Abstract: The modern meaning of the word "Gonghe" in Chinese comes from the use of Chinese classics by Japanese intellectuals to correspond to Western texts during the Meiji period. Regardless of ancient and modern times, it has many meanings at home and abroad, and it is easily confused with aristocratic oligarchy and co-ownership of the monarch and the people. Before 1902, when Sun Yat-sen used Chinese language and writing, he almost never used the concept of republic. Even though he used the word "republic" inspired by Zou Rong's "Revolutionary Army" in 1903, he still strictly adopted democratic constitutionalism or civil rights constitutionalism at the level of academic theory and political platform. On the occasion of the Revolution of 1911, democracy and republic were deliberately used together to prevent the practice of autocracy in the name of republic. At the same time, Sun Yat-sen believed that the federal system of the United States would help China move from separatist rule to unified democracy during the revolution, but he had reservations about the American representative democracy. He first supplemented the system with a five-power constitution to prevent fraud, and then used the National Assembly to introduce direct civil rights. To ensure the civil rights and constitutional attributes of the republic and improve efficiency. Sun Yat-sen's exploration of democratic republic shows that in order to reach the political extreme of human society, we must learn from the strengths of others and work hard to move forward based on national conditions.
Republic is an important concept relative to the imperial system during the Revolution of 1911. It may be said that the Revolution of 1911 created the first republic in Asia. Therefore, the Revolution of 1911 is also called the Republican Revolution, and Sun Yat-sen, who took the lead in the anti-Qing revolution without mentioning it, is revered as the Beidou of the Chinese Republic. In the past, when summarizing the lessons of the failure of the Revolution of 1911, it was said that only a republican brand was left. Regardless of praise or criticism, it shows that the Republic of China has a close relationship with the Revolution of 1911. Regarding Sun Yat-sen's attitude towards the Republic, there was not much objection. In recent years, with the deepening of relevant research, the relationship between Sun Yat-sen and the Republic has become less clear and clear. Wang Xuezhuang first noticed that Sun Yat-sen generally did not use the concept of republic. It was not until Zou Rong's "Revolutionary Army" received a strong response that he accepted the concept of republic. Li Gongzhong believed that the republic originally had two meanings: democracy and federalism. Sun Yat-sen originally was more inclined to federalism, and the democratic color was not obvious. A related issue is that Sun Yat-sen always disapproved of representative democracy and tried to reform it. This is closely related to the poor image of American representative democracy and the major challenges that representative democracy encounters around the world at that time. These two issues have been discussed separately in several articles on relevant points before. On this basis, we will further focus on the discussion, hoping to comprehensively and systematically grasp the historical process surrounding the republic and representative democracy in modern China, so as to make Sun Yat-sen and Sun Yat-sen The context of republican relations becomes clearer, and it also helps deepen our understanding of the historical destiny of republics and representative systems in modern China.
1. Limited acceptance of the "Republic"
During the Xinhai period, Sun Yat-sen was mainly active overseas, so the language tool used in various forms of interpersonal communication was mainly English. Many of the speeches and texts of Sun Yat-sen during the Xinhai period collected in various current anthologies or complete collections are actually translations of Sun Yat-sen in Western. A specific examination of all the texts in which the word "Gonghe" appears shows that there are obviously more translations than direct use of Chinese, and many of them are borrowed or translated from Japanese. It turns out that researchers ignored the difference between the translation and the original text and confused them into one. As a general discussion, it is harmless, but when quoted as a key concept, it must be strictly distinguished. Otherwise, not only will the discussion be meaningless, but it will also cause various troubles.
The word republic has different meanings in ancient and modern times. The republics in ancient China were the well-known Zhou Gonghe, and there were also the aristocratic republics of ancient Rome. The original meaning of Zhou Gonghe now has many different explanations according to the progress of archaeological and documentary research. Perhaps it was not that Zhou Zhao or the six ministers ruled together, but that two reign titles or the names of specific kings were used at the same time. As for the aristocratic republic of ancient Rome, it was a translation applied to foreign institutions based on the Chinese understanding of classical Chinese and Meiji New Chinese. You cannot think that it is the same in both China and foreign countries just because it is called republic. In fact, this is just a Chinese term. Strictly speaking, "republic" is only a proper noun used by East Asians using Chinese vocabulary to refer to a historical situation or system. Not all countries in the world have the concept of "republic".In order to avoid the entanglement caused by this, some overseas researchers believe that the languages of different cultural systems should be used to express key concepts with the same name and different reality. Even if the same Chinese is used, Meiji Japan and modern China should also indicate different pronunciations. the difference.
