全球化了台灣的什麼？國際化與台灣的政治經濟變遷

What Has Been Globalized? Internationalization in Taiwan

本篇文章利用Dani Rodrik（2011）的「世界經濟的不可能的三角」理論架構，透過台灣的經驗資料來檢視Geoffrey Garrett（1998）對於全球化對國內政治和經濟衝擊的經驗研究結果是否仍然能夠在近四十年來台灣面對全球化的經驗上依然成立。我們發現，台灣參與全球化的過程與OECD（Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development）國家參與全球化的經驗並不相同。在布列頓森林體系崩解之後，OECD國家在全球化的壓力下仍然維持著國內補償，並且走向了全球化不可能三角的右邊，透過國際整合與國際政策協調等「全球治理」的方式來減少市場開放所帶來的國內衝擊，其國內政策並未被全球化逼到「新自由主義」的底限。但與OECD國家不同的是，在全球化的壓力下，台灣的國內政策受到了相當大的限制：台灣在國際政治上的困境使台灣難以走向全球整合治理，台灣在國內選舉上的困境使台灣難以拋棄國家認同的議題，台灣在經濟上依賴國際貿易的困境又使台灣無法選擇有限度地加入全球化，所以在全球化的過程中，與OECD國家的腳步不同，台灣逐漸地走上了三角型左邊的「黃金緊身衣」之路，主要靠著透過削減生產成本維持經濟的成長，所犧牲的是全球化所帶來的社會衝擊。本文的研究發現也突顯出，台灣與OECD國家在全球化經驗上的不同，與中國在經濟上與國際政治上對台灣所施加的結構性限制有關。在這個國際結構的困境沒有改變的情況之下，本文的理論認為，台灣全球化的前景難以翻轉，很難透過自身單方面的國內政治或是政策上的改革來把「黃金緊身衣」的發展方向調整至「全球治理」的道路上。

In this article we apply Rodrik’s (2011) theoretical framework of “The Political Trilemma of the World Economy” to investigate whether Garrett’s (1998) finding concerning the OECD countries’ experience of globalization can still hold in Taiwan. We find that Taiwan’s globalization process is different from that in the OECD countries. After the collapse of the Bretton Woods System, in “The Trilemma” framework, the OECD countries walked along the path of “global governance,” successfully mitigating the negative impact of globalization on society through international integration and international policy coordination. Differing from the OECD countries’ experience, China precluded Taiwan from joining in the global governance; Taiwan’s main social cleavage has precluded politicians from paying attention to domestic compensation issues; and Taiwan’s small scale domestic market has precluded the government from limiting the degree of globalization. Therefore, Taiwan is gradually walking along the path of the “golden straightjacket.” By walking along this path, Taiwan maintains its economic growth and competitive ability mostly by reducing the costs of production and transactions in ways that include cutting down the domestic compensation and social welfare. As a result, the government sacrifices the losers due to globalization and pays the price of neglecting the negative impacts of globalization on society. This study also demonstrates that it is a structural predicament that precludes Taiwan from choosing the path of “global governance.” Therefore, as long as the status quo remains so, it is very difficult for Taiwan to unilaterally switch from the path of the “golden straightjacket” to that of “global governance” simply through domestic political reform or policy change.