The Conflict And Balance Of Political Democracy And Government Effectiveness

The existence of democratic government is not only for its democracy but effectiveness, while the construction of effective government cannot trample upon democracy either. Democracy and government effectiveness both are goals of political development and modern state building for all countries of the whole world.In traditional view, there is inevitable conflict between them which is also not easy compromised. The tide of democratization is surging forward with great momentum, however, the rapid social development attract people’s attention to the hunting for an effective government. Under the dual pressures, no anti-democratic or ineffective government can gain a foothold in today’s world. Thus, it becomes an important issue for countries in the modern society to see the tension of democracy and government effectiveness for seeking the way to reconcile them, and eventually build an effective and democratic government.Establish an effective and democratic government is the target for modern political development, but the thought of it can be traced back to ancient Greece as other political issues. To some extent, the root reason for philosophers in ancient Greek to reject the democracy is the concerning about its invalidity.This thought continues down to the modern times, which makes modern thinkers to adopt cautious attitude to the democracy:government can only play an effective role in limited areas, inevitable conflict exists between democracy and effectiveness of government. To solve these problems, it should separate politics and administration, making democracy assigned to the field of politics, and administration follow the principles of efficiency. This view is more obvious in the political system design in America, and fully expressed in the ideas of America’s founding fathers and American scholars. John Stuart Mill, who is the represent for the political thoughts in the modern times, makes a first attempt to merge democracy and effectiveness government.Mill’s thought features a double character of the principle of "liberalism" and "utilitarianism", which may shows he pursue double values of democracy and effectiveness of government. Thus, he is nicknamed "Double Mill".Now, balancing democracy and effectiveness of government has been acknowledged in theory as an object fact and begun springing up across the world. People reach a consensus on the interdependency of democracy and effective government, and democratic government’s advantage in government performance is also accepted by the masses. Democracy must be effective; It should show more attraction even in the failure under democratic institutions than the future prospect under non-democratic institutions.The emergence of the concept of "government effectiveness" brings a new opportunity for the balance of democracy and efficiency of government. In other words, this government performance evaluation system——compound evaluation of government action——gives more opportunities for the integration and balance of democracy and government efficiency. Government effectiveness breaks through the limited conceptions which simply focus on the ration of quantity in the traditional government evaluation system, and brings the pluralistic social values into evaluating indicators of government performance. Even if the autocratic and centralized government has any advantages on efficiency, it still cannot anchor hopes on them to uphold justice principles of freedom, equality, etc. As an objective value, democracy itself is an important indicator to evaluate the government’s performance. The instrumental value of democracy is making more satisfactory performance in upholding justice principles of freedom, equality, etc. Therefore, to achieve effective governance from the practical viewpoint is a significant pursuit and substance of modern democracy.The first chapter presents general relation between democracy and government effectiveness. Judging from the perspective of political development, the quality of democracy is continuously upgrading, and transferring from democratic reality to democratic ideal.In the process of democratic quality improvement, the key to realize democratic and effective governance lies in the choice of democratic model which is actually a complex "netted texture" formed by concepts and general rules of fundamental conditions of related political field and its economic and social aspects. Government effectiveness is an assessment of democratic performance. Government power, which is the premise of government effectiveness, Government power and Government capacity are essential means to complete the basic assignments assigned by government functions. The rational division of government functions is the key link for government effectiveness building. Besides influenced by three elements of internal structure:government power, government capacity and government function, government effectiveness is also deeply influenced by the relationship of state and society, political system, political decision-making process and political culture, etc.Generally speaking, the four aspects above are also important dimensions for summarizing the characteristics of different model of democracy.By the axis of the four groups of variations can establish corresponding relations between democracy and government performance. From this model, it is easy to find the point for balancing democracy and government performance.The American political system is designed not only follow the concept of separation and balance of powers, but also take full consideration to mutually cooperation between all government departments. Thereby, the government can