Sun Yat-sen presented Ma Xiang with the hanging scroll "Republic"
During the Meiji period, Japanese intellectuals borrowed the Chinese classical republic to correspond to Western texts, making the originally difficult and cumbersome translation in Japanese concise and clear. But for Chinese people, such concise and concise words can easily cause confusion and trouble. Because other East Asian countries in the Chinese character culture circle use Meiji New Chinese as proper nouns corresponding to Western languages, they are just simple symbols when used, and are generally not associated with the ancient meaning of Chinese. The Chinese often imagine the meaning of foreign words based on the classical original meaning. The two often appear similar but are actually different, which can lead to confusion.
In the 1970s and 1980s, Huang Zunxian, Wang Tao and others introduced the Japanese-style Jinyi Republican Sutra to China. At first, they just used Japanese terms to refer to the history, current situation and ideological doctrines of European and American countries and had nothing to do with China. By the 1890s, republicanism began to become a realistic new institutional option discussed privately by China's aspiring innovators. However, in public, the response was denial and opposition.
Liang Qichao played an important role in spreading republican doctrine and popularizing the republican concept corresponding to republic. After the 1898 Coup, he went into exile in Japan. He published a series of important writings in "Qing Yi Bao" and "Xin Min Cong Bao", systematically introducing Western national theories, allowing the republican concept and its academic theories to enter the spiritual world of the Chinese people, and the resulting A significant effect is that the republic is described as the most advanced political system, which arouses the endless yearning of many Chinese who are seeking new ideas, especially young students. The opposing autocratic regimes and imperial monarchies are regarded as evil political systems, which arouse the disgust and disgust of more and more people.
Liang Qichao (1873-1929)
It was precisely because of the advocacy and propaganda of Liang Qichao and others that a new social atmosphere was created. When Zou Rong's "Revolutionary Army" proposed with great fanfare that the political goal of the revolution was to change the political system and establish the Republic of China, and the provinces would vote. When the publicly elected general members voted for the president and vice president, it immediately aroused widespread resonance among the new intellectual group. The new Republic of China is a free and independent country, so it shouts the slogan: "Long live the Republic of China! Long live the freedom of the 40 million compatriots of the Republic of China!" In other words, the Republic of China is an independent country where 400 million citizens enjoy freedom. Freedom is directly linked to the institutions of the country.
Before "Revolutionary Army" spread like wildfire, Sun Yat-sen repeatedly expressed his vision for the new China's political system when contacting foreigners. Whether they were Japanese, French, British or American, the information he received was that he advocated republicanism. . The Japanese use the word republic directly, while Europeans and Americans use the Western vocabulary corresponding to the Chinese republic. However, in direct expressions in Chinese, Sun Yat-sen almost never used the word republic. At this time, "Republic" had become popular in the spiritual world of the Chinese people. As early as January 13, 1898, Shen Yugui, who had worked for "Shenbao" and "Global Gazette" successively, and had a close relationship with Lin Lezhi, published the "Journal of Practical Studies" on the same day. "Volume 14 published an article "On the Abuse of the Theory of Democracy", quoting a reform opinion at that time: "Let the United States and the Commonwealth be the rule, each son after his own son, each people for his own people, and every small and isolated country will be governed by a federal republic. , can also protect itself, strengthen the country by tigers and wolves, and then annex." Although he himself did not agree with this, he revealed that in the eyes and hearts of people at the time, the United States, the Federation, and the Republic were all expressions of different aspects of the democratic system. Sun Yat-sen used the terms United Nations, Federation, and Republic of China, but did not use the Republic. This was obviously intentional rather than an unintentional mistake.
Zou Rong and the book and movie of "Revolutionary Army"
What does such a conscious choice mean? One possible explanation is that Sun Yat-sen favored federalism but neglected democracy.Because the records about Sun Yat-sen's "republican" expressions before and after the Sino-Japanese War were all left by the Japanese. The Japanese word "republican politics" at that time could correspond to both the English republic and the federal government. Sun Yat-sen may have been more focused on "federalism." (Federalism), federal founding, rather than "Republicanism", civil rights constitutionalism. After the 1898 Movement, with the rise of the ideological trend of criticizing the autocratic monarchy and advocating the democratic republic, Sun Yat-sen's understanding of "republic" gradually focused on the "civil rights" aspect. The interpretation of
seems reasonable and well-founded, but after comparing it before and after, it is found that there are many obstacles and it is difficult to penetrate. There are many historical materials in recent times, and historical events are complicated and entangled. If you want to make a statement, it is not enough to just have some basis and be able to justify your explanation. What is important is to integrate all the materials and facts as much as possible according to the original time and space sequence. Based on this, another possible explanation is just the opposite, that is, precisely because Sun Yat-sen focused on the core of democracy, he had reservations about the current meaning of the word "republic" in Chinese. And he focused on the federal aspect of the republic precisely to realize and ensure the democratic attributes of the republic through the Union.
