– Who “Makes” the Trail? – A Trail Governance Study from Taiwan
Ming-Chien Hsu (徐銘謙)
Assistant professor, Center for General Education, National Tsing Hua University
Deputy Executive Director, Taiwan Thousand Miles Trail Association
Trailology Instructor, Taiwan Community College
Taipei, Taiwan
Jacky Tao (陶俊成)
Head of International Relations,
Taiwan Thousand Miles Trail Association
Taipei, Taiwan
隨著當代遊憩或環境保護的需求，步道管理與維護的方式也因應不同國家或區域的歷史與政治哲學，及應運而生的公私協力模式而生。由於這些多重因素的作用，我們主張步道的研究，意即步道學（trailology），本質上即是研究治理模式的學問。
在這篇短文中，我們以台灣的案例出發，由政治社會學與政治哲學的角度，分析幾種步道修築理念型態，也期望藉由本次大會的發表與分享，擴充國際案例與理論結構。
Animals and creatures roamed the earth without needing a specified linear walkway; it is only when humans appeared, only when we purposefully and regularly walked the same routes, to hunt, to trade, or to commute, subsequently leading to the community-based maintenance of said routes, that “trail” gains its modern definition: a route that is followed for a particular purpose.1
Nowadays, driven by recreational needs and their complementary environmental protection purposes, we started to develop various trail maintenance/stewardship modes and different systems of trail management, based on our respective public-private collaboration models, which further stem from our histories and political philosophies.
Because of these various factors at work, we can say that the study of trails, or “trailology” per se, is fundamentally a study that investigates how human society systematically considers or handles the maintenance and management of trails. The study, whether in an academic sense or from a pragmatic perspective, is intertwined with the study of modes of governance.
How are trails managed in a certain manner, and what measures and thinkings can be adopted if we want to push for a “paradigm shift”? In this piece, we provide some theoretical frameworks and preliminary comparative analysis we have done in Taiwan. We hope this could serve as a dialogue and experience exchange for trail practitioners, and an incentive for future international studies for academics.
Trails, Techniques and Governance
By definition, when trails enter into nature, whether we view it as a technical object, a human activity, or a knowledge system including maintenance and the philosophy behind, it is a display of technique. The formulation of techniques is not objective, as recent studies from Science, Technology and Society (STS) shows. Therefore, one needs to analyze the sociological factors as well as the political-economy behind, including ownership, control and accessibility.
On the other hand, techniques are also strongly related with the struggle between state and civil society. Who allocates resources when it comes to trail maintenance? Whose responsibility it is to build or maintain the trails? Such questions fall into the domain of political sociology.
Based on Taiwan’s history, construction policies and norms, we combine the two theoretical frameworks above, and come up with four trail construction/ maintenance ideal-types:
| Who Controls the Construction Norm | |||
| Technocracy | Folks | ||
| Who Allocates Resources | State | State Scenic Model | State Conquer Model |
| Civil Society | Public Participation Model | Community Self-help Model | |
Community self-help model would be the earliest mode of maintenance. Due to limitations in capability or resources, neither the state nor the technocracy (mostly engineers and technicians) intervene.
State conquer model refers mainly to when Taiwan was under Qing Dynasty and Japanese colonial rule, when trails (routes) were built with force to suppress revolts.
State scenic model is the prominent mode in Taiwan. It refers to an alliance between the government and engineers, where the former controls construction resources (often via budgets and construction outsourcing) and the latter controls engineering standards, resulting in collaborative trail projects.
Finally, the public participation model, which is also the one TMI Trail has been advocating for the last decade, wishes to transform the state into a coordinator, and getting the hiking as well as environmental NGOs involved in setting the construction norms. This is also the philosophy behind TMI Trail’s eco-craft trail activities.2
Trail Governance and Political Philosophy
Based on different political philosophies, the institutional arrangements of public and individual rights vary.
