What is
republicanism? What is its relationship with the theory and practice
of democracy?
As I mentioned
in the last essay, republicanism is regarded as one of the four sources
of democratic theory and practice. However, republicanism is not
attributable to ancient Greece; it was instead exemplified by republican
Rome (510-23 BC) and was revived by the Italian city-states in the Middle
Ages and the Renaissance period. Instead of emphasizing the importance
of "rule by the people" and the ideal of political equality
(as the classical democracy does), the classical republicanism advocates
self-government, mixed constitution and the need for a government that
reflects the interests not only of "the many (the people),"
but also of "the one (the monarch)" and "the few (the
aristocrats)," which in pre-modern days were regarded as two distinct
classes separate from the people ("the many").
Republicanism
was revived to fight against the claims of natural rights to rule by
monarchs and churches in medieval Europe. As such, the first key
proposition of the Renaissance republicanism is self-government.
The classical republicanism, facing various claims of natural rights
to rule, posits that a government should answer to no one other than
the community of people that it governs. The possibility and institutions
of self-government is at the core of the classical republicanism, and
the basic idea of sovereignty of people is an important contribution
of republicanism to the modern theory of democracy. According
to the Renaissance republicanism, an independent and self-governing
people, together with the right of citizens to participate in the government
and a constitutional framework assigning definite roles to various social
groups, forms the basis of liberty.
As a corollary
of the first proposition, the second important proposition of the classical
republicanism is that government power should be derived from a great
majority of the people, not from god or other supernatural forces, nor
from a small group of privileged individuals. Since a republican
government has to be accountable to the community as a whole, its power
can only be derived from the community as a whole.
In addition, the classical republicanism posits that a government must
have a mixed constitution in order to be legitimate and stable.
Governments that are in the exclusive control of "the one"
(monarchy), "the few" (aristocracy) or "the many"
(democracy) are illegitimate because none of the groups can represent
the community as a whole. Only a government that incorporates
the interests of all groups can be truly legitimate. This government
is called a republican government. The republican government is
also stable because few people can complain that their voices are not
heard.
To be
sure, many of the classical republicanism's premises and propositions
are the same as those of democracy. The classical republicanism
and the classical democracy have the same goals: a society sustained
by civic virtue, in which people live a happy life by devoting to public
good and committing to civic duties. People are by nature political
and social, according to the classical political thinkers, and that
is why people can be happy only by living in a political association.
The major
difference between the classical republicanism and the classical democracy
lies in their different approaches to the ideal society. Republicanism
emphasizes the importance of a mixed government stabilized by incorporating
the preferences of various classes of the society (meaning, a great
majority of the society), while democracy focuses on the interests of
"the many" which, as mentioned above, was regarded in pre-modern
ages as a distinct and different class from "the one" (monarch)
and "the few" (aristocrats). In other words, the
classical republicanism demands a broad social basis for self government
(which, as we will see below, survives as a central element of modern
republicanism), and it posits that any government controlled by one
class is both illegitimate and unstable; in contrast, the classical
democracy favors participation of the people ("the many")
in the political process and focuses on the ideals of liberty and political
equality.
There is another difference between the classical republicanism and
the classical democracy: while the classical Greek democracy elates
the potentials of civic virtue, the Roman republicanism is more concerned
with the fragility of the civic virtue. As such, the classical
republicanism is closer to the modern liberalism's assumptions about
human nature; i.e., people are short-sighted, impulsive and prone to
vanity and passion. The major threat to civic virtue, according
to the classical republicanism, is factions and political conflicts.
As such, the major task of republicanism is to design a system of mixed
government so that different interests are balanced and civic virtue
is maintained.
The third difference between republicanism and democracy is historically
obvious. The classical republicanism tries to find the truly legitimate
source of government power. In contrast, the classical democracy
does not concern itself with this question; instead, the Athenians are
more concerned with political equality and political participation.
To Athenians, there is no question about legitimate source of government
power because the people is the government and the government is the
people. In this sense, the classical
republicanism foreshadows the modern theory of representative government
and liberal democracy, because it implicitly draws an distinction between
"the government" and "the people."
As two
examples, we will take a look at the Roman Empire and the city republics
in 12th-century Italy. The Roman Empire is regarded as republican
for two reasons. First, the Roman people were regarded as highly
virtuous and actively participating in the political process. Second,
with its system of consuls, Senate, and tribunes of the people, the
Roman Empire maintained a mixed constitution that accommodated and contained
various social forces in the public domain. Similarly, the 12th-century
Italian city-states were republican because of their ideals and institutions
of self-government. Their systems of government consisted of ruling
councils headed by "podesta," officials with supreme executive
and judicial powers. Podesta were elected officials with limited
terms, and they were accountable to the ruling councils and ultimately
to the citizens of the republic. In feudal Europe, the self-governing
Italian city republics were remarkable because "they represented
an explicit challenge to the prevailing assumption that government must
be regarded as a God-given form of lordship" (Skinner).
