公民参与对南非民主可持续发展的促进作用

Citizen participation as a contributor to sustainable democracy in South Africa

学术界认为,民主自身并不能有效运转,需要依赖于政府和公民来维持。对于南非民主的可持续发展而言,需要整合政府和公民的作用,以确保责任性、透明性、有效性以及向公民提供优质的公共服务。本研究的目的是确定大学生如何看待政府和公民在加强南非民主过程中的作用。为实现此目的,通过对南非大学公共行政与管理系注册的学生进行问卷调查的方式收集信息。结果显示,受访者认为对他们自己进行民主教育以及对政治家行为的监督是最重要的。调查结果进一步表明,受访者认为,诸如教育、健康、公共秩序和安全、创造就业机会等问题,从某种程度上来说,都是政府的关键角色。本文结论部分,通过专门提及南非中期战略框架及其12个预期成果,深刻思考了在加强南非民主中公民教育的重要性。

Academe has argued that democracy cannot be effective on its own,but is reliant on the government and citizens to sustain it For the South African democracy to be sustained,the roles of the government and the citizens need to be integrated to ensure accountability,transparency,effectiveness and good quality provision of public services to the citizens.The aim of this study is to establish what students view as the role of the government,and of citizens,in strengthening South African democracy.To this effect information was collected by means of a survey targeting students enrolled for modules in Public Administration and Management at a South African university.It emerged that the respondents deemed it important to educate themselves about democracy as well as the monitoring of politicians’behaviour.The findings further indicated that the respondents considered issues such as education,health,public order and safety,and job creation to a lesser extent to be key roles of government The article concludes by contemplating the importance of educating citizens in strengthening the South African democracy with special reference to the South African Medium Term Strategic Framework,and its 12 outcomes.