Later, during the debate between "Minbao" and "Xinmin Congbao", Wang Zhaoming argued that constitutional government was opposed to monarchy and autocratic politics, and pointed out: "There are two types of constitutional government: constitutional monarchy and constitutional democracy." He believed that China was moving from nationalism to Nationalism will result in a democratic constitutional government. The so-called democratic constitutional government is the democratic constitution that Sun Yat-sen previously expressed as a republican doctrine. According to Wang Zhaoming’s explanation, “a democratic constitutional government” is “commonly known as a democratic constitutional government.” He also specifically explained: "Therefore, it is not necessary to use the term republic to formulate a constitution. The term republic has two meanings, the broad and the narrow. The broad meaning includes aristocracy, so it is not used." Wang Zhaoming's rigorous expression and related explanations are obviously not It is original, but comes from Sun Yat-sen's explanation and instruction. In other words, in Sun Yat-sen's view, in the context of the time, not only could the Republic not reflect democracy well, but it might be undemocratic or vague and confusing. That's why he used the word republic sparingly to avoid being vague about this key concept.
Jingwei (Wang Zhaoming): "The People of the Nation", the first issue of "Minbao"
The ancient Greek and Roman republics introduced in modern China, including aristocracy. In Chinese classics, even according to the original interpretation, a republic is similar to an aristocracy. Yan Fu once made a clear distinction: "European political systems can be divided into three types: the Manna Desert, a system in which one king ruled the people; the Wristogora Period, a republic of noble families; and the Demogla Period. It is a system of government by the people. It was also called Gongzhi in Demogra's time, and it was also called Hezhong. The two histories of Heroes and Romans are very familiar." This statement was later quoted by others. As for Yan Fu himself, he always disagreed with the use of the word "Republic". word. To take a step back, even if the report is true, the republic in Yan Fu's mouth mainly refers to the aristocratic republic in history, while the democracy where the people are the government is also known as public property or the commonwealth, which is clearly distinguished from the republic.
When the term "republic" was transformed into its present meaning in Meiji Japan, it did not necessarily refer specifically to the democratic republic. Professor Naoki Hazama pointed out that the republic in the mid-term was once the main concept of the constitutional monarchy, that is to say, the monarch and the people were called a republic. Such accusations also affect Chinese people who hope for change. When Kang Youwei encouraged the Qing emperor to reform, he proposed "American and French civil affairs, British and German constitutions." In "Dynasty Zhu Ai Wen Bian" and Liang Qichao's "Records of the 1898 Revolution", both wrote "British-German Republic". What it means is that the constitutional monarchy is a republic between the monarch and the people, while civil government refers to democracy as opposed to the monarchy.
So far, the earliest Sun Yat-sen directly used the word "republic" in Chinese was the preface written by Renyin August (August 1902) for Miyazaki Tozo's "Dream of Thirty-Three Years", in which he praised Miyazaki Tozo. "When I heard that we had a plan to rebuild China and create a republic, I traveled thousands of miles to make friends with you." The Japanese single volume of Miyazaki Torazo's book was published in August 1902. The preface of Sun Yat-sen quoted now is from Jin Yi's translation of "The Dream of Falling Flowers in Thirty-Three Years" published by Shanghai Qunxue Society in November 29th, Guangxu's 29th year.The concept expressed by Sun Yat-sen in Western is mostly translated as Gonghe by the Japanese, so this is just following the common usage of the Japanese, and does not necessarily indicate Sun Yat-sen's recognition that the Chinese word "Gonghe" corresponds to the Western language. However, this also shows to a certain extent that Sun Yat-sen can accept or does not reject this accusation.
Miyazaki Tora collected the book and film of "Thirty-Three Years' Dream"
In 1903, Sun Yat-sen established contact with the anti-Qing revolutionaries in Shanghai, hoping that they would support his propaganda activities against the royalists in Hawaii. From this, he noticed that "China Mainland news magazines and new books are published, and many of them have the concept of republican government. This is a change in the academic world." The general shift in domestic academia and journalism played an important role in Sun Yat-sen no longer deliberately avoiding the use of the word "republic" under normal circumstances.
After this, democratic republic has become the opposite of autocracy and Sun Yat-sen's classic expression of opposing imperialism and establishing a new civilized government. However, the ambiguity in the meaning of the word "republic" has not been completely eliminated. In addition to the repeated use of the word "republic" in his speech at the welcome meeting for foreign students in Tokyo, the extant speeches and writings of Sun Yat-sen before 1911 that appear in the word republic are still mainly translations, and they are written directly in Chinese, especially when formulating various programs. When referring to sexual documents, the word "republic" is rarely used alone.
