The Theoretical Forerunners and Practical Pathways of the Formation of Western Social Law

After the mid-19th century, the capitalist system, characterized by private law and a market economy, brought humanity increasing material wealth but also gave rise to growing social problems. Especially in some developed capitalist countries, the fruits of the Industrial Revolution fell into the hands of a minority, and society as a whole completely lost control over this portion of wealth. As social security and individual survival came under threat, capitalist society encountered an unprecedented crisis. Under these circumstances, capitalist states sought to resolve the social problems brought about by marketization and industrialization through intervention in the private economy, using administrative and legal means to regulate various social issues. In this process, public law instruments were continuously applied in fields such as labor, social welfare and relief, education, and the economy, with the aim of using the strong hand of government to protect the interests of socially vulnerable groups and safeguard people’s livelihoods and well-being. It was precisely the inadequacy of both public law and private law in solving social problems that led to the privatization of public law and the publicization of private law, ultimately giving rise to new legal branches such as social law, economic law, and environmental law.

19世纪中期以后，以私法和市场经济为特征的资本主义制度为人类带来了越来越多的物质财富，也造成了越来越多的社会问题。尤其是在一些发达资本主义国家，工业革命的成果落入少数人手里，社会对这部分财富完全失去支配权。由于社会安全和个人生存受到威胁，资本主义社会遇到了空前危机。在此情况下，资本主义国家力图通过干预私人经济来解决市场化和工业化所带来的社会问题，并运用行政、法律手段对各类社会问题进行调节。在此过程中，公法手段被不断运用于劳动、社会福利救济、教育和经济等领域，目的是以政府这只强有力的手来保护社会弱势群体的利益，保护民生福祉。正是由于公法和私法在解决社会问题时的不足，造成了公法私法化和私法公法化，并最终导致社会法、经济法、环境法等新的法律部门诞生。

I. Theoretical Forerunners of the Emergence of Social Law

一、社会法产生的理论先导

As a product of human reason, the theoretical foundations for the formation of Western social law include humanitarianism, ideas of social equality, charitable thought, social solidarity thought, social security thought, social justice theory, and social democracy. However, its theoretical forerunners and direct theoretical sources are primarily utopian socialism, the theory of state responsibility, human rights theory, and welfare economics thought.

作为人类理性的产物，西方社会法形成的理论基础有人道主义、社会平等思想、慈善思想、社会连带思想、社会安全思想、社会正义理论和社会民主主义等，但其理论先导和直接理论来源主要是空想社会主义、国家责任理论、人权理论和福利经济学思想。

01

01

Utopian Socialism

空想社会主义

In Western countries, utopian socialist theory can be traced back to the 1516 travelogue *Utopia* by the English thinker Thomas More, which established his status as the founder of utopian socialism. In the book, More proposed that pregnant women, women in childbirth, nursing mothers, and infants should receive social protection, that medical services should be completely free, and that all who are ill should receive treatment and necessary nutrition—this was an ideal of implementing social security. Another early work expounding utopian socialist thought was *The City of the Sun* by the Italian Tommaso Campanella, which had considerable influence upon publication. The main representatives of mid-period utopian socialism were the French thinkers Gabriel Bonnot de Mably and Morelly. Mably wrote many treatises; his *Complete Works of Mably*, published in 1792, runs to 15 volumes. Morelly’s representative works are mainly *The Code of Nature* and *Basiliade*, which were deeply influenced by French Enlightenment thought and exhibit typical characteristics and forms of utopian socialist theory.

在西方国家，空想社会主义理论可以追溯到1516年英国思想家莫尔（Thomas More）的游记体著作《乌托邦》，该书奠定了其空想社会主义者鼻祖地位。在书中，莫尔提出的孕妇、产妇、哺乳期妇女以及婴儿受到社会保护，医疗服务完全免费，一切患病者都可得到治疗和所需营养，就是一种实行社会保障的美好理想。早期阐述空想社会主义思想的另一本著作是意大利人康帕内拉（Tommas Campanella）写的《太阳城》，该书一经出版就产生了较大影响。中期空想社会主义者的主要代表人物是法国的马布利（Cabriel Bonnot de Mably）和摩莱里（Morelly）。马布利的论著很多，其1792年出版的《马布利全集》多达15卷。摩莱里的代表作主要是《自然法典》和《巴齐里阿达》，这些著作深受法国启蒙思想的影响，具有典型的空想社会主义理论特征和形态。

After the 19th century, capitalism developed rapidly in Europe, and society as a whole gradually split into two antagonistic camps, the bourgeoisie and the proletariat, with the internal contradictions and problems of capitalist society increasingly exposed. Faced with the brutal exploitation of capitalists and the suffering of the working class, Saint-Simon, Fourier, and Owen elevated utopian socialism to an unprecedented height. They linked the struggles of the lower classes with socialist ideas, subjected the capitalist system to profound critique and merciless condemnation, and even attempted to overthrow the existing social system by violent means. For example, Owen worked to improve workers’ welfare and their working conditions. He called on parliament to pass relevant draft legislation and published the pamphlet *An Address to the Inhabitants of New Lanark* [1]1 The Chinese text refers to Owen’s pamphlet *论工业体系的影响*; the standard English title is *An Address to the Inhabitants of New Lanark* (1816). to promote the idea of labor welfare. Later, Owen issued two appeals, *An Address to the British Factory Owners on the Employment of Children in Factories* and *A Letter to the Earl of Liverpool on the Employment of Children in Factories*, striving to transform sporadic relief into legally entitled rights for workers, while putting these ideas into practice in his own factories. The utopian socialists’ brilliant conceptions of an ideal future society provided rich intellectual material for the emergence of social law and became an important intellectual resource for it.

19世纪以后，资本主义在欧洲迅速发展，整个社会逐渐分裂成资产阶级和无产阶级两大对抗阵营，资本主义社会内部矛盾和问题日益暴露。面对资本家的残酷压榨和工人阶级的苦难，圣西门、傅立叶和欧文将空想社会主义提升到了前所未有的高度。他们将底层抗争与社会主义思想相联系，对资本主义制度开展了深刻批判和无情鞭挞，甚至试图以暴力手段推翻当时的社会制度。如欧文致力于提高工人福利，改善他们的劳动条件。他呼吁议会通过相关立法草案，并出版《论工业体系的影响》小册子，宣传劳工福利思想。后来，欧文发出《致不列颠工厂主书——论工厂雇用童工的问题》和《上利物浦伯爵书——论工厂雇用童工的问题》两份呼吁书，力图将零星赈济转变为劳工依法享有的权利，同时在自己的工厂实践这些想法。空想社会主义者对未来理想社会的一些天才设想，为社会法的产生提供了丰富的思想资料，成为社会法重要的智识资源。

02

02

The Theory of State Responsibility

国家责任理论

Early bourgeois thinkers such as Adam Smith, François Quesnay, and David Hume all believed that in the pursuit of private interest, people would automatically bring about social prosperity; guided by an “invisible hand,” society as a whole would operate in an orderly manner, ultimately achieving a balance between private and public interests. The work ethic prevalent at the time was Calvinist philosophy and social Darwinism, which held that poverty was caused by individual failings and had nothing to do with the state or society. For instance, John Locke argued that, on matters of poverty, the rich could do nothing to help the poor except exert influence over them through their own conduct. With the development of capitalism, people’s views on poverty and social risks underwent significant change; poverty was no longer seen as one’s own fault, and social risks were regarded as an inevitable outcome of industrialization that could only be addressed and mitigated through social security. Moreover, the market principle of “survival of the fittest” ensured procedural justice and formal equality, not equality of outcomes or substantive fairness. Therefore, one of the important responsibilities of the state was to actively provide citizens with basic guarantees such as necessary education, medical care, and unemployment relief, including social insurance and employment promotion. These were the initial theoretical forms of state responsibility, providing a theoretical opportunity for the emergence and development of social law.

