社会福利保障的宪法路径选择

世界各国宪法保障社会福利有两种模式,一种是在宪法中列举各种社会权利的社会权保障模式,另一种是仅在宪法中明确建设社会国家的原则或者类似条款的社会国保障模式。从我国《宪法》的现有规定及其变迁、宪法的解释与学界的解读看,我国属于社会权模式。社会权保障模式的缺陷是随着民众追求平等意识的成长、市场机制的扩展和公民权利意识的增强,社会福利可能借助宪法无序、无限地扩张。通过淡化社会福利的权利性质、转变社会权的合宪性审查的方向、扩展反射利益推进社会福利以及贯彻宪法设立的可承受性、适度性原则,可以推进我国社会福利宪法保障模式由社会权模式向社会国模式转换。

On the Choice of the Constitutional Path of Guaranteeing Social Welfare

There are two modes of guaranteeing social welfare in the constitutions of countries around the world. One is the social-rights guarantee mode by listing various social rights in the Constitution, the other is the social-state guarantee mode by only clarifying the principles of building a social state or stipulating similar provisions in the Constitution. From the current provisions of the Constitution and their evolution, the interpretation of and the academia’s understanding on the Constitution, China adopts the socialrights mode. The deficiency of such mode is that, with the growing awareness of the public of pursuing equality, the expansion of market mechanisms, and the increasing awareness of citizens of their rights, the social welfare may be unorderly and unlimitedly expanded by use of the Constitution. By weakening the nature of social welfare as rights, changing the direction of constitutional review on social rights, expanding the reflective interests to promote social welfare and sticking to the principle of acceptability and proportionality of establishing social welfare in the Constitution, we can promote the transformation of China’s constitutional guarantee of social welfare from the social-rights mode to the social-state mode.