Economic and Political Studies Vol. 1, No. 1, January 2013, 156-177 Deliberative Democracy in China: A Sociology of Knowledge Perspective HUOSHENG TAN 1* Abstract: This paper analyzes from the perspective of the sociology of knowledge how the theory of deliberative democracy was introduced into China. This perspective means that the analysis of this article will not focus on the theory itself, but rather on the various strategies adopted in this process (the strategy of introducing deliberative democracy theory into China and the strategy of putting this theory into practice) and their effects. Keywords: deliberative democracy, theoretical implantation, embedded development I. Introduction DELIBERATIVE DEMOCRACY AS THE LATEST achievement of Western democratic theories has only a history of about 20 years. At the turn of the century, this au courant theory was introduced into China, where it soon attracted a flurry of interest. This article analyzes, from the perspective of the sociology of knowledge, how this theory was introduced into China. As a result, the analysis of this article will not focus on the theory of deliberative democracy itself, but rather on the various strategies adopted in this process (the strategy of introducing deliberative democracy theory into China and the strategy of putting this theory into practice), as well as the effects produced by these strategic choices. Deliberative democracy theory first entered the Chinese academia around 1998 through Taiwan of China. The earliest interest in this theory occurred among sociologists rather than political scientists. To the best of my knowledge, Utopia of Public Opinion Poll (Yang, 1998) is the earliest Chinese article about deliberative democracy. Soon, China s political scientists followed suit, resulting in more systematic research (Chen, 1999; Hsu, 2000; Lee, 2000). In contrast, it was the great reputation of * Huosheng Tan is from the Department of Political Science, Tsinghua University; e-mail: hsruc@ yahoo.com.cn.
Deliberative Democracy in China 157 Habermas that helped this theory land on the Chinese mainland. Thanks to the translation of Three Normative Models of Democracy (Habermas, 1994), scholars from the Chinese mainland began to notice deliberative democracy theory. The earliest publication addressing this theory is A Road to Discourse Democracy: A Dialogue with Habermas (Wang, 2002). The following year, the reform of Peking University sparked controversy. With the theory of deliberative democracy, Xu (2003) analyzed this issue in the article Deliberative Democracy in the Reform of Peking University, gaining the attention of academia. However, scholars were not so enthusiastic about this theory in this period despite the publication of Deliberative Democracy (Chen, 2004) and the convening of the International Symposium on Deliberative Democracy Theory and China s Local Democracy in Hangzhou in August 2004. In 2004, there were only five papers on deliberative democracy in academic journals of the Chinese mainland. Two of them were introductory articles by the same author; of another two articles, one was a translation, and the other a review of the aforementioned Deliberative Democracy. In 2005, 16 articles on the topic appeared, of which seven were the result of the 2004 symposium in Hangzhou. However, starting in 2006, the number of articles soared on deliberative democracy. According to an online search (at www. cnki.net) by the author on April 28 2011, 160-180 articles were found with deliberative democracy in the title each year during 2008-2010, and 38 appeared in the first quarter of 2011. From 2004 to the first quarter of 2011, the overall total stood at 760. 200 180 160 140 120 100 80 60 40 20 0 168 176 160 131 66 16 5 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 FIGURE 1. Number of Articles on Deliberative Democracy in Academic Journals of the Chinese Mainland (2004-2010)
158 Economic and Political Studies Similarly, master s theses relating to deliberative democracy theory also showed an upward trend during 2004-2010. A search in China Master s Theses Full-text Database included in cnki.net shows that from 2004 to 2010, a total of 75 papers were about deliberative democracy, of which in the years 2009-2010 alone there were 46, accounting for 61.3% of the total. The academic enthusiasm for deliberative democracy theory was thus visible and is still growing. 35 30 30 25 20 15 10 12 11 16 5 0 5 1 0 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 FIGUER 2. Number of Master s Theses about Deliberative Democracy in the Chinese Mainland (2004-2010) The theory of deliberative democracy was introduced into China only a few years ago. Nevertheless, there has been enormous related research up to now, 21 and these publications have been relatively concentrated: 83.6% of periodical articles and 92% of master s degree theses were completed 1 A comparison with studies concerning other Western theories or even other democratic theories reveals that this number is very notable. According to a search by title keyword (at www. cnki.net), as of May 2011, only 16 articles contain elite democracy in their titles; 7 have pluralist democracy ; 76 include liberal democracy (of which the first article appeared in 1952, and a considerable number of articles merely introduce Liberal Democratic Party in many countries, having nothing to do with liberal democratic theory itself); 119 contain participatory democracy ; 80 include direct democracy ; and 60 involve representative democracy. All of these articles only add up to 358 (of which many are counted repeatedly), less than 1/2 of articles with deliberative democracy in the title published during the last five years.
