本文以後藤新平的臺灣「中央財政」（總督府財政）改革為討論主題，分析了其在土地調查與改賦、海關／關稅／貨物稅、以及鴉片／樟腦／食鹽專賣等的變革。為從臺灣長期財政史角度闡明變革的性質，本文將透過與晚清劉銘傳同類改革事業的比較，從定性制度面與定量統計面，釐清後藤新平財政改革的意義。本文發現劉銘傳的改革主要倚賴家產官僚與傳統統治理性來推動，因此無法克服組織上的尋租舞弊與無效率，各項財政改革所能增加的財稅收益也相當有限。且其財稅改革僅意圖擴大財政收入，並無促進產業發展的一併規劃，因此其改革反而一定程度阻礙臺灣的產業發展。與此相較，後藤新平的改革主要透過科層官僚與近代統治理性來推動，因此得以克服組織上的腐敗與無效率，而大量增加財稅徵收的效率，使臺灣中央財政收入遽增約七倍。另外，其改革不僅實現了財政收入的擴大，也促進了產業的近代化。最後，本文也承認後藤新平的改革的確具有殖民地性，包括其不是以臺灣為主體的規劃，而係將臺灣有效納入帝國經濟圈以及培植殖民統治協力者，以促進殖民母國的經濟利益並強化政治控制。但整體來說這些財政改革，的確有助於臺灣的經濟近代化，除讓殖民母國得利外，也令臺灣社會與人民同樣受益。

The paper will primarily discuss Japanese fiscal reform in Taiwan Government-General during the Gotō Shinpei period, analyzing Gotō Shinpei’s changes to land tax reform, customs/tariff and commodity taxes, as to the monopoly system on opium/camphor/salt. Meanwhile, in order to clarify the characteristics of these changes in terms of Taiwan’s long term financial history, we will compare it from the qualitative institutional aspect and the quantitative statistical aspect, with similar reforms made by Liu Ming-chuan during the late Qing Dynasty, in order to gauge the historical significance of Gotō Shinpei’s fiscal reform. The paper discovers that Liu Ming-chuan’s reform was largely dependent on patrimonial bureaucarcy and traditional governmentality, therefore failing to defeat organizational rent-seeking, corruption and inefficiency, and resulted in limited fiscal profit from the fiscal changes. Meanwhile, these fiscal changes usually aimed only to maximize fiscal revenue, without attempting to concurrently promote industrial development, hence to some degree hindered the progress of Taiwanese economic development. In contrast, Gotō Shinpei’s reform was mostly implemented through rational bureaucracy and modern governmentality, thus succeeded in overcoming organizational corruption and inefficiency, increased significantly the efficiency of tax revenue, and was able to boost Taiwanese central fiscal revenue by as much as 7 times in less than 10 years. On the other hand, these reforms had in mind not only the maximization of fiscal revenue, but also the modernist goal of promoting economic development, and Gotō Shinpei modernized various industries through these reforms. Finally, the paper admits that there are certain colonial traits to Gotō Shinpei’s fiscal reform, including the fact that it was not made with the Taiwanese as the central subject, instead aims to effectively incorporate Taiwan into the economic sphere of Japanese empire, promoting the interest of mainland Japan, and concurrently foster collaborators that are beneficial to colonial rule. Nevertheless, Gotō Shinpei’s fiscal reform is, as a whole, beneficial to Taiwan’s modernization of economic development, benefiting not only mainland Japan, but also the society and people of Taiwan.