Research On Procedural Democracy

Nowadays,democracy is a political value,but also a form of government,the pursuit of democracy has largely reflected people's expectations and aspirations for a better life.However,the traditional democratic theory generally focuses on explaining the connotation and significance of democracy from the perspective of macro values,especially on whether the main body of power is majority or minority,but the procedural process of democratic rule is not taken seriously enough.Procedural democracy essentially belongs to the category of experiential democracy,it pays attention to the realization process and operation mechanism of democracy and the descriptive analysis of democratic process,it regards democracy as an institutionalized and standardized procedural rule and mechanism to promote the realization of democratic values,ideas,goals and other substantive content.Meanwhile,procedural democracy and substantive democracy are corresponding exist,and they together constitute two important components of modern democratic politics.Although the decisions made through democratic procedures and the results they produce may not necessarily be the best or most in line with the requirements of justice,modern democratic politics is still regarded by most zealous democrats as effective ways to realize democratic values and ideal goals.With the continuous development of modern democratic politics theory and practice,more and more democratic theorists tend to interpret and understand democracy from the perspective of procedure,procedural democracy has gradually become an important entry point in the study of democracy.Schumpeter,Dahl andHabermas are the core representatives of the three major democratic schools in the West:elite democracy,pluralistic democracy,and deliberative democracy,they all emphasize the theoretical value and practical significance of procedural democracy,devote themselves to get rid of the value disputes left by the traditional democratic theory,and try to promote the development of modern democratic politics in a relatively neutral and procedural way.Therefore,on the basis of explaining the basic theory of procedural democracy,this paper intends to review and analyze Schumpeter's elitism procedural democracy view,Dahl's pluralism procedural democracy view and Habermas' s deliberative procedural democracy view,systematically discusses the ideological origins,theoretical basis,core connotation,formal characteristics and practical conditions of the three different procedural democratic views,and then makes a comparative analysis and positioning of the three procedural democratic views in order to reveal the similarities and differences between them,and makes preliminary thoughts on the future development of procedural democracy.The core of Schumpeter's view of elitism procedural democracy lies in competitive political elections.Schumpeter believes that the "common happiness" and "people's will" presupposed by the democratic theories of the 18 th century are virtually non-existent,and the so-called "rule of the people" is largely a theoretical fiction.In Schumpeter's view,the people's task is mainly to elect government rather than to rule directly,and democratic politics can ultimately only be ruled by a few professional politicians.That is to say,democracy is only the procedural design and institutional arrangement for the selection of political elites,and it is only one way or method to achieve the purpose of selecting political leaders.Once the election process is over,ordinary people will withdraw from the political arena on their own,and the elected professional politicians will assume the responsibility for specific political affairs management and public decision-making.In Schumpeter's opinion,the process of democratic elections is essentially a process of competing for political power,whereby the political elite gains political leadership by competing for the votes of voters,andthen acquires political power to maintain the normal operation of democratic politics.Therefore,Schumpeter's procedural democracy avoids the entanglement of democratic values to a certain extent,and makes democracy closer to the actual political life,and thus more practical and operable.The core of Dahl's view of pluralism procedural democracy is the rule of multiple minorities.In Dahl's view,pluralistic democracy is based on the concept of power sharing,which is a process that takes relatively independent autonomous organizations as its carrier and advocates the rule of multiple minorities with social restrictions on power.Diversified social organizations or interest groups form an important force to express public opinion,protect civil rights and restrict power through interactive cooperation and game with government agencies.According to Dahl,the ideal procedural democracy is embodied in a series of democratic procedural standards and conditions,including effective participation,equality in voting,full knowledge,ultimate control over the agenda and citizenship of adults,and the main purpose of his procedural democracy theory is to construct an ideal procedural democracy system with a realistic basis around these procedural standards and conditions.At the same time,Dahl emphasizes that rights are a key component of the democratic rule process,and a democratic system is essentially a kind of rights system,which making political equality an important value orientation of procedural democracy.As a result,Dahl's procedural democracy contains substantive elements such as freedom and equal rights,and realizes the unity of procedural democracy and substantive democracy to a certain extent.The core of Habermas' s view of deliberative procedural democracy is the institutionalization of rational consultation and communicative presupposition.Unlike Schumpeter and Dahl,Habermas built a normative democratic model of proceduralism by merging the rational elements of liberal and republican democratic theory through ideal negotiation and decision-making procedures.According to