早期资产阶级思想家亚当·斯密（Adam Smith）、魁奈（Francois Quesnay）和休谟（David Hume）等都认为，人们在追逐私利的过程中，会自动带来社会繁荣，在“看不见的手”指引下，整个社会将有序运行，最终达到私人利益和公共利益的平衡。当时十分流行的工作伦理是加尔文主义哲学和社会达尔文主义，认为贫困是自身原因造成的，与国家和社会无关。如洛克（John Locke）提出，在有关贫穷的问题上，除了以自己的行为对穷人施加影响力之外，富人无法帮助穷人。随着资本主义的发展，人们对贫困和社会风险的看法出现了很大变化，贫困不再被视为自己的过错，社会风险被看成工业化的必然结果，只能通过社会保障应对和化解。而且，“物竞天择，适者生存”的市场法则保证的是程序公正和形式公平，而不是结果平等和实质公平。因此，国家的重要职责之一是通过积极作为向国民提供必要的教育、医疗、失业救济等基本保障，包括社会保险和促进就业。这些是国家责任最初的理论形态，为社会法的产生和发展提供了理论契机。

In the 1930s, the introduction of Keynesianism pushed the theory of state responsibility to a new height, fundamentally overturning the theoretical foundations of classical economics. The theoretical starting point of Keynes was “insufficient effective demand.” He argued that bourgeois states faced serious crises such as inflation and relative surplus, which could trigger proletarian revolution and lead to the complete collapse of the social economy. Consequently, he proposed a package of state intervention in the market, including a “semi-inflation” policy, expanding capital and commodity exports, and raising the marginal efficiency of capital. Its core policy stance was to abandon the classical liberal laissez-faire “night watchman” approach, using state public power to actively intervene in and regulate the market economy and people’s livelihoods, in order to alleviate various social contradictions of capitalism and save the capitalist system. On this basis, the U.S. Congress approved the *Social Security Act*, which for the first time stipulated social insurance, social welfare, and social relief within a single law, creating a new model in which social security legislation evolved from purely social insurance to comprehensive development and state functions shifted from passive to active.

20世纪30年代，凯恩斯主义的提出将国家责任论推向了新的高度，从根本上颠覆了古典经济学的理论基础。凯恩斯的理论原点是“有效需求”不足，认为资产阶级国家出现了通货膨胀、相对过剩等严重危机，可能引发无产者革命，导致社会经济彻底崩溃。由此，他提出了国家干预市场的一揽子计划，包括“半通货膨胀”政策、扩大资本和商品输出、提高资本边际效率等。其核心政策观点是摈弃古典自由主义完全放任的“守夜人”式做法，运用国家公权力对市场经济和民生进行积极干预和调节，以缓和资本主义的各类社会矛盾，拯救资本主义制度。以此为基础，美国国会批准了《社会保障法》，第一次在同一部法律中规定社会保险、社会福利和社会救济等内容，创建了社会保障法规由单纯的社会保险向综合性发展、国家职能从消极到积极转变的新模式。

03

03

Human Rights Theory

人权理论

Modern human rights theory originated in the European Renaissance’s recognition and affirmation of the intrinsic value of the human person—that every individual possesses innate natural rights, a kind of human right based on human nature. In the later period of the Renaissance, Locke, in his *Two Treatises of Government*, provided the earliest definition of “natural rights.” He argued that human beings are born equal, without relations of subordination or subjection, and that no one may infringe upon another’s life, liberty, property, or health. According to his exposition, the core of natural law is social survival. He said: “If there is not enough to satisfy both demands fully… those who have abundance should reduce their claim to full satisfaction, so that those who would otherwise face the threat of death may obtain their urgent and prior right.” [2]2 This is a paraphrase of Locke’s argument in the *Second Treatise of Government*, Chapter V, on the limits of property rights and the right of the needy. In the relationship between the individual and society, Locke sought to achieve an appropriate balance, holding that “a person is born with the right to survival” and that a person’s basic right to survival is inviolable. During this period, scholars represented by Locke, Montesquieu, Voltaire, and Rousseau advocated ideas of freedom, equality, fraternity, and human rights, which caused great changes in the political and social spheres and became the theoretical forerunner of the state’s obligations to citizens and social legislation.

现代人权理论起源于欧洲文艺复兴对人的本体价值的认识和确认，即每个人都有与生俱来的天赋权利，这是基于人类本性的一种人权。文艺复兴后期，洛克在《政府论》中对“自然权利”做出了最早界定。他认为，人生来就应该是平等的，不存在从属或受制的关系，任何人都不得侵害他人的生命、自由、财产或健康。根据其论述，自然法的核心是社会生存。他说：“如果没有足够的东西可以充分满足双方面的要求……富足有余的人就应该减少其获得充分满足的要求，让那些不是如此就会受到死亡威胁的人取得他们迫切和优先的权利。”在个人与社会的关系上，洛克力图使之达到适当的平衡，认为“人一出生即享有生存权利”，人的基本生存权利不受侵犯。这一时期，以洛克、孟德斯鸠、伏尔泰和卢梭等为代表的学者，倡导自由、平等、博爱和人权等思想，在政治、社会领域引起巨大变革，成为国家对公民应尽义务和社会立法的理论先导。

The theory of the right to subsistence is an inevitable outcome of the development of human rights theory. This theory holds that the state should regard guaranteeing the people’s right to subsistence as its duty, that the distribution of social wealth should establish a general objective standard that ensures everyone receives a basic share commensurate with their conditions for survival, and that members of society have the right, based on this standard, to demand from the state the material goods and labor necessary to maintain their own survival. In the late 18th century, a group of thinkers represented by Thomas Paine explicitly articulated the idea of the right to subsistence, generating immense social impact. In his book *Rights of Man*, Paine comprehensively discussed the rights of the poor in clear language, arguing that in addition to political rights, the poor should also enjoy various social, cultural, and economic rights. To enable them to truly enjoy these rights, he proposed for the first time a radical social reform plan, namely, the imposition of a progressive tax on unearned income, including using tax revenue to pay allowances for the elderly, sick, and disabled, and to conduct public welfare projects and social relief activities. Due to the outstanding contribution of his ideas, some scholars have pointed out that “the achievement of the first part of *Rights of Man* is great, but the second part is extraordinary, because the second part set up the beacon guiding the way to 20th-century social legislation,” and it became the herald of social law legislation.

生存权学说是人权理论发展的必然结果。这一学说认为，国家应该把保障人的生存权作为自己的义务，社会财富的分配应确立一个使所有人都获得与其生存条件相适应的基本份额的一般客观标准，社会成员根据这一标准具有向国家提出获得为维持自己生存而必须的物和劳动要求的权利。18世纪末，以托马斯·潘恩（Thomas Paine）等为代表的一批思想家明确提出生存权思想，产生了极大的社会影响。在《人权论》一书中，潘恩用清晰的语言全面论述了穷人的权利，认为除了政治权利，穷人还应享有各种社会、文化和经济权利，为使他们真正享有这些权利，他首次提出了一项激进社会改革方案，即对无劳收益征收累进税，包括用税收为老弱病残支付津贴，举办公益事业和社会救助活动等。由于其思想的杰出贡献，有学者指出，《人权论》的“第一部分的成就是伟大的，但第二部分是非凡的，因为第二部分树起了导向20世纪社会立法的航标”，并成为社会法立法的先声。

04

04

The Theory of New Property Rights

新财产权理论

As legal concepts, “property” and “property rights” have long been regarded as important subjects of civil law research. For instance, utilitarians believe that property rights have a strongly private nature, and that even for the sake of public interest or the majority’s benefit, individuals cannot be illegally forced to make sacrifices that infringe upon personal rights. Social contract theorists propose that everyone has natural basic rights, including property rights, and that people form governments to protect their property rights; once the government illegally deprives them of private property rights, people can reasonably disobey. However, the development of the publicization of private law and the privatization of public law has meant that property rights are no longer rights in the traditional private sphere. For example, Thomas Hill Green proposed a theory of “new property rights,” arguing that the actual condition resulting from private property rights is the emergence of a large number of proletarians and people who cannot sustain themselves in the market. To change this reality, legislation should appropriately constrain property rights that hinder social common welfare and the interests of others. But Green also strongly advocated for maintaining the individual’s right to freely use and dispose of property, believing that the reasonable, unrestricted exercise of property rights capacity is the prerequisite and means for achieving the “highest good,” and that this capacity must be universally possessed by individuals, regardless of how they exercise it, as long as its use does not affect others’ enjoyment of the same rights.