Deliberative Democracy in China 159 between 2007 and 2010. Moreover, in the few short years, experimentation guided by this theory in China has sparked the interest of the international academic community, where very quickly there appeared related articles and works (Leib and He, 2006; Hess, 2009; Fishkin et al., 2010; He and Warren, 2011). One can only be curious as to why there has been such a striking amount of interest in China and why China s local experiments has attracted prompt response from the Western academia. This paper will examine this phenomenon from the perspective of the sociology of knowledge. It will focus on the following two questions: How was the Western theory of deliberative democracy introduced to China? And how has this theory been incorporated into China s knowledge system and even political and social practice? II. Sinicization: The Strategy for Introducing the Theory into China Ever since the May Fourth Movement of 1919, the implantation of Western theories has been commonplace in China. But why have some foreign-originated theories vanished quickly after their introduction into China, while others have been able to stimulate long-term interest? Why do some theories have a real impact on China s social and political practice, while others are merely limited to narcissism within the ivory tower? These questions remain largely unexplored by academia. The dissemination of deliberative democracy theory in China has provided us with a very interesting case, through which we may propose a preliminary answer to the aforementioned questions. In this section, we will try to investigate these two questions: Who introduced the theory? How was it introduced into China? Of course, these two questions are closely linked; the choice of the theoretical introduction strategy clearly influences the composition of disseminators of this theory. During the process of implanting deliberative democracy theory, quite a few policy researchers from the CPC departments and even some government officials have been engaged in discussions. This success is largely attributable to the introduction strategy of scholars, a strategy that stresses the connection between Western democratic theory and China s political tradition. In order for a theory from abroad to make an impact in a country, the first task is to translate the basic literature and introduce the core ideas and important scholars in the history of the theory. Then the theory must be consciously localized, that is, be acclimatized to the target country s conditions. It should be said that deliberative democracy theory has been
160 Economic and Political Studies relatively successful in this regard. Firstly, the translation about deliberative democracy theory has achieved fruitful results. Since 2004 when the first anthology on deliberative democracy was published, ten monographs or anthologies have been translated into China. There are three anthologies edited by Chinese scholars on deliberative democracy: Deliberative Democracy (Chen, 2004), Deliberative Democracy (Tan, 2007) and The Evolution of Deliberative Democracy (Chen and He, 2006). The former two include some of the core theses in the history of this theory, covering the basic stages of development, core concepts and controversies. They have become basic reference materials for Chinese scholars studying this issue. Moreover, Tan (2007) offers a 17-page bibliography on the theme, including references as of 2005, which provides a useful guide for further research. The Evolution of Deliberative Democracy consists of theses for the 2004 Hangzhou conference, which includes recent research and several articles from overseas scholars (e.g., Fishkin, 2006; Dryzek, 2006). Apart from this, under the direction of Keping Yu, Deputy Director of the Central Compilation and Translation Bureau (CCTB), the Translation Series on Deliberative Democracy plan has managed to translate the core literature into Chinese and played an important role in the promotion of deliberative democracy theory in China. Up to now eight books have been included in this series, among which four were published in 2006 and another four in 2009. All these books represent the most important studies in this field. Some of them are anthologies of great importance in the 1990s, including Bohman and Rehg (2006), Elster (2009), and Benhabib (2009); there are also anthologies reflecting the latest developments since 2000, such as Fishkin and Laslett (2009) and d Entreves (2006). However, there are some shortcomings in the translation work on deliberative democracy, of which the biggest regret is, despite the relatively large number of journal articles on deliberate democracy, translated texts have been very rare. In academic journals, we rarely see deliberative democracy-related translations. The results of a search (at www. cnki.net) show that during 2004-2011, there are only six translation articles containing deliberative democracy in their titles, accounting for only 0.79% of the total of 760 articles, which seems way out of proportion for a Westernoriginated theory. If again analyzing the distribution of these six articles, one will find two published in 2005 are from the Hangzhou conference; both articles published respectively in 2004 and 2006 are translated by the CCTB; one was published in 2010 in Comparative Economic & Social Systems, a journal edited by the CCTB; only the one article published in 2011 has nothing to do with the CCTB.
