A Research On Restricting Power By Society Of Robert A. Dahl

Robert A. Dahl is a well-known democratic theorist and an outstandingrepresentative of pluralist democracy theory in contemporary Western. His theoryof pluralist democracy is known as the only correct theory to explaincontemporary political life. One important concept in his theory is restrictingpower by society. This idea is a development of traditional ways of powerrestriction, and it makes people turn their attention to the social dimension.This paper first introduces the early thought of social restriction, thenelaborate the background, the content, the value and limitations of Robert A.Dahl’s theory of social restriction. Finally, I associate his theory with theconstruction of democracy in China and expect to find a breach for our country’sconstruction of democracy from the perspective of social democracy. I think thatrestricting power by society may be an effective way for our country’sconstruction of democracy.China’s socialist modernization and democracy have made a certainachievement, the level of democratization of the Government has greatlyimproved. However, due to a variety of historical and practical reasons, ourcurrent level of democratization is Relatively low and far from a real moderndemocratic. Researchers proposed many programs on how to improve China’sdemocracy,we advocate "social restraining power" as first step on Building ademocratic.That is using social power to restrict the authority, so as to achieve the national democracy. As how to the implement the"social restraining power",we account that citizens, government and society should move togetherto construct the democracy of our country.