作为法律概念，“财产”和“财产权”长期被视为民法研究的重要内容。如功利主义者认为，财产权具有极强的私人属性，即便是为了公共利益和大多数人的利益也不能非法强制个体做出牺牲，侵犯个人权利。社会契约论者提出，每个人都有天赋的包括财产权在内的基本权利，人们组建政府是为了保障其财产权，一旦政府非法剥夺私有财产权，人们可以合理不服从。但是，私法公法化和公法私法化的发展，使得财产权已经不再是传统意义上私领域的权利。如格林（Thomas Hill Green）提出一种“新财产权”理论，认为私有财产权导致的现实状况是，出现了大批无产者和不能在市场上自存的人。为了改变这种现实，应通过立法对妨碍社会共同福祉和他人利益的财产权予以适当约束。但格林又力主维护个人自由使用和处置财产的权利，认为合理的、无限制的财产权能力的运用是实现“最高善”的前提和手段，这种能力必须为个体普遍所有，而不论其怎样行使，只要在使用中不影响别人享有同样的权利就可以。

After the 20th century, Professor Charles Reich further elaborated and developed the theory of “new property rights” in an article published in the *Yale Law Journal*. He argued that the content of property includes not only traditional money, goods, chattels, and real estate such as land, but also government grants such as social welfare, public positions, and operating licenses; these “grants” are also a form of property rights and should be protected by relevant laws. According to Professor Reich’s exposition, modern states are constantly creating new forms of wealth, such as welfare rights, franchise rights, government contracts, and rights to use public assets. Their distribution is achieved not through private law but through public law, and they are of great significance to individual survival and development. He argued that government-provided social relief and social welfare should also be regarded as “new property” and given full legal protection. Reich’s theory of new property rights focuses on the relationship between the rights holder and the government, rather than the relationship among holders of private property. It guides people to pay attention to what benefits the state can provide and how to protect these benefits, which is very useful for understanding property rights from the perspective of public law. It is precisely this important change in the concept of property rights that provided sufficient conditions for the development of social law.

20世纪以后，查理斯·赖克（Charles Reich）教授在《耶鲁法学杂志》上发表的一篇文章中对“新财产权”理论做了进一步阐述和发挥。他认为，财产的内容不仅包含传统的钱物、动产和土地等不动产，还包括社会福利、公共职位和经营许可等政府赠予，这些“赠予”也是一种财产权，应该受到相关法律的保护。根据赖克教授的阐述，现代国家正在不断地制造新的财富形式，如福利权、特许经营权、政府合同、公共资产使用权等，对其分配不是通过私法而是公法来实现，对个体的生存和发展具有十分重要的意义。他认为，政府提供的社会救济和社会福利等也应被视为“新的财产”而给予充分的法律保障。赖克的新财产权理论，重点阐述的是权利持有者与政府的关系，而不是私有财产持有人相互之间的关系，它指引人们去关注国家可以提供哪些利益，如何保护这些利益，这对于从公法角度理解财产权是非常有益的。正是财产权观念的重要变化，为社会法的发展提供了充分条件。

05

05

Welfare Economics Thought

福利经济学思想

The ethical foundation of welfare economics is utilitarian thought. For example, Jeremy Bentham believed that “the greatest happiness of the greatest number is the measure of right and wrong,” and that “the principle of utility is that principle which approves or disapproves of every action whatsoever, according to the tendency which it appears to have to augment or diminish the happiness of the party whose interest is in question”; common welfare “is the sum of the interests of the several members who compose the community,” and “it is in vain to talk of the interests of the community, without understanding the interests of the individual.” Although Bentham proposed some form of collective welfare concept, his theory had a major flaw: it only emphasized the growth of total wealth, without asking how this wealth is distributed. As Norman Barry said, the confusion in Bentham’s thought lies in that “it can construct both an economic theory far more laissez-faire than *The Wealth of Nations* and a welfare theory allowing for the expansion of state power.” Later, John Stuart Mill further discussed specific methods for the secondary distribution of national wealth, becoming a herald of welfare economics thought. He argued that “the laws and conditions of the production of wealth partake of the character of physical truths. There is nothing optional or arbitrary in them,” while “the distribution of wealth is a matter of human institution solely.”

福利经济学的伦理学基础是功利主义思想。如边沁（Jeremy Bentham）认为，“最大多数人的最大幸福是正确与错误的衡量标准”，“功利原理是指这样的原理：它按照看来势必增大或减少利益相关者之幸福的倾向，亦即促进或妨碍此种幸福的倾向，来赞成或非难任何一项行动”；共同福利“是组成共同体的若干成员的利益总合”，“不理解个人利益，谈论共同体的统一便毫无意义”。虽然边沁提出了某种集体形式的福利观念，但其理论有一个重大缺陷是只强调财富总量的增长，而不问这些财富如何分配。正如诺曼·巴里（Norman Barry）所说，边沁思想的混沌之处在于，“它既可以建构比《富国论》远为自由放任的经济理论，也可以建构允许国家权力扩张的福利理论”。后来，约翰·穆勒（John S. Mill）进一步论述了对国民财富实行二次分配的具体办法，成为福利经济学思想先声。他认为，“财富生产的法则和条件具有自然真理的性质，它们是不以人的意志为转移的”，“财富的分配不是如此，这是一件只和人类制度有关的事情”。

The true foundation of welfare economics was laid by the British economist Arthur Cecil Pigou. The two famous theories he established, namely the theory of “eliminating free market externalities” and the theory of “redistribution of social wealth,” became strong supports for government intervention in the market. In the 1840s, the German Historical School proposed many theoretical views and policy propositions opposed to classical political economy. Later, the New Historical School, represented by Gustav von Schmoller, explicitly articulated the idea of state welfare. Because they advocated for social reform and workers’ welfare, they were also called “socialists of the chair.” The New Historical School’s state reform policy had two theoretical pillars: first, the contradiction between labor and capital is a matter of morality and ethics; as long as the moral and psychological state of workers is changed, it can be resolved without the need for social revolution; second, the state is supreme, and the government can bear the responsibility for “civilization and welfare” by intervening in economic life. Their policy ideas for improving social welfare were that human economic life should satisfy complete and basic ethical and moral desires, and the state must implement social protection through legislation and progressively promote social and economic reforms. These ideas and propositions of the New Historical School became the direct theoretical source of German social law.

真正奠定福利经济学基础的是英国经济学家庇古，他创立的两个著名学说即“消除自由市场外部性”和“社会财富再分配”学说，成为政府干预市场的有力支撑。19世纪40年代，德国的历史学派提出了许多与古典政治经济学相对立的理论观点和政策主张。后来，以施穆勒（Gustav von Schmoller）等为代表的新历史学派明确提出国家福利思想，因其主张社会改良和工人福利，又被称作“讲坛社会主义”。新历史学派的国家改革政策有两个理论支点：其一，劳资矛盾是道德和伦理领域的问题，只要改变劳动者的道德和心理状况就能解决，不需要进行社会革命；其二，国家至高无上，政府可以通过干预经济生活，负担起“文明和福利”的责任。他们提出的关于改善社会福利的政策思路是，人类经济生活应满足完善的、基本的伦理道德方面的欲望，国家必须通过立法实行社会保护，循序推进社会和经济改革。新历史学派的这些思想主张成为德国社会法直接的理论源头。

II. The Practical Paths of the Formation of Western Social Law

二、西方社会法形成的实践进路

Social law emerged in response to social needs and is a product of the development and progress of the times. Especially after the 19th century, the legislative orientation of Western countries gradually transitioned from the public law standard of statism and the private law standard of liberalism to a third legal domain integrating public and private law, thereby giving rise to a completely new legal department—social law.