Deliberative Democracy in China 161 The work of implanting deliberative democracy theory has been fruitful only in the last couple of years. Among the 760 articles published from 2004 to the first quarter of 2011, only 171 articles (or 22.5%) discuss deliberative democracy theory itself. It may seem like a big number, but a closer examination will reveal that most of these articles are general overviews without going into depth of any issue about deliberative democracy theory, and the degree of repetition is quite high, in terms of both topics and arguments. As a result, the range of introductions is quite limited. Not only are many important issues basically overlooked, but many introductions of thinkers are also concentrated on Habermas. However, this situation has improved in the last few years, as some younger researchers have chosen deliberative democracy as the theme for their master s theses and PhD dissertations. They have published a number of papers adapted from their dissertations, covering in depth core issues including civism, reason, equality, consensus, legitimacy, representative, preference, politics of difference, public policy, etc. Some of them are quite good (e.g., Zhang, 2008; Diao, 2009; Yan, 2010; Du, 2009). Some less important thinkers are also introduced into China (Ma, 2009). In contrast with the relatively weak theoretical research, 589 articles (or 77.5%) on deliberative democracy discuss China-related questions. Two aspects are worthy of our attention about this clear practice-centered orientation. First, this is the inevitable result of the introduction strategy. When scholars began to introduce this theory, they intended not only to pursue knowledge but also to provide theoretical resources for the construction of democratic politics in China. The translation of the term deliberative democracy is a manifestation of this intention. Since the term deliberative democracy itself entered the Chinese academic vocabulary, there has been at least seven different types of translations in the Chinese literature: 审议民主 (or its derivatives 审议式民主 and 审议性民主 ) (Jiang, 2003; He, 2003; Lin and Chen, 2003; Chen, 1999; Huo, 2004; Tan, 2007), 商议民主 (or its derivatives 商议性民主 and 商议民主制 ) (Hsu, 2000; Xu, 2003), 协商民主 (Chen, 2004; He and Wang, 2007), 慎议民主 (Kymlicka, 2004), 商谈民主 (Tong, 2003), 慎辩熟虑的民主 (Liu, 2002). 32 In Taiwan, the most commonly seen translation is 审议民主 ; while on the mainland, the most popular translation is 协商民主. 43 Among these, the translation of 协商民主 (democracy through consultation) makes it easier to combine 2 Regarding the respective advantages and disadvantages of these translations, please see Tan (2007, 6-7). 3 Among the 760 articles, only 21 (or 2.76%) used the translation of 审议民主, and only one article used 慎议民主.
162 Economic and Political Studies this theory with local resources and implement it in China. A high degree of consensus has been reached on this point. The most vigorous advocate of deliberative democracy in China is Professor Baogang He. He has said privately more than once that the more accurate translation may be 慎议民主 or 审议民主, but 协商民主 is more appropriate for it to be promoted in reality. This translation can be connected with the Chinese People s Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) and the mass line, thus providing more space for its development (He, 2008, 114). I agree with this point though I still choose the translation of 审议民主. I choose 审议民主 not only for more precise understanding of the theory itself, but also for implementing this theory in practice. The translation of 协商民主, though it is more acceptable for the Chinese people, may make this theory less inspiring. By contrast, the translation of 审议民主 deliberately creates a sense of alienation to prompt us to reflect upon our own political practice. In this sense, the original intentions of the two translations are both to promote China s democratic construction. It should be said that the strategy of implanting deliberative democracy has been very successful. This theory has quickly attracted wide attention of scholars and the public, it also showed vigorous vitality in grassroots political and social practice. As early as 2006, Junru Li, Vice President of the Party School of the Central Committee of CPC, wrote many articles for newspapers and magazines, stating that deliberative democracy is an important form of democracy (Li, 2006a; Li, 2006b). Because of his special status, his view aroused heated discussions after it was reprinted by digital media such as people.com.cn and xinhuanet. com. During the National People s Congress and the CPPCC in 2010, CCTV News made a brief review of deliberative democracy in China s political life under the title of Deliberative Democracy Blossoms in Vigorous Practice. This shows that deliberative democracy has been accepted not only by the general public, but also by top leaders. Second, coverage of the topics. According to this author s calculation, these 589 articles discussing Chinese-related issues can be divided into the following categories (see Table 1). TABLE 1 Coverage of Articles Addressing China-related Issues with Deliberative Democracy Theory Type Deliberative democr a c y with C h i n e se characteristics Number of articles Percentage of the total (%) Contents 127 21.56 General introduction
Deliberative Democracy in China 163 TABLE 1 Continued Type Number of articles Percentage of the total (%) Contents Political institutions 169 28.69 CPPCC: 94 articles; political party system: 50 articles; unified front: 5 articles; people s congress system: 5 articles; constitutionalism: 15 articles Grassroots governance 85 14.43 New village construction; village autonomy; grassroots elections; protection of the rights of the disabled; community governance; wage negotiations; town governance; petition letter; mass disturbance; disadvantaged groups; democratic consultation; budget reform Civil society and political participation Service-oriented government and harmonious society construction 61 10.36 Civil society: 12 articles; media: 23 articles; political participation: 21 articles 51 8.66 Harmonious society: 33 articles; ethnic group issues: 5 articles; service-oriented government: 13 articles Public policy 41 6.96 Hearings; scientific decision-making; democratic decision-making Deliberative democracy and ideology 13 2.21 The mass line; scientific outlook on development; thoughts on deliberative democracy of Mao Zedong, Zhou Enlai, Deng Xiaoping, Jiang Zemin or Hu Jintao Deliberative democracy in practice in modern China 6 1.02 D u r i n g A n t i -J a p a n e s e Wa r ( 1 9 3 1-1 9 4 5 ) ; t h e Wa r o f Liberation (1945-1949); the New Democratic Revolution (1919-1949); early years of the PRC; the Political Consultation Conference (1945-1946) Others 36 6.11 Community policing; hospitals; schools; Communist Youth League, etc. Table 1 shows some interesting phenomena. Firstly, quite a number of articles interpret deliberative democracy as an important form of socialist political practice with Chinese characteristics. The titles of these articles often highlight that deliberative democracy is an important form of socialist democracy with Chinese characteristics, deliberative democracy is an important innovation of China s 30 years of political construction, and deliberative democracy is the Chinese form of democracy. Most articles do
