Local courts, whose judges are appointed and paid by the local government, often simply refuse to file cases that challenge official decisions.	地方法院的法官就是被地方政府任命和支付工资的，他们常常直接就拒绝接受那些对官员的决定表示异议的案件。


In the few cases where a court rules in favor of the plaintiffs, the judgments often remain un-enforced.	在少数一些法庭的判决对起诉人有利的案件中，判决常常得不到执行。


When lawyers and legal activists try to help villagers or evicted residents to fight through the legal system, they often become victims of retaliation.	当律师和积极诉诸法律的人试图帮助村民或被强制拆迁的居民通过法律体系进行抗争时，他们常常成为报复的牺牲品。


Because people cannot get justice through the courts, unrest has skyrocketed nationwide in recent years: official statistics record more than 200 protests a day, four times the number a decade ago.	因为人民无法通过法院获得公正，最近几年全国的骚乱呈直线上升的态势：官方的统计显示每天有超过200起的抗议事件，这是十年前的四倍。


The central authorities have recognized the link between abuses, unrest, and the need to develop legal services for preventing the escalation of disputes.	中央当局已经认识到了滥用权力、骚乱和发展法律服务以制止抗议上升的态势的需要之间的联系。


Wen Jiabao, China’s Premier, acknowledged last year that protests in the countryside were caused by “some localities [that] are unlawfully occupying farmers’ land” and promised “effective legal services and legal aid so as to provide effective help to people who have difficulty filing lawsuits.”	中国总理温家宝去年承认农村的抗议声是因为“有些地方政府非法占用农民的土地”，并且承诺“提供有效的法律服务和法律援助以便给那些提起诉讼有困难的人提供有效的帮助”。


But reality doesn’t match official rhetoric.	但是现实并不是官员的花言巧语所描述的那样。


In the past year, three prominent lawyers and rights activists were arrested.	在去年，有三位著名的律师和维权激进分子被逮捕了。


Administrative restrictions on lawyers were tightened to discourage class action or multiple plaintiff suits – typically cases against arbitrary or corrupt government actions – and to facilitate local authorities’ intervention and control over cases.	管理部门加紧了对于律师的限制以阻止共同起诉和有多个起诉人的诉讼，主要是对政府部门的专制行为和腐败行为的诉讼，并且对地方当局可以干涉和控制这些案件。


And the media were prohibited from reporting cases involving land disputes and forced evictions.	而媒体被禁止报道有关土地争议和强制拆迁的案件。


The new property law won’t be the breakthrough for rights protection that the government claims it is until it is matched by increased access to justice for ordinary citizens.	新的物权法如果不能配以普通公民有更多诉求公正的途径，那么它就不会成为政府所标榜的维护权利的一个突破。


The government is fortunate to have my lawyer friend’s faith in the legal system, but now it must earn ordinary citizens’ trust by enacting reforms.	政府很有幸能拥有我的律师朋友对于法律体系的信心，但是它现在必须通过强化改革来博取普通公民的信任。


Removing constraints on lawyers and ensuring that they are not attacked with impunity would be a good place to start.	取消对于律师的限制，确保他们不被无端攻击将是一个很好的起步点。


Mao’s China at 60	花甲之年的毛泽东中国


LONDON – Every country is shaped by its history, but countries fabricate and rewrite their histories, too.	发自伦敦——每个国家都由其历史塑造而成，然而与此同时，国家也虚构和重写他们的历史。


The story of how we became who we are needs to accommodate our sense of tribal solidarity and accomplishment.	我们如何走到今天的故事内容必须要考虑到我们的民族团结感和成就感。


Our triumphs and virtues are exaggerated; our villains externalized; our failings covered up.	我们的成功和美德被过分夸大； 我们中的坏人都被归为异类；


All this makes the study of history potentially insurrectionary, but hugely valuable.	而失败则被掩盖了。 因为以上这些，对历史的研究都像是潜在的反动行为，但这也是十分值得的。


Good historians encourage us to be honest about ourselves. They destroy our self-delusions.	好的历史学家鼓励我们诚实地面对我们自己，他们能够令我们停止自欺欺人。


This is especially true of our flawed heroes, as we see today with the Chinese Communist Party’s treatment of Mao Zedong.	这条道理对于我们的那些有缺陷的英雄来说尤其正确，就像如今我们所看到的中国共产党对于毛泽东的评价一样。


Sixty years ago this October, Mao stood on the rostrum of Tiananmen, the Gate of Heavenly Peace in Beijing, and declared the founding of the People’s Republic.	60年前的这个十月，毛泽东站在北京天安门城楼的主席台上，宣布中华人民共和国的成立。


That moment marked the end of years of war and terrible hardship; the revolution had been won through blood, sacrifice, heroism, the mistakes of enemies, and the manipulative assistance of Stalin, who purported to be a friend.	那一刻标志着多年来的战争以及难以言说的苦难终于终结，而革命在经历了流血与牺牲，英雄主义与敌人的错误以及斯大林这个所谓朋友的操纵与干预之后，终于获得了胜利。


The decades of rapacious war lords, greedy imperialists, and Japanese invaders were over; China could stand up – though much misery still lay ahead as Mao’s tyranny put down its roots.	充斥着军阀混战掠夺、帝国主义者的贪婪分割，以及日本侵略的几十年终告结束； 而中国有了崛起的可能——即使从这一刻起，是毛泽东的专制统治落地生根，还有诸多的悲剧在等待着中国。


Verdicts on Mao differ wildly.	对毛泽东的评价差别极大。


For hard-line Communists, he was a hero three times over – historical, patriotic, and world-class.	对于共产主义的强硬派来说，他是三重英雄——无论从历史学角度上，从爱国主义角度，还是从全世界的角度来说。


For the brave and charismatic dissident Wei Jingsheng, Mao “cast virtually the whole of China into a state of violence, duplicity, and poverty.”	而对于勇敢而富有感召力的不同政见者，魏京生来说，毛泽东“实际上把整个中国变为了一个充满暴力、欺骗和极度贫穷的国度”。


The Communist Party’s official verdict, undoubtedly the product of fierce ideological disputes, is that he was a great Marxist and revolutionary, whose “gross mistakes” during the Cultural Revolution were outweighed by his contribution to China.	而中国共产党的官方定论，则无可争议的是激烈的思想政治斗争的产物，即：毛泽东是一位伟大的马克思主义者和革命家，而他在文化大革命期间犯下的“重大错误”则不及他对中国所作出的贡献。


“His merits,” it argues, “are primary and his errors secondary.”	定论坚持主张，“他的功绩是第一位的，错误是第二位的。 ”


China’s Communist Party will not tolerate any questioning of this assessment.	对于这样的评价，中国共产党不能容忍任何的质疑。


Mao’s establishment of authority over China, his injection of patriotic pride into a land that had been appallingly sundered and humiliated by external and internal forces for a century and a half, and his romantic legend as a global revolutionary leader – all contribute to the moral and political legitimacy for which China’s leaders search.	毛泽东在整个中国建立起了威信，他把爱国主义和民族自豪感注入了中国大地，这是一片被国内国外势力以非人道的方式分裂和蹂躏长达一个半世纪的土地。 毛泽东本人作为一名世界革命领导人还是一个浪漫主义的传奇——这些都符合中国领导人所需要的那种道义和政治上的合法性。


What they cannot gain through democratic elections they acquire through the history of the revolution and today’s economic triumphs.	他们无法通过民主选举所获得的政治合法性则可以从革命历史以及如今的经济发展的成功中所取得。


But the dark side of Mao cannot be totally expunged.	然而毛泽东统治中的阴暗面无法被一笔勾销。


Too many people remember what happened.	太多人记得曾经发生的事情。


It is an intimate part of their family stories.	这一部分同他们自己家族的故事密切相关。


There was the Great Leap Forward, which led to mass starvation and perhaps as many as 38 million deaths.	首先是“大跃进”，曾导致了大规模饥荒以及大约3800万死亡。


Then the madness of the Cultural Revolution, when millions suffered terribly, many died, and many more behaved disgracefully as Mao sought to destroy those who had rescued China from his earlier follies.	紧跟其后的是文化大革命的混乱局面。 几百万中国人深受其害，许多人丧生，而在毛泽东试图毁灭那些曾经拯救中国的老一辈革命者时，更多的人表现得极其可耻。


Jung Chang’s famous biography of Mao, published in 2005, recounts those awful events in the sort of bleak detail that makes Communist propagandists nervous – and some academic Sinologists critical that Mao’s achievements go too little recognized.	2005年出版的，由张戎所著的著名传记《毛泽东：鲜为人知的故事》详细讲述了那些可怕的事件，其中一些令人绝望的细节让这些共产主义的宣传者们非常恐慌——而一些学院派的汉学家甚至批评道毛泽东的成就被承认的部分太少。


Mao is certainly a more interesting figure than were many tyrants – a poet, an intellectual, a student of history as well as a serial philanderer, who, according to his doctor, Li Zhisui, liked to swim in water, not bathe in it.	显然，毛泽东是一个比其他许多暴君都更有趣的人物——他是一位诗人，一个知识分子，一名历史学生，并且是一位同多位女性都有着韵事的风流男子。 据其私人医生李志绥所说，毛泽东喜欢在河流里游泳，而非沐浴其中。