社会法是适应社会需要出现的，是时代发展进步的产物。尤其是19世纪以后，西方国家立法取向由国家主义的公法本位和自由主义的私法本位逐渐向公、私法融合的第三法域过渡，由此催生了全新的法律部门——社会法。

01

01

The Pre-Industrial Revolution Period

前工业革命时期

In early human society, productive forces were extremely low. To survive and reproduce, people lived a communal life of mutual dependence and shared labor. At that time, there was no wealth gap or the series of social problems arising from it; members’ livelihood security was resolved internally by the clan or group, and there was no social law in the modern sense. As Engels said: “In most cases, age-old custom had regulated everything. There were no poor or needy people, because the communistic household economy and the clan knew their obligations toward the elderly, the sick, and the war-disabled.” In *The Republic*, Plato described the conditions for a truly egalitarian communistic society and regarded the family as the key to inequality. He said that individual motivation is to obtain for other family members and their loved ones all the privileges they enjoy—that is, there exists in society an inherent drive to institutionalize inequality. Therefore, the only way to create a communist society is to take children away from their parents, have the state raise and nurture them, thereby eliminating social privilege and strengthening social public security.

在人类社会早期，生产力十分低下，人们为了繁育生息过着相依为命、共同劳动的群体生活，这时没有贫富差距和由此带来的一系列社会问题，成员的生活保障都由氏族或群体内部解决，不存在现代意义的社会法。正如恩格斯所说：“在大多数情况下，历来的习俗就把一切调整好了。不会有贫穷困苦的人，因为共产制的家庭经济和氏族都知道它们对于老年人、病人和战争残废者所负的义务。”柏拉图在《理想国》中，描述了一个真正平等的共产制社会的条件，并将家庭看作是不平等的关键所在。他说，个体的动机是为家庭的其他成员和他们的至爱亲朋获得他们享受的所有特权，即社会中存在着要求使不平等制度化的内在动力。因此，创立共产社会的唯一方法就是把孩子们从其父母身边带走，由国家来抚养和培育他们，从而消除社会特权，增强社会公共保障。

After entering a society based on private ownership, this public security gradually disappeared. Before entering capitalist society, Western countries had no institutionalized social security, only family support, neighborhood mutual aid, and charitable donations. Taking medieval Europe as an example, social relief was generally religious in nature. As Philip Lee Ralph and others said: “If anything was rescued from the ruins, it was largely due to the stabilizing role played by the organized church.” In England, the government’s attitude toward vagrants underwent a long process of change. In the early period, punishment was the main approach, but harsh laws alone did not reduce the number of vagrants; instead, they provoked increasing resistance. Under pressure from social order, the government gradually increased relief efforts for vagrants and the poor. In 1531, Henry VIII issued a decree known as the “Genuine Relief Act,” stipulating that the elderly and those lacking ability could beg, and local authorities would engage in poor relief according to their conscience. In 1572, the government ordered the nationwide collection of poor rates to meet unforeseen needs. Historically, the most far-reaching was the 1601 Elizabethan Poor Law, which was applied in England for over 300 years and later emulated by many countries.

进入私有制社会以后，这种公共保障逐渐消失。在进入资本主义社会之前，西方国家没有制度化社会保障，只有家庭兜底、邻里互济和慈善捐赠等。以中世纪欧洲为例，社会救助普遍带有宗教性质，正如菲利普·李·拉尔夫（Philip Lee Ralph）等所说：“如果说从废墟中拯救出什么东西来的话，这很大程度上要归功于有组织的教会所起的稳定作用。”在英国，政府对待流民的态度经历了较长的变化过程。在初期，对这一类人以惩罚为主，但单纯的严刑峻法没有减少流浪者的规模，反而激起了越来越多的反抗。迫于社会治安的压力，政府对流民和贫困者的救济力度逐渐加大。1531年，亨利八世颁布一项被称为《名副其实的救济法》的法令，规定老人和缺乏能力者可以乞讨，地方当局将根据良心从事济贫活动。1572年，政府规定在全国征收济贫费，以备不时之需。从历史上看，影响最为深远的是1601年《伊丽莎白济贫法》，其在英国适用300多年，后来为大量国家所效仿。

02

02

Early Industrial Revolution

工业革命前期

With the development of productive forces, humanity transitioned from an agricultural to an industrial society, and the function of livelihood security, originally mainly borne by the family, was gradually weakened. Especially in the early period of industrialization, the view of economic liberalism was all the rage, the polarization between rich and poor and various social problems became increasingly evident, and calls for protecting workers’ livelihoods constantly emerged. Adam Smith was an active advocate of free competition. He said: “Every man, as long as he does not violate the laws of justice, is left perfectly free to pursue his own interest in his own way, and to bring both his industry and capital into competition with those of any other man or order of men.” He believed that individual happiness and the public interest are not contradictory; each person’s self-interested pursuit of wealth automatically promotes public happiness, and full market competition and complete economic freedom can simultaneously maximize the public interest, because “by pursuing his own interest he frequently promotes that of the society more effectually than when he really intends to promote it.” That is, individuals acting on self-interest to advance social welfare is a requirement of the natural order.

随着生产力的发展，人类从农业社会向工业社会过渡，原来主要由家庭承担的生活保障职能被逐渐削弱。尤其是工业化早期，经济自由主义的观点风靡一时，贫富分化和各种社会问题越来越明显，要求保障工人生活的呼声不断出现。亚当·斯密是自由竞争的积极鼓吹者，他说：“每一个人，在他不违反正义的法律时，都应听其完全自由，让他采用自己的方法，追求自己的利益，以其劳动及资本和任何其他人或其他阶级相竞争。”他认为，个人幸福与公共利益并不矛盾，每个人追求财富的利己活动，都会自动促进公共幸福，实行充分的市场竞争和完全的经济自由，可以同时实现公共利益最大化，因为“他追求自己的利益，往往使他能比在真正出于本意的情况下更有效地促进社会的利益”。也就是说，个人按利己之心活动，推进社会福利，是自然秩序的要求。

During the period from the 17th- and 18th-century bourgeois revolutions to the development of capitalist society, the emergence of natural rights and social contract theories made concepts such as liberty, equality, life, and property rights deeply rooted in people’s minds. Private property and individual rights were strictly protected and highlighted by law, and the legal theory gradually shifted from state-centered to individual-centered. With the development of the Industrial Revolution, bankrupt small handicraftsmen and the unemployed increased continuously, the poor population expanded rapidly, obvious social differentiation appeared, and social problems became increasingly serious. Because the market economy, despite its formal rationality, also has unavoidable inherent defects—namely, that everyone, in order to obtain wealth, will cause the result of polarization between rich and poor and opposition between strong and weak. If left unchecked, it will form a Matthew effect of “the strong getting stronger and the weak getting weaker,” causing an overall imbalance in social relations and leading to the collapse of the social system. During this period, many thinkers saw the suffering of the socially weak and successively proposed social ideals for relieving and protecting the lives of the laboring masses, such as More’s “Utopia,” Thomas Münzer’s “Heavenly Kingdom” conception, and Campanella’s “City of the Sun.” These all reflected a beautiful yearning for life and also provided important analytical pathways for the formation and development of social law.

