모두의 민주주의 실현을 위해
Freedom is like flowers in the greenhouse which should be treated carefully. According to Rousseau, it is easy to be swallowed but not so easy to be digested. If we don't find a way to digest it, freedom does not go very well with democracy. As a result, freedom spins free out of the system itself. To make freedom and democracy work well together, citizens are required. Citizens should participate voluntarily and actively in society with a full sense of responsibility for it. In a word, democracy as well as freedom will not survive without citizens.
Democracy cannot be copied nor imported directly and easily from the other countries. It can be created and constituted only with the existence of civil society and proper consciousness of citizenship. Citizens should have their public voice back with our conscious and intentional efforts, and also understand that they are one of the community, and finally find out a way to live with others. When citizens become aware of their own publicity, democracy will be successively settled in our society, in which we can enjoy our life and make our dreams come true.
Once democracy is settled with active citizens, we need to clarify the relationship between freedom and equality to make democracy work well. Freedom as a critical concept of democracy can be settled in society with a base of equality. Equality cannot exist without freedom. In theory, freedom and equality are twin concepts without one the other cannot survive. In reality, however, we observe totally different scenes in which freedom encounters equality on a log bridge. On the log bridge crossing the stream of the real-politik, they seem to be in conflict and force us to choose one. However, we should embrace both to make 'democracy of everyone' come true. Here we can get to know that democracy is not made automatically, but formed with a great deal of labor. The most important thing for democracy is to make freedom and equality go well in society.
Majority rule as a typical system, considering freedom and equality together, is easily to be led to the excess of equality and the lack of freedom. This is the point by which Tocqueville worried about the possibility for the 'tyranny of the majority' in democracy and Mill presented the principle for the 'protection of the minority.' If freedom is soul, equality is the bowl for it.
The excess of freedom will hurt the minority and others, which means inequality. On the other hand, the excess of equality will be led to the loss of freedom, and could ultimately be reached at the critical result, such as the loss of equality. In sum, we, as the citizens of a democratic society, have to put freedom and equality separately in two different control systems. It is why we have to think about the recognition of others and the protection of the minority to keep democracy sustainable and finally to make the dream for 'democracy of everyone' come true.
By Park Euikyung, Professor, Dept. of Political Science
박의경 정치외교학과 교수
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