I know of no better, more fascinating “warts and all” portrait of any political leader than Li’s book, The Private Life of Chairman Mao .	而据我所知，世上再也没有比这本《毛泽东私人医生回忆录》更好，更加全面而充满事实魅力的政治领导人传记了。


I remember being told a story about China that gives credence to the Communist leadership’s generous verdict on Mao.	我记得曾经有人给我讲了一个故事，故事讲述了中国大众是如何信任共产党的领导阶层对于毛泽东的慷慨评价的。


The mother of a Chinese journalist (now living outside the country) had been one of those who returned after 1949 to her homeland with her husband and family from a comfortable life at an American university.	一位中国记者的母亲（现生活在国外）曾经是1949年之后返回她的祖国中人们的一员，一同回国的还有她的丈夫和家庭，他们放弃了美国一所大学的舒适生活。


They regarded returning as their patriotic duty.	他们认为回到祖国怀抱是一种爱国的责任。


The family sacrificed everything.	这个家庭牺牲了一切。


They were hit by round after round of Mao’s tyrannical campaigns against “Rightists,” beginning with the silencing of critics after the Hundred Flowers Movement in 1956.	从1956年的“百花齐放”中使批评者噤声的浪潮开始，他们在毛泽东所领导的“打倒右派“的斗争中遭受着一轮又一轮的打击。


The family lived in penury. The father died from ill-treatment during the Cultural Revolution.	一家人生活在贫困之中，而父亲则死于”文革“期间的虐待。


But the mother never complained.	但是，这位母亲从没有抱怨过。


She believed that her family’s sacrifices were justified by the liberation and rise of China.	她相信，随着（“文革“结束）中国的再次解放和重新崛起，她一家人所有的牺牲都会得到公正的评判。


Towards the end of her life, this mood changed.	然���当她垂暮时，这种情绪却有所改变。


She saw in the 1990’s the beginning of China’s economic ascent – the early years of spectacular growth.	她看到20世纪90年代中国经济崛起的开端——最早几年令人瞩目的经济增长。


She witnessed the return of the greed and corruption that she believed had destroyed the Kuomintang in the 1930’s and 1940’s.	她目睹了贪婪和腐败的重新到来，而这些在她看来不正是在30、40年代毁掉国民党的原因吗？


Why, she asked herself, had her family suffered so much if it was only to prepare the way for this?	她自问这究竟是为了什么，她的家庭受到了如此严重的伤害，而仅仅为了走这样一条道路吗？


Yet it is China’s economic renaissance – some of whose effects so disturbed this patriotic old woman – which has been the most remarkable event in recent world history.	而这仍是中国经济“文艺复兴“般的巨大繁荣——尽管某些其中的效应是如此困扰这位年老的女爱国者——中国的经济复苏是当今世界史上最非凡的成就。


The economic turnaround began under the leadership of Deng Xiaoping, who had survived Mao’s purges to follow in his footsteps and become the architect of China’s rise as a world power.	中国的经济好转始于邓小平的领导，而后者在毛泽东对自己追随者的大清洗运动中存活了下来，成为了中国崛起于世界的总设计师。


The hundreds of millions of Chinese who have been lifted out of poverty as a result of Deng’s reforms will in time regard him as a greater hero than Mao.	成千上万因为邓小平的一系列改革措施而摆脱贫困的中国人在当时认为，他的功勋比毛泽东更为卓著。


But, whatever Mao’s terrible failings, during his years of absolute power there was a sense of common purpose and solidarity that went with shared hardship.	但不管在毛泽东当权期间曾犯下多少不可饶恕的错误，他的绝对权力带给中国的是一种共同的目的和团结，以及共同的艰苦奋斗精神。


Maoism was a curious and unique mixture of class warfare and socialist leveling, all enunciated by a man who believed that individuals – or at least Mao himself – could shape history rather than be formed by its tides and currents.	毛泽东主义是阶级斗争和社会主义性质的平均主义之间的一种奇特而独特的结合体，毛泽东将这些观念清楚的表达为，他认为每一个体——或者至少是毛泽东本人——能够塑造历史，而不是单单被历史的潮流与趋势所塑造。


This creed has clearly not survived its creator.	很显然这个信条救不了毛泽东。


Pragmatism with a Leninist face is the order of the day.	一个打着列宁主义的实用主义者才是当今世界的新秩序。


The glories of getting rich have overwhelmed the deprivations of patriotic self-sacrifice.	致富的荣耀感已经压过了爱国主义自我牺牲的匮乏感。


Mao made China proud. Deng made it prosperous.	毛泽东令中国为自身骄傲，邓小平则使中国昌盛繁荣。


What happens next?	而接下来即将发生什么?


For all our sakes, I hope that the future does not derail China’s economic progress, though it will be a surprise if it does not challenge its arthritic and adamantine political system.	看在我们所有人的份上，我期待着未来中国经济的快车不会脱离其轨道，尽管如果经济的腾飞不会变成步履蹒跚但顽固不变的中国政治体制的一大挑战，将会是一个奇迹。


Sanctions Blowback	制裁的反作用


BERLIN – With the crisis in Ukraine intensifying, the United States and the European Union are locked in a battle of wills – and sanctions – with Russia.	柏林—随着乌克兰危机的升级，美国和欧盟也陷入了与俄罗斯的意志——还有制裁——之战。


Indeed, in retaliation for the intensification of Western financial sanctions, Russia has announced a ban on food and agricultural imports from the US and the EU.	事实上，作为对西方升级金融制裁的回应，俄罗斯宣布禁止从美国和欧盟进口食品和农产品。


But the real threat to the West lies in the potential impact of a financial crisis sparked by its own sanctions against Russia.	但对西方的真正威胁在于其对俄罗斯的制裁所引起的金融危机潜在影响。


Consider Russia’s 1998 financial crisis.	以1998年俄罗斯金融危机为例。


In August of that year, then-President Boris Yeltsin declared, “There will be no devaluation – that is firm and definite.”	当年8月，时任总统叶利钦宣布“不会有贬值——绝对不会。


Three days later, the ruble was devalued, and Russian financial markets went into a tailspin.	”三天后，卢布贬值，俄罗斯金融市场崩溃。


With capital pouring out of the country, the Russian government was forced to restructure its debt, and the economy entered a deep recession.	资本纷纷出逃，俄罗斯总理被迫重组债务，经济陷入深度衰退。


Though Russia was relatively insignificant financially, its crisis had far-reaching consequences.	尽管俄罗斯在金融上相对不重要，但其危机仍造成了深远后果。


Among the worst affected was Argentina; the Russian crisis exacerbated a decline in investors’ confidence in emerging markets that culminated in Argentina’s sovereign default less than four years later.	受影响最大的是阿根廷； 俄罗斯危机加剧了投资者对新兴市场信心的下滑，不出四年，阿根廷就爆发了主权违约。


Even the US and Europe were not immune, with the collapse of the major hedge fund Long-Term Capital Management (LTCM) fueling anxiety about the viability of many other financial institutions.	甚至美国和欧洲也未能幸免，大对冲基金长期资本管理公司（LTCM）的倒闭让人们十分担心其他许多金融机构的安全。


Today’s financial dramas bear a striking resemblance to this experience.	今天的金融闹剧与这一经验十分相似。 阿根廷在技术上破了产；


Argentina has technically defaulted; American and European financial institutions and markets are jittery; and Russia is promising that the sanctions it faces will have no impact on its economy.	美国和欧洲金融机构和市场风声鹤唳； 而俄罗斯信誓旦旦地表示其所面临的制裁对经济毫无影响。


The most obvious similarity is Russian President Vladimir Putin’s assertions that his country can weather any and all Western sanctions.	最突出的相似之处是俄罗斯总统给普京宣称俄罗斯可以抵御一切任何形式的西方制裁。


That may be wishful thinking.	这或许只是一厢情愿。


In fact, barring most major Russian banks from operating freely in Western capital markets could affect the entire Russian economy, not just the banks themselves.	事实上，阻止大部分俄罗斯大银行在西方资本市场自由经营可以影响整个俄罗斯经济，而不仅仅是银行本身。


And the central bank’s decision to raise interest rates to buttress the ruble may lead to much tighter credit conditions for companies and households, pushing the Russian economy into recession this year and next.	而央行决定生息以巩固卢布可能导致公司和家庭面临的信用条件进一步收紧，让俄罗斯经济在今年和明年陷入衰退。


The problem with financial sanctions is that no one knows precisely how they will unfold – especially in an economy as large as Russia’s.	金融制裁的问题是没人知道制裁如何展开——特别是在像俄罗斯这么大的经济体。


If they prove to be more effective than intended, they will pose a serious threat to global financial stability.	如果制裁比预想中的更加有效，那么将给全球金融稳定造成严重威胁。


The restrictions on Russian banks operating in Europe and the US appear modest.	对俄罗斯银行在俄罗斯和美国的经营限制颇为温和。


The banks can still access money markets, cover their short-term financing needs, and count on the central bank for support.	俄罗斯银行仍能进入货币市场，满足短期融资需要，指望中央银行的支持。


But investors’ risk appetite could easily shift, spurring them to withdraw large amounts of capital.	但投资者的风险偏好正在快速变化，促使他们抽回大量资本。


Though Russia’s public debt is modest, its foreign-exchange reserves large, and its economy much stronger than in 1998, once the herd is running, it is impossible to stop it.	尽管俄罗斯公债水平不高，外汇储备充足，并且经济也比1998年强得多，但羊群效应一旦形成就很难阻止。


