Wei Jingsheng Foundation News and Article Release Issue: A748-W474

魏京生基金会新闻与文章发布号: A748-W474

 

Release Date: February 2, 2013

发布日:2013年2月2日

 

Topic: The Way Out for China (Part LXIX): The Origin and Fundamentals of the Human Social System (3) -- Wei Jingsheng

标题:《中国的出路》之六十九:人类制度的起源和根本(三)-- 魏京生

 

Original Language Version: Chinese (Chinese version at the end)

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The Way Out for China (Part LXIX): The Origin and Fundamentals of the Human Social System (3)

-- Wei Jingsheng

 

 

Starting around the first millennium BC, both Europe and China had entered into a stage when countries were rapidly expanding, and the population of non-citizens surpassed citizens.  Therefore, slaves or serfs became a great obstacle to social stability or effectiveness in foreign combat.  In the two thousand years that followed, Europe and China went on two different paths.

 

Europe is relatively smaller than China, thus making it relatively easier to make a unified Greek and Rome Empire.  Soon its fledgling democracy was replaced by the imperial system.  Authority came from the emperor who had a lot of slaves and mercenaries.  The legal system also tended to be perfect.  Democracy within a clan society gradually retreated to appendage status.  Great emperors and generals were the people and history to focus on.

 

These vast empires lacked enlightenment systems and sources of authority.  There were fierce internal struggles, while their capacities in dealing with outside gradually degraded.  Division and slave rebellions continuously occurred.  Christianity was timely introduced into Europe, which played a strong role of enlightening people with education, as well as solving the problems of internal strife and slave uprisings.  Afterwards, Europe was split into a number of small countries still under the authority of the Pope.

 

Although there were many small-scale mergers during the Middle Ages, the power of religion made Europe lose its momentum to change slavery.  So-called serfdom, which has slightly more human rights than slavery, was maintained up to the recent religious Reformation and the Renaissance.  Equality for everyone before God was the imagination within the religion, instead of the equality for everyone in the social and legal identity for all.  The result was that the unequal social system of these smaller countries was maintained for more than one thousand years, and they lagged far behind China in the development of science, technology and economy.

 

The reason for China advancing ahead of the West in technological and economic development during these two thousand years, was exactly that, after the violent wars during the Spring and Autumn period, China developed a social system that was more advanced, had more respect for human rights, with equality for everyone before the law.  At the period when the agricultural age started to develop, in addition to stimulating more personal ingenuity and labor enthusiasm, it was easier to regulate social conflicts with more judicial authority than in the European slavery system.

 

Starting around eight hundred years BC in the Spring and Autumn period, the social system in China changed rapidly, with a lot of competition and frequent wars between countries.  In that land of vast territory and large population, the speeds of mergers were much faster than in the relatively smaller Europe.  The huge ratio between the population of the rulers and the ordinary people who were merged made it impossible to maintain slavery.  China had to develop an imperial system that was different from slavery; that retained the existing system of rights in the original countries.

 

Under this system, both the sovereign state and merged countries had their own master class and the slave class, while the merged countries had lower identity and status than the sovereign state.  That resulted in three different levels of classes, with different classes having different levels of rights and freedom.  Naturally, regarding the stimulation of ingenuity and enthusiasm to fight, there were great differences.  All of these were important reasons that affected the strength of the states.

 

Because of the vast land and excellent natural conditions, as well as the frequent wars between small countries and the absence of a religion to resolve social conflicts, using legal means to resolve the internal conflicts within the society became a major and critical condition in the competition between countries.  In other words, improving their own national identities and the enthusiasm of the people in their own countries was a prerequisite for the survival of these countries.  The emergence and success of a variety of schools during that time represented the need for the reform of the political system.

 

After more than two hundred years of exploration, a legal system of equality for everyone that originated in the Central Plain of China and was achieved in the state of Qin was able to motivate people's work enthusiasm and sense of identity better than the legal systems that had insufficient human rights.  This reform, which was called "Political Reform" in Chinese history, enabled the Qin country to be superior in its economic development and military power compared to other countries in the Central Plain of China.  This social system with equality for every one under the law, overcame the various social systems that were lacking human rights, and thus quickly unified all the countries within the Chinese territory.

 

However, the people in the occupied countries could not agree to rely solely on the punishment of the legal system.  Relying solely on a legal system executing violence, while lacking authority to do so, resulted in a mood of opposition in the occupied land that soon developed into rebel actions.  The Qin country perished after only two generations of emperors because it relied solely on the law and punishment.