The subsequent historical development process shows that Sun Yat-sen was prescient in being cautious about "republic" and insisting on expressing related concepts in terms of democratic constitution or civil rights constitution. When the open republic became the general trend, there would be the Republic of the Virtual King, the Republic of the Five Nationalities, and even the Empire. The inclusion of concepts such as the Republic, as a political system, more expresses other demands besides democracy and no longer directly opposes the imperial power. Usually, republicanism is regarded as a category that is naturally opposed to constitutionalism, which is actually misleading and misunderstanding. Even a republic in the modern sense is only the opposite of an empire, and in terms of the analysis of the state system and government in national theory, there is no difference between a constitutional monarchy and a constitutional democracy. In other words, although there are theoretical differences between constitutional monarchy and constitutional democracy, they do not constitute fundamental opposition. The opposition between a republic and an empire actually depends on the democracy of the former and the autocracy of the latter. That is to say, it does not mean that a republic is in opposition to an empire. Oligarchy under a republic is much the same as imperial autocracy. Since the minority imperial power has no constitutional legitimacy, and it is neither possible nor necessary to transform into a majority emperor, constitutional monarchy is no longer a possible option. Misled by a one-sided understanding of the debate between the revolutionary party and the royalists, they were unable to distinguish in detail the various complex situations at the theoretical and factual levels. They a priori placed the republic and the monarchy in an either-or opposition, and rashly discussed relevant issues except Self-righteous clarity will only make things more confusing.
In the First Rebellion of 1911, all provinces became independent, and the voice of the Republic was at its peak. During the peace talks between the North and the South, the focus of conflicts focused on the monarchy and the Republic. Later, when Chinese people talked about republic, it seemed self-evident that they opposed autocracy with democracy. In this way, the ambiguity of republic as a historical concept was covered up, which not only hindered the understanding of the meaning and language of various historical texts. environment will also cause interference in understanding democracy and republic in reality. In fact, at the national and political level, the opposite of republic is mainly monarchy, not autocracy. In the name of republic, not only can power be centralized, but also dictatorship can be achieved. When Yuan Shikai sought to become the first formal president of the Republic of China, he planned to implement a republic "in the spirit of enlightened despotism." Therefore, in the early years of the Republic of China, Sun Yat-sen often used the terms "republic" and "republic of China" together. He declared to the outside world "to build a republic" and "to change the monarchy to a republic". He emphasized that republic and freedom were "exclusively explained for the people, not for a small number of soldiers and officials." This is true. It is to highlight the core of democracy and prevent republicanism from being used as a cloak to cover up dictatorship.
In October 1911, the revolutionary army established the Hubei Provincial Military Government in Wuchang.
It was obviously different from the general expectations of ordinary people. A republic may not necessarily be a democracy. This reality brought many difficult problems to the history of China after 1911 and caused catastrophic consequences. Influence.The so-called failure of the Revolution of 1911 is manifested in leaving only an empty signboard, which is somewhat exaggerated. What is worthy of further study is what kind of connotation is contained under the signboard "Republic".
2. Retention of the representative system
What determines the attributes of a republic is democracy, and there are different forms of democracy. Most developed countries in Europe and the United States use representative democracy. Further inspection shows that representative democracy also has many forms.
Chinese people in the Qing Dynasty yearned for a republic and took the United States as their ideal model. The system of "Revolutionary Army" was modeled after the United States. Zou Rong clearly declared: "1. The establishment of the constitution shall be in accordance with the Constitution of the United States and the nature of China. 1. The laws on self-government shall be in accordance with the laws made by the United States. 1. All matters concerning all individuals, matters of negotiation, and the establishment of officials and their duties All national affairs are allowed to be handled by the United States." Sun Yat-sen's Republic was also modeled on the United States, but it mainly adopted its federal government form, and it did not copy everything. Sun Yat-sen believed that an American-style federal republic could dismantle the alliance of great powers to control China externally, and facilitate the unification and democracy of the separatist regimes that arose during the Chinese revolution internally. In his opinion, the Chinese people tend to think that the big ones are kings and the small ones are the kings, and it is difficult for them to consciously hand over the power they have monopolized. The correct way to solve this problem is to coordinate and unify the two concepts of federalism and civil rights within the structure of the republic. Within, through the Confederacy toward civil rights. The idea of its revolutionary procedural theory is to realize democracy through the federation and prevent those who embrace imperial ideas from separatist dominance, resulting in internal disputes and endless external troubles. Therefore, the Xinhai Uprising "aims at establishing a federal republic." “On the day when the revolution succeeds, follow the example of the United States in electing a president, abolishing autocracy, and implementing a republic.” He even believes that China has a vast territory and a large population, and the differences among provinces are significant. “Politically, centralization of power is not suitable. If the North American federal system is the most suitable... Only a republican federal government is the most beautiful, and there is no other way.” Obviously, Sun Yat-sen valued the Federation of the United States not only because he ignored the democratic connotation of the republic, but also believed that federalism was the only way for China to move towards democracy through revolution. In other words, to ensure the democratic attributes of a republic, federalism is a form suitable for China’s national conditions during the revolutionary transition period.