Europe’s banks have extended almost €200 billion ($268 billion) in loans to Russian institutions and firms, and hold a significant share of Russia’s euro-denominated assets, making them especially vulnerable.	欧洲银行给俄罗斯机构和企业的贷款接近2,000亿欧元，并且持有很大一部分俄罗斯的欧元计价资产，这使它们极易受到冲击。


Moreover, the eurozone’s current stress tests may well reveal significant capital holes in major European banks in the coming months.	此外，欧元区目前的压力测试可能暴露出欧洲主要银行在未来几个月中可能出现重大资本漏洞。


Having just emerged from a deep recession, financial disruptions could easily cause Europe to slide back into recession, particularly given the eurozone economy’s close links to Russia via trade and energy.	刚刚从深度衰退中走出的欧洲很容易因为金融干扰而重新陷入衰退，特别是考虑到欧元区经济与俄罗斯密切的贸易 和能源联系。


Compounding the problem, no one truly understands the precise connections among Russian and European institutions and markets.	让问题更加复杂的是，没人真正理解俄罗斯和欧洲机构和市场之间的确切关联。


The collapse of LTCM in 1998 was completely unexpected.	1998年LTCM公司的倒闭完全没人预料到。


Is Europe today prepared to deal with a similar failure of an important financial institution?	今天的欧洲准备好处置类似的重要金融机构倒闭事件了吗？


The financial sanctions on Russia are not targeted, temporary, or fully credible.	对俄罗斯的金融制裁是非定向的、临时的、完全可信的。


If they affect Russia’s entire economy, hitting ordinary citizens the hardest, popular support for Putin’s regime may solidify further.	如果制裁影响俄罗斯整体经济，普通公民受影响最大，那么对普京政权的支持率将得到进一步巩固。


Of course, an economic slowdown could erode Putin’s popular support, which is based on the gains in living standards made under his leadership.	当然，经济减速可能腐蚀普京的支持度——它建立普京所领导的生活水平的不断提高的基础上。


In that case, Putin’s response could be even more damaging.	果真如此的话，普京的反应可能会更加具有破坏性。


Another problem is that implementing sanctions that cannot be reversed quickly removes the incentive for Russia to return to the negotiating table, especially because the threat of an escalation of financial sanctions lacks credibility, given the risk to European and US financial stability.	另一个问题是不可逆的实施制裁可能迅速打消俄罗斯回到谈判桌的动力，特别是考虑到，由于欧洲和美国金融稳定也会受到影响，因此金融制裁升级的威胁并不可信。


Once these sanctions begin to bite, no one can say who will be hurt – or how badly.	随着制裁开始起作用，没人能确定谁会受到伤害、受到何种程度的伤害。


And, as Russia’s experience in 1998, and Argentina’s after 2002, demonstrated, the process of restoring confidence among market participants is a long and painful one.	此外，1998年的俄罗斯和2002年后的阿根廷表明，重塑市场参与者的信心是一个漫长而痛苦的过程。


These concerns do not mean that the US and the EU should not impose sanctions on Russia for its illegal annexation of Crimea and continuing efforts to destabilize eastern Ukraine.	这些顾虑并不意味着美国和欧盟不应该针对俄罗斯非法吞并克里米亚和继续动摇东乌克兰的行为采取制裁。


But sanctions that hit the real side of the Russian economy – such as energy, natural resources, and the military – could provide a better solution.	但冲击俄罗斯经济实体面——如能源、自然资源和军事——的制裁可能效果更好。


Though such sanctions may not work as quickly, they would be targeted, temporary, and credible, enabling the US and Europe to control – and adjust – the impact on the Russian leadership and economy.	尽管这类制裁或许无法迅速见效，但可以是定向、暂时且可信的，让美国和欧洲控制和调整其对俄罗斯领导层和经济的影响。


In any case, US and European leaders must recognize that all sanctions will have costs – many of them unexpected – for both sides.	无论如何，美国和欧洲领导人必须认识到，一切制裁都会给双方造成代价——其中许多代价是不可预料的。


If they are not willing to risk global financial stability in an unpredictable game of chicken with Putin, perhaps it would be wise to re-think the composition of the sanctions that they impose.	如果他们不想拿全球金融稳定冒险与普京玩不可预料的懦夫博弈，也许更明智的做法是反思他们所实施的制裁的构成。


Poland’s Eurozone Tests	波兰的欧元区考验


WARSAW – The European Union’s new member states from Central and Eastern Europe are required to join the eurozone as part of their accession agreements.	华沙—欧盟的中欧和东欧新成员国被要求加入欧元区作为入盟的接受条件之一。


But deciding when to adopt the euro is a matter of heated debate.	但何时开始采用欧元引起了热议。


At stake is not just an economic calculation, but also a judgment about the outlook of the single currency itself.	这不仅仅是经济上的考量，也事关对单一货币本身前景的判断。


For many, the benefits of membership have diminished since the financial crisis, and prospective members, such as Poland, can derive maximum advantage from joining only if they are clear about the economic conditions that must first prevail in their own countries.	对许多人来说，自金融危机以来，加入欧盟的好处有所减少，而对波兰等潜在成员国来说，弄清楚它们一开始会处于怎样的经济环境中再决定加入能够获得最大的好处。


The formal criteria for entry are contained in the 1992 Maastricht Treaty, which sets targets for government debt, budget deficits, inflation, interest rates, and exchange rates.	正式的加入标准写在1992年马斯特里赫特条约中，其中规定了政府债务、预算赤字、通货膨胀、利率和汇率的目标。


But merely hitting these targets (or, worse, just approaching them) at any given point in time has proved to be an inadequate foundation for membership.	但是，在任何一个给定时点，仅仅是达到这些目标（或更糟糕的，仅仅是接近这些目标）并不能构成成员资格的全部基础。


Indeed, the malleability of the Maastricht criteria has caused many of the eurozone’s problems.	事实上，马约标准的可变性引起了大量欧元区问题。


As long as eurozone debts continue to rise and member economies diverge rather than converge, prospective members should also be stress-tested to see if they can withstand external shocks and sustain the membership criteria over the long term.	只要欧元区债务继续上升，成员经济体继续两极分化而不是趋同，潜在成员国就应该先做一下压力测试看看是否能在长期经受住外部冲击、保持成员资格标准。


Before Poland decides to share a currency with its main trading partners, it should consider three vital economic conditions: its international competitiveness, the flexibility of its labor market, and the health of its public finances.	在波兰决定与其主要贸易伙伴国共用一种货币前，它应该考虑三个关键性经济条件：它的国际竞争力、它的劳动力市场的灵活性，以及它的公共财政的健康状况。


Poland’s export markets are growing steadily.	波兰的出口市场在稳步增长。


But this is not because the country trades mainly with other dynamic emerging economies, or because there is huge global demand for uniquely Polish products.	但这不是因为波兰主要与其他充满活力的新兴经济体做贸易，或者因为世界对波兰独特的商品有巨大的需求。


Rather, Poland simply combines low costs (including wages) and high-quality production.	相反，波兰只是提供了低结合了（包括工资）和高质量产品。


For this reason, Poland is sometimes called the “China of Europe.”	因此，有时波兰被称为“欧洲的中国”。


But competitiveness based on cost, rather than brand value or innovation, makes the Polish economy vulnerable.	但基于成本而不是品牌价值或创新的竞争力让波兰经济十分脆弱。


Poland lacks the deeply rooted competitiveness of, say, Germany, the Netherlands, Austria, Sweden, or Switzerland.	波兰缺少根基稳固的竞争力，难以与德国、荷兰、奥地利、瑞典和瑞士相提并论。


Polish exports are sold under non-Polish names (Italian for shoes, for example, or English for clothing).	波兰出口的商品很少以波兰语名字通行世界（就像意大利语之于制鞋业、英语之于制衣业）。


Its machinery exports are part of larger multinational networks run by German, Dutch, or other global companies.	其机械出口只是德国、荷兰和其他全球公司所主导的更大的多国网络的一部分。


And Poland’s cost advantage would disappear if the złoty were to strengthen sharply.	如果兹罗提大幅升值，波兰的成本优势也将消失。


Although Polish companies are working hard to build brands abroad, this can take decades.	尽管波兰公司努力地建立海外品牌，但这可能需要几十年时间。


In the meantime, the country must be careful about joining the exchange rate mechanism (ERM II) – the narrow band within which applicant currencies must operate for at least two years prior to adopting the euro.	与此同时，波兰在加入汇率机制（ERM II，在采用欧元之前，申请国货币汇率的波动范围必须限制在一个狭窄范围内，时间不短于两年）时要慎之又慎。


Doing so could cause the złoty to strengthen, as it did to the Slovak koruna, and wipe out Poland’s competitive advantage.	这样做可能导致兹罗提升值（就像斯洛伐克克朗一样），导致波兰失去竞争优势。


Another important aspect of Poland’s competitiveness is its flexible labor market.	波兰竞争力的另一个重要方面是其灵活的劳动力市场。


One in four employees is on a fixed-term contract or self-employed.	每四个工人中就有一人拥有固定合同或是个体户。


A quarter of the typical Polish wage comprises variable elements, making it easy to freeze, or even lower, compensation during tougher economic times.	波兰工资构成中通常有四分之一是浮动因素，这意味着在经济不景气时工资很容易冻结甚至降低。


