How Social Inequality is Being Written
in “New” Taiwanese Sociology
Textbooks: When Western Theories
meet Local Reality
Hsin-Huang Michael Hsiao
Distinguished Research Fellow andDirector, Institute of Sociology
Academia Sinica, Taiwan
A Presentation at The 2012 Japan Sociological Society,
Session on Globalization and Social Inequality in
Sociological Textbooks: Views from East Asia,Sapporo Gakuin University
Sapporo, Japan, November 3, 2012
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I. Introduction: A Brief Re-cast of Taiwanese Sociology
1. The first 30 years of Rootless and Dependless: 1950-1970s
2. The second 30 years of Indigenization and self-liberalization: 19802011
3. Three Turns(1) The Moderate Turn: close to Taiwan reality(2) The Critical Turn: on top of Taiwan’s critical issues(3) The Radical Turn: inside of Taiwanese political democratization
4. “A paradigm shift” has been taking place in Taiwanese sociology inthe past 3 decades. Since then, “Taiwan in context” has been in theminds of many local Taiwanese sociologists when they wrote aboutsociology and Taiwan society. And only taking such context ofparadigmatic shift in Taiwanese sociology in mind, the following
reading of Taiwanese textbooks on social inequality could makemore sense and with more appreciation.
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II. The Textbooks and Related Chapters to be Looked at
1. Taiwan Society (台灣社會), edited by J. H. Wang, Taipei: Chiu-Liu
Books, 2002, 540 pp. (a total of 15 chapters)
Chapter 6: Social Stratification, by R. M. Tsai
Chapter 7: Sex and Gender, by C. F. Chang
Chapter 8: Ethnic Relation, by F. C. Wang
2. Sociology and Taiwan (社會學與台灣) (3rd edition), edited by J. H.
Wang and H. Y. Chiu, Taipei: Chiu-Liu Books, 2009, 550 pp. (a totalof 21 chapters)
Part II: Social Differentiation and Inequality
Chapter 5: Social Class and Social Stratification, by K. H. Su
Chapter 6: Gender, by M. H. Chen
Chapter 7: Ethnic Relations, by C. C. Chih3

3. Social Problems of Taiwan (台灣社會問題) (2nd edition), edited by
H. Y. Chiu and L. Y. Chang, 2010, 608 pp. (a total of 16 chapters)
Chapter 6: Poverty, by Y. C. Wang
Chapter 7: Unemployment, by W. C. Chou
Chapter 9: Indigenous Peoples under Colonial Structure,by C. C. Chi
Chapter 11: Immigrants/ Workers under Globalization,by H. C. Hsia

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III. The Matrix of Social Inequality in Taiwan
1. Four Major Manifestations of Social Inequality (treated associal problems) are identified in the textbooks:
Poverty
Unemployment＊ Domestic Ethnic Minority＊ International Marriage and Labor Immigrants＊＊

2. Three Primary Structural Sources (Factors) of Social
Inequality (considered as social structures) are also
underlined in the textbooks:
Class＊ Gender＊＊ Ethnicity

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3. The Mapping of Social Inequality Analysis
A Matrix of Social Inequality
Manifestations of SIStructures of SIPoverty

Unemployment Ethnic
Minority

InternationalImmigrants

ClassGenderEthnicity

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IV. An Initial Reading of Social Inequality in the Textbooks
1. Poverty and unemployment have long been considered as theestablished and conventional social inequality problems in Taiwan,
while the inequality issue of ethnic minority defined with a criticalperspective was induced by the recent ethnic movements andinspired by the emerging discourse of minority rights. The
discrimination and human rights issues faced by the newinternational marriage and labor immigrants were also recently
discovered and analyzed with critical sociological eyes.
2. Very significantly, the three structural factors as the causes of theabove four prevailing social inequality issues in Taiwan, are class,gender, and ethnicity. The three structural factors have always
been identified as the sources of social inequality in the westernsociology. But such “structural perspective” was a rather recent
development in Taiwanese sociology and it was only possible after
its liberalization and indigenization phases since 1980s and 1990s.
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3. From a content analysis of the selected 160 edited books
published by sociologists between 1980 and 2011 reveals that themost popular phrases (concepts) used in the titles are “change”(變遷) and “development” (發展), followed by “issues” (課題)and “problems” (問題). Obviously, various aspects of Taiwan’ssocial change and development and the related emerging issues
and problems have indeed occupied the attentions ofindigenously minded sociologists when they intended to portray
Taiwan as a changing society in their edited books.

