The Road To Welfare

Along with the theory of the state development, both the liberal and the anti-liberal acknowledge the legitimacy of the state interference behavior in a certain extent. Since the neo-liberalism has appeared, even the liberal democracy is impossible to be satisfied with merely providing the protection of life, freedom and property which is the basic function of country, the state interference behavior more and more penetrations into various fields of people's lives. This kind of phenomenon's appearance, makes the theoretical analysis gradually expand to the behavior of the state's paternalistic interference. Because people have be confused with the difference between paternalism and patriarchism for many years, the theorists always try to avoid talking about the paternalistic behavior. This article will re-introduce the paternalism to the vision of the public and intend to make the behavior of paternalistic interference obtaining its proper researching status.The work of justifying the state's paternalistic interference is divided into two aspects, from the discussion of individual will to the demonstration of individual welfare, the explanation of individual autonomy is the bridge of communicating liberalism with the non-liberalism ,they had justified paternalism by the different understanding of autonomy and its value. In the context of liberalism, the justifying of paternalism inevitably need to resort to individual will, but when the genuineness of consent and the utilizable value encounter set at variance, unique charm of the consent theory has also dissipates along with it. At the same time, the justification of paternalism request to choose another space. Gerald Dworkin make the"autonomy"as one procedural concept, it concerns with individual welfare , and argue that for individual's more autonomy in future we can limit his/her immediately autonomy. This argument recognizes the legitimation of paternalistic interference from a macroscopic significance. At the same time, although some liberals has different understanding with Gerald Dworkin about the value of autonomy, but they reaches the same goal or conclusion from different approaches with Gerald Dworkin, and for the individual welfare, the state's paternalistic interference is legitimacy. Then, the justifying for paternalism completely changes over to individual welfare's discussion. The ethics of care concerns with individual welfare, and maintain that it can justify the interference by the purpose to enhance the person's own benefit. Therefore some important viewpoints of the ethics of care can justify the state's paternalistic interference from a side card.The content of this article can divides into four parts: First, the connotation of paternalism; Second, individual's will and paternalism, as the approach of liberalism; Third, individual autonomy and paternalism; Fourth, the ethics of care and paternalism——the discussion about welfare.The first part of article explained the connotation of paternalism. The introduction of paternalism is from two aspects: First, the origin of paternalism; Second, different definition of paternalism. Paternalism stemming from pater in ancient Greece language, the meaning is that we can interfere with a person's action which is for the person's own benefit like father treats the child. Gerald Dworkin proposed that paternalism should meet the three conditions: 1, X interferes with the liberty or autonomy of Y; 2, X does so without the consent of Y; 3, X does so just because it will improve the welfare of Y. In view of these three aspects, the different theorists proposed the different viewpoint. Bernard Gert and Charles M. Culver argue that paternalistic behavior is not necessarily need to interfere with individual's liberty, and also not necessarily needs to violate individual's will. Simultaneously, they maintained that paternalistic behavior can be independently of individual's will. However, the definition debate about the paternalistic behavior is still to be continue, and did not make the conclusion yet.The second part of article introduced the approach which is used by the liberals to justify paternalistic behavior. Because many paternalists believing that, in On Liberty, Mil allowed paternalistic interference in a certain extent, they are likely to choose individual's will to justify the state's paternalistic behaviors. And the paternalistic liberals believing that the person's consent (future consent) will justify paternalism, but the anti-paternalistic liberals thinks that if there is consent in paternalism, there is no paternalism at all.When it comes to this,many theorists realized that perhaps using consent to justify paternalism is an unwise choice, because the consent theory has the natural paradox: an initial hypothesis of consent requests liberty and equality; but the purpose of consent is still for the people's liberty and equality. Moreover, because the phenomenon of the adaptive preference, we cannot easily obtain the genuine consent, so just using the person's consent to justify interference is not adequate.The third part of article maintain that, in front of the failure of justifying paternalism by consent theory, the anti-liberal paternalists, Gerald Dworkin for example, make the re- explanation of individual autonomy to justify paternalism. They define the autonomy as a procedural concept, the state can interfere with person's behavior for their own good, and the paternalistic behavior is legitimacy because it can improve the person's autonomy in future by limiting his immediately autonomy. From the analysis about individual autonomy and its value, the theorists reverse their attention from individual's will to individual's welfare.The fourth part of article show the emphasis on the individual's welfare. This article part have surmounted the liberal approach to justify the paternalistic interference. The ethics of care has provide a different vision which is different from the liberalism, it maintain that the concern to the person's welfare enabled the people to pay more attention to other people's benefit, realized individual growth is dependent on the others, and for every person ,the individual growth is the most important welfare. The ethics of care broke the dominations of the liberalism which advocates right, independence as a person's most important value, it reconstructed the theory network which is for about dependence and relation, and it justifies paternalism in a certain extent.Nowadays, liberal democracy is becoming a mainstream all over the world, but the state's paternalistic interference still grow continually in the Western theorists. Paternalism has a great deal of significance for Chinese government, especially for the research on the political theory of China in the socialist system. Certainly, in the real life, the state's paternalistic interference allows public power to limit personal liberty, therefore, we must limit the paternalistic interference strictly. This can prevent the wanton abuse of power, and can also make progress and improve the harmony in the society.