中国和俄罗斯需要比民主吗？-Ivan Krastev

俄罗斯和中国，哪个更民主？

抛出这个问题就好像问“史泰龙和施瓦辛格哪个更具女性魅力”一样，我们可以比较两人的二头肌和个人魅力，但话说回来，俄罗斯和中国本质上都不是民主国家。中国人和俄罗斯人也许过上了前所未有的好日子，但这两个国家都不符合民主的基本定义——开放性的选举。

不过，两国免不了要遭遇民主化、全球化的大潮。过去，非民主国家可以依靠君主威望或意识形态来支撑；如今，治理国家的权力唯一来源是人民主权。霸道不再是俄罗斯或中国的行事逻辑。民主化的必然结果人民赋权，尤其是在这全球化时代，技术和通讯进步助力颇多。非民主国家仍然阻止不了民众使用互联网与外界保持联系。

金融危机也是一个不容忽视的因素。危机爆发伊始，许多分析家认为这将破坏新兴民主体的稳定局势，还有人断言，此次危机向威权主义政府宣判了死刑。但实际情况要复杂得多：民主主义与威权主义的界限变得模糊。俄罗斯与中国的体制虽然还不能说提供了一条替代性道路，但至少已经调整、适应了民主化大潮的挑战。宽泛地说，俄罗斯人假装民主，中国人假装共产主义。

俄罗斯和中国，哪个更民主？（资料图）

两种诡辩

1989-1991年间，苏联和中国的共产主义领导层意识到，共产主义的体制已经无法有效运转。但两国对失灵的肇因有着不同理解。苏联的戈尔巴乔夫认为，社会主义理念有它的价值，坏的是共产党，苏共已经失去了社会动员的能力。戈尔巴乔夫的社会转型理念是超越政党统治，发展西方模式下的有竞争力的国家体制。中国共产党的想法迥然不同。后者认为，共产主义、社会主义的理念（尤其在经济学意义上）出了问题，值得保留的是共产党本身，及其管理社会的能力。所以，中国共产党人全力以赴，确保基本的权力机制不受破坏。

这两个国家现在如何？俄罗斯政府乍看之下当然很像民主政体。俄罗斯有民主宪法、有选举、有多党制，还有一些自由媒体。**假如外星人突然降临俄罗斯，他会觉得这个国家就是民主的。相反，中国看起来不民主，更像是一个典型的共产主义政权。**马利德（Richard McGregor）在《中国共产党不可说的秘密》（The Party）一书中写道：“北京继承了二十世纪共产政权的大量特质。中国共产党消灭了政治敌人，解除了司法独立和媒体独立，限制了宗教和公民社会，建立了全面的公安网络，还把异见者送入劳改营”。

自1989年以来，中国的体制设计没什么大变化，但俄罗斯却天翻地覆。悖论却是，俄罗斯试图模仿西方民主体制，结果却丧失了政治能动力，决策能力低下。人们普遍认为，中国政府在决策能力上比俄罗斯更为高效。中国大概比俄罗斯更民主。中国政府更善于自我纠正。中国人成功地吸纳了民主制度的关键元素，同时，保留共产主义政权的基本权力制度。

五点理由：中国比俄罗斯更民主

权力更替

俄罗斯当然有选举，但那不是权力更替。**苏共垮台后的二十年间，现任总统从未在选举中失手过。选举不是为了更替权力，而是维持权力。**在中国，反对派也没有胜选的机会。但另一方面，中国领导人掌握最高权力不会超过10年，党的总书记和国家主席职位会自动进行新的选举。换言之，俄罗斯的选举是为了掩饰权力更替的缺失，而中国则是发展了具有权力更替特征的体制。当然，我们还是在讨论两个非竞争性政权。但中国人知道，你必须更换领导层，否则就会出问题。中国体制基于集体领导原则，防止了个人化的威权主义，具有更强的分权制衡因素。中国不同于俄罗斯，没有权力交接的困扰：中共具备明晰的权力交接程序。

