当美国对全球化说不 - 双语阅读 - FT中文网

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当美国对全球化说不 Angry America raises the barricades作者:英国《金融时报》专栏作家 菲利普•斯蒂芬斯 字号最大 较大 默认 较小 最小 背景                    收藏 电邮 打印 评论 中文  

 

Angry at Barack Obama, angry at the world, America has turned its back on the president who promised to change everything. Now it may turn its back on globalisation.

对巴拉克•奥巴马(Barack Obama)、对整个世界都怨气冲冲的美国,抛弃了曾经承诺要改变一切的奥巴马。现在,美国还有可能抛弃全球化。

Amid the cacophony of explanations for Mr Obama’s fall from grace, the most obvious was the most persuasive. The midterms were a referendum on an administration presiding over anaemic economic recovery and stubbornly high unemployment. The Republicans claimed a famous victory, but the country really wanted to punish the Democrats.

对奥巴马失去支持的纷纭解释中,最明显的解释也是最具说服力的。中期选举是对经济复苏乏力和失业率高企时期的奥巴马政府的全民公投。共和党人声称自己大获全胜,但美国民众实际上是想惩罚一下民主党人。

Mr Obama argued plaintively that he had nursed the economy through the crisis inherited from his predecessor. If he had not acted decisively to shore up the financial system and stimulate the economy, things would have been a great deal worse. Rescuing Wall Street was about saving Main Street.

奥巴马哀怨地辩称,他带领美国经济度过了前任留给他的危机。若不是他果断出手支撑金融体系,并刺激经济,情况会糟糕得多。拯救华尔街是为了拯救千千万万普通家庭。

Such protestations were lost to the sourness of the national mood. Nearly nine out of 10 voters told the pollsters they were worried about the economy; two-fifths said their own living standards had fallen. Someone had to take the blame.

这种辩解在国民的不满情绪面前全然无用。近九成的选民向民意调查者表示,自己对经济十分担心;五分之二的人表示,自己的生活水准有所下降。总要有人为此承担责任。

Doubtless other things counted against Mr Obama. The great communicator of 2008 has seemed inexplicably wooden in the White House. His indisputable intelligence is not of the emotional variety. For some Mr Obama was too liberal; for others he lacked the courage of his convictions. His handling of healthcare reform was scarcely adroit.

无疑还有其它不利于奥巴马之处。令人不解的是,在2008年曾被誉为“伟大沟通者”的他,在白宫显得有些呆头呆脑。他具有不容置疑的才智,但在情感层面做不到与众人打成一片。对于一些人而言,奥巴马太倾向自由主义了;在另一些人看来,他不具备坚持自己的信念所需的勇气。他对医改的处理真是笨拙得可以。

Such flaws, real and imagined, were also-rans against the anxiety and anger stirred by high unemployment, squeezed living standards and record mortgage foreclosures. This discontent has deep underpinnings. Times have been hard for a lot longer than the past couple of years.

在失业率高企、生活水准下降及房屋被收回创历史新高所引起的焦虑和愤怒面前,奥巴马的上述缺陷(无论是真实的还是臆想出来的)成了失败因素。美国人的不满有着深远的渊源。他们的艰难日子由来已久,远远不止过去两年。

For some time, one of the most interesting numbers in US politics has been one not found in the opinion polls’ exit survey. It is published every month by the Federal Bureau of Labor statistics. It tracks changes in the real earnings – and thus the living standards – of middle America.

一段时间以来,美国政治活动中最有意思的数字之一,在任何民意出口调查中都找不到。该数据每月由美国劳工统计局(Bureau of Labor Statistics)公布,追踪美国中产阶级实际收入——由此可判断其生活水准——的变化。

During the past 20 years the median earnings of these workers have risen in total by less than 10 per cent after adjustment for inflation. During the past decade they have stagnated. Someone has thrown a wrench into the escalator.

过去20年,这部分人群经通胀调整后的收入中值,总共上升了不到10%;过去10年则陷于停滞。谁在阻碍工资涨势?

To put these figures into perspective, the economy grew by 60 per cent – six times as fast as median earnings – during the 20 years from 1990. Even during the past decade, which included the deepest recession since the 1930s, output expanded by 15 per cent.

让我们客观地看待这些数字,自1990年以来的20年间,美国经济增长了60%——相当于中值收入增幅的6倍。即使过去10年经历了自上世纪30年代以来最严重的衰退,产出仍增长了15%。

For a time the effect on living standards was masked by the explosion of cheap imports and cheap credit. Americans could live their dream by borrowing from the banks and buying cheaply from China. The party came to an end with the global financial crash.

廉价进口商品和廉价信贷的剧增,一度掩盖了生活水准受到的影响。美国人靠从银行借债和购买廉价中国商品,可以过上与梦想相符的生活。全球金融危机的爆发,让这场狂欢曲终人散。

If Middle America has not shared in rising prosperity, the same cannot be said of the most affluent. The proceeds of growth have gone largely into corporate profits and into huge increases in boardroom pay. The richest have had a ball.