 

The Han Dynasty after that inherited the legal system of equality of the Qin Dynasty.  However, due to the lack of a morally enlightened people with education, instability prevailed for the early years of the Han Dynasty despite it being much more tolerant than the Qin Dynasty.  It was in that environment that the Confucian enlightenment of people with education rose with the support of the emperors and their officials, taking the same function as the European religion.  Confucianism is the main reason that the Chinese political system rarely changed in more than two thousand years.

 

It was not enough just to give people general freedom and rights.  Lack of an administrative and legislative power that was separated from the judicial system was an important reason for the lack of authority.  Although enlightenment can make people accept the theory that authority is granted by fate or God, such authority will never be completely and heartfully recognized.  Even in China with equal legal rights for all, indifference to politics was also the inherent reason for disunity of the society.  The right to participate in power is the main reason why the modern West has surpassed China.

 

After several hundreds years of strife, the Westerners finally established a political system of the separation of powers, based on the legal base of equality.  This is not just the restoration of the ancient democracy, but also the establishment of a modern democracy that is based on a new cultural and economic basis.  It has more content than ancient democracies, in order to adapt to the difficulty of information exchange due to the large population.

 

The first is the protection of freedom of speech.  Developed beyond the ancient freedom of speech in the forum, the modern freedom enables information to communicate to every member of the society through use of the media.  It developed a system of voting, which overcame the difficulty to vote in a broad range during the Middle Ages.  Most importantly, it created a system of political parties, thus enabling political competition to be the important method for selecting preferred decision-making and limiting corruption, in order to ensure the competitiveness and healthy internal politics of the country.  This is the reason that the West exceeded China.

 

Unfortunately, in China, the culture of the Chinese Communist Party represented by the May Fourth Movement, precisely did not learn the strengths of the West, but instead learned the shortages of the Middle Ages, while losing a lot of the advantages of our own Chinese culture.  This is the real reason that ignorant literati have scourged China in the past hundred years.

 

 

To hear Mr. Wei Jingsheng's related commentary, please visit:

http://www.weijingsheng.org/RFA/RFA2012/WeiJS120816ChinaWayOut69HumanSystemOrigin3.mp3

 

(Written and recorded on August 16, 2012.  Broadcasted by Radio Free Asia.)

 

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中文版

 

Wei Jingsheng Foundation News and Article Release Issue: A748-W474

魏京生基金会新闻与文章发布号: A748-W474

 

Release Date: February 2, 2013

发布日:2013年2月2日

 

Topic: The Way Out for China (Part LXIX): The Origin and Fundamentals of the Human Social System (3) -- Wei Jingsheng

标题:《中国的出路》之六十九:人类制度的起源和根本(三)-- 魏京生

 

Original Language Version: Chinese (Chinese version at the end)

此号以中文为准(英文在前,中文在后)

 

如有中文乱码问题,请与我们联系或访问:

http://www.weijingsheng.org/report/report2013/report2013-02/WeiJS130202ChinaWayOut69HumanSystemOrigin3A748-W474.htm

 

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《中国的出路》之六十九:人类制度的起源和根本(三)

-- 魏京生

 

 

大约在公元前一千年时候开始,欧洲和中国都进入了国家迅速扩大,人口中的非公民成分超过公民的阶段。因此,奴隶或者农奴成为社会稳定或者对外战斗力的极大障碍。这之后的两千多年,欧洲和中国走了不太相同的两条道路。

 

欧洲的规模比较小,希腊和罗马很容易造成统一的大帝国。它的民主制也很快被帝国制度所代替。权威来自拥有大量奴隶和雇佣军的皇帝,法律体系也趋向于完美。氏族民主制逐渐退缩到了附庸的地位。人民和历史只看见了伟大的皇帝和将军。

 

这些庞大的帝国缺乏教化体系和权威的来源。内部的争斗十分激烈,对外的能力也在逐渐退化。分裂和奴隶反抗在不断地发生。这个时候,基督教适时地进入到欧洲,起到了很强的教化作用,解决了内部的纷争和奴隶起义的问题。在这之后,欧洲才分裂为若干个小国。

 

虽然中世纪也有许多小规模的兼并,但宗教的力量使欧洲失去了改变奴隶制的动力。比奴隶制多一些人权的所谓的农奴制,一直维持到近代的宗教改革和文艺复兴。宗教内部的想象中的人人平等,代替了社会身份和法律上的人人平等。使这些小国的不平等的社会制度维持了一千多年,在科技和经济发展上也远远落后于中国。