倾听民意

按照定义，非民主政权本质上无法顺畅地响应民意。监听和民意调查无法代替定期的、自由的、竞争性选举所体现的民意。民主选举不仅是选领导人，也是测量民众立场的直接手段。

但在“倾听民意”方面，中俄有着巨大差异。必须提到的一点是，中国政府没有在法律上禁止工人抗议。劳资冲突通常都是指向地方领导或公司老板，对于党本身没有危险。所以，每年都有数以万计的罢工，并且这已成为可靠的信息来源。直接的抗议要比民意调查更有价值，更能考验地方领导处理危机的能力。在俄罗斯，理论上体制更加民主，但你看不到罢工，因为罢工代价极为高昂。俄罗斯的贿选现象削弱了民意表达的有效性以及地方官员的领导力。

宽容异见

民主的决策过程需要多元的意见和宽容的心态。比较中俄两国，俄罗斯对于反对派组织更为宽容。过程很糟糕，但你至少可以注册一个政党，甚至上街抗议要求普京下台。中国政府在这方面更为严厉。克里姆林宫对反对派持宽容态度，但对他们的意见充耳不闻。政府不允许异见者干预政策，官员也会小心翼翼地避免与反对派站在同一立场上。

中国的体制更加威权主义和共产主义，决策的质量更高、更具包容性。**在俄罗斯，就算你和精英们意见不同，大多数只会觉得这是“屁股决定脑袋”。而在中国的集体领导制度下，意见不同则是正常现象。只有到了真正的执行阶段，党才要求忠诚。**在俄罗斯，总统一提出想法，“忠诚测验”就开始了。普遍的乐观精神和国力上升，也使得中国人对于政策走向的异议持更加宽容的态度。

吸纳精英

也许，中俄两国政治制度最有趣的差异是吸纳精英的方式。政府要职由哪些人来填补？新闻周刊《Russkiy Reporter》2011年末发现了一些有趣的事实。第一，绝大多数俄罗斯精英都来自两所大学。第二，300个最高层的政府官员中，没有一个来自远东地区。第三，精英圈子在普京当上总统以前就对他十分熟悉。简而言之，俄罗斯是由一小帮子人统治的。这和选贤任能毫无关系：其中大多人都没有匹配的资历，但最终总能占据统治精英的一席之地。

这不是中国共产党的运作方式。中共尽可能扩大社会精英的阶层范围，选拔最为优秀的人才。如果你足够睿智、如果你想飞黄腾达，中共会张开双臂欢迎你。中共成为吸纳精英、让精英服务社会的工具，中国领导层投入大量精力，努力保证精英的地区代表性，让干部在各个地方获取经验。

试验精神

最后一点，中俄看待政治的试验性方式完全不同。中国的政治改革和经济改革围绕着不同地区、不同模式的试验，领导层从中考量何种模式更为有效。俄罗斯的情形完全不同，基本上，“试验”在那儿是句脏话。他们筑建国家的过程中从不试验。

有何意义？

总之，**从前你可以通过制度衡量民主程度，现在你必须要问制度是如何运作的。在多大程度上像民主？可能是假民主吗？**俄罗斯是一个极好的例子。俄罗斯搭建了民主的表面功夫，但表面之下，各种非民主因素暗潮汹涌。中国完全是另一个国家，威权主义、管制严厉。但由于体制压力、转型期各种思潮以及对外开放，中国的政治实践比表面上要开放得多。

自我纠错和问责制度是民主的根本优势。克里姆林宫里面有许多人以为，过度民主化是新兴国家问题的根源。**许多人羡慕中国“货真价实的”威权主义。但事实是，中国在许多方面比俄罗斯更加民主，决策机制更加优越。**过去二十年间，中国致力于提高国家能力，俄罗斯看起来则专注于掩盖无能。西方评论家考量新兴威权主义国家之间的差异时，思路应该超越形式上的制度设计。

（朱新伟 译）

英文原文请见下一页

 Is China more democratic than Russia?

Ivan Krastev

Asking the question, ‘who is more democratic, Russia or China’? is in some ways like asking the question ‘who is more feminine, Sylvester Stallone or Arnold Schwarzenegger’? We can spend some time comparing bicep sizes, and we can speculate about their gentle souls, but Russia and China are essentially two non-democracies. The average Chinese or Russian may today be wealthier and freer than any time before, but neither country can satisfy a minimalist definition of democracy, i.e. competitive elections with uncertain outcomes.