虽然美国中产阶级未能分享到日益繁荣的果实,但最富裕的那部分人并非如此。增长收益大部分都化成了企业利润,以及企业高层收入的大幅增加。最富有的人群一直过得很滋润。

Figures from the Congressional Budget Office show that the share of overall incomes of the wealthiest 1 per cent of households stood at about 12 per cent in 1990. By 2007 that had jumped to more than 19 per cent. Measured in 2007 dollars, the incomes of this group more than doubled from a little more than $800,000 a year to $1.8m.

国会预算办公室(Congressional Budget Office)的数据显示,1990年,美国最富裕的1%家庭的总收入占国民总收入大约12%。到2007年,这一比例已升至19%以上。以2007年的美元汇率计算,这部分家庭的收入翻了一番以上,从每年略高于80万美元升至180万美元。

Globalisation, from this vantage point, has been good only for the few. It has enriched bankers and chief executives, but left the middle classes at once no better off today and more insecure about tomorrow.

从这一点看,全球化只对少数人有利。它让银行家和企业高管们腰包更鼓,但让中产阶级的日子不再有起色,同时对未来也更加没有把握。

Of course, it is a bit more complicated than this. My economist friends tell me that all sorts of other factors have been at work. Technology has changed the distribution of rewards from employment. Shifting comparative advantage was around long before the rise of China and India. For all that, it is not unreasonable for US voters to draw the conclusion that the world as well as Washington has been conspiring against them.

当然,实际情况比这要复杂一些。我的经济学家朋友告诉我,还有其它各种各样的因素在起作用。技术已改变了薪酬分配。比较优势的转移在中印崛起之前很久就出现了。尽管如此,美国选民得出结论认为整个世界(还有华盛顿)都和他们对立,也不无道理。

The Republicans, and particularly the Tea Party movement, tapped into this mood. The populist promise to reclaim the old America reaches beyond rage at the perceived evils of big government. There are other enemies within and without.

共和党人,尤其是茶叶党(Tea Party)运动,利用了这一情绪。承诺重现旧日美国辉煌的民粹主义者的矛头,并不局限于他们眼里的“大政府”的弊端。国内外还有其它敌人。

This pantheon of the wicked includes bankers who sold out to globalisation, the immigrants who took US jobs, the corporate chiefs exporting jobs overseas, and the Chinese factories flooding the US with cheap goods. America has been lost to the un-American values of cosmopolitan elites.

这些敌人包括向全球化低头的银行家、抢美国人工作的移民、向海外输出就业的企业高管,以及用廉价商品占领美国的中国企业。美国已屈服于国际化精英的非美国价值观。

Efforts to forestall climate change are slotted into the meandering narrative of a conspiracy against the American way of life. The plan is to hand power to a world government run by the United Nations.

阻止气候变化的努力,被套上了“颠覆美国生活方式的阴谋”这个帽子。而这个阴谋就是将权力交给由一个联合国(UN)领导的世界政府。

The Tea Party manifesto is shot through with contradictions and worse. Many of the movement’s supporters want at once smaller government and the government to do more to support them. Nativism plays to paranoia. In its nastier manifestations, it targets Mr Obama’s background and race as a personification of the threat. Some 30 per cent of Americans believe the president to be a Muslim.

茶叶党宣言充满了自相矛盾(以及更糟)的说法。许多茶叶党运动的支持者一方面希望缩减政府职能,另一方面希望政府采取更多行动支持他们。排外主义利用人们的多疑。他们那些比较卑劣的言论矛头指向奥巴马的背景和种族,把奥巴马说成是美国面临的威胁的化身。约三成的美国人认为,他们的总统是一名穆斯林。

The anger, though, is not confined to the insurgents of the right. Democratic as much as Republican candidates cast China as a threat in their campaign advertisements. Mr Obama’s party may well now tilt further towards protectionism in an effort to win back voters lost to populism.

然而,这种怒火并不局限在右翼反叛者。民主党和共和党候选人都在竞选广告中将中国描绘成一个威胁。奥巴马所在的民主党现在很可能会进一步朝保护主义倾斜,以努力赢回转向民粹主义的选民。

And before Europeans scoff at what many of them see as the primitivism of America’s political discourse, they should take a look at what has been happening closer to home. Eminent Germans now write books insinuating that Turkish immigrants are inherently less intelligent; a French president expels Roma communities; Britain closes the door on foreigners.

而欧洲人在嘲笑他们许多人眼中原始的美国式政治说教之前,应看一看自己本土正在发生的事情。德国名流如今著书暗示,土耳其移民的智商天生低一些;法国总统在驱逐罗姆人;英国则对外国人关上了大门。

It is the direction that America takes that matters, though. The US was the architect of globalisation. Paradoxically, its geography, natural resources and technological edge leave it better placed than most to retreat behind the barricades. We would all be the losers.

但最重要的是美国选择的方向。美国是全球化的设计者。可看似矛盾的是,它的地理、自然资源和技术优势,意味着它比大多数国家都更能以邻为壑。那时,我们所有人都会是输家。

It is fashionable to talk about America’s shrinking role in the world. Even its friends sometimes seem to take satisfaction from its diminished power. They should be careful what they wish for.

谈论美国在世界上的作用不断下滑俨然已成为一种时髦。即使是盟友有时也似乎对美国实力的下滑感到安慰。但它们应当对自己的愿望更慎重一些。

 

译者/陈云飞