17、18世纪资产阶级革命至资本主义社会发展时期，天赋人权和社会契约理论的产生，使自由、平等、生命和财产权等观念深入人心，私有财产和个人权利为法律严格保护和彰显，法律理论中国家本位主义逐步向个人本位主义过渡。随着工业革命的发展，破产小手工业者和失业者不断增多，贫困人口迅速扩大，出现了明显的社会分化,社会问题日趋严重。因为市场经济尽管有形式上的合理性，也有不可避免的内在缺陷，即人人为了获得财富，会造成贫富分化和强弱对立的结果，如果任其发展，将会形成“强者越来越强、弱者越来越弱”的马太效应，使社会关系整体失衡并导致社会制度体系崩溃。这一时期，很多思想家看到社会弱者生活的苦难，纷纷提出救济和保障劳苦大众生活的社会理想，如莫尔的“乌托邦”、闵采尔（Thomas Münzer）的“天国”构想、康帕内拉的“太阳城”等，都体现了对生活的美好向往，也为社会法的形成和发展提供了重要的分析路径。

03

03

Late Industrial Revolution

工业革命后期

Although industrialization brought enormous material wealth to society, workers’ lives not only failed to improve but tended to worsen. As capitalism transitioned from free competition to the monopoly stage, social contradictions began to intensify. Taking England as an example, due to soaring prices, many workers’ wages were severely insufficient. In 1795, the government adopted the then-influential “Speenhamland system,” stipulating that if a worker’s wages could not guarantee a minimum standard of living, relief would make up the difference. In 1834, the British Royal Commission, based on classical liberalism, formulated the new Poor Law, which held that the cause of poverty among the poor lay in individual failure. It stipulated that able-bodied workers and their dependents could only receive relief in workhouses, while others such as the elderly, the sick, and children were subject to strict discipline. Moreover, all recipients of relief lost the right to vote and were required to wear special uniforms marking their second-class citizenship. The new Poor Law revised outdoor relief, established a Central Poor Law Board to coordinate poor relief work, and stipulated that specific relief affairs were jointly responsible by local parishes. At the same time, the new Poor Law held that relief was not a passive action but a positive welfare measure.

工业化虽然为社会带来了巨量的物质财富，但工人的生活不仅并未没有得到改善，反而有日益恶化的趋势。随着资本主义由自由竞争过渡到垄断阶段，社会矛盾开始激化。以英国为例，由于物价飞涨，许多工人的工资严重不足。1795年，政府采纳了当时颇具影响的“斯宾汉兰制度”，规定如果劳动者的工资不能保证最低生活标准，将由救济支付补足。1834年，英国皇家委员会以古典自由主义为思想基础，制定新《济贫法》，认为穷人贫困的原因在于个人失败，规定有工作能力的人及其抚养者只有在贫民习艺所才能得到救济，其他如老人、病人和儿童等都应服从严格的纪律约束，且所有接受救济者都丧失选举权，并被要求穿上特殊制服标明其二等公民地位。新《济贫法》修正了院外救济，设立济贫法中央管理局，统筹济贫工作，规定具体济贫事务由地方教区共同负责。同时，新《济贫法》认为，救济不是消极行动，而是一项积极的福利措施。

In France, scholars represented by Voltaire and Rousseau advocated ideas of liberty, equality, fraternity, and popular sovereignty, which caused great changes in the political and social spheres. This was reflected in social legislation by establishing social security as a fundamental right of all citizens and a duty of the state toward its citizens. For example, in 1793, the unimplemented Jacobin Constitution stipulated: “Public relief is a sacred debt.” In June 1850, France issued the Public Relief and Prevention Law, deciding to provide public relief for the lives of retirees and the socially weak, becoming an early germ of French social law. In 1898, the government promulgated the Work Injury Insurance Regulations, clearly stipulating that employers should bear compensation liability for injured employees. In the United States, early colonists mainly adopted the Elizabethan Poor Law to address the survival security of the socially weak: first, auctioning off the poor to families willing to care for them at the lowest cost; second, handing over the sick and the poor to couples willing to manage them with “as little as possible” payment; third, outdoor relief; fourth, using poorhouses. After the 19th century, Americans had more views on how to deal with poverty, such as the emergence of Societies for the Prevention of Poverty and Charity Organization Societies, but their work ethic was still the then-popular Calvinist philosophy and social Darwinism.

在法国，以伏尔泰、卢梭等为代表的学者倡导自由、平等、博爱和主权在民思想，在政治、社会领域引起了巨大变革，反映在社会立法中就是将社会保障确定为全体公民的基本权利和国家对公民的应尽义务。如1793年，法国未能实施的《雅各宾宪法》规定：“公共救济是神圣的债务。”1850年6月，法国发布《公共救济与预防法》，决定对退休者及社会弱者的生活予以公共救济，成为法国社会法的早期萌芽。1898年，政府颁布《工伤保险条例》，明确雇主要对受伤的雇员承担补偿责任。在美国，早期殖民者主要采用《伊丽莎白济贫法》解决社会弱者的生存保障问题：一是拍卖穷人到愿意以最低的付出照料他们的家庭；二是将疾病患者和穷人交给愿意以“能少则少”的付出来照料他们的夫妻进行管理；三是院外救助；四是使用济贫院。19世纪以后，美国人对如何应对贫困有了更多看法，如防止贫困会社和慈善组织会社等相继出现，但其工作伦理仍是当时十分流行的加尔文主义哲学和社会达尔文主义。

In the late 19th century, Germany surpassed England to become the world's most economically dynamic nation. Driven by the New Historical School and Chancellor Bismarck, among others, German Emperor Wilhelm I issued a proclamation in 1881 on establishing social insurance, stating that solving social problems could not rely solely on suppressing the unlawful acts of social democracy, but must also provide the working class with greater security and more support. In 1883, the German parliament approved the world's first social insurance law, the *Sickness Insurance Law*, and subsequently enacted the *Work Accident Insurance Law* in 1884 and the *Old Age and Disability Compulsory Insurance Law* in 1889, inaugurating a new process of legalizing social insurance. In fact, as early as 1871, in a letter to Count Eulenburg, Bismarck had expressed this governing philosophy: "For the justified demands of the working classes, insofar as they can be reconciled with the interests of the state, the government should satisfy them through legislation and administrative measures." Historically, Bismarck's social legislation pioneered the practice of Western state social law. In Bismarck's own words, it was like adding "a few drops of socialist oil" to the recipe for restoring the health of the Empire. Consequently, this legislation was also derided by some as "Bismarck's socialism."

19世纪后期，德国超过英国成为世界上经济发展最强劲的国家。在新历史学派和首相俾斯麦等推动下，德皇威廉一世于1881年发布建立社会保险的文告，提出解决社会问题不能仅靠镇压社会民主主义的不法行为，还要给劳工群体更大的安全感和更多的支持。1883年，德国议会批准了世界上第一部社会保险法《疾病保险法》，并于1884年和1889年相继颁布《工伤事故保险法》和《老年与残疾强制保险法》，开启了社会保险法律化的新历程。事实上，早在1871年，俾斯麦在给伊尊·普立兹伯爵的一封信中，即表达了这样的治理理念：“对于具有正当理由的劳动阶级的要求，只要在能与国家利害相调和的范围内，政府应通过立法及行政手段予以满足。”从历史上看，俾斯麦的社会立法开创了西方国家社会法实践的先河，用俾斯麦自己的话说，是在恢复帝国健康的菜料中“加几滴社会主义的油”。因此，该法律也被一些人讥刺为“俾斯麦先生的社会主义”。

04

04

The Post-Industrial Revolution Period

后工业革命时期

Entering the post-industrial revolution period, the interpenetration and coordination between the political state and civil society became closer. Because the substantive inequality of private law was concealed by formal equality, correction from the perspective of substantive justice became necessary. Therefore, people increasingly focused on the coordination of individual interests and social interests, especially the interests of the socially weak and the poor. By the 1930s, the economic crisis sweeping Europe and the United States brought increasingly severe social problems to Western capitalist countries. In 1933, President Roosevelt, adhering to the governing principle that a democratic state should be "based on the health and welfare of its citizens," implemented a series of reform measures to eliminate the economic crisis, historically known as the "New Deal." An important measure of the New Deal was to guarantee the basic living standards of the unemployed and vulnerable groups. Under his impetus, Congress approved the *Social Security Act* in 1935, which for the first time stipulated social insurance, social welfare, and social relief within a single law, creating a new model for the development of social security law from simple social insurance towards comprehensiveness. Thus, U.S. social law primarily safeguards the rights of particularly vulnerable groups and enhances social welfare, which is also a significant marker of the maturation of Western social law.

