「安全化」的行政擴權與國家防疫成效之關聯性：以特定國家因應COVID-19為例之比較研究

The Relationship between the Expansion of Executive Power Based on Securitization and the Effectiveness of Preventive Measures against Pandemic: A Comparative Study of COVID-19 Responses in Selected Countries

當國家面對突發性的重大危機事件時，基於強化安全或抑制損害之需要，政府往往會啟動「安全化」（securitization）的行政擴權。然而，此種因應危機之方式真的有助於國家維繫自己的安全或是提供給人民較高的安全保障？本文藉由新型冠狀病毒肺炎（COVID-19）此一衝擊全球各國之重大危機事件為例，嘗試回答上述問題。研究結果顯示：（1）在均有啟動「安全化」行政擴權的國家間，非民主政體的中央集權國家在防疫表現上有值得借鏡之處，但如果民主國家的防疫治理近似中央集權或能夠中央與地方協調一致，防疫成效也同樣值得被肯定；（2）啟動「安全化」的行政擴權並非一國達成有效防疫之充分條件，但確實是必要條件。應注意的是，一旦政府啟動「安全化」來因應疫情，防疫措施的即刻性、施政主軸，還有國家本身貧富差距情況嚴重與否（以Gini coefficient為據），會在一定程度上左右防疫的實際成效。

For strengthening security or mitigating damages, governments often expand their executive power or initiate the process of securitization when they face unanticipated crises. However, does this way of responding to crises really help sovereign states maintain their own security or provide a higher level of security for their people? This article aims to answer this question by taking the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic, a crisis that has hit countries around the world, as an example. The research finding shows that: (1) Among the countries that experienced securitization, the centralized non-democratic countries indeed performed well in epidemic prevention, which is worthy of our attention. However, if democratic countries responded COVID-19 in a centralized governance or harmonized the separate administrations nationwide, the effectiveness of epidemic prevention is also worthy of our gratitude. (2) Initiating the expansion of executive power based on Securitization is not a sufficient condition for a country to achieve effective epidemic prevention, but it is indeed a necessary one. It should be noted that once a government initiates the process of securitization to respond to COVID-19, the timing, the main purpose of power expansion, as well as the level of wealth inequality based on the Gini coefficient, will to some extent affect the performance of epidemic prevention.