The broader trends of democratization and globalization have not, however, passed either by. If in the past, monarchical power or ideology gave strong foundations to non-democratic regimes, today the only way to claim the right to govern is to claim popular backing. Coercion is no longer the central survival logic of either the Russian and Chinese regimes. A corollary of democratization is the empowerment of people, and in particular the role of technology and communication within a globalizing society. However hard they may try, non-democratic countries are still unable to prevent people from using the Internet, keeping cross-border connections, travelling or obtaining information about the wider world.

Added to these trends is another factor: financial crisis. At the onset of the difficulties, many analysts assumed that the effects would destabilize emerging democracies; others saw the crisis as a death sentence for authoritarian regimes. What seems to have happened is instead something more complex: a blurring of the border between democracy and authoritarianism. Though not quite representing an alternative to the age of democratization, the Russian and Chinese systems have essentially become adjustments to it. Broadly speaking, the Russians are faking democracy while the Chinese are faking communism.

A tale of two sophistries

At the juncture 1989-1991, both communist leaderships – Soviet and Chinese – came to realize that Communism had become a dysfunctional type of system. But they had different understandings of what was wrong with it. In the Soviet Union, Gorbachev decided that what was worth preserving were the socialist ideas, and what was bad was the Communist Party and its inability to bring to mobilize the energy of the society. His idea of social transformation meant moving beyond Party rule, and developing a state which could be competitive in the Western paradigm. The Chinese Communist Party took a totally different view. They believed what was bad about communism were the communist, socialist ideas, especially in an economic sense, and what was good about socialism was the Communist Party itself and its capacity to keep control of society. So they did everything to keep the power infrastructure intact.

What do these regimes look like today? The Russian regime, observed from afar, certainly looks like a democracy. It enjoys a democratic constitution, runs elections, has a multiparty political system, has some free media and has not yet used tanks to crush massive public protests. If an alien with a degree in political science came from some other planet and landed in Russia, he would most probably think the country was a democracy. China, on the other hand, does not look like a democracy, not even to our alien friend. It is, instead, rather like a classic communist regime. As Richard McGregor observes in his book ‘The Party’: ‘Beijing retains a surprising number of qualities that characterized communist regimes of the twentieth century. The Party in China has eradicated and emasculated political rivals, eliminated the autonomy of courts and press, restricted religion and civil society, established extensive network of security police, and dispatched dissidents to labour camps’.

On the level of institutional design not so much has changed in China since 1989, but almost everything has changed in Russia. The paradox, though, is that Russia’s imitation of democratic institutions has led to the establishment of an ineffective political regime deprived of political dynamism and characterized by low quality decision-making. The Chinese regime is generally accepted to be much more effective than the Russian one, and the quality of its decision-making is certainly much better. Moreover, it is arguably more democratic than Russia. Chinese regimes are much more capable of self-correction. They have succeeded in integrating key democratic elements while preserving the communist infrastructure of power. Five reasons why China is more democratic than Russia

Power Rotation

Russia clearly has elections, but no rotation of power. In the two post-communist decades, the president has not lost a single election: the role of the elections are not to secure the rotation of power, but to avoid it. In the case of China, clearly, the opposition doesn’t have a chance of winning either. Yet on the other hand, Chinese leaders do not stay in power for any more than ten years, after which a new party leader and president are automatically elected. In other words, in the Russian system elections are used as the way to legitimize the lack of rotation, while the Chinese Communist institutional structure has developed to allow an element of power rotation. Of course, we are still talking about two non-competitive regimes. But the Chinese understand that you need to change leadership, or you have a problem. The Chinese system, based on the principle of collective leadership, prevents the emergence of personalized authoritarianism and provides much more checks and balances. Unlike Russia, China is not haunted by the ghost of succession: the Party ensures a clear process of succession.

Listening to the people

By definition, non-democratic regimes have in-built hearing problems. Surveillance and polling can never replace the information that comes from people regularly taking place in free and competitive elections. Democratic elections are not only an option to elect leaders, but also a direct way to gauge where people stand.

