Chapter 17 3. A good democracy is a good thing

In addition to the political difficulties in Pakistan and Kenya, Lebanon, Bangladesh, the Philippines, Georgia, Nigeria, Sri Lanka, Mongolia, Thailand and other developing countries have frequent political crises and social turmoil.We have to ask some questions: Why did democracy in these countries not bring the peace and prosperity that the people hoped for, but instead became the cause of various crises?What's wrong with their democracy?What lessons can we draw from this?In order to answer these questions, I think we might as well understand a little about the thinking of Western philosophers on the issue of democracy.A philosopher is a philosopher, and a master is a master. After many years of vicissitudes, their views are still full of emotion.Many people in the West have already forgotten many of the advices given by their own political sages about democracy. Perhaps we should remind them that forgetting the past means betrayal.Understanding the views of some Western sages is also beneficial to help us understand the root of the democratic dilemma in developing countries today, understand the blind spots of Western democratic fundamentalism, and enable us to do some forward-looking thinking and thinking for China's democratic construction. layout.

Talking about democracy can be traced back to ancient Greece, because that is the birthplace of Western democracy.At that time, the city-state of Athens in Greece implemented a democratic system, and male citizens (excluding women, and slaves who accounted for the vast majority of the population) decided major matters such as the declaration of war and peace, and the final judgment of the court through the citizens' assembly.Socrates, the great thinker of ancient Greece, was sentenced to death by this system for the crime of "corrupting the minds of young people".His student, Plato, another giant of thinking in ancient Greece, was indignant about this, thinking it was a "mob" rule.This Western sage who was born in 124 years after Confucius has always believed that there are differences in human intelligence, character and ability, and the democratic system of ancient Greece denied these differences and assumed that all male citizens, regardless of good or bad, exercised the same political power, resulting in "mob" politics.To illustrate his point, Plato also asked a thought-provoking question: If you are sick, do you call the people to heal you?Or go to a doctor with superb medical skills?You will definitely go to a doctor with superb medical skills. Then the responsibility and difficulty of governing a country are far greater than that of a doctor. Who should you go to?

This question represents Plato's idea of ​​elitist politics, which has long influenced the development of European politics.Judging from today's standards, Plato's elite consciousness may be too strong and the public consciousness is too weak. Although the Athenian democratic system has various flaws, it is the earliest democratic attempt in human history after all, and its contribution cannot be denied.But in the same way, although Plato's views have shortcomings, the questions he raised still have practical significance today. How many countries have gone to disaster because one person, one vote elects the wicked.The most typical example is Hitler and his Nazi Party in Germany.The Weimar Republic was a product of good design, with fair elections, free press, and constitutional democracy.But the Nazi party, through a good grassroots organization system, took advantage of people's various grievances, and adopted populist means, and won 37% of the votes in the 1932 election.In 1933, it won 44% of the votes, more than the sum of the votes of the other three political parties, and became the largest party in the German Parliament.The Germans, known for their rationality, finally elected Hitler, who hated mankind, to be in power. In the end, not only brought disaster to Germany, but also almost destroyed the entire Western civilization.If Plato had lived to 1933, he would have said, I have foreseen all this.

Some western countries have greatly simplified democracy, which should be rich in content, profound in culture, and delicate in operation, and even the basic elements of high-quality democracy such as economic development, education level, society ruled by law, and civic culture have become dispensable things. Only the "procedural democracy" of "one person, one vote" represents real democracy. As a result, inferior democracies emerge in endlessly in the third world: Corrupt officials can easily gain power by bribing elections, and a large number of politicians only know how to fight for power and profit. Due to tribalism and black money politics, their countries are frequently caught in turmoil and even wars, the economy is in decline, and the people are in dire straits.History has proved that only high-quality democracy is a blessing to the people, and bad democracy can only be a disaster for the people; only good democracy is a good thing, and bad democracy can only be a bad thing.China's political reform must reject rotten democracy and build a good democracy.

We should not learn from the kind of democracy advocated by the West, where election procedures determine everything.The election process determines everything, just like a student who registers for class is a good student, but it doesn't matter whether his academic performance is good or bad.It is legal for you to choose an actor or a beautiful woman to be in power without any achievements at all.Taiwan's Chen Shui-bian is a typical example. He has been the "President" for 8 years. He has no political achievements to speak of. He failed the "examination" and is also corrupt. But according to the Western procedural determinism, he can rely on his position and is not anti-democratic. .Our democracies are designed to prevent this from happening.Not only do we require this student to register for classes, he must also pass the exams continuously, and must pass with high scores.