effectively complete tasks and achieve the people’s welfare.It is clear that, from the very beginning, the balancing between democracy and efficiency of government has been largely taken account into the American political system design and American founding father’s thought of group politics as well. With the establishment of polyarchy, group politics become an important dimension of the conflict and balance between American democracy and government effectiveness.Interest group is an organizational entity by individuals who have some common goals and attempt to influence public policy organization. In America, interest group’s participation in the political process started when the United States was found and kept expanding. When American founders was formulating a new constitution, this group phenomenon in the political process had been seriously thought and debated.Anti-Federalists believe that the citizens of the Republic must be free and independent-minded, also they should be homogeneous," In Republics, People’s behaviors, emotions and interests should be the same.If not, people’s views will be conflicted, and part of the representatives will have a long-period dissension with the others. And it inevitably hinders not only the operation of the government, but also the pursuit of public interest. " Therefore, Anti-Federalists proposed a state structure design of estabishing small Republic, making the centre power in state government. While Federalists pointed out that the faction should be controlled rather than eliminated, through setting appropriate government structures by the Constitution.In Madison’s thought, the republican government designed by forerunners can effectively prevent and control factions. The republican government entrusts the responsibility of decision-making on a small number of representatives who are voted by majority of citizens. In addition, when the government’s authority spreads to alienated masses, the competition of interests is the best way to weaken the factions. For this, Madison believes that in the United States, with various interest groups constantly rising, no political parties can lead the government according to the representative system. Government has to listen various views to make policy for the public interest. From a historical reality, the U.S. interest group in the political process does bring some political scandalsa to a certain degree. But, generally speaking, it is actually developing to multi-factor structure of group competion in accordance with Madison’s expectation. This multi-structure is the key for the formation of the conflict and balance of the U.S.democracy and government effectiveness. In chapter II, it discusses the development of American interest groups, structural features, its general impact on the political process and the American framers’s initial thoughts of group politics.The following chapter III, chapter IV, Chapter V, Chapter VI have discusses conflict and balance of democracy and government effectiveness, based on the respective discussion about interest group’s involving in the process of election, legislation, administration and the justice in the U.S..The conflict and balance of democracy and government effectiveness are reflected first in the electoral process. Election is the democratic pivot of liberal democracy and the mark of the degree of democracy development.Election is an instrument for the combination of popular sovereignty and effective management, majority rule and minority rule. And election is also the first stage for interest groups to participate in the U.S. political process.It is actually a positive contribution that enhance quality and performance of democracy when interest groups participating in the U.S. election. Interest groups play a vital role in the realization of universal suffrage. Interest group’s participation effectively arouses citizens’ enthusiasm to participate in elections and assumes the functions of organizing citizens; Interest groups also become an important complementary tissue when political parties are motivating and organizing voters. Interest groups and political parties become two engines of modern democracy by its interaction. After winning universal suffrage by leading, organizing and supporting women, the blacks and workers, interest groups continue to organize them to effectively participate in political life, election process, enhancing the quality of American democracy. In terms of government effectiveness building, interest groups point out the direction for the construction of government effectiveness and provide a wealth of information, knowledge and technical support for its participation in the electoral process. In addition, the management, which needs command skills involving unpretentious convincing manner, faculty of judgment, managerial aptitude and negotiation skills, should has a long-period patience to the pursuit and coherence of policy. The game between candidates and interest groups is favorable toward cultivating and performing candidate’s governance capacity.ChapterⅢis discussed the influence on the conflict and balance of democracy and government effectiveness by interest group’s participation in the electoral process, based on the external politics and perspective of the relationship between the external and internal politics. ChapterⅣ, chapterⅤand chapterⅥhave discussed respectively from the three internal politics:legislative, executive, and judicial. Involving in legislative process is the primary state and main site for interest group to engage in politics. For hundreds of years since the founding of the United States, the interest groups have found a variety of lobbing methods to present at the Congress, making