This means that firms can hire workers on short-term contracts when they are unsure of the business outlook; more generally, such flexibility helps the economy withstand external shocks.	这意味着企业在商业前景不定时可以与员工签订短期合同； 总体而言，这一灵活性有��于波兰经济抵御外部冲击。


But flexible labor markets have disadvantages, too.	但灵活的劳动力市场也有劣势。


Companies tend not to invest in talent or develop new skills, and the quality of existing skills can suffer.	公司不再愿意投资于人才和开发新技能，现有技能质量也会受到冲击。


In the longer run, flexible labor markets also increase structural unemployment and fuel the informal economy.	在长期，灵活的劳动力市场还增加了机构性失业、助长了非正式经济。


Furthermore, shortages in Poland’s residential rental market restrict workers’ ability to move to where the jobs are.	此外，波兰住房租赁市场的不足限制了员工随工作前移的能力。


Arguably, Poland’s labor market is more akin to Spain’s than that of Scandinavia, where generous social protection allows for extensive employee training.	可以说波兰的劳动力市场与西班牙而不是慷慨的社会保护让全面的员工培训计划变得可行的斯堪的纳维亚更加类似。


Finally, Poland needs sound public finances – that is, fiscal space for automatic stabilizers during economic crises.	最后，波兰需要可靠的公共财政——即经济危机期间的财政自动稳定器。


By saving money for hard times, the government can implement countercyclical measures, while ensuring stable finances throughout the economic cycle.	政府可以通过为艰难光景储蓄实施反周期措施，同时保证整个经济周期中的财政稳定。


Such a policy was successfully implemented in 2009 and 2010, but the government lacked the funds it needed when economic conditions subsequently deteriorated.	这样的政策在2009年和2010年成功地实施国，但当经济条件大幅恶化时，政府也缺少所需的资金。


Sound public finances require not only low public debt, but also appropriate budgetary policy, which includes cutting spending (or raising taxes) during boom times, not during downturns, as was recently the case.	可靠的公共财政不但需要较低的公债水平，也需要合理的预算政策，包括在繁荣期而不是衰退期（如现在）减少支出（或增加税收）。


Broad-based competitiveness, truly flexible labor markets, and prudent budgeting are not beyond Poland’s reach.	基础广泛的竞争力、真正灵活的劳动力市场和审慎的预算都不在波兰的能力范围之外。


In each case, there are other national examples to emulate: Switzerland’s competitiveness, Denmark’s labor markets, and Estonia’s public finances, for example.	在这些领域波兰都能找到可以效仿的国家榜样，比如瑞士的竞争力、丹麦的劳动力市场和爱沙尼亚的公共财政。


Before Poland joins the eurozone, its economic policy should be directed toward these three criteria of long-term economic success.	在波兰加入欧元区之前，其经济政策应该导向这三大经济长期成功的标准。


The World Economy’s Impossible Demand	世界经济的不可能需求


WARSAW – The global economy’s glory days are surely over.	华沙—世界经济的光荣岁月毫无疑问已经结束了。


Yet policymakers continue to focus on short-term demand management in the hope of resurrecting the heady growth rates enjoyed before the 2008-09 financial crisis.	但决策者的注意力仍集中在短期需求管理，希望能够重现2008—09年金融危机之前的告诉增长。


This is a mistake.	这是一个错误。


When one analyzes the neo-classical growth factors – labor, capital, and total factor productivity – it is doubtful whether stimulating demand can be sustainable over the longer term, or even serve as an effective short-term policy.	当我们分析新古典增长因素时——包括劳动力、资本和全要素生产率——刺激需求在长期内是否可持续、甚至是否是有效的短期政策是可疑的。


Consider each of those growth factors.	逐一考察这些增长因素。


Over the next 15 years, demographic changes will reverse, or at least slow, labor-supply growth everywhere except Africa, the Middle East, and South Central Asia.	在未来15年中，人口变化趋势将会逆转（至少减缓）除非洲、中东和东南亚之外的劳动力供给增长趋势。


Europe, Japan, the United States, and eventually China and East Asia will face labor shortages.	欧洲、日本、美国甚至中国和东亚将面临劳动力短缺。


Although large-scale migration from labor-surplus regions to deficit regions would benefit recipient economies, it would almost certainly trigger popular resistance, especially in Europe and East Asia, making it difficult to support.	尽管大规模从劳动力盈余地区向不足地区的移民将有利于移入经济体，单几乎肯定会引发公众抵制，特别是在欧洲和东亚，这意味着这一政策难以获得支持。


Increasing the labor-force participation rate, especially among women and the elderly, might ease tight labor markets, but this alone would be insufficient to counter the decline in working-age populations.	增加劳动力参与率，特别是女性和老年人的参与率，或许能缓解劳动力市场的紧张，单光靠这样不足以抵消工作年龄人口下降的影响。


The world economy cannot count on higher investment levels either.	世界经济也无法再依靠提高投资。


The global investment/GDP ratio, especially in advanced economies, has been gradually declining over the past 30 years, and there is no obvious reason why it would pick up again in the medium to long-term.	全球投资/GDP比率（特别是发达国家的投资/GDP比率）在过去三十年里逐渐下降，并且没有显而易见的理由认为它能在中期到长期重拾涨势。


Until recently, falling investment in the developed world had been offset by rapid increases in investment in emerging markets, mostly in Asia.	知道最近，发达国家投资下降一直对应着新兴市场（主要是亚洲）投资的快速增加。


But high rates of investment there are also unsustainable.	但那里的高投资率也是不可持续的。


As in Japan, China’s investment rate (running at almost 50% of GDP since 2009) will decline as its per capita income rises.	和日本一样，中国的投资率（2009年达到了GDP的近50%）将会随着人均收入的增加而下降。


The third engine of growth, total factor productivity, will also be unable to maintain the relentless gains witnessed from the late 1990’s to the mid-2000’s.	增长的第三个引擎，及全要素生产率也无法维持20世纪90年代末到2005年前后的勇往直前之势。


During this time, the global economy benefited from the confluence of several unique developments: an information and communications revolution; a “peace dividend” resulting from the end of the Cold War; and the implementation of market reforms in many former communist and other developing economies.	在此期间，全球经济得益于几大独特发展趋势的合力：信息和通信革命、冷战结束带来的“和平分裂”，以及许多前共产主义国家和其他发展中经济体实施了市场改革。


Moreover, global growth received a further boost from the completion of the Uruguay Round of free-trade negotiations in 1994 and the overall liberalization of capital flows.	此外，全球增长因为1994年的乌拉圭回合自由贸易谈判的完成以及资本流动的总体自由化而得到了更多的提振。


It is difficult to point to any growth impetus of similar magnitude – whether innovation or public policy – in today’s economy.	现在已很难找到可以与这些因素相提并论的增长推进因素——不管是创新还是公共政策。


No new technological revolution appears to be on the horizon.	新技术革命尚未出现在人们的视野中。


The World Trade Organization produced only a limited agreement in Bali in December, despite 12 years of negotiations, while numerous bilateral and regional free-trade agreements might even reduce world trade overall.	12月，在经历了12年的谈判后，世界贸易组织在巴厘岛只实现了有限的协议，层出不穷的双边和地区自由贸易协定甚至可能从总体上抑制世界贸易。


Worse, in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, sluggish growth and high unemployment in developed countries have fueled demands for more protectionism.	更糟糕的是，2008年金融危机爆发后，发达国家的停滞不前的增长和高失业助长了采取更多保护主义措施的要求。


Thus, the financial liberalization of the 1990’s and early 2000’s is also under threat.	于是20世纪90年代末和21世纪初的金融自由化也受到了威胁。


The far-reaching macroeconomic and political reforms of the post-Cold War era also seem to have run their course.	后冷战时期影响深远的宏观经济和政治改革也似乎失去了动力。


The easy gains have already been banked; any further structural change will take longer to agree and be tougher to implement.	唾手可得的好处已经挖掘殆尽，更进一步的结构性变革需要更长时间形成共识，实施起来也更加困难。


Thus, with supply-side factors no longer driving global growth, we must reassess our expectations of what monetary and fiscal policies can achieve.	因此，在供给面因素不再能够驱动全球增长的情况下，我们必须重估我们队货币和财政政策所能实现的效果的预期。


If actual growth is already close to potential growth, then continuing the current fiscal and monetary stimulus will only create more bubbles, exacerbate sovereign-debt problems, and, by reducing the pool of global savings available to finance private investment, undercut long-term growth prospects.	如果实际增长已经接近潜在增长，那么持续当前的财政��货币刺激只能产生更多泡沫、恶化主权债务问题，并减少可用于私人投资融资的全球储蓄，从而破坏长期增长前景。


Instead, policymakers should focus on removing their economies’ structural and institutional bottlenecks.	相反，决策者应该专注于消除经济的结构性和制度性瓶颈。


In advanced markets, these stem largely from a declining and aging population, labor-market rigidities, an unaffordable welfare state, high and distorting taxes, and government indebtedness.	在发达市场，这些瓶颈大多来自人口的下降和老化、劳动力市场僵化、不堪重负的福利国家、高昂的扭曲性税收以及政府负债。