164 Economic and Political Studies not really care about the deliberative democracy theory itself, the similarities and differences between deliberative democracy and China s political practice, or the theory s implications for China s democratic political construction. What they intend to do is in fact to provide more legitimacy to China s current political practice. Secondly, most articles discuss deliberative democracy and China s political institutions, especially China s political consultation system and the related political party system. This is natural because when Chinese scholars translate deliberative democracy into 协商民主, they consciously emphasize the connection between the two. Thirdly, grassroots governance is the second most popular topic. If most articles stressing Chinese characteristics merely put old wine into a new bottle, then articles about grassroots governance mostly put new wine into an old bottle (this will be discussed in more detail in the next section). Almost all major issues about grassroots governance have been covered in these articles. We will find from these articles that practically all the hot topics are labeled as deliberative democracy; and nearly all top leaders are regarded as important representatives of deliberative democracy. Moreover, deliberative democracy has almost become China s greatest contribution to the world. One has to wonder whether deliberative democracy has become some kind of panacea that can solve all problems in China. This situation reminds us that when people hastily introduce deliberative democracy into China, some misinterpretations do exist. Despite some scholars warning as early as 2007 (Jin and Yao, 2007), misunderstanding of this theory has spread inevitably. It can even be said that the popularity of this theory among scholars and the public is partly attributable to this misunderstanding. It is also due to its popularity that a previously rare phenomenon has been observed: many policy researchers (mainly in the CPC departments) and even some government officials have joined scholars and use their magazines or journals to disseminate this theory. According to the author s calculation, 35.3% of the 760 articles are published in these magazines or journals (see Table 2). TABLE 2 Distribution of Articles on Deliberative Democracy Department Number Publications of articles CPPCC system 49 Theoretical Research of the CPPCC: 29 Jiangsu CPPCC: 11 CPPCC Affairs (sponsored by Fujian CPPCC): 1 Boating Together (sponsored by Guangdong CPPCC): 2 Unity (sponsored by the Revolutionary Committee of the Chinese Kuomintang): 6
Deliberative Democracy in China 165 TABLE 2 Continued Department United front work department Number of articles Publications 116 Journals of institutes of socialism: 113 China s United Front (sponsored by the United Front Work Department of CPC Central Committee): 1 Sichuan United Front (sponsored by the United Work Department of Sichuan Provincial Committee): 2 Party school system 103 Journals of Party schools: 54 Journals of academies of governance: 40 Party and Government Forum: 6 Public Administration and Law: 3 Total 268 Note: Party schools and academies of governance are separate institutions in a small number of provinces and at the national level, but the two practically belong to one system. So they are treated as the same thing in this article. III. Embedded Development: Putting Theory into Practice When we say deliberative democracy is somewhat misread when it is linked to China s contemporary political practice, this does not mean that we cannot link the two; on the contrary, we should do so. However, the right way is not to take China s political practice as the realization of the ideal of deliberative democracy; nor should this theory be rigidly and literally forced onto China s political practice. Instead, we should, on the one hand, be aware that consultation is not deliberation (Jin and Yao, 2007), and on the other hand, in accordance with the principle of limited deliberative democracy, we should embed skills of deliberative democracy into China s reality and improve China s political practice gradually but constantly (He and Wang, 2007). In fact, soon after this theory was introduced into China, it was put into practice. It can be said that the theoretical implantation and experiments in practice took place almost simultaneously. However, despite the emergence of many forms of deliberative democracy the citizens councils, urban resident councils, meetings of villager representatives, hearings and so on virtually all of these experiments have taken place thus far at the grassroots level. Therefore, here we will analyze the interaction between theory and practice with the relatively sophisticated practice of deliberative democracy in Wenling, Zhejiang Province. The practice of deliberative democracy in Wenling is in fact an integral part of Wenling s democratic consultation (minzhu kentan, which literally means sincere heart-to-heart democratic discussion ). As some commentators have pointed out, regardless of political results, Wenling s