However, on the key issue of democracy, Sun Yat-sen was quite dissatisfied with the representative democracy in the United States and had reservations. He appreciated Switzerland's direct civil rights, but disapproved of the American-style representative system. He believed that state affairs were handled by political parties. Once the political parties rotated, all officials would be replaced, which was not only troublesome but also harmful. He also said that recruiting talents purely through elections puts those who are good at rhetoric in power, while those who are not eloquent but have knowledge and ideas are left idle. "There are many idiots in the U.S. Congress, which is enough to prove the shortcomings of the election." Therefore, he does not agree with copying the American system. In addition to the three powers of legislation, judiciary, and executive, he must set up additional voting rights and picket powers to implement the five powers. Constitution to make up for the shortcomings caused by the loopholes in the separation of powers.
During the 1911 period, unlike the Qing government's pursuit of the New Deal, which blindly imitated Japan, the revolutionary anti-Qing people began to look westward, and at the same time gradually got rid of the earlier trend of generally looking westward. Besides Sun Yat-sen, Zhang Taiyan also disapproved of the representative system, and even for a time he did not consider the republic a reality. However, Zhang Taiyan's views mainly come from books and word-of-mouth information, and lack personal experience. Liang Qichao, who originally advocated a republican and constitutional monarchy, after traveling to the New World in 1903, not only bid farewell to the republic, but also abandoned the constitutional monarchy, taking a step back to enlightened autocracy. Slightly different from Sun Yat-sen and Zhang Taiyan who believed that the representative system itself had many shortcomings, Liang Qichao on the one hand perceived the chronic diseases of American democracy, and on the other hand felt that a democratic republic was not suitable for China.
Liang Qichao's "Travels to the New World" book and film
Liang Qichao understood that the republic itself has countless shortcomings. Even the United States, which has the most successful results, still has a lot of problems. The United States is a society of immigrants. “Foreigners cannot enjoy the qualifications of citizens of the republic because they are unintelligent, ignorant, and moral. If the sovereignty of a country is given to these people, it may lead to degenerate mob politics, and the country’s foundation will be endangered.” ".In particular, European immigrants, who constitute the majority of American citizens, have become a close concern. The original reason for American politicians to be proud is that "they have the right to vote but I do not." However, it is precisely because of this that the balance of victory and defeat that puts votes first makes politicians unable to face it. In reality, "To win favor from the public and ignore the biggest problem, how can one choose to talk about the failure of the imperial court in an autocratic country? This is also a major shortcoming of the republican government." In addition, since the term of office of the general is four years, "the question he studies carefully is how to make his party win the election." In order to win votes, he ignored the country's century-old plan and only focused on the current interests of one party. "This is why this great leader cannot get talents, and the reason why the republican government has its drawbacks."
If we compare the electoral systems of the United Kingdom and the United States with each other, American democracy is even worse than that of the United Kingdom: "The victory or defeat of the British parties is decided when the members are elected. The victory or defeat of the American parties is decided when the general is elected. The British but Party members are required to have a majority in the House. Once they have a majority, the leader of the party will be proud to be the prime minister and will not compete with him. Therefore, the person who is fighting is not the prime minister. On the contrary, in the United States, the chance of victory or defeat depends on one thing. You should not worry about this. The disadvantages of fighting for the president in the United States are not just this. There are other dark situations that are too numerous to enumerate. When I visited the United States, I deeply lamented that the republican government is not as good as the constitutional monarchy, which has fewer disadvantages and is more flexible. ." It can be seen from this that "Burlen Zhili said that the republican government was not suitable for future competition, and he believed it." This statement is intended to criticize the shortcomings of the republic, not necessarily to praise British democracy.
Not only that, the quadrennial electoral system and political party distribution have led to the United States being the most corrupt among all countries on earth, with mediocre officials and low efficiency. With the rotation of political parties, the appointment of officials is like an auction house. "In a despotic country, those who seek office will flatter those above them; in a free country, those who seek office will flatter those below them. In a despotic country, those who seek office will flatter one person; in a free country, those who seek office will flatter the common people. They will flatter everyone, and the consequences will be inevitable. There are few differences." According to the principles of republican politics, official positions should be constantly rotated, and "repeated changes in official positions are not conducive to the country. Modern political scholars such as Bolan Zhili and Polenhak have said this in detail. Husband is important in a country. The various positions have been changed frequently, which is disadvantageous, not to mention all kinds of practical work. Officials are like passing down the family, and the seats are not warm. Everyone has the heart of the five-day capital omen, which is why things are so stagnant. Every time the British government changes, The positions that were changed were only fifty internal and external officials (most of them held important positions in various ministries of the central government, and the same was the case in Japan), but the United States even changed all the positions. This is actually the biggest shortcoming of republican politics." . The United States is still like this, and other countries whose national strength and social development are less than those of the United States are even worse. "If the countries in Central and South America commit murder and bloodshed every time they hold elections, how can they be more self-satisfied?" From this point of view, the extension of American democracy to other countries will not only be useless, but will cause endless disasters.