The list of growth obstacles in emerging markets is even longer: corruption and weak rule of law, state capture, organized crime, poor infrastructure, an unskilled workforce, limited access to finance, and too much state ownership.	新兴市场的增长障碍名单甚至还要长：腐败和法治精神欠缺、国家俘获（state capture）、有组织犯罪、基础设施落后、劳动力技能低下、无法获得足够融资以及太多的国家所有权。


In addition, markets of all sizes and levels of development continue to suffer from protectionism, restrictions on foreign capital flows, rising economic populism, and profligate or poorly targeted welfare programs.	此外，各种规模、各种发展层次的市场仍然受保护主义、外国资本流限制、经济民粹主义兴起以及定位不当又过于慷慨的福利计划的困扰。


If these problems can be addressed, both globally and at the national level, we can end the dangerous fiscal and monetary expansionism on which the world economy has come to rely and allow growth to be sustained over the long term – though at lower rates than in recent years.	如果可以在全球和国家层面解决这些问题，我们就能结束世界经济目前所依赖的危险的财政和货币扩张主义，让增长获得长期可持续性——不过要比最近几年的速度低一些。


The Iron Lady as Liberator	作为解放者的铁娘子


KHARKIV, UKRAINE – Prison is always a place of mourning.	哈尔科夫，乌克兰—监狱永远是令人哀伤的地方。


But perhaps learning of Margaret Thatcher’s death in this place is grimly appropriate, because it made me remember the imprisoned society of my youth that Thatcher did so much to set free.	但对于获知撒切尔的死讯，这里或许正合适，因为这个消息让我想起了我青年时代的被囚禁的社会，撒切尔为解放它做了很多努力。


For many of us who grew up in the Soviet Union and its satellites in Eastern Europe, Margaret Thatcher will always be a heroine.	对于我们这些生长于苏联及其东欧卫星国的人来说，撒切尔永远是巾帼英雄。


Not only did she espouse the cause of freedom – particularly economic freedom – in Britain and the West; by proclaiming Mikhail Gorbachev a man “we can do business with” (at a time when almost every democratic leader was deeply suspicious of his policies of perestroika and glasnost), she became a vital catalyst in unlocking our gulag societies.	她不但拥护英国和西方的自由事业——特别是经济自由； 也是把我们从古拉格社会解放出来的关键催化剂——她称戈尔巴乔夫是“可以和他谈谈”的人（当时，几乎所有民主领导人都对他的改革和开放政策持深深的怀疑态度）。


Indeed, for everyone in the former communist world who sought to build a free society out of the wreckage of totalitarianism, the “Iron Lady” became a secular icon.	事实上，对所有身处前共产主义世界、致力于在集权主义的废墟上建立自由社会的人来说，“铁娘子”是不朽的旗帜。


Her qualities of courage and persistence – of being “not for turning” – provided a living example for us of a type of leadership that does not buckle at moments of political peril.	她的勇气和坚持——“绝不掉头”——给我们树立了活生生的榜样，向我们展示了一种面对政治危险从容不迫的领导力。


I have certainly taken inspiration from her fidelity to her principles and absolute determination to fight, and fight again, when the cause is just.	毫无疑问，她面对公正事业的坚守原则和对斗争再斗争的坚定信念让我启发良多。


One of the true joys of my life in politics was the opportunity to have a quiet lunch with Thatcher in London some years ago, and express my gratitude to her for recognizing our chance for freedom and seizing the diplomatic initiative to help realize it.	我政治生涯的真正光辉时刻之一是多年前获得了一次与撒切尔安静地共进午餐的机会，我向她表达了感激之情——她为我们识别出自由的机会，并把握了外交主动权帮助我们实现这个机会。


Throughout my premiership, I kept a quote of hers in mind: “I am not a consensus politician; I am a conviction politician.”	在我担任总理期间，我时刻铭记着她的话：“我不是共识政客； 我是信念政治家。


Her rigorous sense of the true duty of a politician always gave me comfort during a political struggle, for our duty as leaders is not to hold office, but to use our power to improve people’s lives and increase the scope of their freedom.	”她对政治家的真正责任的深刻认识让我从容度过了政治斗争，因为我们作为领导人的责任不是上台，而是用我们的权力改善人民的生活、增加他们的自由。


When Thatcher first expressed her belief in the potential of Gorbachev’s pro-democracy reforms, I was a 24-year-old recent university graduate beginning my career.	撒切尔第一次表达她相信戈尔巴乔夫亲民主改革的潜力时，我还是个24岁刚刚大学毕业开始职业生涯的女生。


There was scant hope that my life would be better than that of my mother and, more dispiriting, even less hope that I would be able to build a better life for my young daughter.	我看不到自己的生活会比父辈更好的希望，更令人沮丧的是，我能够为我子辈构建更美好生活的希望甚至更加渺茫。


Thatcher’s embrace of the cause of our freedom was electrifying for me.	撒切尔致力于我们的自由事业不啻给了我一剂强心针。


The great dissident writer Nadezhda Mandelstam had seen for us a future in which we could only “hope against hope”; yet here was a leader who saw for us a future not of squalor and moral compromise, but of freedom and opportunity.	著名异见作家曼德尔施塔姆（Nadezhda Mandelstam）为我们看到了一个我们只能“希望希望”的未来； 但在撒切尔看来，我们的未来并不是暗淡无光、道德妥协，而是自由和机会。


I still shake my head in wonder that she could embrace the abandoned hope of liberation when almost no one else – not even Gorbachev – could even imagine it.	我仍然百思不得其解，为何她会致力于被放弃的自由希望，要知道，甚至连戈尔巴乔夫都不敢想象这一幕。


But, of course, Thatcher understood freedom, because it was in her very sinews. She was assuredly not for turning, but she also was not for taking orders or settling for the restricted life that her society seemed to hold in store for her.	但是，撒切尔显然知道什么是自由，因为这就是她的力量之源。 她确实没有掉头，但她也不会接受她的社会为她所准备的受限制的生活。


In a Britain where social class still typically determined one’s destiny, the grocer’s daughter from the north made her way to Oxford and starred as a student of chemistry.	在英国，通常社会阶级仍决定着一个人的命运，作为来自北方的杂货店老板之女��她成功跻身牛津大学，成为一名主修化学的女生。


Then she dared to enter the exclusive male preserve of politics.	接着，她敢于闯入清一色男性的政坛。


When she became the first woman to be British Prime Minister, she fired the ambitions of countless young women around the world (including mine).	当她成为英国历史上第一位女首相时，她点燃了全世界无数女性的雄心（包括我）。


We could dream big because of her example.	因为她的榜样，我们也可以有大梦想。


And, as a woman, Thatcher knew that she brought something unique to the corridors of power.	作为一个女人，撒切尔知道，她为权力走廊带来了某种独特的东西。


As she said on taking office in 1979, “Any woman who understands the problems of running a home will be nearer to understanding the problems of running a country.”	正如她在1979年就职演说上所言，“理解齐家直到的女人举例理解治国之道已经不远。


That common-sense fusion of family values and fiscal probity set an example for every elected leader who has followed her.	”这一家齐然后国治的常识以及财政上的廉洁为后来每一位当选领导人树立了榜样。


Of course, I well understand that many in Britain felt left behind by the economic and social revolution that Thatcher unleashed.	当然，我十分理解，许多英国人感到因为撒切尔引入的经济和社会革命而导致他们落于人后。


But the entire point of Thatcherism, as I understood it from afar, was to create conditions in which everyone could work hard and achieve their dreams.	但从我现在的角度看，撒切尔主义的全部要义在于为所有人创造一个努力工作就能实现梦想的环境。


That is what I – and all of Ukraine’s democrats – want for our country: a society of opportunity, under the rule of law and not under the thumb of cronies and oligarchs, in an open Europe.	这正是我——以及所有乌克兰民主人士——对祖国的期许：一个开放欧洲的机会的社会，依法治国而不是依帮派和寡头治国。


The record speaks for itself.	桃李不言，下自成蹊。


Before Thatcher’s premiership, Britain was widely considered the “sick man of Europe” – afflicted by stifling regulation, high unemployment, constant strikes, and chronic budget deficits.	在撒切尔夫人执政之前，英国被广泛认为是“欧洲病夫”，饱受令人窒息的监管、居高不下的失业、没完没了的罢工和旷日持久的预算赤字的折磨。


When she stepped down 11 years later (the country’s longest-serving prime minister since Lord Liverpool left office in 1827) Britain was among Europe’s – and the world’s – most dynamic economies.	当她11年后下台时（她是1827年利物浦勋爵卸任以来在任时间最长的英国首相），英国已跻身欧洲——以及世界——最有活力经济体的行列。


As a result, we are all Thatcherites now.	因此，我们都是撒切尔的门徒。


Thatcherism’s Bellicose Soul	撒切尔主义的好斗灵魂


LONDON – Margaret Thatcher was Britain’s greatest twentieth-century peacetime prime minister.	伦敦—玛格丽特·撒切尔是20世纪和平年代最伟大的英国首相。


In the 1980’s, the near-simultaneous crisis of communism in the East and social democracy in the West gave her the opportunity to do great deeds.	20世纪80年代，东方共产主义和西方社会民主主义几乎同时爆发危机，这给了她一次伟大的机会。


But it required a great leader to take advantage of it.	但要抓住机会，你还必须是伟大领袖。


Her relationship with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev opened up the way to ending the Cold War; her privatization policies showed the world how to dismantle state socialism.	她和苏联领导人戈尔巴乔夫的关系开启了结束冷战的大门； 她以私有化政策向世人展示了如何取消国家社会主义。