A super-large country like China has a tradition of elite governance for thousands of years. We should proceed from China's reality and traditions, actively explore and gradually establish a system that can not only ensure that talents with both ability and political integrity stand out, but also enable A new type of democracy in which their powers are fully monitored.This is probably also the enlightenment of the question raised by Plato to our democratic construction today. Some people say that as long as the system is good, the quality of the leaders does not matter.Switzerland is an example. Each of the seven federal councilors takes turns serving as the chairman of the federation for one year. Many Swiss citizens do not know who their head of state is because they change too often.Isn't Switzerland doing well too?But Switzerland is a super small country, and its unique political system was formed after a long period of adjustment. China cannot imitate it, nor can the United States and France, and there is no need to imitate it.Because the traditions and conditions of different countries are too different, just like almost every family in Switzerland has guns, can China learn from it?In developing countries, the construction of the rule of law has not been completed in general, and the relationship between politics and economic development is inseparable. Therefore, the quality of leaders often has a decisive impact on the fate of a country for a long time.For example, without Deng Xiaoping, how could there be China's reform and opening up?Even in a country like the United States, the unflattering Bush Jr. was re-elected for two consecutive terms, but he failed to lead well, and the national fortunes of the United States plummeted, and the world quickly entered the "post-American era" (Fareed Zakaria, editor-in-chief of the US "Newsweek") May 2008).

Here we should also mention another great thinker in ancient Greece, Aristotle, who also had profound insights into what constitutes a good political system.He believes that a good political system requires at least two conditions: one is the majority of the middle class, and the other is the establishment of the rule of law.He believes that the middle class tends to be more stable than any other class. They will not seek other people's property as easily as the poor, nor will they attract others' covetousness as easily as the rich. Therefore, the middle class is the foundation of a good government.Aristotle emphasized the role of law very much. He believed that only when a city-state can maintain the authority of law can it prove that it has established a good political system.He believes that if elected leaders do not have the norms of the rule of law, they are likely to become dictatorships and tyrants.

These thoughts of his had a profound influence on the construction of western democratic system.From the experience of the world, a society can function well without the rule of law and a large middle class without one person, one vote. The most typical example is Hong Kong; Class, the quality of democracy must not be high, and the probability of inferior democracy is extremely high.The fundamental reasons for the above-mentioned countries that have fallen into a democratic dilemma are almost all that the middle class is too small and the rule of law is too weak.For example, the Kenyan general election was controversial. There was neither a credible judicial system to rule, nor a strong middle class to support social stability, so different factions and tribes began to fight and fight.Throughout the development of democracy in the world, the best entry point for developing countries to build democracy is not one person, one vote, but to vigorously develop the economy and education, continuously expand the middle class, and strive to promote the construction of the rule of law.China is taking this path. In 2020, our middle-income earners will account for the majority of the population, which will have extremely far-reaching significance for China's democratic construction.

When talking about democracy, one cannot forget Rousseau, a radical French thinker. He first put forward the idea that "sovereignty lies with the people", which has inspired generation after generation of democrats who are willing to sacrifice their lives for democracy. However, Rousseau also proposed in his famous book that today Deep questions that seem to be forgotten.He assumes that there are 10,000 citizens in a country, so the sovereignty that each citizen can enjoy is one ten thousandth.If there are 100,000 citizens in this country, then his sovereignty is one in 100,000. That is to say, the influence of a vote in one person's hand is 10 times smaller all of a sudden.From this, he reasoned, the larger the state, the less influence a citizen has over his own state, and the less effective democracy will be.Rousseau himself failed to propose a real solution to this problem, but he believed that an ideal democratic society should be a small country, a small government, and the gap between the rich and the poor should not be too large, so as not to cause confrontation.To practice democracy in a super-large country with a population of 1.3 billion, we must seriously consider and answer the question raised by Rousseau in the design of our system.

Finally, I would like to mention Hayek. He is a master of Western liberal theory. He strictly defines democracy as a decision-making procedure and a means rather than the ultimate value. He believes that the ultimate value is human freedom.Hayek opposed the abuse of the democratic majority, arguing that even a decision agreed by the majority may not necessarily be legal (for example, most people decide to divide the property of a small number of people).No matter what you think of Hayek's liberal doctrine, one piece of advice on democracy building in his famous book "The Road to Serfdom" is worth noting.Here's how he put it: "We have no intention of creating a fetish of democracy. Our generation may talk and think too much about democracy and not pay enough attention to the values ​​it is meant to serve."

Looking at the world today, those who try their best to promote Western democracy all over the world are almost all believers in democratic fetishism. They always think that one person, one vote can solve all the world's problems. He didn't even say an apology to others.This kind of arrogance and ignorance has led to a sharp decline in US political soft power in recent years. Even former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright recently lamented that America's reputation in the world has never been as bad as it is today.Hayek's view that the value served by democracy is higher than democracy itself still inspires our democratic construction today.In the process of building democracy, we should first consider the value that democracy serves. This value should be the good governance of the country and the happy life of the people. We should design our democratic system based on this value, not democracy for the sake of democracy, let alone cater to the approval of Western countries.We must study and practice democracy from the perspective of the Chinese people to solve the problems faced by the Chinese people. Only in this way can we ensure the prosperity of China and the happiness of the people.Our more than 30 years of reform and opening up experience have proved that China's own reform and opening up, although there are many problems, the overall effect is much better than those developing countries that follow the West.The same is true in politics, none of the developing countries that copied the Western democratic model really succeeded, and quite a few failed countries.From this perspective, China can only follow its own path of democratic innovation.We must learn all the experience and lessons from the development of human political civilization, reject rotten democracy, practice democracy well, and gradually build China into a great country that is rich, harmonious, and democratic.In terms of economic development, China has blazed its own path, and the whole world is amazed by it.In terms of political reform, we will gradually walk out of our own way and finally win the applause of the world.