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为什么说今年对西方是个好年头?
送交者: icemessenger[♂☆★★★SuperMod★★★☆♂] 于 2022-11-20 6:02 已读 1128 次 1 赞  

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This was the year liberal democracy fought back



Populists have lost elections and autocrats have lost the aura of competence. 6park.com

专制者善于将美国及其盟友的个别挫折总结为不可阻挡的衰落。当事情向相反方向发展时,自由派人士应该敲响自己的鼓声。




Just don’t call it an annus mirabilis. There has been too much suffering in Ukraine for that. 6park.com

可别把今年称为“奇迹年”(annus mirabilis)。乌克兰遭受了太多苦难,这个称号不合适。 6park.com


What is in good taste — and crucial to do — is to name the many ways in which the west has rallied this year. Autocrats are good at fitting individual setbacks for the US and its friends, such as the withdrawal from Afghanistan, into a story of inexorable decline. So when events go the other way, liberals should bang their own drum. The year has spoilt them for examples. 6park.com

品位较高——同时至关重要——的做法是列举西方在今年扬眉吐气的许多方面。专制者善于将美国及其盟友的个别挫折(例如从阿富汗撤军)编成一个衰落不可阻挡的故事。因此,当事情向相反方向发展时,自由派人士应该敲响自己的鼓声。他们可以从今年援引的事例太多了。 6park.com


Emmanuel Macron became the first president of France to win re-election since 2002. He retired Marine Le Pen in the process. The most successful electoral politician in the west is a Molière-quoting centrist and former banker. Imagine being told that amid the populist pomp of 2016. 6park.com

埃马纽埃尔•马克龙(Emmanuel Macron)成为自2002年以来第一位赢得连任的法国总统,迫使极右翼对手玛丽娜•勒庞(Marine Le Pen)出局。当今西方最善于赢得选举的政治人物竟然是一位中间派和前银行家,爱引用莫里哀(Molière)的话。想象一下在2016年民粹主义甚嚣尘上的氛围中被告知这一幕。 6park.com


The UK began the year with Boris Johnson as prime minister and ends it with Rishi Sunak, which is a moral upgrade if nothing else. Even Liz Truss, in a short stint that was still too long, did some perverse good for the nation’s governing institutions. The Treasury, the central bank, the fiscal watchdog: each was undermined, each was vindicated, each now stands enhanced. No politician will challenge them for a while, which is a problem of its own. This was also the year that Brexit died, if not as a fact of life then as a project that inspires. Former enthusiasts disown it or blame its meagre returns on poor implementation. 6park.com

今年开始时,英国首相是鲍里斯•约翰逊(Boris Johnson),而在今年走向尾声之际,英国首相换成了里希•苏纳克(Rishi Sunak),即使没什么别的不同,这至少代表着道德上的“升级”。就连首相任期短暂——却仍被嫌太长——的利兹•特拉斯(Liz Truss),也从反面为国家的管理机构做了一些好事。英国财政部、央行、财政监督机构:这些机构都曾被她削弱,最终却都被证明正确,其地位因而得到增强。短期内没有一个政客敢于挑战这些机构(这本身也是一个问题)。今年也是“英国退欧”死亡的一年——即使不是作为一个真实的存在,至少作为一项鼓舞人心的事业是消亡了。以前的狂热支持者要么与退欧撇清关系,要么将其成效不佳归咎于实施无方。 6park.com


Elsewhere in the world? Jair Bolsonaro washed out after one term as president of Brazil. Nato is getting wider, as Sweden and Finland attempt to join, and deeper, as the German defence budget goes up. As for the mightiest of all democracies, dare to hope. Congressional Republicans did not take the Kremlin line, or anything like it, on Ukraine. Midterm voters punished candidates who bore the stamp of Donald Trump. A second political life for the man himself is less probable now, if still plausible. 6park.com

世界其他地方发生了什么呢?雅伊尔•博索纳罗(Jair Bolsonaro)在担任巴西总统一届后就出局了。随着瑞典和芬兰申请加入,北约(NATO)的地盘有望扩大。随着德国大幅增加国防预算,北约的底气也更加深厚。至于世界上最强大的民主国家,世人要敢于抱有希望。国会共和党人并没有在乌克兰问题上接受克里姆林宫的立场或类似立场。中期选举的结果表明,美国选民想要惩罚与唐纳德•特朗普(Donald Trump)一鼻孔出气的候选人。此人本人迎来第二次政治生命的几率现在降低了——即便仍有可能。 6park.com


True, there were populist breakthroughs in Italy and Israel. Much of the rich world is souring on free trade, a sop to nativism that will go as well as it usually does. But an overall account of the year would show the autocrats and their friends to be in arrears: reputationally, not just electorally. 6park.com