The neo-liberal revival of the 1980’s will always be known as the Reagan-Thatcher revolution.	20世纪80年代新自由主义的复苏永远都会以里根-撒切尔革命而被人铭记。


She was also the most divisive British prime minister of modern times, admired and reviled in equal measure, owing as much to the self-righteous way she pursued her policies as to the policies themselves.	她也是现代以来英国最有争议的首相，崇拜者和憎恨者等量齐观，这既是拜她的自负路线所赐，也是因为政策本身。


She rightly described herself as a “conviction politician.”	她自称“信念政治家”（conviction politician），这倒名副其实。


A conviction is a settled belief that brooks no argument.	信念是一种不容置疑的既定观念。


And she did not deign to conciliate, instead dividing the political world into “us” and “them.”	她从不屈尊于安慰，而是把政界分为“我们”和“他们”。


“Where there is error, may we bring truth,” she announced on her entry to No. 10 Downing Street, quoting Saint Francis of Assisi.	“犯错误，就有可能获得真理，”在其入主唐宁街十号时，她引用了亚西西的圣方济各（Saint Francis of Assisi）的名言。


“In victory, magnanimity,” Winston Churchill advised.	 “胜则仁，”温斯顿·丘吉尔如此建议。


Thatcher was brave and resolute, but she was not magnanimous.	撒切尔勇而有断，但失于仁。


She won famous victories, but showed no generosity to the defeated, in word or deed.	她获得了辉煌的胜利，但不论言辞还是行动，都从未体现出对败者的慷慨。


As a result, she failed to create harmony out of discord.	结果，她无法从不和中创造和谐。


Her mission was projected from a narrow ideological base.	她的一举一动都有狭隘意识形态根基。


In instinct and language, she was a follower of Friedrich von Hayek.	从直觉和用词上，她是弗雷德里希·冯·哈耶克的信徒。


For Thatcher, as for Hayek, the great intellectual error of the twentieth century was the belief that the state could improve on the spontaneous efforts of individuals.	对撒切尔，以及对哈耶克来说，20世纪的智识大错误是认为国家可以改善个人的自发行为。


What others saw as the state’s role in elevating the condition of the people, she saw as the insidious road to serfdom.	别人看到了国家在提升个人环境方面的作用，而她看到的是险恶的通往奴役之路。


It is easy to see why this message resonated in Eastern Europe.	很容易就可以看出为何这会在东欧引起共鸣。


Translated into British terms, it meant releasing the impulse to wealth creation from the dead hand of socialism, bureaucracy, and trade unions, which in her reading of history had brought about Britain’s decline.	用英国话来讲，这意味着从社会主义、官僚主义和工会的死亡之手中解放财富创造动力，她的历史知识告诉它，前三者是导致英国衰落的罪魁。


The Good Samaritan, she said, was to be admired because he helped himself before helping the poor.	她说，撒玛利亚善人之所以值得崇拜，是因为他先自助而后助人。


This insular program of national revival increasingly estranged her from continental Europe’s more dirigiste approach.	这一孤立的国家复兴计划让他与欧洲大陆的国家干预经济方式渐行渐远。


In her famous Bruges speech in 1988, she thundered: “We have not successfully rolled back the frontiers of the state in Britain, only to see them re-imposed at a European level, with a European super-state exercising a new dominance from Brussels.”	1988年，在著名的布鲁日演讲中，她振聋发聩地说道：“我们没有能够在英国成功地撤回国家的界线，而是让国家回到了欧洲水平，一个超级欧洲国在布鲁塞尔行使新主宰权。


She left Britain’s relations with the European Union in a mess from which they have never recovered.	”她把英国与欧盟的关系弄得一团糟，直至今天从未恢复。


Of course, like any shrewd politician, Thatcher knew which battles were unwinnable, or had to be postponed; but she always preferred winning a fight to reaching a compromise.	当然，和所有精明政治家一样，撒切尔知道不可胜之处在哪里，知道适可而止； 但她永远更喜欢先获胜再谈妥协。


She won the sobriquet “Iron Lady” for her decisive leadership in the Falklands War; yet most of her battles were fought against sections of her own people – the “enemy within,” like the miners whom she crushed in the strike of 1984-1985, or Ken Livingstone’s Greater London Council, which she abolished in 1986.	她因在福克兰群岛战争中的果断领导而获得了“铁娘子”的绰号； 但她的大部分战斗的对象是她自己的人民——“内部敌人”，比如1984—1985年粉碎矿工罢工以及1986年废除肯·利文斯顿（Ken Livingstone）的大伦敦议会（Greater London Council）。


She made much of her humble origins as the daughter of a Grantham grocer, and had no time for the Establishment, which she blamed for Britain’s moral and economic decline.	她充分利用了自己的卑微出身——格兰瑟姆（Grantham）杂货店主之女，她反对英国国教，指其为英国道德和经济衰落之源。


She understood the lower middle class, shared its material aspirations and moral prejudices, and argued for government spending cuts in the language of the housewife managing the weekly accounts.	她理解中低阶级，理解他们的物质向往和道德偏见，以管理日常家计开销的家庭主妇口吻要求削减政府开支。


She rewarded “aspirational” members of the working class by selling off council houses at discounted prices.	她通过折价出售廉价公屋奖励“上进”的工人阶级。


Support for the deserving poor was to her like charity wrung from the household budget.	支持自取其咎的穷人对她来说与榨取家庭预算无异。


And, while she was Britain’s most successful female politician ever, she regarded feminism as “poison,” and did little to encourage women to follow her.	此外，尽管她是英国自古至今最成功的女性政治家，但她认为女权主义是“毒药”，也不鼓励女性步她后尘。


Thatcher’s answers to the growing industrial disorder of the 1970’s were “monetarism” to liquidate inflation, legal curbs on trade-union power, and privatization of bloated state-owned industries – “selling off the family silver” as former Conservative Prime Minister Harold Macmillan called it.	撒切尔对20世纪70年代日益增长的工业失序的回答是“货币主义”以清算通货膨胀、合法地遏制工会力量以及私有化臃肿的国有产业——用前保守党首相麦克米伦的话说就是“卖家底”。


The aim of all three measures was to restore both state authority and economic dynamism.	这三项措施的目标是同时重建国家权威和经济活力。


With the help of North Sea oil, Thatcher reversed Britain’s relative economic decline.	在北海石油的帮助下，撒切尔扭转了英国的相对经济衰落。


But her victories came at a huge social cost, with unemployment rising to 12% of the labor force (three million people) in 1984, the highest since the 1930’s.	但她的胜利带来了巨大的社会代价，1984年，失业率劳动力比例升至12%（300万人），为20世纪30年代以来最高值。


For those growing up in the industrial north, Thatcherism foreclosed the future.	在北方工业重镇长大的人来说，撒切尔主义葬送了他们的未来。


The new economy based on finance and shopping skipped a generation.	基于金融和购物的新经济忽略了一代人。


Much as they may have admired her, most Britons were never convinced that the Thatcher way was the only way.	大部分英国人或许崇拜撒切尔，但他们也不会认为撒切尔道路是唯一的道路。


Although she won three consecutive elections, the Conservatives never polled more than 43% of the popular vote, well below the levels achieved by Conservative leaders – Churchill, Anthony Eden, and Macmillan – in the 1950’s.	尽管她连任三届首相，但保守党从未获得过43%以上的民众支持度，远远低于29世纪50年代的保守党领袖丘吉尔、艾登和麦克米伦。


Her approval rating exceeded 50% in only five of her 137 months in office.	在她137个月的执政生涯中，支持率超过50%的日子只有5个月。


Indeed, in economic and social affairs, the electorate grew steadily less Thatcherite during her years in office.	事实上，在经济和社会事务上，选民在撒切尔执政时期就和撒切尔主义渐行渐远。


Her missionary zeal fell on deaf ears.	她传教士般的热诚根本无人理会。


She owed her power to a divided opposition and a first-past-the-post electoral system.	她之所以能够掌权，是因为英国采取赢者通吃的选举制度，而当时反对者阵营也存在分裂。


Thatcher offered her own summary of her political project: “Economics are the method.	撒切尔自己总结过自己的政治套路：“经济只是途径。


The object is to change the soul.”	改变灵魂才是目标。


If that is the metric, then, despite her achievements, Thatcherism was a failure.	”如果以此作为衡量标准，那么尽管她获得了成功，但撒切尔主义是失败的。


The shift toward finance that Thatcher promoted heightened inequality and made the economy more volatile.	撒切尔所推进的朝金融转型提高了不平等性，也让经济变得更加波动。


Her “right to buy” policy triggered an upward spiral in house prices, which encouraged households to take on more and more debt.	她的“购买权利”政策触发了房价的上涨循环，而这反过来鼓励家庭背上越来越多的债务。


The “Big Bang” of 1986, which de-regulated financial services, made risky behavior in the City the norm.	1986年的“大爆炸”——对金融服务的去监管化——让冒险行为成为金融城的常态。


These reforms sowed the seeds of the financial crisis of 2008.	这些改革种下了2008年金融危机的种子。