In political sociology, pluralism argues that the primary arena of politics lies within society rather than the state. One of the most notable examples is Alexis de Tocqueville’s observations in Democracy in America, where he noted the proactive nature of political associations in the United States is that it “gives rise to an executive power which remedies the inconvenience before anybody has thought of recurring to an authority superior to that of the persons immediately concerned.” This underlying distrust of the state can be understood in Sarah Mittlefehldt’s book Tangled Roots: The Appalachian Trail and American Environmental Politics, where the establishment of the Civilian Conservation Corps by President Franklin Roosevelt to participate in the construction of the Appalachian Trail, is seen as an intrusion of state power. Even the National Trails System Act of 1968, which was globally considered progressive, was still perceived as state intervention by Americans.
Corporatism, as Peter J. Williamson pointed out, gained its foundation from the Catholic tradition in Europe, emphasizing social unity and nationalism. Under corporatist structures, citizen groups are absorbed into the state system. They establish institutionalized relationships with the state through legitimate channels, providing input and participating in government decision. Philippe Schmitter further distinguishes corporatism into state corporatism and societal corporatism, with the latter particularly emphasizing the post-World War II corporatism’s elements of liberal democracy and social centrism elements.
During the Central & Eastern Europe Study Tour organized by the World Trails Network in 2023, we observed the roles played by hiking associations in trail maintenance in countries such as Hungary, Slovakia, Slovenia, and Poland. From a political sociology perspective, the hiking associations in Central and Eastern European countries, which have experienced communist regimes, seem to have evolved from pluralism before the two World Wars to state corporatism afterward, with characteristics of being transmission belts under state integration. After democratization, they are moving towards societal corporatism.
In the case of Taiwan, influenced by Confucian culture’s “order of stratified closeness” (Fei Hsiao-tung), it tends to lean towards communitarianism in political philosophy. During the martial law period, the Kuomintang itself adopted a Leninist party-state system, leaving a legacy of “strong state, weak society” under authoritarian rule. Civil society relied on government mobilization and the provision of public services, falling under state corporatism in political sociology. After democratization, local construction became tied to factional politics, forming a “patron-client relationship” (Wu, Nai-teh), where political support was exchanged for favors. Trail projects were a part of this. It wasn’t until the 1990s that civil society gradually matured, with increased initiative and responsibility for voluntary participation in public affairs, leading to a shift towards pluralism. The grassroots trail movement emerged against this backdrop, advocating for the paradigm shift towards citizen participation.
Closing Remarks
The differences in political philosophy and cultural contexts among different countries explain the operation and characteristics of civil societies in each country, as well as the interaction patterns between the state and society. When using the frameworks proposed in this paper for cross-national comparative researches, regional cultural characteristics or key events influencing policies may also be incorporated to enrich the details, and these models may change over time.
In the past, theories related to civil society research have been rarely used to analyze organizations and social movements related to trails. Interdisciplinary theoretical frameworks may provide insights, and this paper attempts to make initial explorations using the case of Taiwan. Further research is warranted to enrich case studies from various countries.
Footnotes
1 Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary.
2 While these models might seem chronological, several models might co-exist, and might be in a struggle till now. For more detailed explanation and analysis, please refer to Hsu (2011).
References
Fei, X. (1948). From the Soil: The Foundations of Chinese Society. Shanghai: The Commercial Press.
Hsu, M.-c., & Lin, T.-h. (2011). Changing the Path: Civil Society and Technological Change of Taiwan’s Tourist Trail. Taiwanese Journal for Studies of Science, Technology and Medicine (13), 109-58.
Mittlefehldt, S. (2013). Tangled roots: The Appalachian Trail and American Environmental Politics. Seattle: University of Washington Press.
Schmitter, P. C. (1974). Still the Century of Corporatism? The Review of Politics, 36(1), 85–131.
Tocqueville, A. de. (2004). Democracy in America (Vol. 1). (H. Reeves, Trans.) The Project Gutenberg eBook. Accessed 2024-04-29.
Williamson, P. J. (1989). Corporatism in Perspective: An Introductory Guide to Corporatist Theory. Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE Publications.
Wu, N.-t. (1988). The Politics of a Regime Patronage System: Mobilization and Control within an Authoritarian Regime [Dissertation].