进入后工业革命时期，政治国家与市民社会相互渗透和配合更加紧密。由于私法的实质不平等被形式平等所掩盖，需要从实质正义的角度进行矫正。因此，人们越来越关注个人利益与社会利益的协调，尤其是要关注社会弱者和穷人的利益。到了20世纪30年代，席卷欧洲和美国的经济危机，给西方资本主义国家带来了愈来愈严重的社会问题。1933年，罗斯福总统秉持民主国家应“以公民的健康与福利为基础”的治国理念推行一系列消除经济危机的改革措施，史称“罗斯福新政”。新政的一个重要举措就是，保障失业者和脆弱群体的基本生活水平。在他的推动下，国会于1935年批准了《社会保障法》，第一次在同一部法律中规定社会保险、社会福利和社会救济等内容，创建了社会保障法由单纯的社会保险向综合性发展的新模式。可见，美国社会法主要是维护特殊脆弱群体的权利，提升社会福利，这也是西方社会法走向成熟的重要标志。

The transformation of Western social law from guaranteeing the right to subsistence towards welfarism was marked by the implementation of the British "Beveridge Plan." In 1908, Britain enacted the *Old Age Pensions Act* based on a "minimum standard of living," establishing old-age pensions for the elderly in a humanitarian manner. In 1909, the British government established the Royal Commission on the Poor Laws, which published and adopted the "Minority Report" signed by the famous Fabian leader Beatrice Webb, proposing the combination of social relief with social insurance. From then on, the *Poor Law*, which had been in effect for over three hundred years, was declared terminated. In 1911, the *National Insurance Act* established workers' sickness and unemployment insurance, among other things. During the interwar period, the legislative process of British social law slowed. After World War II, the Labour Party government adopted the proposals of William Beveridge, known as the "father of the welfare state," and enacted a series of social decrees such as the *Family Allowances Act* and the *National Health Service Act*, and also specifically formulated the *National Insurance Act*, gradually perfecting the British social law system and showing characteristics of transition towards a modern welfare state. The introduction of the comprehensive *National Insurance Act* in 1944 and the *National Assistance Act* in 1948 marked the completeness and maturity of British social law.

西方社会法从生存权保障向福利化转变以英国的“贝弗里奇计划”实施为标志。1908年，英国在“最低生活标准”的基础上颁布《老年退休金法案》，以人道主义方式确立了老年人退休金。1909年，英国政府成立济贫法皇家委员会，发表并采纳了费边社著名领导人韦伯夫人签名的“少数派报告”，提出将社会救济与社会保险结合起来。从此，实行了三百多年的《济贫法》宣告终结。1911年，《国家保险法案》确立了劳动者的疾病和失业保险等。在两次世界大战期间，英国社会法立法进程趋缓。第二次世界大战后，工党政府采纳了被称为“福利国家之父”的贝弗里奇（William Beveridge）的主张，颁布了一系列社会法令如《家庭津贴法》《国民保健服务法》等，还专门制定了《国民保险法》，使得英国的社会法体系逐步完善，并呈现向现代福利国家过渡的特征。1944年综合性的《国家保险法案》出台和1948年《国家救助法案》诞生，标志着英国社会法的完备和成熟。

III. The Essential Characteristics of Western Social Law

三、西方社会法的本质特征

As seen above, social law is a new legal system formed in response to the inadequacy of private law in solving social problems. It adjusts social relations that are formally equal but substantively unequal, and its legal interest standard gradually transitions from a part of society to the whole of society. Compared with traditional legal departments, social law possesses unique legal essence, value objectives, and legal functions.

前述可见，社会法是应对私法解决社会问题不足形成的新的法律体系，调整的是形式平等而实质不平等的社会关系，其法益本位是由部分社会渐次过渡到全体社会。与传统法律部门相比，社会法具有独特的法律本质、价值目标和法律功能。

01

01

The Legal Essence of Social Law

社会法的法律本质

In terms of its formation, social law emerged alongside the fusion of public and private law. The so-called "publicization of private law" refers to the state exercising public power to adjust certain social relations in the private law sphere that were previously not subject to intervention, imbuing private law with the color and characteristics of public law. The so-called "privatization of public law" refers to the state intervening in specific private spheres as a subject of private law, introducing principles of private law such as equal negotiation and restorative compensation into the public law sphere, making the state a party in private law. The result of the fusion of public and private law is the eventual formation of a tripartite legal structure of "public law, private law, and a third legal domain." The third legal domain includes many departmental laws, such as social law, economic law, and environmental law. The three keywords defining social law—"the living security of the weak," "provision of social welfare," and "state and societal assistance"—were ultimately formed mainly because the results of market competition cause limited social wealth to flow towards the strong, leaving the vast majority of the socially weak unable even to secure their survival. People strongly demanded that the government must intervene in social security and public welfare to perfect the economic functions of the state. Thus, social law originates from the guarantee of the people's right to subsistence and is one of the important markers of the political, economic, and social civilization of a modern state.

从形成上看，社会法是伴随着公、私法融合而产生的。所谓私法公法化，指国家行使公共权力调整以前不干预的私法领域的某些社会关系，使私法具有公法的色彩和特征。所谓公法私法化，指国家以私法主体的身份介入特定私人领域，将私法平等协商、恢复补偿等原则引进公法领域，使国家成为私法上的当事人。公、私法融合的结果是，“公法、私法和第三法域”三元法律结构最终形成。第三法域的部门法很多，有社会法、经济法、环境法等。界定社会法的三个关键词“弱者的生活安全”“提供社会福利”“国家和社会帮助”最终得以形成，主要是由于市场竞争的结果使有限的社会财富流向强者，绝大多数社会弱者连生存都难以保障，人们强烈要求政府必须介入到社会保障和公共福利中来，完善国家的经济职能。由此可见，社会法起源于民众的生存权保障，是现代国家政治、经济和社会文明的重要标志之一。

From a jurisprudential perspective, the institutional philosophy of social law is similar to that of economic law; its pursuit of social justice and fairness is achieved by remedying and regulating the defects of the market. Because the pure market mechanism has inherent defects and shortcomings that are difficult to overcome on its own, social law implements a guarantee of the right to subsistence, enabling citizens to participate in market competition under the condition that their basic living standards are secured. The so-called guarantee of the right to subsistence means that, to ensure the stable development of the economy and society, the state and society provide assistance to citizens in situations such as illness, disability, old age, unemployment, or encountering disasters, guaranteeing their basic living needs. Japanese scholar Nobuyoshi Ashibe stated: "The purpose of the right to subsistence is to ensure that citizens can live a life worthy of human beings, thereby practically safeguarding human dignity in social life." Some Chinese scholars have also proposed that, setting aside economic and political factors, the positioning of social law lies in the human being itself; its essence is "a kind of relief and guarantee for the basic right to subsistence of people," embodying profound humanistic concern. Therefore, recognizing the right to subsistence as a legal right of citizens imposes an obligation on the state to perfect relevant systems to satisfy the legitimate claims of rights holders. Conversely, if the state fails to fulfill its legal duties, rights holders can safeguard their rights through legal means.

从法理上看，社会法的制度理念与经济法类似，它对社会正义与公平的追求是通过对市场缺陷的弥补和调节实现的。由于单纯的市场机制存在自身难以克服的缺陷和不足，社会法通过实施生存权保障，使公民能在基本生活水平得到保障的前提下参与市场竞争。所谓生存权保障，是国家为了保证经济和社会稳定发展，在公民疾病、伤残、年老、失业或遭遇灾害等情况下，由政府和社会给予帮助，保障其基本生活需要。日本学者大须贺明说：“生存权的目的，在于保障国民能过像人那样的生活，以在实际社会生活中确保人的尊严。”我国也有学者提出，撇开经济、政治因素等，社会法的定位在于人本身，其本质“是对人的基本生存权的一种救济和保障”，蕴含着深刻的人性关怀。因此，承认生存权是公民的法律权利，国家就有义务完善相关制度以满足权利人的合法要求。反之，如果国家不履行法定义务，则权利人可以通过法律手段维护自己的权利。

02

02

The Legal Value of Social Law

社会法的法律价值

As part of the legal system, the values pursued by social law are generally consistent with the general value concepts of law, but they also possess their own particularities or departmental law characteristics. As seen above, the value foundation of social law lies in theories such as humanitarianism, reflecting mutual respect and care among people, and also embodying its social ethical value. First, ethics and morality support the establishment of social law. John Bordley Rawls stated that people's choice of a legal system "is based not only on economic foundations but also on moral and political foundations," meaning that all laws are oriented towards certain ethical values. Second, all laws must be premised on certain value understandings, judgments, and choices. Social law pursues a virtuous social life, ensuring that people in society can lead a reasonably minimal human life. Therefore, some scholars have proposed that social law takes ethical thought values as its standard everywhere and is "illuminated by the ethical spirit of people." In terms of its content system, social security law embodies the human spirit of mutual aid and mutual benefit, social protection law is a product of humanitarianism and altruism, and social promotion law reflects the spirit of Great Harmony [5]5 The Great Harmony (大同, *datong*) is a classical Confucian concept describing an ideal, utopian society of universal peace and equality, often invoked in modern Chinese political discourse. where everyone can live a happy life. In short, ethical orientation and humanistic concern constitute the logical premise and human foundation of social law.