The “Victorian values” that Thatcher sought to foster fell afoul of the unrestrained celebration of material wealth that her rule brought about.	撒切尔寻求铸造的“胜利价值”与她执政时期带来的放浪恣睢的物质财富盛宴纠缠不清。


The moral society, based on decent self-interest, that Thatcher hoped to establish became the greedy society, based on coarse self-regard.	撒切尔希望建立的基于高尚私利的道德社会变成了基于下流利己的贪婪社会。


If she experienced any retrospective doubt, she gave no sign of it.	她可能在回忆中自我怀疑过，但她从未表露过。


Marginalizing Malaria	使疟疾边缘化


SAN FRANCISCO – Last fall, Bill and Melinda Gates sent shock waves through the global health community when they announced the audacious goal of eradicating human malaria from the face of the planet.	旧金山—去年秋天，当比尔和梅林达·盖茨夫妇宣布要将人类疟疾从地球上消灭的雄心勃勃的目标时，他们给全球的医疗卫生界以极大的冲击。


Nothing less, they urged, would be enough.	他们强调，“一个地方都不能少。 ”


Heated debate immediately erupted, with some experienced practitioners questioning the feasibility of such a goal.	随后立即爆发了激烈的争论，一些经验丰富的医生质疑实现这一目标的可行性。


These skeptics pointed to the first Global Eradication Program, an ambitious effort in the 1950’s to clear malaria from many areas of the world (Africa was excluded).	这些怀疑主义者提到了第一次“全球消灭计划”，该计划是20世纪50年代的一个试图从世界上众多地区（不包括非洲）消灭疟疾的雄心勃勃的计划。


Despite initial progress, eradication programs crumbled as donors, governments, and populations grew tired and turned their attention elsewhere, allowing malaria to resurge to devastating levels.	尽管这个计划最初取得了一些进展，但是当捐款人、政府和民众对它失去兴趣并将注意力转向其他地方的时候，消灭计划很快就破灭了，这使疟疾又死灰复燃达到了具有破坏性的水平。


No one is suggesting a return to the failed strategies of the first eradication program.	没有人会提议让第一次消灭计划的失败的策略再显身手。


The Gates Foundation has sensibly begun to facilitate consultations with leading scientists on accelerating the development of potent new tools, and is already funding the development of a vaccine, as well as new drugs and diagnostics.	盖茨基金已经明智地开始推进向主要科学家就加快强有力的新诊疗手段的研发进行的咨询活动，并且已经资助了一种疫苗，新药品以及新诊断技术的研发。


At the same time, the Roll Back Malaria Partnership has recently launched a long-term Global Action Plan to unify the actions of the malaria community and spur additional investment.	与此同时，减疟伙伴关系最近已经启动了一项全球商业计划，以统一抵抗疟疾的各界人士的行动，并刺激更多的投资。


All agree that eradication is decades away.	各方都认为离彻底消灭疟疾只有几十年的时间。


Yet, while total eradication is beyond the horizon, and new tools are needed to get there, there is much that can be achieved in the near term with our current armory.	然而，虽然离彻底消灭疟疾还有一段距离，并且需要新的手段来实现这一目标，但是，利用我们现有的手段，我们可以在近期取得许多成果。


Recent success in countries such as Ethiopia and Rwanda in expanding access to impregnated bed nets and slashing malaria rates is building confidence that the disease can be dramatically reduced around the world and, in some areas, eliminated entirely.	最近，在诸如埃塞俄比亚和卢旺达这样的国家扩大药浸蚊帐的使用和减少疟疾患病率上的成功，使人们建立了疟疾可以在全世界范围内大规模减少并在一些地区彻底被消灭的信心。


To realize this opportunity, a sound strategy must rapidly be developed and executed.	为了将这一机会变成现实，亟待发展一个可靠的策略并加以施行。


In a recent article in the British scientific journal The Lancet , Oliver Sabot and I proposed such a strategy. The approach is simple: a redoubled effort to reduce infections and deaths rapidly in the malaria “heartland” (i.e., equatorial Africa and a handful of other areas around the world) should be accompanied by a campaign to roll back the disease from its current margins.	在最近一篇载于英国科学杂志《柳叶刀》的文章中，奥利弗·萨博（Oliver Sabot）和我一起提出了这样一个策略，该策略使用的方法很简单：加倍努力在疟疾“中心地区”（例如，赤道非洲和世界其他几个地区）迅速减少疟疾感染和死亡率，与此同时开展降低当前疟疾发病率的运动。


Malaria has natural limits, determined by latitude, altitude and, in some cases, human intervention.	疟疾有天然的范围，这是由经度和纬度，以及在有些情况下人类的干预决定的。


The countries at the fringe of this zone typically benefit from a range of factors that make complete elimination of malaria possible, including lower transmission of the disease, stronger health systems, and relative national wealth.	一些位于这样的区域边缘的国家就特别能从一系列因素中受益，这些因素包括较低的疾病传播率，较健全的医疗卫生系统以及国家比较高的富有程度，它们使彻底消灭疟疾成为可能。


Most importantly, these countries are not surrounded by malaria.	最重要的是，这些国家并没有被疟疾所包围。


As they successfully eliminate malaria, they will provide a new malaria-free anchor that will enable their neighbors, which have been pursuing aggressive control measures in the interim, to embark on their own eradication campaigns.	当这些国家成功地消灭了疟疾时，它们就提供一种新的“没有疟疾”的支点，这使在这个过程中追求积极的控制措施的它们的邻国，能够开始自己的消灭疟疾的运动。


In this way, malaria will literally be rolled back from its current borders.	通过这种方法，发生疟疾的范围确实能比当前的范围缩小很多。


This strategy has begun to emerge organically, without prompting from the global community.	这个策略已经在没有国际社会推进的情况下自发地运用了。


In the Pacific, Vanuatu and the Solomon Islands, at the far southeastern margin of the malaria endemic zone, have embarked on an eradication campaign with support from the Australian government.	在太平洋沿岸，在瓦努阿图以及所罗门群岛上得到澳大利亚政府支持的消灭疟疾的运动，在疟疾地方病流行的远东南地区已经开始了。


Across the globe, the Southern Africa Development Community has set a goal of eliminating malaria from its four southernmost members – Botswana, Namibia, South Africa, and Swaziland – by 2015.	在全球范围内，南部非洲发展共同体已经制定了到2015消灭其四个最南的成员国——博茨瓦纳、纳米比亚、南非和斯威士兰——国内的疟疾的目标。


To do so, they are in active discussions with their northern neighbors, and innovative cross-border collaborations are being developed, building on the model of the highly successful partnership between Mozambique, South Africa, and Swaziland.	为了实现这一目标，它们正积极的和它们的北部邻国进行讨论，并且依靠莫桑比克、南非和斯威士兰之间非常成功的伙伴关系模式的创新性跨区域合作也正在发展之中。


Other malaria margins where eradication efforts are underway are China, the Philippines, and Central America.	其他正在努力消灭疟疾的地区有中国、菲律宾和中美洲国家。


More than one million people die each year from malaria, most of them are children.	每年有100多万人死于疟疾，其中大部分是儿童。


Yet malaria is a preventable and treatable disease.	然而，疟疾却是一种可以预防和可以治愈的疾病。


The task of eliminating malaria, country by country, and eventually reaching global eradication, is underway.	一个接一个国家消灭疟疾，并最终达到全球消灭目标的消灭疟疾的任务正在进行中。


This time, we must not rest until it is completed.	这一次，我们不能在这一任务完成之前止步不前。


Why Big Oil Should Kill Itself	为何石油巨头应该自杀


LONDON – Now that oil prices have settled into a long-term range of $30-50 per barrel (as described here a year ago), energy users everywhere are enjoying an annual income boost worth more than $2 trillion.	伦敦—如今，石油价格已经安稳地位于每桶30—50美元的长期区间（如一年前的本文所述），世界各地的能源用户每年可以获得2万亿美元以上的收入提振。


The net result will almost certainly accelerate global growth, because the beneficiaries of this enormous income redistribution are mostly lower- and middle-income households that spend all they earn.	净结果几乎肯定可以加速全球增长，因为如此巨大的收入再分配的受益者大多是中低收入家庭，他们会把所有的收益都花掉。


Of course, there will be some big losers – mainly governments in oil-producing countries, which will run down reserves and borrow in financial markets for as long as possible, rather than cut public spending.	当然，也有大输家——主要是石油生产国政府，它们的储备下滑，只要有可能，它们就从金融市场上借钱而不是削减公共支出。


That, after all, is politicians’ preferred approach, especially when they are fighting wars, defying geopolitical pressures, or confronting popular revolts.	毕竟，这才是政客偏爱的方针，特别是当他们正在打仗、抗拒地缘政治压力或面对群众暴乱时。


But not all producers will lose equally.	但并非所有的生产者的损失都一样。


One group really is cutting back sharply: Western oil companies, which have announced investment reductions worth about $200 billion this year.	有一个群体确实遭到了重创：西方石油公司，今年它们宣布减少价值大约2,000亿美元的投资。


That has contributed to the weakness of stock markets worldwide; yet, paradoxically, oil companies’ shareholders could end up benefiting handsomely from the new era of cheap oil.	这导致了全球股市低迷； 但是，矛盾的是，石油公司股东可能最后还能从新的廉价石油时代获益。


Just one condition must be met.	只需要满足一个条件。


The managements of leading energy companies must face economic reality and abandon their wasteful obsession with finding new oil.	领先能源公司管理层必须面对经济现实，不再徒劳无益地沉迷于寻找新石油。


