abstract
Harmonious society is a great idea put forward by our party in the process of promoting social development in China. To guide our society towards harmony, we must take Scientific Outlook on Development as the guiding ideology on the basis of fully understanding and grasping the laws of natural science and social science. Building a harmonious society needs to adjust various rights relations, and the harmony between state power and civil rights is the foundation of a harmonious society. At the same time, power and rights are a pair of basic categories and theoretical fulcrums of law, especially the constitution. Using the research methods of history, law and sociology to analyze and think, clarify the relationship between them and promote their balance is of profound guiding significance for China to deal with a series of major issues in the current modernization process and social transformation period.
Key words:
State power; Civil rights; balance
Rights and power need to be balanced.
Since the reform and opening up, China has attached great importance to the realization of citizens' rights, respected and guaranteed people's basic rights, and taken practical measures to this end, and made remarkable and important progress. With the rapid and healthy development of the national economy, people's material living standards have generally improved, the number of private property of citizens has gradually increased, and private property rights have been confirmed and guaranteed by law; The society is becoming more and more open, citizens' democratic rights are getting higher and higher, the cultural and artistic space is prosperous, and the phenomena of "convincing people with words" and "convincing people with words" are gone forever; With the progress of society, citizens' right to education has been effectively realized and the scientific and cultural quality of the whole nation has been improved; With the strengthening of democracy and clean government, citizens' rights to criticize, suggest, appeal, accuse and report state organs and state functionaries are guaranteed; With the seriousness of law and discipline, a few state functionaries abused their powers, bending the law and extorted confessions by torture were punished, and citizens' personal rights and personal dignity were guaranteed. In addition, the government's level of administration according to law is improving day by day, the administrative organs strictly enforce the law, and the illegal administrative problems have been effectively corrected; The judicial organs administer justice fairly, and citizens whose rights have been violated can get relief through judicial channels and enjoy legal rights. To sum up, today, with socialist Scientific Outlook on Development as the guiding ideology and building a harmonious society, a society ruled by law and a peaceful society as the main theme, it is not difficult to see that to achieve national prosperity, national rejuvenation, people's happiness and long-term national stability, it is necessary to maintain the coordination and balance between state power and civil rights.
1 Overview of state power
1. 1 the meaning of state power
Modern scholars have many explanations for the meaning of "power", such as "power is a kind of management relationship with all aspects of society fixed in the form of law, reflecting a certain political life" [1], "power is the compulsion and domination of a specific subject (including individuals, organizations and countries) to society or others within its scope of duties" [2]. British scholar A Brock believes: "Power is the ability of its holder to force other individuals to obey or obey their own wishes on any basis." [3]
The core parts of these definitions all think that power embodies the mandatory dominant power of a certain subject. According to the nature of power, power can be divided into social power, state power and supranational power. Social power is the power reserved by society. In a country ruled by law, social power is the expression of social autonomy, such as the power of enterprises to subordinate employees and the power of chambers of commerce to subordinate enterprises. State power is the power enjoyed by a political state, which can usually be divided into legislative power, administrative power and judicial power; Supranational power is the power exercised collectively by the international community or countries, such as the power of the United Nations and the power of the European Union. Among these three kinds of power, state power is the main and typical form of modern power, and it is also power in a narrow sense, which is what we usually call "public power". In this sense, state power refers to the dominant power of state organs that are produced after citizens' democratic elections and are backed by violence to force citizens to obey.
1.2 characteristics of state power
As a dominant social force, the exercise of state power has the following characteristics:
(1) Inequality among subjects. In civil or commercial activities, the relationship between actors is an equal legal relationship. One party has no right to force the other party to act according to its own will, but both parties sign a legally meaningful contract through consultation to ensure the performance of their actions and the realization of the same meaning. In the process of exercising state power, the legal relationship between power organs and citizens is not equal, but the relationship between management and being managed, domination and being dominated. Authorities have the right to force citizens to obey.
(2) unilateral exercise. In civil or commercial activities, the actor must reach an agreement through equal consultation before the civil act can be effective, that is, the beginning of the civil act must be agreed by both parties. The exercise of state power does not require the consent of citizens, but only the unilateral behavior of state organs, which will have legal consequences. Of course, under the framework of constitutionalism, the state must not exercise public power at will, so as not to create unconstrained arbitrary power and endanger the rights enjoyed by citizens. The exercise of state power should be within the scope prescribed by law and be strictly bound.
(3) compulsory domination. In civil or commercial activities, when a contract concluded through equal consultation is broken by either party, the other party has the right to bring a lawsuit to the state public authority on this ground, that is, to bring a lawsuit to the court to get relief for his rights, but the injured party cannot directly force the other party to compensate for the losses by private coercive means. State power is the ability of the state to impose its will on the object of power and make it obey. Therefore, compulsion is the inherent attribute of state power, and every exercise of state power is backed by a powerful state machine.
(4) self-expansion. Power has the ability of self-expansion and expansion, and always tends to expand its own boundaries in order to achieve a wider range of domination. Its application is marginal until it encounters resistance and rebound and cannot move forward. At the same time, people who hold power also have the requirement of expanding and accumulating power in their inner desires. This desire is manifested in breaking the boundaries and scope of the original power, infringing on other powers and rights to expand their own power, thus intensifying the expansion of power. Therefore, "absolute power is absolute corruption".