Deliberative Democracy: The Possible Path Of The Constitutional Democracy Of China

Deliberative democracy is one of the new trends of democracy theory in 1980's. This paper study on the theory and practice of deliberative democracy, while focus on its background, meaning, value, practice carrier and so on. It also discusses the constitutional significance of this theory in the democratic process of China under relevant social background. The main research method used in this paper is the positive method, while the comparative and comprehensive and other research methods is also important.The first chapter studies on the basic theory and practice of deliberative democracy, and analysis its occurrence, development, meaning and function in a macro horizon. The social background of the emergence and development of deliberative democracy is the difficulties faced by representative democracy in the pluralistic society, including the mediocre trend and the elite trend of the representative democracy, as well as the marginalization of minorities. Based on the contrast to western scholars'definition, this paper proposed its own understanding, that is a variety of social subjects, including government, citizens and non-governmental organizations, consult with each other and exchange information, their aim is to reach compromise, participation and autonomy. This definition inherently includes the community, responsibility, communication, public participation, rules security, and other factors. This paper holds the view that deliberative democracy is not a replacement, but an innovation. It's not an ontological revolution, but a methodological update. The significance of deliberative democracy is that it is conducive to the orderly political participation, promote the implementation of public decision-making, constraint public power, cultivate civic spirit, and taking the interests of the minority into account. Its limitation is that it's likely to influence decision-making efficiency and cost, and because of the diversity of its main structure, it is easily to bring about individual citizen to a discourse space under the extrusion of relatively strong organization. In Western society, deliberative democracy is no longer only theory; it has already deepened into the western's social governance process. People developed legislative hearing, citizens'juries, deliberative polling, town meeting, focus group and other practice forms.The second chapter explores the path of democratic of our country at a macro level. During the improvement of our constitutional democracy, we should continue to develop electoral democracy, but at the same time, we should absorb a number of theoretical and practical elements of deliberative democracy, in order to expand and enhance the breadth and depth of citizen participation in the process of public decision-making. Its necessity is that there are many changes in the process of rapid transformation of social structure, including that the pattern of interests is growing differentiation, scientific and technological progress has led to the redistribution of the right to speak, but the channels of public participation is not smooth yet. In China, the feasibility of deliberative democracy is that the path of gradual reform, the more and more broad-based participation in public decision-making, and the rights consciousness of public, although there are also some social and psychological barriers. The constitutional of the development of deliberative democracy in China is that it is conducive to the freedom of expression, as well as the equal protection of civil rights. What's more, it is conducive to the cultivation of modern personality of citizens, and it can help us to regain the republican spirit. So the development of deliberative democracy will provide some ideas and improvement for our constitutional system, it may become an important source of the constitutional democracy in China. At the constitutional level, we need to correctly determine the position of the development of deliberative democracy. We should develop it as a certain repair to the broad framework of the electoral constitutional system. As a result, we should develop the main role of people's congress system and other relevant system, expand and deepen the political participation of public, in order to develop various forms of deliberative democracy. We should firstly explore the democratic forces within our political system, because that the growing point is based on the current political state. We should improve the system of political consultation and other formal negotiations, and develop the dialogue between the government and the public in the process of public decision-making. We should expand and deepen the scope and depth of citizen participation on the base of urban self-government, as well as rural villagers'self-government, not only based on the roots, but also on the role of the elite.Starting from the empirical study, the third chapter explores the practice carrier of deliberative democracy in China, with the aim to improve relevant systems. This chapter analyzed the effective consultative mechanism in the political practice, especially the grass-roots political practice. These mechanisms include local legislation, government decision-making, enterprise management, and governance of rural and urban communities. Although most of them are not known as a deliberative democracy in name, but it is not lack such factors as public participation, equal consultation, and rational discussion. On the basis of these mechanisms, we should be committed to reforming the organizational structure, improving the negotiation rules, expanding the scope of participation, and to the development of diversified forms of consultation. The first is the deliberative democracy in legislative procedure. Legislative hearing is an important form of deliberative democracy in the legislative process. We should endow the public not only the opportunity to learn about the legislative process, but also the conditional to discuss and consulate the legislative issues. The scope of discussion and consultation should include not only whether or not the matters should be legislated, but also include on how to legislate in the legislative process. The second is the deliberative democracy in Government decision-making. Through the positive study on the hearing decision of Ling County, Shandong Province, the budget hearing of Minhang District, Shanghai, and the earnest talk of democracy of Wenling City, Zhejiang Province, this paper summarized the need and viable path for the development of deliberative democracy in the process of government decision-making. Its goal is to build an open democratic decision-making system. We should establish norms of democratic decision-making system by raising the transparency of government operations. The third is the deliberative democracy in rural communities. Through the positive study on the democratic decision-making in rural affairs of Quzhou City, and the Council of Chengdu City, this paper proposed the road of the development of deliberative democracy in rural communities. On the external environment, we should regulate the functions of the party's grass-roots organization and the village self-government organizations. On the consultative bodies and consultative process itself, we should regulate the organization of deliberative democracy carrier, and improve the true extent of the consultation process. The fourth is the urban communities in the deliberative democracy. Through the positive study on the new forms of community democracy, this paper proposes the path of deepen the deliberative democracy in community, which is to standardize the organizational structure of the community of democratic governance, and to improve the degree of organization of community residents. The fifth is the deliberative democracy involved in corporate governance. Through the positive study on the earnest talk of Longbiao group and the tripartite wage bargaining of Wenling City, this paper proposed the direction of the development of deliberative democracy involved in corporate governance, that is to the develop the system of employee share participation, and to improve the form on the democratic management of enterprises. The last one is the deliberative democracy on the Internet. The Internet provides a new concept of the public sphere for communication between people and government, which has become a new platform of discussion on public affairs and political participation. We should standardize the platform for e-government, and improve the legislation related to the Internet, and more important; we should cultivate a healthy network cultural of according to the characteristics of Internet.Through the comprisal, historical and empirical research, this paper hold the idea that deliberative democracy fit the path and direction of the development of our constitutional democracy at a certain extent. We can look forward that through continuous development, deliberative democracy can create a new way to fatherly improve our constitutional system, and to fatherly advance our progressive reform continues to move in depth.