166 Economic and Political Studies democratic consultation has created a miracle in terms of the amount of academic literature it has generated. In the period from January 2003 to September 2009 alone, 39 academic articles on this topic were published in journals of the Chinese mainland, and one appeared in an international academic journal (He, 2010). These articles have taken different theoretical approaches to explain Wenling s democratic consultation. However, as to what concerns us here how is theory put into practice the existing literature has not given a satisfactory answer. He (2010) proposes that the conjunction of power, idea and governance skills is crucial to understand the whole development of Wenling s democratic consultation, and the sequence of appearance of the three factors and the forms of their combination is the structural framework determining the timing and ways of Wenling s democratic consultation. This explanation is very enlightening, but it fails to illuminate how they are combined. He and Wang (2007) have their own views of the forms of combination, believing that deliberative democracy should be embedded into China s social reality. Unfortunately, they just skate over the issue without going into further discussion. Upon the heels of them, I use the concept of embedded development to explain how the theory and skills of deliberative democracy are combined with the practice of Wenling s democratic consultation. This idea comes from the concept of embeddedness in sociology (Polanyi, 2001). Facing the compound characteristics of modern society, Polanyi sought to explain how heterogeneous components are integrated in modern society. He pointed out that the economy is not autonomous, but rather part of the greater social system; therefore, the functioning of the economy is not only affected by economic institutions, but also by politics, religion, social relations and ideas (Polanyi, 2001). Granovetter (1985) provides a systematic explanation of this issue. He criticizes that Polanyi s explanation of socioeconomic history with the concept of embeddedness is insufficient; he also tries to enrich this concept from a micro-perspective, and to find out a middle way between the two existing paths: one is the undersocialised explanation, as in neo-classical economics, which treats people as atomized individuals detached from the social background; the other is the oversocialised explanation in sociology, as in structural functionalism, which regard individuals as puppets of the society without any autonomy. Granovetter emphasizes that the actor is not an isolated individual, but is embedded in a particular social structure; therefore, widespread social relations will continue to influence the actor s behaviors. Subsequently, there has been a large amount of literature using the concept of embeddedness to explain human behaviors and institutional changes. They are not limited to the field of sociology, but have also spread into the fields of economics,
Deliberative Democracy in China 167 political science, law and other social sciences. Of course, some scholars have tried to use this concept to explain China s development. For example, O Brien (1994) uses this concept to explain the evolution of China s National People s Congress (NPC) in the reform era. Through interviews with staff and representatives of the NPC, he finds that development of the NPC in this period results from its cooperation with Party committees and the government. Support and attention from Party committees and government departments is critical for its organizational development and increased capacity. It is worth noting that O Brien (1994) also warns that we should not extend the comparison unduly and use signs of embeddedness to outline a Chinese path toward democracy; an embedded Chinese legislature may ultimately contribute to increased state capacity and a more efficient authoritarianism. The leap to democracy requires systematic, nonincremental changes and going beyond embeddedness. Obviously, according to O Brien, embeddedness is a negative factor which needs to be transcended to realize China s democratization. Nevertheless, a completely free market without state regulation is not possible, the active intervention of the state is necessary; therefore disembedding cannot be successful (Block, 2001). If disembedding is not an ideal choice, then how to face embeddedness is an unavoidable problem. There is an important difference between deliberative democracy and the NPC system. The NPC system is an existing institution, where legitimacy is not a problem; instead, the problem is how to give full play to the potential of this system. Therefore what we need to do is to focus on the support and attention of other ingredients of the political system. Nevertheless, as a heterogeneous element coming from abroad, deliberative democracy should first solve the problem of legitimacy before winning the support it needs. Therefore, its embeddedness involves both embeddedness in China s ideology and embeddedness in China s power structures. For China s democratization, embeddedness may be a viable option; the result may not necessarily be the strengthened authoritarianism as expected by O Brien, but may be updated social and political structures (this will be discussed next). The embedded development here means the embedding of some heterogeneous components into the existing social and political structures, which will activate or remold some functions of the structures and gradually revitalize the entire structures through continuous improvement and expansion. Specifically, what embedded development stresses is to win the space for development through the means of embedding. This means we cannot force reality to adapt to theory; instead, with the conditions being unchanged, we should make new elements separately infiltrate into the existing social and political structures. At the same time, embedded
168 Economic and Political Studies development requires that new heterogeneous components must find counterparts in the existing social and political structures in order to survive. Only after this will they possibly activate some dormant functions and develop themselves through constant self-improvement. Moreover, their expansion within the system also follows existing paths to power. During this process, they reinterpret the original system and reset its functions. Embedded development is easily confused with path dependence. In my opinion, the most important difference between the two is that while the latter is a passive adaptation, the former is a proactive choice, which through the form of embeddedness gains space for development and all kinds of necessary resources (institutional resources, legitimacy, etc.). Below is an examination of how much Wenling s practice of deliberative democracy and even the entire process of democratic consultation can by interpreted by the above theoretical assumption. As we all know, Wenling s democratic consultation at the early stages of its creation was not a new form of democracy, but rather a creative carrier of political and ideological work at the rural grassroots level. Afterward, it gradually became an original form of grassroots democracy (Chen, 2005), and then by incorporating components of deliberative democracy it has turned into deliberative democracy in