Researchonthe Operation Mechanism Of Urban Community Councilsfromthe Perspective Of Deliberative Democracy

After the introduction and in-depth study of the concepts of " deliberative democracy " by the academic circles and the multiple institutional supply from the top to the bottom and from the central to the local of the political circle,the practice of community deliberative democracy in China has sprung up.This article attempts to discuss the relationship between this practice and the development of China’s political democratization and grassroots social governance by examining the community council of the Y community in Shenzhen as a practice of community deliberative democracy.The development of the community council in China has gone through three stages of exploration,imitation,and overall advancement,realizing the refined development under the top-level design.From the theoretical perspective of deliberative democracy,research on the operating mechanism of the residents ’council in Y community found that the practice of Y community is in line with the comprehensive characteristics of deliberative democracy(plurality,legitimacy,procedure,openness,equality,participation,responsibility,rationality).It is an important way for the effective realization of deliberative democracy in the grassroots political field of our country,which improves the scientificity and legitimacy of community decision-making,reduces governance costs,improves governance performance,and reflects the socialist nature of the people as the masters of the country.However,the practice of deliberative democracy in the Y community also shows such phenomena as insufficient structural fairness,issue limitations,issue contention,unclear issue boundaries,procedural superficiality tendency,and administrative resource resolution.The study found that community-based deliberative democracy with Chinese characteristics is "limited,orderly,and living." Specifically,"limited" means that due to factors such as institutional arrangements,resource constraints,and insufficient enthusiasm of residents,deliberative democracy remains on the surface and lacks depth."Orderly" means that the community party committee always has the right to negotiate and control issues and to ensure that various community consultations are under the leadership of the communityparty committee.This can effectively promote community consultation while ensuring the orderly participation of society and ensuring political stability at the grassroots level."Living" refers to the logic of " life-oriented politics " in which the community consultation is a top-down system supply,which endows the democratic system and idea of consultation with the grass-roots political ecology,and combines the logic of " politicization of life " in which the affairs among community residents are included in the scope of public affairs and "politicize it with consult".At the same time,"living" also means that community consultation focuses on simple events of people’s livelihood,and less involves political affairs inside and outside the community.Even though there are many operational difficulties in the practice of community council in China,it is still an effective way to realize the extensive practice of socialist deliberative democracy.From the perspective of "incremental democracy",this is a kind of "Pareto improvement" in the construction of political democratization.