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4. Furthermore, a look into the detailed topics of the included 1133
chapters in the above 160 books even reveals another significant
fact: “ethnicity” related articles take the lead (137 chapters),
followed by “social class” and “social mobility” (131 chapters),“social structured change” (83 chapters), and “gender” related
issues (78 chapters), and then “social movements” oriented topics(73 chapters).
Once again, these focused themes have reflected the “indigenousattention” and “liberal intention” in the minds of the Taiwanesesociologists in their writing about Taiwan’s change anddevelopment, especially on the recently emerging social
inequality issues.

9V. The Substantive Writings of Social Inequality in
the Textbooks
1. To refer to the above matrix, each possible “analyticalcell” can be filled by:(a) Introduction of related theoretical frameworks developed in theWest(b) Illustration of empirical evidence in Taiwan(c) Offering social criticism and policy recommendations so as toeliminate the injustice incurred in the specified aspects of social
inequality1052. On every and each aspect of the four social inequality
manifestations and the three social inequality
fundamental structures, respective authors/ sociologists
have introduced relevant sociological theories oranalytical perspective in interpreting the specific social
facts of social inequality as conceived in the westernsociologies. It ranged from the classical sociologicaltheorists such as Marx vs. Weber and neo-Marxist vs.
neo-Weberian theories on class; to contemporary
theorizing such as assimilation theory, pluralism andsocial constructionism on ethnic relations; to liberal
feminism, radical feminism and socialist feminism on
gender; to Orientalism and the theorizing of “the others”
on foreign spouses and workers, among others.
113. However, reading through the related seven chapters, itis found that there are more “instructive concepts” todescribe the phenomena of social inequality than
“guiding theories” to explain the causes, magnitudes andconsequences of social inequality in the texts. In otherwords, the respective authors have not really intended
to apply any particular western sociological theory towrite about the whole story of specific social inequalityof Taiwan, rather it is their purpose to introduce thestudents (readers) with different aspects of the realworld of social inequality that could empiricallyobserved and witnessed through verifiable empirical
data and statistical evidence.

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4. To offer as complete empirical illustrations of social
inequality as possible seems to be the main objectives foreach related chapter, the author also introduces succinct
conception or phrasing to catch the essence of certain
complexity of inequality phenomenon such as“stratification of gender”, “stratification of ethnicity”,“social problemization of indigenous peoples andimmigrants”, “racialized class discrimination”, “shift fromprovincial backgrounds to ethnic origins”, “class matters”,“gender matters”, “ethnicity matters”, and “state matters”

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5. All in all, the related seven chapters are successful in
portraying, depicting and sketching various dimensions ofboth “manifestation” of and “fundamental structures” ofsocial inequality problems in Taiwan by verified empiricalevidence generated by Taiwanese sociological researchand government statistics. They also use highlighted
useful concepts to explain the issues of social inequality ina sociological manner.
6. Finally, it is the “local reality” rather than “westerntheories” that has occupied Taiwanese sociologists minds
when they write about the aspects of social inequality inTaiwan.

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VI. Possibility for a Common Textbook on Social
Inequality in East Asia?
1. Yes, if such textbook is an empirically based one that is intended toteach East Asian sociology students of the commonality anddifference of social inequality issues among the five East Asiansocieties. So far, it is more or less ready to take on this challenge as
empirical studies of social inequality with enlighten perspectives are
generally in fine shape.

2. No, if such textbook is designated to be a theoretically-driven one
that is intended to inform East Asian sociology students of thecomprehensive and even locally-generated theoretical constructionof social inequality among the five East Asian societies. Though thetheoretical-analytical interpretation of the manifestations andcauses of social inequality in each society has begun for some years,
it is still far from the stage where an East Asian theory of social
inequality can be produced.
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3. Nevertheless, judged from the Taiwan case and its relevance tothe rest of four East Asian societies, it is instructive to envision a“state-generated social inequality” theorizing in analyzing andexplaining how the state actions have shaped the origins,
ramifications and consequences of different aspects of social
inequality---poverty, unemployment, ethnic minority andinternational migrants, as well as a “state-associated socialinequality” theorizing in understanding how the state has also
actively molded the extent to which class, gender and ethnicity
have directly or indirectly created social inequality.

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