practice and Wenling has become a leading practicer of contemporary democratic theory (He, 2010). Every step has been realized by embedding new governance skill into the existing frameworks (i.e. power structures and ideological discourses) to achieve improvement and innovation (Zhang, 2003). Observed from the perspective of power structures, when democratic consultation emerged in 1999 as a new form of political and ideological work, it was implemented by the municipal publicity departments of Taizhou and Wenling in accordance with the plan of the provincial Party committee. At that time, the municipal publicity departments selected Songmen Town as the pilot site for the Agricultural and Rural Modernization Education Forum and agreed on specific operational measures with the town Party committee and town government. It was the two-way dialogue between officials and the public in imitation of the press conference that gave rise to democratic consultation. The whole process was run within the existing framework of power. After democratic consultation achieved legitimacy within the existing institutional framework, it became the substrate for developing deliberative democracy and budget democracy. The practice of Wenling s deliberative democracy is in fact realized by implanting the technique of deliberative polling into the original democratic consultation. It is also achieved under the leadership of the Party committee and government of the Zeguo Town. As some scholars have pointed out, the whole process fully
Deliberative Democracy in China 169 embodies the Chinese characteristics of China s grassroots participation through consultation, that is, the domination of government (Lang, 2005). A closer look at the procedures will make this clear. For example, the townlevel democratic consultation goes like this: the township leading group of democratic consultation gathers opinions of the representatives of town people s congress or CPPCC, mass organizations and individuals the town Party committee and government examine the information the joint conference of the town Party committee, government and people s congress determines the theme of consultation the general office of the town government makes the implementation plan the general office announces the time, vanue, theme, and the participators generated through random sample discussion materials are delivered to participators ahead of time; venue layout and division of labor and other related issues are determined democratic consultation is conducted the township leading group studies opinions and suggestions gathered from the consultation and maps out a project the project is announced town government implements the project. In the whole process, the Party committee and people s congress supervise and solicit for feedback opinions (Lang, 2009). It can be said that the success of the strategy of embedded development lies in that it is government-dominated and thus controllable. It does not directly challenge the existing power structures, thus significantly reducing political obstacles and risks of reform; technically, the Wenling model is greatly practicable. For cadres in charge, it is quite controllable; at least they don t have to worry about losing their future (Jing, 2003). Observed from the perspective of ideological discourses, Wenling s democratic consultation has evolved completely within the existing ideological framework. In the early days, it was smoothly integrated into the mainstream ideology and the discourse system of the ideological and political work, and was interpreted as reflecting the tradition of maintaining close ties with the masses. Later, when it became a new form of grassroots democracy, it was included in the interpretative framework about democracy by the 15 th CPC National Congress. According to this official interpretation, democracy includes the four major parts of democratic election, democratic decision-making, democratic management and democratic supervision. Wenling s democratic consultation not only covers the last three aspects, but also avoids democratic election which is too sensitive for local authorities to touch. It fully meets the requirements of the 15 th CPC National Congress and is politically safe (He, 2010). Moreover, according to experts (e.g., Chen, 2005), democratic consultation not only manifests the unification of the Party s leadership, people as the masters and the rule of law, it also has implications for changing the way of governance and improving the capacity
170 Economic and Political Studies of governance of the CPC as a ruling party. Later, the method of deliberative democracy was embedded into democratic consultation. Even though this practice can be explained with Western theories, the term of democratic consultation is still used. This is extremely important since it gives a legitimate form to the Western-originated theory. People s acceptance of deliberative democracy is also related to the way it is introduced: it is embedded into China s original system in a technical form (as a new public opinion survey skill). After its entry, it will inevitably bring with it the values of equality, freedom, reason, and so on. But in the early period it is neutral, showing no any ideological preference. Furthermore, this new public opinion survey skill can even be explained as institutionalizing and routinizing the mass line. On the one hand, it can make the public understand and practice deliberation instead of resorting to extreme measures to voice their political desires and demands to the government; on the other hand, it allows government officials to know the specific implications of democratic administration. Therefore, deliberative democracy can be said as an innovative form of the mass line in the new era (Lang, 2005; Wang, 2005). From a new method of political and ideological work to deliberative democracy, Wenling s democratic consultation has found in each step its counterpart in the existing ideological discourses, and gained the ideological legitimacy with its creative interpretations. This is an important precondition for its sustainable development. If we can say that democratic consultation itself is embedded in the framework of political and ideological work and gains space to grow, then deliberative democracy and budget democracy are embedded in the framework of democratic consultation and thus gain space for development. After surviving in the framework of political and ideological work, democratic consultation has turned into an original form of grassroots democracy. When deliberative democracy and budget democracy survive, will they give rise to a mode of governance based on deliberation and cooperation and then facilitate the transformation of China s grassroots governance? This needs further work: activation, institutionalization and diffusion. Activation refers to the fact that when heterogeneous components are embedded in the existing social and political structures, they may wake up some dormant functions, such as the mass line, and the tradition of maintaining close ties with the masses. This requires that the heterogeneous components do not appear as alien things but as the new forms of old components. For instance, the deliberative polling skill used in deliberative democracy is interpreted as the institutionalized and routinized mass line. This is creative work, which requires re-interpreting the existing functions
