| 英文摘要 |
This paper aims to clarify the legal significance and scope of the Constitutional Court Judgment No. 17 of 2022 (hereinafter“J.Y. Interpretation No. 17”) in Taiwan, and to examine, from both theoretical and comparative law perspectives, the challenges it raises regarding the reconstruction of the indigenous status recognition system. J.Y. Interpretation No. 17 casts doubt on the constitutional compatibility of the existing binary structure of“mountain indigenous peoples”and“plains indigenous peoples”under the Indigenous Status Act. It is of groundbreaking significance in that it recognizes unacknowledged indigenous groups, including the Pingpu peoples, as subjects of constitutional protection and calls upon the legislature to establish a new institutional framework. This paper first analyzes the reasoning structure and normative content of the judgment, clarifying the significance of the framework for recognizing indigenous peoples based on three criteria:“continuity of cultural characteristics,”“maintenance of group identity,”and“objective historical records.”It further examines the judgment’s distinctive feature of integrating collective ethnic recognition with individual status recognition, and explores its institutional implications. In addition, by referring to the legal theories concerning the recognition of the Ainu people as indigenous in Japan, this paper conducts a comparative analysis of status recognition frameworks grounded in cultural characteristics and identity. Through these analyses, this paper seeks to theoretically situate the constitutional framework for indigenous protection articulated in J.Y. Interpretation No. 17 and to derive implications for future legislative policy and institutional design. |