十九世紀晚期，臺灣巡撫劉銘傳為了增加財政收入而積極推動裁隘事業，試圖將原本由地方隘首經收的隘租歸公，作為剿撫山地住民的經費。然而，因為臺灣的隘制有其深遠的歷史背景，這使得裁隘事業除了關係地方豪紳的經濟利益外，也涉及了清廷邊界政策、防衛體制、請墾，以及土地稅收等制度變革。本文將裁隘事業分成造冊、收租、裁隘、清賦等四個階段，觀察地方政府在推動事業改革時面臨了怎樣的問題，藉以瞭解晚清地方政府和社會的狀態。 本文的結論認為，邊區社會在裁隘政策推動期間所呈現的抵抗行為，大部分是針對縣級地發政府粗糙的行政措施，而非政策本身。這意味著作為傳統帝國行政體系末端的地方政府，難以負荷過多的行政行為。儘管政府的公文往來顯示，直到帝國晚期的一八八○年代，從朝廷到省、縣地方的命令傳達，以及情報流通，還是相當的流暢與通順，但直接面對社會的縣級地方政府，卻無法有效率的規劃政策的推行與監督。在晚清的政府和社會改造潮流中，我們沒有看到作為帝國行政末稍的縣級政府，在行政編制以及財政上有相對應的改革。縣級政府為了順利達成改革任務，只能更加仰賴地方豪紳，即使事務直接關係著豪紳的利益。我自也可以看得出來，縣官的地方治理陷入了前所未有的困境，豪紳的地方支配反而藉此改革而日益壯大。

In the late Nineteenth Century, Taiwan Governor Liu Mingchuan performed many reforms to improve Taiwan’s defense capability and modern infrastructure. One of then was to abolish all guard posts and to use the rents that were originally collected for supporting guard posts as funds for pacifying mountain aborigines. However, due to the historical complexity of the guard-post system, its abolition created a ripple effect on state tax, frontier defense policy, and the interests of big land owners in the frontier. To help understand the relationship between the society and the state during the late Ch’ing period, this paper investigates the four stages of the guard-post abolition: 1) original guard-post registry, 2) rent collection by guard posts, 3) abolishing the guard posts, and 4) land taxation originally under guard-post jurisdiction. The paper finds that persistent resistance by the frontiersmen stemmed from crude local governance rather than from the policy itself, evidencing the incapability of the local government to perform the task. Even though the information transmission at all administrative levels was fluent in the 1880s, local governments failed to carry out the policy efficiently. County governments had yet undertaken corresponding administrative and fiscal reforms as did the provincial government. In the final analysis, county governments relied heavily upon local strongmen and gentry as agents to accomplish the mission. As a consequence, local governmental jurisdiction was substantially weakened while the power of the gentry grew stronger and stronger until they dominated the local society.