没错,民粹主义在意大利和以色列取得了突破。许多发达国家对自由贸易开始感到厌恶,这是对本土主义的一种安慰,它会像往常一样奏效。但如果算一下总账,专制者及其盟友今年是亏空的:在声誉上,而不仅是在选举上。 6park.com


What the enemies of liberalism have lost in 2022 is more precious than a series of votes. It is the aura of competence. This time last year, Vladimir Putin was still grudgingly credited in parts of the west with a sort of primal cunning. Even the most contrarian finance bro hesitates to do that now. It was also common to hail the executive grip of the Chinese state as the US shambled its way to 1mn Covid-19 deaths. Or to gawp at its economic feats. On both scores, China watchers have grown less impressed. 6park.com

自由主义的敌人在2022年失去的东西比一系列选举结果更加宝贵。他们失去了精明强干的光环。去年此时,西方一部分人仍然不情愿地承认弗拉基米尔•普京(Vladimir Putin)具有某种原始的狡猾。如今即使是最具逆势操作意识的金融人士也不愿这么做。当初美国跌跌撞撞地逼近100万新冠死亡人数时,曾有很多人为中国政府的执行力和控制力喝彩,或者赞叹中国的经济成就。在这两个方面,中国观察家的好评现在都变少了。 6park.com


More than the gas reserves, more than the “carrier-killer” missiles, what the authoritarian world believes it has over the west is effectiveness. The idea that autocracy works, that answering material human needs is more truly democratic than holding elections, is serious enough to deserve a counter. It has purchase in the “global south”, wherever that is, and in the west itself, where the firm smack of government polls alarmingly well. But it is a hostage to fortune. It can’t easily survive a botched conscript war or lockdown-induced economic malaise. Dictators can just about afford to look callous. They can’t afford to look inept. 6park.com

比天然气储量和“航母杀手”导弹更重要的是,专制世界认为自己相对于西方的优势在于有效性。有关专制制度行之有效、而满足人类物质需求其实比举行选举更为民主的观念足够严重,以至于应该做出反驳。这种观念在“全球南方”(无论它指的是哪里)乃至西方本身(在西方,抨击政府的拉票效果好得令人震惊)都有市场。但它是命运的人质。它无法轻易挺过一场让应征入伍者上战场的拙劣战争或封锁引发的经济低迷。专制者可以表现出冷血无情,但他们不能表现出无能。 6park.com


If the attack on Ukraine was shocking, the way it went wrong was familiar to the point of banality. There was the absence of feedback and self-correction within the system (Truss, as damning as her rise was of British public life, was gone in 44 days). There was the refusal to credit that other nations are capable of nationalism. There was the Marxian belief that history has a set course in which liberalism is weeded out like a faulty gene. This is how strongmen have over-reached since at least the first half of the 20th century. Their real competence is hanging on to that spurious reputation for competence. Western credulity helps. 6park.com

如果说入侵乌克兰令人震惊,那么世人对这场战争出问题的方式如此眼熟,以至于他们会觉得不出问题才怪。体制内部缺乏反馈和自我纠正(特拉斯成为首相固然让英国公共生活蒙羞,但她毕竟在44天后就被迫辞职)。另一个问题是拒绝相信其他国家也可能出现民族主义异军突起的局面。马克思主义相信历史进程有一个预设的航向,而在这个进程中,自由主义会像有缺陷的基因那样被淘汰。至少从20世纪上半叶开始,强人就是这样不自量力的。他们真正的胜任能力在于紧紧抓住那种虚假的胜任能力名声。在这方面,西方的轻信起到了帮助作用。 6park.com


This column has dealt in the absolutes of “liberalism” and “autocracy”. But much of the world lies between the two models. Victory, if we can speak of such a thing, consists in luring these waverers. Some of this is about invoking “values”. Most of it is about being, or seeming, the strong horse. There was a time, before and during the pandemic, when that was the autocrats’ club. How sure it was of being the way of the future. Then came the most fortifying year for the west in a long time. There is little reason to be complacent, and even less to be magnanimous. 6park.com

本专栏探讨了绝对含义上的“自由主义”与“专制”。但世界上很多人的信念介于这两种模式之间。胜利(如果我们可以谈论胜利的话)在于吸引这些犹豫不决的人。这方面的一部分努力关乎召唤“价值观”,而大部分努力关乎成为——或者看起来像是——那匹强壮的马。在疫情期间和疫情爆发之前曾经有那么一段时间,专制者俱乐部是那匹强壮的马。那时,那个俱乐部多么确信自己代表着未来发展方向。然后就迎来了很久以来对西方最有利的一年。没什么理由自满,更没有理由大度。 6park.com


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