Deliberative Democracy in China 171 as well as localizing heterogeneous components. Only in this way can heterogeneous components gradually become an organic part of the existing system. This creative work requires the participation of experts and scholars, as well as the combination of power, ideas and the art of governance (He, 2010). In fact, throughout the entire development process of democratic consultation, the participation of experts and scholars and their timely theoretical guidance are crucial. The transformation of Wenling s democratic consultation from a new method of political and ideological work to a new form of grassroots democracy is the result of the efforts of experts and scholars. According to Yimin Chen, the chief of the theoretical section of Wenling s municipal publicity department, it was in the year 2000 when a summing-up meeting was held that they were reminded by experts and scholars of the difference of democratic consultation: At that time, we still thought it was a form of ideological and political work, but experts from the Central Party School and our province pointed out that it has already gone beyond the scope of ideological and political work and become a new form of democracy. It is after this meeting that Wenling s municipal publicity department officially identifies this as a new form of democracy (He, 2010). After deliberative democracy as a new technique of governance is embedded into democratic consultation, it has not only activated the mass line, but also revitalized to a greater extent people s congress, the core of the original political structures. The experiment of deliberative democracy in the Zeguo Town has two links involving the township people s congress. The first is inviting representatives of the town people s congress to participate as observers. The second is submitting the resolution of the meeting to the town people s congress, and inviting village representatives chosen by means of sampling to participate in the discussion and voting process. This design produces two results. One of them is the strengthened self-consciousness of representatives of the people s congress. In February 2009, I visited the Zeguo Town and talked with those representatives of the people s congress. Several of them told me that they attended meetings and listened attentively because they felt pressure: These village representatives will come to listen to our discussions in several days. If we cannot do as well as they did, how embarrassed we will be as their representatives! The other result is the revitalized functions of the grassroots people s congress. According to the institutional design, the people s congress has the power to review and oversee the government budget. However, this power has long been in a dormant state, though this procedure is fulfilled every year. Thanks to the experiment of deliberative democracy, the town people s congress has started to genuinely exercise its power under the pressure of village representatives who also review the government budget. At the same time, the experiment
172 Economic and Political Studies of deliberative democracy by village representatives provides a model for the congress to understand how reviews should be conducted. If we say activation is a key step in updating a system, then institutionalization and diffusion are important conditions for the sustainable development of the updated system. Institutionalization provides an important stimulus for the development of Wenling s democratic consultation. From 2000 to 2004, Wenling introduced a series of official opinions on democratic consultation and set up related institutions. This has institutionalized the obtained results at each stage, and the institutionalization itself has in turn deepened this practice. In this process, there are two crucial institutional designs. One is the incorporation of democratic consultation into the assessment system. Township leaders will get bonus points if they perform well in democratic consultation. This facilitates competition between towns and the emergence of various forms of democratic consultation. The other is the establishment of a topdown leading institution (i.e., leading group on democratic consultation) from the municipal to the township (sub-district) level. The office of the municipal leading group belongs to the municipal publicity department. This structural arrangement has become a powerful force in promoting the sustainable development of democratic consultation. It is because once such an institution is established, the meaning of its existence lies in the in-depth and sustainable development of democratic consultation (He, 2010). The demand of self-expansion itself will press it to consistently seek new forms of and breakthroughs in democratic consultation. In fact, it is exactly this force that facilitates all kinds of innovative practices to emerge at the appropriate time, just as practices in towns like Zeguo and Xinhe. Diffusion occurs in two forms. One scenario is the innovative practice spreads between different levels, organizations or fields. For example, the activation of the function of Zeguo s people s congress has changed the municipal people s congress. And the standing committee of the municipal people s congress has also become a vigorous supporter of democratic consultation, promoting the Xinhe model to another four towns and including it into the agenda of the municipal people s congress. Another scenario is some innovative practices have led to other innovative approaches. For example, each town has made some kinds of improvement of the original model. This innovative process of mutual inspiration is currently promoting the continuous development of democratic consultation including deliberative democracy.
