ABSTRACT
This chapter selects promotion of deliberative democracy after 2000 in Taiwan by a group of sociologists as a case study to investigate how historical and societal conditions shaped relationships between the discipline of sociology and the general public, how some sociologists prioritized democratic consolidation as a significant issue and initiated sociological engagement into public deliberation and how citizen participation in deliberative democracy has become important phenomena for sociological research in which public sociology has continued to nurture professional sociology. The case study of Taiwan public sociology intends to illustrate variations of the nature of public sociology and the different kind of relationships between public sociology and professional sociology. Moreover, public sociological practices have achieved some public good but sometimes have led into unintended negative consequences. In the case study, systematic analyses will also focus on societal conditions and practices of the public, which might lead into different consequences. This chapter is organized as the following: the historical description about the transition of the authoritative regime into the democratic one and its influence on the development of sociology in Taiwan will be presented in the second section; challenges faced by the representative democracy after the lift of state emergency and subsequent action on the promotion of deliberative democracy led by a group of sociologists will be discussed in the third section; findings and theoretical construction of sociological analyses in public deliberation will be portrayed and implications of interaction between public sociology and professional sociology will be highlighted in the fourth section; the conclusion will be presented in the final section.