作为法律体系的一部分，社会法追求的价值在总体上与法的一般价值理念是一致的，但又有自己的特殊性或部门法特征。前述可知，社会法的价值基础是人道主义等理论，体现了人们之间的相互尊重和关心，也体现了其社会伦理价值。一是伦理道德支持社会法的建立。罗尔斯（John Bordley Rawls）说，人们对法制的选择，“不仅建立在经济基础上，而且建立在道德和政治基础上”，即任何法律都以一定的伦理价值为旨归。二是任何法律都要以一定的价值认识、判断和取舍为前提。社会法追求的是向善的社会生活，它保证社会中的人能过一种合理的最低限度的人类生活。因此，有学者提出，社会法无处不以伦理思想价值为圭臬，受到“人的伦理精神的关照”。从内容体系看，社会保障法体现了互助互利的人类精神，社会保护法是人道主义和利他主义的产物，社会促进法反映了所有人都能过上幸福生活的大同精神。总之，伦理取向和人文关怀构成了社会法的逻辑前提和人性基础。

Social security is the second important value orientation pursued by social law. By providing assistance to those without means of subsistence, the poor, those who have suffered misfortune, and those who have lost the ability or opportunity to work, it eliminates the sense of insecurity among members of society, functioning as a social safety net and shock absorber. On the one hand, social law guarantees the livelihood security of all members of society, ensuring that people do not become "social outcasts" in cases of illness, injury, unemployment, old age, etc. On the other hand, it safeguards social security and effectively maintains social stability. This is because the main factors affecting individual livelihood security are unemployment, old age, illness, disability, childbirth, etc. Social law comprehensively eliminates the factors of insecurity affecting individual and social life, "enabling the goals of individual livelihood security and social livelihood security to be realized." Therefore, when summarizing the role of social legislation in various countries, the International Labour Organization believes that through a series of measures to prevent economic and social risks, livelihood security protection can be provided for members of society; without social stability, there is no social development, and without livelihood security, there is no social stability. From the interpretation of the concept of social legislation in various countries, ensuring individual livelihood security and social security is their common value connotation.

社会安全是社会法追求的第二个重要价值取向，它通过对没有生活来源者、贫困者、遭遇不幸者和失去劳动能力或机会者提供帮助，消除社会成员的不安全感，起到社会安全网和减震器的作用。一方面，社会法保障了全体社会成员的生活安全，使人们在生病、受伤、失业、年老等情况下，不致沦为“社会的弃儿”；另一方面，它保障了社会安全，能够有效维护社会稳定。这是因为，影响个人生活安全的最主要的因素是失业、年老、疾病、伤残、生育等，社会法较全面地消除了影响个人和社会生活的不安全因素，“使个人生活安全和社会生活安全的目标得以实现”。因此，国际劳工组织在总结各国社会立法的作用时认为，通过一系列预防经济和社会风险的措施，可以为社会成员提供生活安全保护；没有社会的安定，就没有社会的发展，没有生活安全保障，就没有社会安定。从各国对社会立法概念的解释来看，保障个人生活安全与社会安全是其共有的价值内涵。

Social equity is the third important value orientation pursued by social law. Through income redistribution and transfer payments, it enables all members of society to share the fruits of development, promoting the realization of social justice and fairness. Some scholars have proposed that both fairness and efficiency are goals pursued by social security, "but the value of fairness is the soul of the establishment of the social security system, the guiding ideology and fundamental principle for constructing the social security system, and occupies a commanding position in the value system of the social security system." Other scholars have suggested that at the inception of social law, "efficiency issues were not taken into consideration," and only values such as equality of rights and social fairness were regarded as relatively independent value orientations, consistently adhered to in practice, thereby truly enabling social security to perform its regulatory, balancing, and stabilizing functions. In short, the value of social equity is of great significance in social law. As Peter Blau stated, "If the demands of a ruling group that monopolizes extremely important resources far exceed the standards defined by social norms as fair and just, subordinates will feel exploited and will try by all means to escape the power of the ruling group or resist it," because "their situation is essentially no different from that of a group yielding to coercive force."

社会公平是社会法追求的第三个重要价值取向，它通过收入再分配和转移支付使全体社会成员共享发展成果，促进社会正义和公平的实现。有学者提出，公平和效率都是社会保障追求的目标，“但公平价值是社会保障制度得以建立的灵魂，是构建社会保障制度的指导思想和根本原则，在社会保障制度的价值体系中处于统帅地位”。也有学者提出，在社会法产生之初，“并没有将效率问题纳入考虑的范围”，仅将权利平等和社会公平等作为相对独立的价值取向，并在实践中始终如一地坚持，使其真正发挥社会保障的调节、平衡和稳定功能。总之，社会公平价值在社会法中具有十分重要的意义。正如彼得·布劳（Peter Blau）所说，“如果对于极其重要的资源进行某种垄断的统治群体的要求远远超过了被社会规范定义为公平和正义的标准，下级将感到受剥削并千方百计地想逃脱统治群体的权力或反抗它”，因为“他们的境遇基本上与屈服于强迫力量的群体没有任何区别”。

03

03

The Legal Objectives of Social Law

社会法的法律目标

The legal objectives of social law have undergone a process of development and change in practice. In the early period of social law, the poor laws had the purpose of punishing the poor, but for a considerable period thereafter, their main objective was to guarantee the basic livelihood of the socially vulnerable and to promote and maintain social harmony. When discussing the intent behind the implementation of Germany's 1883 Social Insurance Law, Bismarck stated, "A person who expects to receive a pension is the most law-abiding and also the easiest to tame," therefore, "disability and old-age insurance is an investment in weakening revolution." It was precisely because bourgeois governments continuously guaranteed the basic livelihood security of workers through social legislation that the once vigorous proletarian movement in Europe repeatedly encountered setbacks. August Bebel, assessing the role of these social legislative measures, said: "In Germany, the state system of workers' insurance broke the branches of trade union action and in fact severed the vital nerve center of the trade unions," and "labor legislation also usurped many activities that should have belonged to the trade unions."

社会法的法律目标在实践中有一个发展变化的过程。在社会法产生早期，济贫法带有惩戒穷人的目的，但在此后相当长时期内，其主要目标是保障社会弱者的基本生活，促进和维护社会和谐。俾斯麦在谈到1883年德国《社会保险法》实施的意图时指出，“一个期待领取养老金的人，是最守本分的，也是容易驯服的”，因此，“伤残和养老保险是削弱革命的投资”。正是由于资产阶级政府不断通过社会立法保障工人的基本生活安全，致使欧洲一度轰轰烈烈的无产阶级运动不断遭遇挫折。倍倍尔（August Bebel）在评估这些社会立法措施的作用时说：“在德国，工人保险的国家制度折断了工会采取行动的枝干，实际上也割断了工会的致命的中枢神经”，“劳工立法同样也对许多本应属于工会的活动越俎代庖”。

Entering modern society, the ideological color of social law has somewhat faded, and its objectives have gradually converged and become increasingly clear: to provide basic livelihood security for the socially vulnerable and to provide a final line of defense for all citizens. In fact, sharing the fruits of social development among all citizens is a hallmark of modern civilization and an objective need for building a harmonious society. From a legal theory perspective, "to use legislative means to 'equally grant every member of society the right to social security, freeing them from material deprivation and fear, is precisely the fundamental purpose of the existence of the social security system.'" Yang Yahua, *The Humanistic Basis of the Social Security Legal System*, 2003. That is to say, by adjusting and regulating various social relations, making them conform to both the public interest and the interests of each individual citizen, the goals pursued by social law can be realized. Marx opposed the capitalist poor laws and social security systems, envisioning a future society as "a social form based on the comprehensive and free development of each individual," and regarded economic development as the foundation for realizing the comprehensive development of human beings. Modern social law is precisely a combination of particularity and universality. It not only concerns the interests of specific socially vulnerable groups but also endows every individual with equal basic rights, thus possessing universal value significance and being an important symbol of a modern state's progress towards civilization and maturity.

