We often see democracy and liberalism as natural partners. But Chinese philosopher Tongdong Bai argues that they are in tension because, as John Stuart Mill foresaw, democracy threatens liberalism’s emphasis on the rule of law and the protection of individuals and minorities against the tyranny of the majority. The rise of populism, he argues, is nothing more than a democratic attack on core liberal values. He proposes instead a hybrid state, inspired by Chinese Confucian political philosophy, which combines democratic and meritocratic elements, abandoning the principle of one-person-one-vote that he thinks has brought liberal democracies to their present crisis.

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The post-Soviet “end of history” euphoria is long gone, and the idea that democracy is in peril has taken hold in the West, not least due to the rise of right-wing populist parties. Yet the irony is that many of these parties, from Trump’s populist Republicans to Germany’s Alternative für Deutschland (AfD), are rising through democratic elections. In several countries, they have even won the largest share of votes, only to be kept out of power when anti-populist coalitions form in the name of defending democracy. Their success, in fact, is a product of democracy rather than a sign of its collapse. If anything, their influence might be even greater if democratic competition were allowed to run its course. Confusion about this stems from how the term “democracy” is used: it has become a loaded concept that often conflates two distinct ideas, namely liberalism and democracy.

Democracy is about the rule of the majority, and liberalism is about the rule of law and protection of certain liberties for individuals. Conceptually, they are different. Historically, proto- and early liberal thinkers sought to protect liberties from oppressive powers. For proto-liberal thinkers such as Montesquieu, the threat was from the rise of absolute monarchy. But in the 19^th century, early liberal thinkers such as John Stuart Mill realized that with absolute monarchy disappearing in the UK, the new threat to liberties was democracy, or the tyranny of the majority. Mill introduced and defended liberalism to save liberties from the threat of the opinions of the many. The emergence of liberalism can therefore be seen as a response to the challenge of democracy. In this fight, liberalism and democracy achieve a balance—what we call liberal or constitutional democracy. With democracy and its first cousin, equality, advancing continuously, however, this fragile balance is now being broken. What is declining is not democracy, but liberalism. Anything that deviates from the opinion of the masses is considered anti-egalitarian, elitist, and undemocratic. “We the people,” left behind by globalization, wish to disrupt the status quo with the power of the majority, hopefully unchecked by any laws. If this is the case, and if you love liberalism, the only hope is to limit democracy and equality in order to regain the balance.

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To be clear, the equality that I have criticized and wish to limit is a specific form of political equality, the idea that each individual should have an equal say in the political decision-making process. It is a result of the continuous advancement of democracy and equality. A liberal could believe in liberties for the few. But a more egalitarian form of liberalism may advocate equal opportunities and equality before the law, while rejecting the aforementioned political equality. Can there be such a balance? 

Facing a world where the old order that was built on aristocracy collapsed, early Confucians in China (roughly between 500 BCE and 200 BCE) believed that the state exists to serve the people. For them, service to the people offers the ultimate legitimacy to the state. That is, the state is for the people. Arguably, they also believed that the state is of the people as well. More importantly, the state should be held accountable for its service to the people. Whether the people are served or not has to be decided by the people, and a government that fails to satisfy its people’s needs should be removed.

A crucial difference between Confucians and democrats, however, is that the former do not think that the state should be by the people. Like democrats, they believe that all human beings have equal potential to govern themselves, and are the best judges of how they feel about their lives. But unlike democrats, Confucians also believe that in reality, only the few can actualize their moral and intellectual potentials to govern for all, and the masses are not competent to make political decisions even for their own benefit. Thus, Confucians would endorse a mixed regime that combines democratic elements (so that the people can express their satisfaction or lack of it with the government) with meritocratic elements (so that political decisions that are good for all can be made). One example of this is a bicameral legislature with a democratically elected lower house and a meritocratically selected upper house.

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The American regime at its founding comes closest to the Confucian hybrid regime in reality.

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In this Confucianism-inspired mixed regime, there are three ways to select members of the upper house. First, the meritocrats of the higher level can be elected by members of the legislature one level lower. Second, we can use the passing of exams as the qualification for voters to vote for the upper house, or as the qualification for candidates for the upper house. Third, we can find proxies that indicate the virtue of the candidate. For example, a one-term-only position in the upper house on the national level can be given to a two-term governor who has maintained a 40% approval rating during his or her terms, has not been convicted of any criminal activities, and is to be retired. These three ways are not mutually exclusive and can complement each other.

This regime should be firmly built on liberal ground, that is, constitutionalism that protects individual rights and liberties. Constitutionalism is perhaps the real contribution the West has made to humans’ search for an ideal regime, and as I have argued in my book, Against Political Equality, Confucians can embrace it. For example, for people’s voices to be heard, and for wise decisions to be made, the right to free speech has to be endorsed. Although traditional Chinese regimes are not full-blown constitutional ones, traditional Chinese thinkers do warn against the oppression of the people’s voice. In one ancient text, the writer says that to seal the mouth of the people is worse than blocking the flow of a river, which leads to disaster.

Now, why can this constitutionalism-based Confucian hybrid regime restrain the excesses of democracy? The present democratic paradigm in the West, especially the convention of one-person-one-vote, has four problems. (1) It encourages radical individualism and anti-intellectualism. (2) It gives all the political authority to the present voters, although domestic policies, such as environmental policies, can affect non-voters, such as foreigners and future generations. (3) It often encourages the majority to silence minorities, eroding liberties in a liberal democracy and potentially leading to ethnic cleansing in fledgling democracies. (4) It builds upon an unrealistic premise that voters are rational about their self-interests, a premise that is considered a myth by many economists and political scientists. It is unrealistic because almost all modern states are far too large for non-experts to understand state-level affairs, and the majority of people, who are so busy working, do not have time to understand them. By de facto limiting the voice of the people, the Confucian mixed regime may address these problems.

Conflating democracy with liberalism and taking equality as sacred, many democratic thinkers still wish to strengthen democracy and equality in order to solve problems that are actually created by democracy and too much equality. Montesquieu once argued that democracy could be ruined by both a lack of equality and by too much equality. Mill suggested that the votes of more informed people should be given extra weight. In the US, the Federalists designed many institutions to check and balance the power of the people, and the American regime at its founding (minus the lack of suffrage and the discrimination against women and minorities) comes closest to the Confucian hybrid regime in reality, although these institutions have been weakened and even eliminated in the progress of democracy and equality. Therefore, the proposal of a Confucian mixed regime is a reminder of a Western tradition that has been lost or neglected, to the detriment of the liberal democracy that has been developed in the West. The resonance between China and these now-neglected Western traditions shows the universality of these ideas.

This article is an edited and updated version of an article first published in Singapore-based Think China.