The classical republicanism later developed into two strands, which
are called protective republicanism and developmental republicanism
by Professor David Held. The major figure in protective republicanism
is Niccolo Machiavelli. An often misunderstood thinker, Machiavelli
points out the important connection between republicanism and individual
liberty. Unlike the classical republicans, Machiavelli is among
the first to foresee the modern distinction between "the public"
and "the private." In an often neglected but very important
treatise titled The Discourses, Machiavelli does not believe that there
is a natural or God-given way of organizing the political order.
To Machiavelli, it is the task of "politics" to create order
in the world, and the objective of politics is to strive to gain, maintain
and use power. At the same time, a nation can never become strong and
dominating unless its people have been enjoying liberty, and the way
to guarantee liberty is to have a mixed constitution, not to meddle
with people's private life, and to expand by constantly engaging in
wars. In the end, however, Machiavelli places collective and national
interest above individual liberties, and he is concerned more with national
strength than with individual happiness. As such, like his classical
predecessors, Machiavelli is ultimately an illiberal republican.
The most
important figure in developmental republicanism is J.J. Rousseau. To
Rousseau, the appeal of republicanism lies not in its potential in guaranteeing
the private liberty of individuals, but in its ability to develop human
potentials and to unleash the "general will." Rousseau
is no liberal, but his influence in republican and democratic theories
is enduring. Like his classical predecessors, Rousseau does not
see the value of a "private sphere;" indeed, Rousseau hates
the private sphere. The existence of a private sphere, with its
accompanying inequality in wealth, vanity and distortions, causes much
of the human sufferings. Rousseau wants people to live independently
and transparently, and only the "general will" of the people
can lead people to happiness and freedom. Rousseau sees a republican
democracy as the way to general will and freedom.
As time
passes by, the classical republicanism encounters various difficulties.
One major difficulty is that it became harder and harder to distinguish
between "the one," "the few," and "the many"
in a society. As such, modern republicanism has abandoned the centrality
of mixed constitution in classical republicanism. Instead, it
emphasizes the importance of a broad social basis for government power.
As James Madison puts it in his famous Federalist Papers No. 39, a republican
government is "a government which derives all its powers directly
or indirectly from the great body of the people, and is administered
by persons holding their offices during pleasure, for a limited period,
or during good behavior." In addition, as Professor Robert Dahl
points out, separation of power, not mixed constitution, is more important
to modern republicanism.
In modern terms, republicanism and democracy are no longer incompatible.
Instead, they tend to focus on different aspects of the same political
regime, and they are complementary to each other. Republicanism
explains the source and nature of governmental power in a democracy,
while democracy provides the mechanism for a government to be truly
republican. In addition, the classical idea of mixed constitution,
and the modern idea of separation of power, can be regarded as a way
to control the problem of democratic tyranny.
Another difficulty for the classical republicanism is about the size
of a republic. Can a republic be a large nation-state? How
can republican ideals be realized in a large nation-state? Most
of the classical republicans are worried that, as a country gets larger,
a republican regime becomes unstable due to the factional disputes and
endless quarrels. However, this worry was alleviated by the "discovery"
of representative government in the 18th and 19th century. We
will discuss the theory of representative government in the next essay.
Additionally, the American Federalists argued in 1787 that a republican
regime is not only possible, but also necessary, for a large country
like the United States of America.
How to
evaluate the classical republicanism? To be sure, most of the
liberal democratic states of our time have the remnants of the classical
mixed constitution. The United Kingdom, with its system of the
Queen (the monarch), the House of Lords (with some remaining aristocratic
arrangements) and the House of Commons (representatives of the people),
is a quintessential example of mixed constitution in modern times.
Even in the United States, there are elements of democracy (the use
of various referenda), aristocracy (the existence of an entrenched class
of social and political elites), and monarchy (the existence of a powerful
President). The continuing existence of mixed constitutions proves the
enduring influence of republicanism. More importantly, the republican
lesson that government power must be from a great majority of the people
has become a central element of the modern theory and practice of democracy.
When we examine the modern liberal democratic states, we find that some
of the core propositions of the republican tradition --- such as its
anti-monarchical spirit and its concern with the corruption of public
life by private interests --- have been maintained and combined with
the later liberal ideas and institutions.
(The author
Bo Li is an associate at the New York law firm of Davis Polk & Wardwell.
Opinions expressed here are solely those of the author's and should
not be attributed to Davis Polk & Wardwell.)
References:
1. Dahl, Robert A. Democracy and Its Critiques. Yale University Press,
1989.
2. Held, David. Models of Democracy (2nd Edition). Stanford University
Press, 1996.
3. Machiavelli, Niccolo. The Discourses. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1983.
4. Madison, James. The Federalist Papers, No. 39.
5. Rousseau, J. J. The Social Contract. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1968.