西方民主的理论转向及其困境

Theoretical transformations of the western democratic theory and its dilemma

西方代议制民主是资本实现统治权力的工具。权力的资本属性与民主实质(人民主权原则)存在着不可调和的矛盾,这是西方民主制度危机的根源。普选权的到来,资本的统治权出现了正当性危机,促使"人民主权"的民主理论转向为选举民主理论。选举民主理论抛弃了"人民主权"的原则,又陷入新的制度性危机,促使社会民主、参与式民主和协商民主等救赎型民主理论的出现。然而,囿于其制度本性,西方民主无法依靠自身的理论修正,挽救危机,它必然会被民主形式与实质统一的社会主义民主超越。

Western representative democracy is a tool used to achieve the sovereignty of the capital. The contradiction between the nature of representative democracy（ i. e.,the principle of people’s sovereignty） and the capital power is the source of the institutional crisis of western democratic system. The principle of people’s sovereignty challenges the capital power in the form of universal suffrage,which has led to the first crisis of representative democracy and a theoretic transformation from the principle of people’s sovereignty to electoral democracy. The electoral democracy has abandoned the popular sovereignty, which has led to another institutional crisis of representative democracy. Therefore, such retrieval theories as social democracy,participatory democracy and deliberative democracy have been proposed. However,owing to the fundamental institutional dilemma of representative democracy,western democracy cannot solve the crisis by theoretical transformations. It is inevitable that it should be surpassed by socialist democracy which is a unity of both democratic form and nature.