When Liang Qichao traveled to the New World, some of the shortcomings of American democracy had begun to be improved, such as serious corruption problems. However, chronic problems such as low efficiency still have no solution. It was not until the Great Depression that forced the company to change course and come back to life. Such a reversal is not so much self-repair as it is the result of learning from each other's strengths. However, the shortcomings of American democracy exposed by Sun Yat-sen, Liang Qichao and others were restricted by the ever-changing domestic and international situations and could not be fully faced for a long time.
Chinese people’s longing for a republic began with Liang Qichao’s propaganda. The United States, as a successful example of the republic, led people to look across the Pacific. Liang Qichao’s blueprint for a future new China also used the United States as a model. Zou Rong, the author of "Revolutionary Army", has never been to the United States, but has endless yearning for the United States. To a certain extent, this is also the result of the propaganda influence of Liang Qichao and others. However, when the founders of China's republican ideals penetrated deeply into the American continent and lasted for a long time, they felt that their dreams were shattered, and they announced to the world that they dreamed of Russia's enlightened autocracy. In contrast, whether Sun Yat-sen inherited traditions or learned from foreign countries, he would not make absolute generalizations, nor would he frequently make today's truth and yesterday's mistake. His understanding can be said to be better. In modern history, due to the stage differences in national development,
has often become a thing of the past in Europe and the United States, while it is still diligently pursued in less developed countries.At a time when countless Chinese people are fighting and dying for a democratic republic, representative democracy is suffering an unprecedented serious crisis in the West. On the one hand, representative democracy continues to suffer from its own chronic problems of high costs and low efficiency, which are difficult to heal on its own. On the other hand, external challenges continue to intensify, making so-called democratic countries feel increasing pressure. The outbreak of the European War was, to a large extent, the release of a systemic crisis. The end of the European War not only failed to resolve the crisis, but also further intensified the crisis due to the contradictions between the victorious and defeated countries and the success of the Soviet revolution. The victorious country that was lucky enough to win did not make institutional adjustments and reforms, but attempted to maintain its dominant position by oppressing the defeated country and besieging Soviet Russia. After World War I, the ghost of the "Decline of the West" consciousness wandered across the European continent. In 1934, at the 8th World Philosophical Congress held in Prague, the capital of the Czech Republic, one of the main topics of concern for the participants was the "crisis of democracy."
Although it lags behind in time, the global crisis of democracy will inevitably affect China's domestic political situation. Sun Yat-sen's criticism of representative democracy and his five-power proposition to prevent malpractices and improve efficiency were not accepted by his colleagues. However, the political establishment during the Beijing government formally included two powers, namely election selection and picketing, which did not come from Sun Yat-sen. This proves from the side that Sun Yat-sen's considerations are indeed closely related to the actual situation in China. In the early years of the Republic of China, parliamentary system and party politics complemented each other. As party representatives in the Congress increasingly became vassals of the provinces and the central military and political power, it caused strong dissatisfaction from all walks of life and various reform plans were brewing. Around 1920, more and more insightful people realized that the failure of the Congress was the main reason for the failure of the current political system. Liang Qichao, Tang Hualong, Zhang Junmai and others who spared no effort to advocate the founding of the Congress in the Qing Dynasty all declared that the representative system was not suitable for China. It has also become obsolete in the world and has even been publicly pronounced a death sentence for Congress. As for how to improve the political system, there are two main different ideas: one is to reduce some of the powers of Congress within the framework of the current political system; the second is to introduce direct civil rights and establish a real organ of people's sovereignty as the mother of all organs of power .
Sun Yat-sen originally advocated Swiss-style direct civil rights and the implementation of national politics. It was only in order to oppose the northern warlords, bureaucrats and politicians that he took up the banner of protecting the law and persisted in the thankless movement to protect the law. With most political factions in the country having abandoned Congress long ago, the Kuomintang finally issued a declaration on January 1, 1923, stating that "the current representative system has reached the end of civil rights, and class elections are easily manipulated by a minority." and further proposed "Introduce a system of universal suffrage and abolish class elections based on assets"; "directly exercise the powers of creation, review and recall through people's assemblies or general votes." The reformed Kuomintang officially included the National Congress in its political platform, making it an important option for direct civil rights.
