The "World Social Science Advanced Lecture" (Lecture 73), organized by the Fudan Institute for Advanced Study in Social Sciences (Fudan IAS) and Contemporary China Research Center at Fudan University, was held on Mar 19, 2019, at Fudan University. Jane Mansbridge, internationally renowned political scientist, representative of Deliberative Democracy, recipient of The Johan Skytte Prize (2018), and Charles F. Adams Professor at Harvard Kennedy School, gave the lecture entitled Deliberative Democracy: A Systems Approach and Second Generation' Deliberative Thought. Prof. Sujian Guo, Dean and Distinguished Professor of Fudan IAS chaired the event. The lecture attracted more than 200 participants from Fudan University.
Prof. Mansbridge began her speech with an important topic: How to make state coercion legitimate? She mentioned that we are or will be in need of more state coercion, and that increasing state coercion means increasing state power. State power is a dangerous thing, but it also plays an important role in the well-being of individuals. The question then arose: how could state coercion be legitimized? In order to achieve this goal, she shared an important way to increase the legitimacy of state coercion, namely by improving the quality of deliberation in the decision-making process. In the main part of her talk, Prof. Mansbridge delved into this question in three main areas: (1) why we need (and need more of) state coercion; (2) deliberative legitimacy and the second generation deliberative thought; and (3) deliberative systems.
(1) Why we need (and need more of) state coercion
Prof. Mansbridge stated that an important mission of political science is to understand how to govern human societies. She argued that when we understand that state coercion is intrinsic to the DNA of the state, we become increasingly concerned with creating legitimate coercion. In today's society, we face an increasing number of common action dilemma as there is a strong demand for shared public goods, such as clean air, water, and security. To help the participants understand this issue, she led a lively game. She gave each person in the audience a check for $0 or $100, and now there was a “Double Up Machine”. If people put $0 or $100 into the “Double Up Machine”, they would get the same amount of money back and the amount in the public pool would increase by the same amount. She suggested that as the game was run many times, the willingness to put money in would diminish. This not only leads to a wasteful use of the valuable “double-up machine”, but also prevents an increase in the public resources of the society. Therefore, we need a minimum of state coercion to promote efficient, orderly and legitimate social governance.
Prof. Mansbridge emphasized that states will face more common action problems in the future due to the increasing interdependence of members of society and the continuing decline of valuable resources for survival. To solve this problem, we increasingly need more state coercion. Therefore, in addition to relying on the cohesion and responsibility of society members, we need to think deeply about how to enhance the legitimacy of the indispensable state coercion.
（2）Deliberative legitimacy and second-generation deliberative thought
Prof. Mansbridge argued that deliberation is a source of legitimacy and that good deliberation creates knowledge, enhances mutual trust, and promotes inclusiveness and equality. As research continues, deliberative democracy undergoes an evolving process. She divides them into the first and second generation and highlighted important changes in consultative theory. (1) First-generation deliberative democracy requires absolute equality for everyone, while its second generation highlights equality of opportunity. Everyone should have the same opportunity to influence the development of society. (2) The first generation focuses on reasons, especially arguable and reliable reasons; the second generation is no longer limited to reasons, but pays more attention to people's emotions, feelings, etc. In other words, deliberative democracy has shifted from a preference for reasons to a consideration of multiple elements, and these relevant elements carry a great deal of information that can help think about deep-seated reasons. (3) The main goal of the first generation is to seek common interests or benefits so as to reach consensus; the goal of the second generation is more diversified, which can be either to reach consensus or to clarify the inherent differences and struggles. Second-generation deliberative democracy takes into account both common and individual interests. Individual interests may be limited by social justice, which requires us to think further about negotiation, an important element associated with the theory of deliberation.
（3）Deliberative systems
Prof. Mansbridge pointed out that system is becoming an increasingly important concept. The system in deliberative systems is not the one we traditionally recognize. This system has two key elements: differentiation and integration. Differentiation refers to a series of visible, differentiated parts that serve different functions to achieve the social division of labor. Integration refers to the interdependence of these internal parts, so that a change in one element leads to a change in the other elements. The elements are interconnected to form a complex whole. There are four aspects to the pathology of deliberation system: (1) consideration of the system is too group- or organization-centered; (2) limited consideration of the interpenetrating relationships within organizations; (3) institutional dominance in the deliberative systems; and (4) social dominance in the deliberative systems. To go beyond the shortcomings of the traditional system approach and make a good decision that citizens fully trust, it is necessary to fully consider the intrinsic parts of deliberative systems and to refine all the components intrinsic to it. According to Prof. Mansbridge, adequate negotiation, two-way communication and a well-developed system of representation are all important ways to further improve deliberative systems.
Finally, Prof. Mansbridge concluded that legitimate coercion is the biggest problem of the 21st century and that good deliberation is essential to increasing legitimacy. She encouraged participants to think deeply about how to better understand deliberation and to explore more ways to legitimize coercion.
After the presentation, Prof. Sujian Guo chaired a Q&A session. Prof. Mansbridge answered the questions from the audience patiently and gave inspiring responses. After the lecture, many students came up to the stage to ask for the signature of Prof. Mansbridge and took photos with her.