台灣地區係屬民主自由、多元化的社會,但卻在所得不均等背後夾雜著不確定性和不安全感,使得經濟與社會朝向失衡發展,連帶著產生社會不公與價值觀扭曲等問題。此種不平等確切地影響各種公民和社會參與活動,但在過往的研究中乏見將公民參與和社會參與跟不均等做完整而且有系統之探討。然而,若不均等是“參與”的決定因素時,那麼可以預見對於公民和社會參與在不同的不平等制度之下,相對所得的地位是有著不同含意。 本研究以2003年行政院主計處編制之「台灣地區社會發展趨勢調查訪問表—社會參與」資料,與2007年中央研究院社會學研究所執行「台灣社會變遷基本調查—社會階層」之資料,觀察受訪者「相對所得位置」、「個人基本社會經濟特性」對公民參與情形的影響。 根據實證的結果可以得知,在大部分的情況下,當臺灣民眾的相對所得愈高時,公民參與的情形也愈踴躍;當相對所得位置處於較劣勢時,的公民往往可能因社會疏離感或忙於生計等問題而忽略公民參與。因此如何提升相對低所得者的參與意願,便成為值得重視的議題,政府可能可以給予相對低所得者適當的補助或提出其他有效輔助政策,以降低公民參與成本,進而增進公民參與的意願,也促使民眾社團參與不普遍的情形能獲得改善,無形中社會資本也悄悄的累積起來。
Taiwan is a society of liberal democracy as well as diversity; however, the uncertainty and the lack of security are both suppressed with the rising income inequality. Meanwhile, the pattern of civic participation is substantially altered by the increasing inequality. The study investigates the relationship between relative income and various types of civic participation with the data drawn from 2003 Survey on Social Development Trends (SSDT) and 2007 Taiwan Social Change Survey (TSCS). The results indicate that a positive relation between relative income and citizen participation is documented in a general phenomenon for Taiwanese citizens. Specifically, the higher relative income is possessed, the more active of citizen participation would be, whereas the inferior relative income being obtained, the less of civic participation. These probably result from the sense of estrangement from society. Therefore, how to encourage the civic participation for people with a lower level of relative income becomes an important policy issue. Hence, appropriate subsidization along with assistance for whom with relative lower income could be provided by government in order to minimize the cost of civic participation.