"The Chinese Kuomintang issued a declaration", "Ta Kung Pao" newspaper clipping on January 1, 1923
On the occasion of the Revolution of 1911, all parties advocated a referendum on the national system and government through the National Assembly. Since then, whenever major national issues were encountered, someone would propose convening the National Assembly or National Assembly to deal with it, and this was implemented. At first, it was because there was no formal Congress. Later, it was felt that the Congress was not enough to shoulder its important responsibilities. Later, even the legitimacy of the Congress was questioned, and it was even advocated to completely abandon the representative system and redesign the political system. As for the specific ideas, on the one hand, it is trying to reduce the power of the Congress and transfer some powers from the Congress to other organs; on the other hand, it is trying to set up a sovereign organ that can truly represent the public opinion, and use the sovereign organ as a power that overrides all powers. Permanent establishment. The functions of the National Assembly (National Assembly) are, firstly, to give full play to the role of public opinion in resolving major issues such as political disputes and constitution-making under the turbulent political situation of separatism and division; secondly, to better embody the idea that sovereignty lies with the people, so that all people can Citizens can exercise sovereignty generally, regularly and effectively.
Among the many ideas to strengthen direct civil rights, Sun Yat-sen referred to the five-power constitution revised by comprehensively integrating various National Assembly plans, and officially listed the National Assembly as the permanent and highest organ of the national administrative system. It not only has the final power of legal creation and review It has the power of adjudication and the highest decision-making power on the election and removal of personnel in various state agencies.This political structure became the formal establishment of the National Government. However, the National Government under the leadership of the Kuomintang, on the one hand, gave the president dictatorial power, and on the other hand, it made the National Congress useless. However, when latecomers reviewed the shortcomings, they not only failed to understand the profound meaning of the system design that Sun Yat-sen carefully revised, but went further on the basis of it. On the contrary, they felt that the various prevention and supplementary measures were unnecessary, so they returned to the original point, as if they could just copy the separation of powers. After solving all the problems, the American political structure based on representative democracy seems to be the only correct option, with far-reaching consequences.
The many drawbacks of the representative system implemented in the early Republic of China and the changes in the origin and implementation of the National Assembly showed that representative democracy must be reformed, and the People's Congress was by no means a simple transplant of the Soviet system. In this process, the problem of the direct and regular exercise of sovereignty by the people has not yet been fundamentally solved. Obviously, we cannot simply resort to the American representative system, which history has proven to be incapable of representing public opinion well. If we repeat the mistake of taking the West as the new, it will be difficult to avoid falling into the quagmire of repeated cycles. The correct approach should be to continue to follow the direction started by Sun Yat-sen, adjust and transform to create a new system on the basis of learning from and absorbing various democratic systems. Only by solving the inherent limitations of democracy can we ensure the democratic and constitutional attributes of the republic and realize the political philosophy Sun Yat-sen pursued throughout his life.
3. One point of comment
Although "republic" has various ambiguities in modern China, as a republic that is opposed to monarchy, its core must be democracy. The Chinese people who fought and sacrificed for this end regard democracy and republic as the ultimate principle of society, that is, the highest form. Therefore, although Liang Qichao and Zou Rong were largely responsible for the popularity of the Chinese word "republic" and the popularization of related concepts, Sun Yat-sen, who cautiously used this new post-Meiji Chinese term, was regarded as a forerunner of the democratic revolution. However, after the founding of the Republic of China, in the form of a republic, the shortcomings of the imperial era were still continued, and various problems of the post-imperial era were superimposed, causing many people to feel disappointed and depressed. Sun Yat-sen, who originally had reservations about the Republic and disapproved of representative democracy, had been working hard to protect the country and the law in the early years of the Republic of China, and tried to safeguard the achievements of the Revolution of 1911, but he failed repeatedly. Although he became more courageous with each defeat, the road ahead was bleak and there was no dawn. Therefore, the Communist Party of China later summarized the experience and lessons of history and concluded that this road was unworkable.
Democracy is only a form, with the purpose of ensuring people's freedom and equality. Capitalism's equality before the law, that is, political equality or political democracy, will inevitably lead to actual inequality. For this reason, socialism must use redistribution. To achieve economic equality or economic democracy. Sun Yat-sen's Three People's Principles already contain some socialist elements. The problem is that in the era of imperialism, the great powers are democratic at home and plundering externally, and they are trying every means to block the upward path of colonies, semi-colonies and all post-development countries. In order to complete the revolution that had not yet succeeded, Sun Yat-sen, who had worked hard for many times, had to use Russia as his teacher. With the help of Soviet Russia, he united with Russia to accommodate the Communist Party, launched a national revolution, and overthrew the great powers and warlords.