an overall and deep insertion into Capitol Hill. The forms of groups reflect citizens’ aspirations, needs and opinions, which improve the quality of its democracy and provided a wealth of information, knowledge and technical support to the Congress for the effectiveness building. The operation of Congress is influenced not only by interest groups but also by strict rules and procedures of the Congress itself. These rules and procedures are stipulated by the law or formed in the long-period practice. Besides, the operation of Congress is checked and supervised by the administration leading by the president. The will of political parties also influences the actions of Congress members. Consequently, interest groups are not the single factor to influence the operation of Congress, or even control the Congress members’ s thought. In the long-time game, Congress and interest groups gradually formed some tacit understanding. With large-scale emergence of lobbying actions by interest groups, the political control by minority interest groups gets weaker, and community views and interests are more equally represented in the Congress. Under the dual impact of expansion and restriction, the work of the U.S. Congress has achieved the balance between democracy and effectiveness to a certain extent.Entering the twentieth century, it mainly performs in administrative process when there are increasingly participations of interest groups, which is the result of the expansion of administrative framework and government’s focus transformation.The set of the U.S. administration framework is no exception to follow the efficiency principle of institutions establishment. The separation of political and administrative is the means that the U.S. government adopted to balance the relationship between administrative efficiency and democratic at the beginning of its foundation. However, with the rise of big government and the expansion of administrative process by interest groups, the political and administrative separation lost its effect in the process of building administrative democracy. While the participation of interest groups gives a new opportunity for the balance of democracy and administrative effectiveness. Between administrative agencies and interest groups, a relationship of competition and cooperation has formed. Public managers works in a "pressure field" which is a real place formed by the fight for interests, values and attitudes. The absence of a hierarchical power structure makes them keep working relationship on the aspect of functions with important interest groups when exercise their duties.Public managers often find that only through the cooperation and support from organized forces can they gather the necessary power and authority together to maintain its position and achieve its goals. Both form a mutual need for dependence in several aspects. The achievement of this operable participation also relies on the system requirements, legal norms, trust and cultural constraints and the natural balance of the formation of free competition.An important characteristic of the judicial system in the design of the U.S. political system is that the judicial system, based on the principle of separation of powers and judicial supremacy, has an important influence on formulation and implementation of the U.S. national law and public policy.At the same time, it is generally considered justice as a representative of the justice, therefore, the influence that the U.S. courts and the judicial system played on state laws and public policy is regarded as safeguards system for legislation and implementation of laws and public policy with the principles of justice.In the judicial process, by influencing the appointment of judges, affecting the legal profession and other indirect lobbying and direct participating in judicial proceedings, through the application of court briefing and other more convenient means, it has formed a competitive balanced situation for lobbying state court, ensuring that impartial justice and a balance between democracy and effectiveness within the judicial system.ChapterⅦof the article analyses characteristics of the conflict and balance on the U.S. democracy and government effectiveness. In America, it is a visible conflict between democracy and government effectiveness. However, In today’s America, the extents of democracy and government effectiveness building are among the first ranks in the world, and it achieves a better balance between democracy and government effectiveness. The reason for it is the unique design of the U.S. political system provides an institutional framework for the balance of democracy and government effectiveness. Also, there are some relationship among strict law, the longstanding political conventions, mature civil society, multicenter model of governance, and the blending of Public Interest and individualism, pragmatism, the spirit of compromise, and other unique civic culture of the U.S..In conclusion, it points out that there is existing a certain tension between democracy and government effectiveness, but the reality of democratic government requires that we should keep the balance between the objective value and instrumental value, calling for from the protective democracy to governance democracy. The introduction of citizen participation in the governance of the idea of governance democracy to be achieved to provide a guideline, the role that interest groups played in the conflict and balance of American democracy and government performance once again reminds us:the development of social interest groups plays a vital role in the balance of political democracy and government effectiveness and the achievement of governance democracy.