 

中国之所以在这两千年里,在科技和经济发展上遥遥领先于西方,正是因为中国经历了春秋战国时代的剧烈战争,发展出了更加先进的、更多尊重人权的、法律面前人人平等的社会制度。在农业时代开始发展的时期,这种制度除了更加能够发挥个人的聪明才智和劳动积极性之外,也比欧洲的奴隶制更加容易调节社会矛盾,拥有司法方面更多的权威。

 

大约开始于公元前八百年的春秋战国时代,社会制度变化很快,国家间的竞争和战争频繁。在幅员广阔人口众多的环境中,兼并的速度也远远超过相对较小的欧洲。统治民族人口和被兼并的人口之间比例相差太大,不可能维持奴隶制度,而是发展出和奴隶制度不同的、在原有国土里保留原有权利体系的帝国制度。

 

在这种制度下,宗主国和被兼并国都有主人阶级和奴隶阶级,而被兼并国在身份和地位上又低于宗主国。形成了三级结构。不同阶级在权利和自由上也是不平等的结构。在发挥聪明才智和劳动以及战斗的积极性上,也就自然会有很大的差别。这些都是影响国家实力的重要原因。

 

由于国土辽阔自然条件优良,小国之间的战争非常频繁等等原因,也由于没有一个宗教来解决社会矛盾,用法律手段解决社会内在矛盾,成为各国间竞争的主要和关键的条件。换句话说,如何提高自己国家人口的认同感和积极性,是国家生存的前提。各种学派的出现和热闹非凡,代表着当时政治体制改革的需要。

 

经过了两百多年的探索,起源于中原地区而在秦国得以实现的人人平等的法律体系,在发挥人们劳动积极性和认同感方面,超过了其它人权不充分的法制体系。这个在历史上被称作变法的改革,使秦国在经济发展和军队战斗力上都优于中原各国。这种人人平等的法律之下的社会制度,战胜了各种人权欠缺的社会制度,很快就统一了中国境内的所有国家。

 

单纯依赖法律惩罚的制度,并不能获得广大被占领人民的认同。仅仅依靠暴力执行的法律体系,而缺乏应有的权威,使在被占领土上的反抗情绪很快就发展为造反的行动。单纯依靠法律和惩罚的秦国,只经过了两代皇帝就灭亡了。

 

在这之后的汉朝,继承了人人平等的法律体系,这就是所谓的汉承秦制。但是道德教化的缺乏,使得比秦朝宽容了很多的汉朝初年,仍然不能稳定。正是在这种环境下,和欧洲的宗教有着相同功能的儒家思想的教化运动,在中国官方的支持下兴起,成为中国的政治体制两千多年很少变化的主要原因。

 

仅仅给予人们一般性的自由和权利还不够。和司法分离了多年的行政权和立法权的缺乏,是权威缺乏的重要原因。虽然教化可以做到使人们接受老天或者上帝赐予权威的理论,但是人们内心的认同却不那么完全。即使在人人法律权利平等的中国,对政治的漠不关心,也是社会一盘散沙的内在原因。参与的权利,是现代西方超过中国的主要原因。

 

西方人经历了几百年的努力奋斗,终于建立起了在人人平等的法律基础上的三权分立的政治制度。这不仅仅是古代民主制的恢复,而是在新的文化和经济基础上建立的现代民主制。它比古代多出了很多内容,以便适应人口的众多带来的信息交流的困难。

 

首先是言论自由的保障。它发展了古代在会场上讲演的自由,利用传播媒体使信息可以传达到每一个社会成员。它发展了投票选举的制度,越过了中世纪不能在广大范围内选举的困难。最重要的是它创造了政党制度,使政治竞争成为决策优选和限制腐败的重要方法,从而保证了国家的竞争力和健康的内部政治。这是西方超过中国的原因。

 

遗憾的是,在中国,以五四运动为代表的共产党文化,恰恰没有学习人家的长处,反而学习了人家中世纪的短处,丢掉了很多中国自己的优点。这就是无知文人祸害中国一百年的真正原因。

 

 

聆听魏京生先生的相关录音,请访问:

http://www.weijingsheng.org/RFA/RFA2012/WeiJS120816ChinaWayOut69HumanSystemOrigin3.mp3

 

(撰写并录音于2012年8月16日。自由亚洲电台播出。)

 

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