Habermas,the procedure of deliberative politics constitutes the key link of democratic process,and democratic politics is actually a process of public consultation.In this process,the idealnegotiation environment has laid the foundation for rational communication,and the discourse communication based on inter-subjectivity realizes the free negotiation between equal subjects in a real sense,thus providing support and guarantee for the formation of civil opinion or public opinion,and the transformation of communication power into administrative power.Habermas' s procedural democracy is actually embodied in a dual-track deliberative democratic structure,which includes both constitutional democratic politics dominated by the institutionalized negotiation process,and the formation of citizen opinions or public opinion that occurs informally in the public domain,this democratic model combines discourse,dialogue,discourse of self-understanding,and discourse of justice,laying the foundation for a just and reasonable outcome.Through comparative study,it is found that Schumpeter,Dahl and Habermas' s procedural democratic thoughts all embody the theoretical characteristics and practical logic of the relative separation of democratic procedure and substance,the interdependence of democratic reality and ideal,and the equal emphasis on power restriction and rights protection.For all that,due to the influence of specific cultural background,the ideology of their democratic school,their own life experiences and other relevant factors,Schumpeter,Dahl and Habermas have distinct differences in their understanding of the basic forms of democratic realization,the core process of democratic operation,the rational basis of democratic interaction,the level of civic participation,and the ways of reaching democratic consensus.Specifically,with regard to the basic forms of democratic realization,Schumpeter and Dahl tend to insist on "voting-centered" competitive elections,arguing that democratic politics is actually electoral politics,and that the electoral process in democratic politics is indispensable;Meanwhile,Dahl stresses that on the basis of reasonable protection of equal voting rights of citizens,promoting government decision-making indirectly reflects the will and interests of voters;Habermas believes that voting is not enough to achieve true democracy,democracy is achieved throughconsultation and dialogue,only "dialogue-centered" can reflect the true meaning of the form of democratic realization.As for the core process of democratic operation,Schumpeter and Dahl prefer to liberalism's understanding of the democratic process,which is essentially a process of "interest compromise",mainly through the exchange of interests to maximize the interests of specific subjects;At the same time,Dahl emphasizes the competition and compromise among interest groups to make up for the lack of political participation ability of individual citizens;while Habermas prefers to emphasize democracy as a process of "public negotiation",whose main purpose is to effectively protect the public interests of the community on the basis of reasonable protection of individual interests through adequate rational negotiation and prudent interaction.On the rational basis of democratic interaction,Schumpeter and Dahl focus on individual rationality in order to pursue and realize the maximization of specific individual interests;Meanwhile,Dahl advocates to realize and safeguard the interests of individual citizens through collective action;while Habermas emphasizes the role of public rationality,and devotes himself to seeking the decision-making plan which can satisfy the wishes of all citizens to the greatest extent through public rationality.As for the level and scope of civic participation,Schumpeter stresses that citizen participation is limited to voting for political leaders,and the specific political affairs will be entrusted to the political elites selected through the election process;Dahl believes that citizen participation should not be limited to electing political leaders,but also exerting influence on government decision-making through certain social organizations and interest groups;For Habermas,deliberative democracy is based on the full communication and rational negotiation of stakeholders,public consultation is maintained through citizen participation,active and universal citizen participation is the necessary condition for the stable operation of democratic politics.On ways to achieve a democratic consensus,Schumpeter and Dahl rely heavily on the preference aggregation,aggregating individual preferences and interests through competitive election and voting,and replacing the democratic consensus with the consensus of the majority;At the sametime,Dahl advocates that individual citizens can achieve more effective convergence of interests or preferences by joining social organizations or interest groups;while Habermas hopes to achieve common good by shifting preferences,and recognizing that the ordinary citizens can change individual preferences in a timely manner based on negotiation and dialogue,which is more conducive to cultivate independent personality and reach democratic consensus.To sum up,Schumpeter,Dahl and Habermas' s procedural democratic thoughts represent the understanding and thinking of contemporary western elite democracy theory,pluralistic democracy theory and deliberative democracy theory on procedural democracy respectively.Through comparative analysis,in a pluralistic modern society,the development of procedural democracy still faces the crisis and dilemma.Accordingly,in the process of promoting the future development of procedural democracy,it is not only necessary to promote the integration of procedural democracy and substantive democracy,to prevent from falling into the dilemma of "procedural supremacy",but also to strengthen the construction of democratic procedures and build a perfect procedural control mechanism to promote the stability and sustainable development of modern democratic politics.