进入现代社会以后，社会法的意识形态色彩有所淡化，其目标逐渐趋同并日益明晰，即为社会弱者提供基本生活保障，为全体国民提供最后一道安全防线。事实上，由全体国民共享社会发展成果，是现代文明的标志，也是构建和谐社会的客观需要。从法理上说，以立法手段“平等地让每一个社会成员都享有社会保障的权利，使其免受物资匮乏和恐惧，正是社会保障制度存在的根本目的”。杨雅华：《社会保障法律制度的人性基础》，2003年。也就是说，通过对各种社会关系进行调整和规范，使其既符合大众利益，又符合每个公民的利益，以实现社会法所追求的目标。马克思反对资本主义的济贫法和社会保障制度，设想未来的社会是“以每个人的全面而自由的发展为基本原则的社会形式”，并将经济发展看成实现人的全面发展的基础。现代社会法正是特殊性和普遍性的结合，它不仅关注特殊社会弱者的利益，而且赋予每个人平等的基本权利，因此具有普遍的价值意义，是现代国家走向文明和成熟重要标志。

04

04

The Legal Functions of Social Law

社会法的法律功能

According to Abraham Maslow's hierarchy of needs theory, human needs are arranged from low to high, from basic to complex: the first level is physiological needs, which, if unmet, make human survival difficult; the second level is safety needs, i.e., protecting oneself from harm, such as risks of disease, unemployment, disability, disaster, and old age. Social law is precisely formed in response to the different levels of human needs. Moreover, it transcends the scope of individual survival, becoming a necessary condition for realizing the comprehensive liberation and full development of human beings. It enables members of society to participate in social competition under the premise of guaranteed basic livelihood, narrowing the gap between rich and poor, and thus plays an increasingly important role in maintaining social stability and improving social welfare. Rudolf von Jhering studied jurisprudence using sociological perspectives and methods, emphasizing that law should be combined with social interests. He said that law is largely formulated by the state to achieve certain purposes, and its purpose is social interest. It should be said that social law protects not only the interests of the socially vulnerable; through systems such as social insurance and social welfare, it protects social interests primarily composed of public interests, effectively maintaining social stability.

根据马斯洛（Abraham Maslow）的需要层次理论，人生的需要是由低级到高级、由基本到复杂排列的：第一层次是生理的需要，如果得不到满足，人类就难以生存下去；第二层次是安全的需要，也就是保护自身免受危害，如免于疾病、失业、伤残、灾害和养老的风险等。社会法正是因适应人类生活不同层次的需要形成的。不仅如此，它还超越个人生存的范围，成为实现人的全面解放和充分发展的一项必要条件，使社会成员在基本生活得到保障的前提下参与社会竞争，缩小了贫富差距，因此在维护社会稳定、提高社会福利方面发挥了越来越重要的作用。耶林（Rudolf von Jhering）用社会学的观点和方法来研究法学，强调法律要同社会利益相结合。他说，法律在很大程度上是国家为了实现一定目的而制定的，其目的就是社会利益。应该说，社会法保护的不仅仅是社会弱者的利益，它通过社会保险和社会福利等制度，保护了以公共利益为主体的社会利益，有效地维护了社会稳定。

Furthermore, social law is also an important condition for the establishment and development of a market economy. On the one hand, it overcomes the uneven distribution caused by market competition through progressive provision of subsidies and multi-faceted guarantees; on the other hand, it regulates the distribution relationships between different classes, between the state and collectives and individuals, and between generations, stimulating consumer demand to a certain extent. In 1934, American physician Francis Townsend proposed that retired employees over the age of 60 should receive a monthly pension of $200, on the condition that they spend this portion of the pension within 30 days. The massive "Townsend Movement" that formed around this plan greatly promoted the birth of the Social Security Act. Therefore, President Roosevelt, in evaluating the 1935 Social Security Act, said: "This law takes care of human needs and at the same time provides the United States with an extremely sound economic structure." American scholar Michael Sherraden proposed in the 1990s a social welfare theory based on asset building, advocating helping the poor accumulate and invest in assets, rather than simply increasing their income and consumption. Because this theory has good economic functions, it has been practiced in the United States, Canada, and some European countries, and has sparked heated discussions on the reform of social law.

不仅如此，社会法也是市场经济建立和发展的重要条件。一方面，它通过累进方式提供资助和多方面保障，克服市场竞争造成的分配不均；另一方面，它调节不同阶层之间、国家与集体和个人之间以及代际分配关系，在一定程度上刺激了消费需求。1934年，美国医生弗朗西斯·汤森德（Frances Townsend）提出，凡年过60岁的退休雇员每月应领取200美元退休金，前提是他们要在30日内消费这部分养老金。围绕这一计划形成的声势浩大的“汤森德运动”，极大地推动了《社会保障法》的诞生。因此，罗斯福总统在评价1935年《社会保障法》时说：“这项法律照顾了人的需要，同时又向合众国提供了极其健全的经济结构。”美国学者迈克尔·谢若登（Michael Sherraden）在20世纪90年代提出了一种以资产建设为基础的社会福利理论，主张帮助穷人进行资产积累与投资，而非简单地增加其收入与消费。这一理论由于具有很好的经济功能，已为美国、加拿大和一些欧洲国家所实践，并引发社会法变革的热烈讨论。

In sum, social law emerged in response to the objective needs of economic and social development; it is the expression of the interests and needs that are common to society and determined by a given mode of material production. In revealing the origin of law, Marx clearly pointed out that “legal relations, just like forms of state, are to be understood neither from themselves nor from the so-called general development of the human mind, but rather have their roots in the material conditions of life,” and therefore “in a given state with codified law, law is formally enacted but actually generated.” [7]7 This is a paraphrase of Marx’s preface to *A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy* (1859), where he states that legal relations and forms of state are rooted in the material conditions of life. That is to say, law is determined by a given economic base and its nature; making law must respect and reflect the objective laws of economic and social development. The emergence of social law was mainly to ease class contradictions and resolve various complex social problems, which precisely confirms Marx’s viewpoint.

总之，社会法是适应经济和社会发展的客观需要而产生的，它是社会共同的、由一定的物质生产方式所决定的利益和需要的表现。马克思在揭示法的起源时明确指出，“法的关系正像国家的形式一样，既不能从它的本身来理解，也不能从所谓人类精神的一般发展来理解，相反，它们根源于物质的生活关系”，因此在“一定的成文法国家中，法律形式上是创制的，实际却是生成的”。也就是说，法律是由一定的经济基础及其性质决定的，制定法律必须尊重和反映经济社会发展的客观规律。社会法的产生主要是为了缓和阶级矛盾，解决各类错综复杂的社会问题，这正好印证了马克思的观点。

(About the author: Yu Shaoxiang, professor at the School of Government, University of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, and chief researcher of the “Innovation Project” at the Institute of Social Development Strategy, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, doctoral supervisor.)

（作者简介：余少祥，中国社会科学院大学政府管理学院教授，中国社会科学院社会发展战略研究院“创新工程”首席研究员，博士生导师）

Online editor: Tongxin

网络编辑：同心