社區發展與社會企業：台灣社區可否逃脫政府控制的命運？

Abstract

本篇研究在探討政府補助、社區發展與社會企業之間的關聯。主要的研究問題是傳統的台灣社區組織是否仍仰賴政府補助款而失去自主性。本文的主要論證，先簡要回顧了社區發展的福利史，以及英國與台灣的社區組織法律形式，主要以英國的社區利益公司(Community Investment Company, CIC)與台灣的社區發展協會(Community Development Associations, CDA)爲例子。簡言之，台灣社區發展的十年實務經驗顯示，社區本身尚無法逃脫中央或地方政府的牢籠控制，尤其是從政府預算年度2001至2009年的補助款資料顯示，各地的社區發展協會基本上並無財務自主性，同時也有失去志願主義之疑慮。從歷史上的因素綜合而言，社會部門界線的模糊、政府預算的長年赤字、經濟發展的不穩定，以及地方社群的社會異質性，使得台灣社區必須另尋出路，而活化社區的其中一個可能方式便是引進社會企業的經營理念。放眼未來，政府仍然扮演重要角色，輔助地方社區發展。從實證資料則顯示，台灣社會企業的發展必須考量到不同社區在地域性的差異，不同社區的彼此學習與創新則有助於活化社區發展，政策上則不可追求齊頭式的補助模式。

This study focuses on the relationship between government funding, community development and social enterprise. The main research question is asking whether traditional community organizations in Taiwan still rely on government grant and therefore lose their independency. In the beginning of this argument, the author tries to identify briefly the local welfare history of community development and particular legal forms in the United Kingdom and Taiwan, namely Community Investment Company (CIC) and Community Development Associations (CDAs). Simply put, empirical community development in Taiwan during the past decade cannot escape from central government’ iron cage in terms of funding and grants of the dataset from the fiscal year 2001 to 2009, therefore the Community Development Association basically loses the financial independency and probably the spirit of voluntarism. Due to some historical explanation such as blurring of social sector boundaries, government budget deficit, economic instability, and social heterogeneity in the local arena, one possible way to revitalize Taiwanese community and gain its self-governing capability is to introduce the idea of social enterprise. In the future, the government is still a vital role to promote the social enterprise models into different local community. In the conclusion, however, some limitations of social enterprise development experiences from the U.K. and other OECD countries still need to be re-considered in advance in Taiwanese social policy agenda setting.