In 1924, Sun Yat-sen gave a speech on the Three People's Principles at Guangzhou National Higher Normal School.
One of the great mysteries of the 20th century is the success or failure of Western democracy, with representative system as the main form. Democracies throughout the ages have been characterized by high costs and low efficiency. Although they have a certain error correction mechanism in the long term, they cannot avoid the problem of low efficiency in the short and medium term. They can enjoy peace and prosperity, but they are often unable to deal with crises. Its anti-fraud effect is far less significant than usually thought. More importantly, the high cost of Western-style democracy so far is mostly at the expense of depriving and enslaving the majority of people both internally and externally, otherwise it will be unsustainable.
With the rise of the national liberation movement, colonial and semi-colonial countries have broken away from imperialist control on a large scale, and the deepening democratic crisis is obviously closely related to this. The crisis is mainly manifested in two aspects. First, the national power of Western European countries is declining. Second, post-development countries are unable to become prosperous and powerful through representative democracy. This has led to widespread concern about various forms of power concentration systems other than democracy.At the beginning of World War II, European countries rapidly collapsed, causing the world's confidence in democracy to fall to a freezing point.
On the eve of the Soviet-German War, the New York Times published a newsletter by Max Esatman on May 11, 1941, stating that the ongoing war was a struggle between democracy and totalitarianism, one of two ways of life in history. war between countries, not just for national power. Yishi listed 20 important characteristics of totalitarianism, each of which can be found in the communist Soviet Union and fascist Germany and Italy, but not in Britain and the United States. Therefore, it is determined that 20 opposite lifestyles are due to the conflict of doctrines. Accordingly, fascism is bundled with nationalism and communism. The Cold War that occurred after the end of World War II has profound ideological origins.
Affected by this, in July 1941, Hu Shi gave a speech "The Conflict between Democracy and Totalitarianism" at the University of Michigan in the United States. The text of the speech was published in Volume 218 of the "Annual Report of the American Political and Social Science Association", which quoted two months ago. Eastman's correspondence published in The New York Times. This had a far-reaching restrictive effect on Hu Shi's later determination to oppose communism. The problem is that moderate concentration of power does not mean totalitarianism (of course it should be restricted). Nazi Germany had just attacked the Soviet Union not long ago, and the latter has become a stronghold on the anti-fascist front. Using the confrontation between democracy and totalitarianism to explain the nature of World War II is quite far-fetched, at least within Ishi’s framework. Although the United States' participation in the war seemed to have saved representative democracy in Europe and allowed those European democracies that had been completely defeated at the beginning of the war to save some face, the actual role of the United States in defeating Nazi Germany was not as great as later publicized. Until the beginning of 1944, a British public opinion poll showed that 50% of the people in the world believed that the Soviet Union was second to none in terms of their contribution to victory, followed by 42% of the United Kingdom, and the United States ranked quite low, with only 4% Three, not even as good as China. Therefore, the victory over fascism is undoubtedly a great victory for the countries and peoples of the world who love freedom and peace, but it does not mean the institutional advantages of democracy.
Hu Shi (1891-1962)
used the opposition between democracy and centralization to flaunt himself, which to a large extent reflected the arrogance of Christianity's absolute exclusivity (that is, it cannot tolerate those who are different at all). He regarded representative democracy as the ultimate political system and excluded everything else. The social system is tantamount to giving up the power of self-adjustment and transformation. In the so-called free world camp that gathered under the name of anti-communism during the Cold War, many nominally republican countries were actually run by dictators. Not only can democracy not be equated with anti-communism, in colonial and semi-colonial countries where national liberation movements are in full swing, anti-communism is exactly synonymous with autocratic dictatorship. Overthrowing autocratic dictatorship is to strive for independence, liberation, democracy and freedom.
should take a broad view of the scenery. The historical process of China and the world over more than a century since the Revolution of 1911 shows that the various systems of human society so far have not reached the ultimate stage. They must learn from each other and absorb each other before they can reach the state of perfection. Frequently using either/or divisions to fight against each other, with the motivation and purpose of excluding and eliminating the other side, is a typical manifestation of the monotheistic way of thinking of European Christianity. With this way of thinking, if you look at the general trend of the world, even if it seems that the balance is tilted towards you for the time being, you will inevitably fail in the end. What can reach the top must be a brand-new system that fully absorbs all the essence of human beings. This law also applies to democratic republics. If representative democracy is only used as a tool for struggle and exclusion, its historical outcome will inevitably not be the ideal model of human society. This is also an important inspiration left to future generations by Sun Yat-sen’s exploration of democratic republic.
published in "Journal of Sun Yat-sen University (Social Science Edition)" Issue 3, 2022
