部份: Democratic Perception and Political Behaviors
本篇探討民主認知對政治行為的影響。是否參與投票、是否參加集會遊行等政治活動取決於人們的理性行為,首先,我們討論教育與其他解釋變數如何影響民主認知,教育程度較高的人是否會有較高的民主認知、民主知識;我們進一步研究,對民主知識愈瞭解的選民,參與政治活動的情況是否愈踴躍?有別於過去的研究皆以歐美等先進國家為分析對象,透過亞洲民主動態調查資料庫(East Asia Barometer),我們取得台灣與日本兩個不同發展程度的東亞國家資料來進行分析。為了能正確的得到估計結果,我們建立聯立方程組模型來估計民主認知與政治參與兩條行為方程式,並預期參與政治活動的人有較高的民主認知,同樣的,參與政治活動也會帶給受訪著更多的民主經驗,進而提昇其民主認知。最後實證結果顯示,民主認知隨著教育程度的提昇而提昇,特別是大學教育有著最明顯的影響; 而民主認知越高的受訪者顯著地有較高的政治活動參與率,反之,參與政治活動對於民主認知的形成也有正面的幫助。

關鍵字

貪污 ； 所得 ； 非線性關係 ； 民主認知 ； 政治行為 ； 聯立方程組 ； 亞洲民主動態調查

並列摘要

This master thesis includes two empirical studies on the political economics:
Section 1: Corruption and Its Determines
In this thesis, we use the corruption perception index (CPI) data from Transparency International to study the relationship between corruption and its determinants, which include several political and economic freedom variables. One of the most significant contributions in this thesis is our attempt to find a non-linear relationship between corruption and economic development. We expected that graphically this relationship would be an “inverse-U”. Mostly, we found that corruption continuously deteriorates until PPP GDP per capita reaches US$1808.04 and then the level of corruption decreases. In other cases, we find that corruption is negatively related to business freedom, monetary freedom, financial freedom, investment freedom, property rights, export and import percentage of GDP, inflation, education and Protestantism. Instead, corruption is positively related to government size as well as communist dummy variables.

Section 2: Democratic Perception and Political Behaviors
The aim of this article is to determine how education affects people’s political participation. In this thesis, two kinds of political behavior are discussed: voting and attending campaign meetings or rallies. We estimate each political behaviors according to two factors: political participation and political perception (knowledge). We estimate how education and other individual characteristics affect our political knowledge, whether better understanding of democracy will make people more likely to engage in political affairs, and further more examine what makes a country more democratic? Otherwise. In order to solve the simultaneous problem of politic behaviors and democratical perception, we constructed a simultaneous model, and used it as our main analysis method. By using a unique data set East Asia Barometer, we acquired individual level data to answer these questions. The results indicate that when other factors remain constant, education plays an important role in forming people’s democratical perceptions, which positively affect people’s decision to engage in political activities.

並列關鍵字

Corruption ； income ； non-linear relationship ； democratic perception ； political behaviors ； simultaneous equation model ； East Asia Barometer

參考文獻

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