When it comes to ‘hearing the people’, however, there is an important difference between China and Russia. This comes down to the fact that the Chinese government has not criminalized labour protest. Labour conflicts, ordinarily directed against regional leaders or company directors, are not considered dangerous for the Party. So every year there are hundreds of thousands of strikes, and these have become an important source of reliable information. When people participate in a direct protest, it is much better than pure polls – valuable not only because they are visible, but because they also offer an opportunity to contest the ability of the local leaders to settle conflicts. In Russia, the supposedly more democratic system, you don’t see strikes, because the price for protesting on labour issues is very high. Russia’s rigged elections are a much weaker test to judge the mood of the people and the ability of the regional leaders to deal with them.

Tolerance of opposition, tolerance of dissent

Democratic decision making depends upon both a diversity of views and the acceptability of disagreement, and here is where we uncover another point of divergence. If you compare Russia and China, you will see that in Russia there is certainly much more tolerance for organized opposition. The process is completely screwed up, but you can register a party, you can go on the street to protest, you can even ask Putin to resign. The Chinese regime is certainly much harsher and intolerant in this respect. But while the Kremlin broadly tolerates the opposition, it does not listen to it. It does not allow for dissent on policy matters and government officials are careful not to advocate policies favoured by the opposition.

Though the Chinese system is much more classically authoritarian and communist, its decision-making process is of a much better quality, more inclusive than the Russian one. In Russia, even when you have differences within the elite, most people explain them simply on the basis of economic differences. In the case of Chinese collective leadership, having different views is actually seen as legitimate. The loyalty test in China starts only once the Communist Party has taken a decision. The loyalty test in Russia starts as soon as the president makes a proposal. A sense of general optimism and rising power also seems to have made China more tolerable to dissent on policy positions.

Recruitment of elites

Perhaps the most interesting comparison you can make between the two political systems is the way each country goes about recruiting its elites. Where do people come from to occupy the most important positions in the state and leading industry? A study conducted by Russkiy Reporter in the end of 2011 revealed a number of interesting facts on this front. First, the great majority of the Russian elites went to one of just two universities. Second, none of those occupying the top 300 positions came from the Russian Far East. And, third, the most important factor influencing membership of this elite circle is to have known Mr Putin before he became president. In short, Russia is governed by a circle of friends. This is not a meritocratic system in any sense: most of these people have not had proper careers, but have simply ended in this ruling group.

This is not the way in which the Chinese Communist Party works. It is doing its best to create different layers of society, and does try to make the system reasonably meritocratic. If you are cynical enough, if you want to do well, if you want to make money, the Communist Party is open for you. The Communist Party serves as a vehicle to recruit and socialize elites, and the Chinese leadership invests a lot in ensuring regional representation and providing its cadres with opportunity to get diverse experience.

Experimentation

My last point comparing these two systems is to emphasize the way in which the Chinese and Russians totally differ in their view of the experimental nature of politics. Chinese political and economic reforms are organized around experimentation with different models in the different regions aimed at figuring out what works from the point of view of the leadership. This is emphatically not the case in Russia, where experiment is, basically, a dirty word. They are not experimenting in the process of trying to build a governable state.

What does it all mean?

In summary, while there was once a time that you measured democracy looking at institutions, now you need to also ask questions about how the institutions function. Do they look like democracies? Is it possible that the democracy is faked? Russia is a brilliant example that should force us to think. It has fashioned a democratic surface, but under this surface all types of non-democratic practices are flourishing. China is another country – authoritarian and severe undoubtedly. But because of the pressure of the system, the different ideas underlying its transformation, and the country’s involvement on the world stage, its political practices are much more open than its formal institutions may lead us to believe.

It is the capacity of a given political regime for self-correction and public accountability that it is at the heart of any democratic advantage. There are now many in the Kremlin who, on the contrary, think that excessive democratization has been responsible for many of the problems that the new country faces. Many envy ’true’ Chinese authoritarianism. But the truth is that in many of its practices China is more democratic than Russia, and its decision-making is undoubtedly superior. Over the last two decades, when China was busy with capacity building, Russia seems to have been preoccupied with incapacity hiding. When western commentators try to make sense of the different performance of the new authoritarians, they would be well advised to look beyond formal institutional design.

From：http://www.eurozine.com/authors/mullerson.html