Deliberative Democracy in China 173 IV. Conclusion It is worth noting that all of these diffusion measures occur within the existing power structures. Whether the supports come from the municipal publicity department of the Party committee or from the people s congress, they are from the existing power structures. And specific implementations are always under the leadership of the Party committees and government departments; actually they have innovated political practice. Questions then arise: Is democratic consultation including deliberative democracy really deliberation or just another form of government domination (Lang, 2005)? How should we evaluate this form of deliberative democracy with Chinese characteristics? Scholars have different opinions about this question. Lang (2005) believes that this government-led deliberative democracy is essentially dominated and controllable deliberation and therefore is different from the ideal deliberative democracy. Recently, He and Warren (2011) jointly put forward the concept of authoritarian deliberation based on China s experience. In their view, deliberative democracy in China is a particularly important case; though China remains an authoritarian country led by the CPC, its government is now permeated with a wide variety of participatory and deliberative practices, such as village-level elections, public hearings, deliberative pollings, citizen rights to sue the state, initiatives to make government information public. However, deliberation is limited in scope and focuses only on particular problems of governance. This governanceoriented deliberation is not unique to China, what distinguishes China is that the governance-level participation is developing side by side with the domination of the ruling party, and is combined with a high degree of experimentalism on consultation, deliberation, and limited forms of democracy. Therefore, He and Warren call this authoritarian deliberation. It should be said that their article is very enlightening. As I see it, however, the term of authoritarian deliberation is somewhat misleading, especially in China where authoritarianism is a quiet negative word. Moreover, authoritarianism is regarded as a concept opposed to democracy, thus combining the two seems a little far-fetched to most (though He and Warren define in their article democracy and deliberation in a broad way, and emphasize that authoritarian and deliberative democracy may be combined together). Compared to authoritarian deliberation, government-led deliberative democracy might be a more appropriate expression. China is governance-
174 Economic and Political Studies oriented as some other countries, but it is different because in other democratic countries democracy is driven more by civil society organizations, while in China it is led by the government. However, this government-led deliberative democracy itself is not necessarily a negative phenomenon. On the contrary, the dominant role of the government is one of the necessary conditions for the promotion of deliberative democracy in China (this is also the inherent requirement of embedded development). And governmentled deliberative democracy itself is a special kind of deliberative democracy, as remarked by He and Warren (2011), so it is unnecessary to criticize it according to the standard of the Western deliberative democracy theory. Instead, we need to think about such a question: if the dominance of government is an important feature of the Chinese version of deliberative democracy, then which path of embedded development should we choose in order to reinterpret the original system and redesign its functions and finally facilitate the transformation from authoritarian governance to governance based on deliberation and cooperation? REFERENCES Benhabib, Seyla, ed. 2009. Democracy and Difference: Contesting the Boundaries of the Political. Trans. Xianghuai Huang and Haibin Yan et al. Beijing: Central Compilation and Translation Press. Block, Fred. 2001. Introduction. In The Great Transformation: The Political and Economic Origins of Our time, authored by Karl Polanyi, xxiii-xxxix. Boston: Beacon Press. Bohman, James and William Rehg, eds. 2006. Deliberative Democracy: Essays on Reason and Politics. Trans. Jiagang Chen et al. Beijing: Central Compilation and Translation Press. Chen, Jiagang, ed. 2004. Deliberative Democracy ( 协商民主 ). Shanghai: Shanghai Joint Publishing Company. Chen, Chun-hung. 1999. Sustainable Development and Democracy: Approaching to Deliberative Democracy ( 永续发展与民主 : 审议式民主理论初探 ). Soochow Journal of Political Science ( 东吴政治学报 ), 1998(9): 85-122. Chen, Shengyong and Baogang He, eds. 2006. The Evolution of Deliberative Democracy ( 协商民主的发展 ). Beijing: China Social Sciences Press. Chen, Yimin. 2005. The Wenling Democratic consultation: Creating Space for Democratic Politics ( 温岭民主恳谈会 : 为民主政治寻找生长空间 ). Decision-making ( 决策 ), 2005(11): 32-33. D Entreves, Maurizio Passerin, ed. 2006. Democracy as Public Deliberation: New Perspectives. Trans. Yingjin Wang. Beijing: Central Compilation and Translation Press. Diao, Aihui. 2009. Politics of Difference and Deliberative Democracy ( 差异政治与协商民主 ). Zhejiang Social Sciences ( 浙江社会科学 ), 2009(6): 30-35.
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