Abstract

In traditional Chinese political philosophy, there has been a lack of explicit discussion on the power-responsibility relationship or the contract state. Western learning does not lack such content. As Western countries have already resolved the question of power-responsibility correspondence by means of constitutional democracy, it has become a linguistic usage of theirs that is not all too logical but quite harmless in practice to discuss “big and small” questions without taking power and responsibility into account. Yet, were our countrymen, our compatriots, who are first of all muddleheaded about the relationship between power and responsibility, to take over and accept such language as theirs and discuss “their problems,” there would be great harm. If it is a mere academic error to say “State power does not go down to the county level,” which in history is actually “The state is not responsible for anybody and anything below the county level,” then the following will bring real harm.