历史教条与美国民主的困境——达尔“历史教条”理论的内涵分析与解决方案

Historic Commitments and the Dilemma of American Democracy——Analysis and Solution of the Connotation of Dahl’s “Historic Commitments” Theory

在美国人看来,美国之所以是美国,是因为美国是独特的。美国为什么是美国呢?为了更好地研究这一现象,达尔提出了其“历史教条”理论。达尔认为,在美国历史上形成了五种政治文化传统,即宪政秩序、民主政治、公司资本主义经济秩序、福利国家和世界角色的信仰。这五种信仰在历史上产生,并对美国民主产生了重要的影响,但是,随着历史的发展,这五种信仰被教条化,形成了五种历史教条,严重地阻碍了美国民主政治的发展。必须从宪政改革、经济民主、程序民主、权利排序等多个角度来破除这五种历史教条。达尔对美国“历史教条”的研究从政治文化传统的角度分析了美国民主的特征,对我们认识美式民主有重要意义。

Dahl believes that five political and cultural traditions have formed in American history,namely,constitutional order,democratic politics,corporate capitalist economic order,welfare state,and belief in world roles. These five beliefs were produced in history and have had an important impact on American democracy. However,with the development of history,these five beliefs were dogmatized and formed five historic commitments,which seriously hindered the development of American democracy. These five historic commitments must be broken from multiple perspectives such as constitutional reform,economic democracy,procedural democracy,and ranking of rights. Dahl’s research on the American “historic commitments” analyzes the characteristics of American democracy from the perspective of political and cultural traditions,and is of great significance to our understanding of American democracy.