The 75 biggest oil companies are still investing more than $650 billion annually to find and extract fossil fuels in ever more challenging environments.	75家族大石油公司每年仍投资超过6,500亿美元用于寻找和开采存在于越来越困难的环境中的化石燃料。


This has been one of the greatest misallocations of capital in history – economically feasible only because of artificial monopoly prices.	这是史上规模最大的资本错配之一——其经济可行性完全依靠人为的垄断价格维持。


But the monopoly has fallen on hard times.	但在困难时期，垄断已被打破。


Assuming that a combination of shale development, environmental pressure, and advances in clean energy keep the OPEC cartel paralyzed, oil will now trade like any other commodity in a normal competitive market, as it did from 1986 to 2005.	假设页岩开发、环境压力和清洁能源的进步让欧佩克难以为继，石油将与其他所有正常竞争市场中的商品没有区别，1986—2005年间就是如此。


As investors appreciate this new reality, they will focus on a basic principle of economics: “marginal cost pricing.”	当投资者关注到这一新现实时，他们将把注意力集中在基本经济原理——“边际成本定价”上。


In a normal competitive market, prices will be set by the cost of producing an extra barrel from the cheapest oilfields with spare capacity.	在正常竞争市场中，价格由存在闲置产能的最廉价油田额外生产一桶石油的成本决定。


This means that all the reserves in Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Russia, and Central Asia would have to be fully developed and exhausted before anyone even bothered exploring under the Arctic ice cap or deep in the Gulf of Mexico or hundreds of miles off the Brazilian coast.	这意味着沙特阿拉伯、伊朗、伊拉克、俄罗斯和中亚的所有储量都必须充分开发和耗尽，然后才会有人有兴趣去勘探北冰洋冰盖和墨西哥湾或巴西海岸线外数百英里的深海中的石油。


Of course, the real world is never as simple as an economics textbook.	当然，真实世界不可能像经济学教科书那样简单。


Geopolitical tensions, transport costs, and infrastructure bottlenecks mean that oil-consuming countries are willing to pay a premium for energy security, including the accumulation of strategic supplies on their own territory.	地缘政治紧张局势、运输成本和基础设施瓶颈意味着石油消费国愿意为能源安全支付溢价，包括在本国囤积战略供给。


Nonetheless, with OPEC on the ropes, the broad principle applies: ExxonMobil, Shell, and BP can no longer hope to compete with Saudi, Iranian, or Russian companies, which now have exclusive access to reserves that can be extracted with nothing more sophisticated than nineteenth-century “nodding donkeys.”	尽管如此，在欧佩克摇摇欲坠的情况下，宽泛的原理会起作用：埃克森美孚、壳牌和英国石油不再希望与沙特、伊朗或俄罗斯公司竞争，后三者现在拥有独家储量，只需要十九世纪的“点头驴”技术就能开采。


Iran, for example, claims to produce oil for only $1 a barrel.	比如，伊朗宣称其每桶石油生产成本只有1美元。


Its readily accessible reserves – second only in the Middle East to Saudi Arabia’s –will be rapidly developed once international economic sanctions are lifted.	只要国际经济制裁取消，它的随时可用储量——在中东仅次于沙特阿拉伯——就可以迅速开发。


For Western oil companies,the rational strategy will be to stop oil exploration and seek profits by providing equipment, geological knowhow, and new technologies such as hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”) to oil-producing countries.	对西方石油公司而言，传统策略应该是停止石油勘探，通过向石油生产国提供设备、地理技能和新科技（如液压致裂法）挖掘利润。


But their ultimate goal should be to sell their existing oil reserves as quickly as possible and distribute the resulting tsunami of cash to their shareholders until all of their low-cost oilfields run dry.	但它们的最终目标应该是尽快卖掉现有石油储量，将获得的大量现金分配给股东，直到低成本油田开采殆尽。


That is precisely the strategy of self-liquidation that tobacco companies used, to the benefit of their shareholders.	这正是烟草公司曾经使用过的自我清盘策略，结果是股东受益。


If oil managements refuse to put themselves out of business in the same way, activist shareholders or corporate raiders could do it for them.	如果石油公司管理层拒绝以同样的方式处理业务，积极股东或公司掠夺者（corporate raider）会替他们做这件事。


If a consortium of private-equity investors raised the $118 billion needed to buy BP at its current share price, it could immediately start to liquidate 10.5 billion barrels of proven reserves worth over $360 billion, even at today’s “depressed” price of $36 a barrel.	如果私募股权投资者组成的财团筹集到购买英国石油所需要的1,180亿美元资金（以当前股价计算），它可能立刻开始清盘其105亿桶探明储量，即使按照当今每桶36美元的“超低”价格计算，也价值3,600亿美元。


There are two reasons why this has not happened – yet.	这一幕尚且没有发生，原因有二。


Oil company managements still believe, with quasi-religious fervor, in perpetually rising demand and prices.	石油公司管理层仍然带着近乎宗教般的热情相信，需求和价格将永远上涨。


So they prefer to waste money seeking new reserves instead of maximizing shareholders’ cash payouts.	因此他们宁可浪费钱去寻找新储量，也不愿意最大化股东的现金回报。


And they contemptuously dismiss the only other plausible strategy: an investment shift from oil exploration to new energy technologies that will eventually replace fossil fuels.	他们还对唯一可行的其他策略嗤之以鼻：将投资从石油开采转向最终将取代化石燃料的新能源技术。


Redirecting just half the $50 billion that oil companies are likely to spend this year on exploring for new reserves would more than double the $10 billion for clean-energy research announced this month by 20 governments at the Paris climate-change conference.	石油公司今年可能支出500亿美元用于新储量勘探，只要将其中的一半转变用途，就可以让这个月20国政府在气候变化巴黎大会上所算不得100亿美元清洁能源研究支出增加一倍多。


The financial returns from such investment would almost certainly be far higher than from oil exploration.	这些投资的财务回报几乎肯定要比石油勘探高得多。


Yet, as one BP director replied when I asked why his company continued to risk deep-water drilling, instead of investing in alternative energy: “We are a drilling business, and that is our expertise.	但是，当我问英国石油的一位董事为何英国石油宁可继续冒险进行深水钻井，而不去投资替代能源时，他回答说：“我们是钻井企业，这是我们的专长。


Why should we spend our time and money competing in new technology with General Electric or Toshiba?”	我们为什么要把时间和金钱用在与通用电气或东芝的新技术竞争上？ ”


As long as OPEC’s output restrictions and expansion of cheap Middle Eastern oilfields sheltered Western oil companies from marginal-cost pricing, such complacency was understandable.	只要欧佩克限产和中东廉价油田扩张使西方石油公司不必采用边际成本定价，这样的自满就不难理解。


But the Saudis and other OPEC governments now seem to recognize that output restrictions merely cede market share to American frackers and other higher-cost producers, while environmental pressures and advances in clean energy transform much of their oil into a worthless “stranded asset” that can never be used or sold.	但沙特和其他欧佩克政府现在似乎认识到，限产只能导致市场份额遭美国液压致裂生产者和其他高成本生产者的侵蚀，而环境压力和清洁能源的进步将它们的许多石油沦为毫无价值的“套牢资产”，用不了也卖不掉。


Mark Carney, Governor of the Bank of England, has warned that the stranded-asset problem could threaten global financial stability if the “carbon budgets” implied by global and regional climate deals render worthless fossil-fuel reserves that oil companies’ balance sheets currently value at trillions of dollars.	英格兰银行行长马克·卡尼（Mark Carney）警告说，如果全球和地区气候协议所隐含的“碳预算”导致石油公司资产负债表给予万亿美元估值的化石燃料储量变得一文不值，套牢资产问题可能威胁到全球金融稳定。


This environmental pressure is now interacting with technological progress, reducing prices for solar energy to near-parity with fossil fuels.	这一环境压力目前正在与技术进步形成合力，让太阳能价格向化石燃料靠拢。


As technology continues to improve and environmental restrictions tighten, it seems inevitable that much of the world’s proven oil reserves will be left where they are, like most of the world’s coal.	随着技术的继续进步和环境限制的收紧，大量世界探明石油储量不可避免地要留在原地，就像大部分煤炭。


Sheikh Zaki Yamani, the longtime Saudi oil minister, knew this back in the 1980s. “The Stone Age did not end,” he warned his compatriots, “because the cavemen ran out of stone.”	长期担任沙特石油部长的雅曼尼（Sheikh Zaki Yamani）早在20世纪80年代就知道了这一点：“石器时代结束的原因，”他警告他的同胞，“不是原始人把石头都用光了。


OPEC seems finally to have absorbed this message and realized that the Oil Age is ending.	欧佩克似乎终于吸收了这一信息，意识到石油时代正在结束。


Western oil companies need to wake up to the same reality, stop exploring, and either innovate or liquidate.	西方石油公司需要警醒于同样的现实，停止勘探活动，要么创新，要么清盘。


The Dark Side of Physics	物理学的暗面


PASADENA – Almost a century ago, the first galaxy beyond our own was discovered, and within a decade the theory that the universe is expanding was first proposed.	帕萨迪纳—近一个世纪前，我们第一次发现了银河之外的世界，此后不出十年，就第一次提出了宇宙正在扩张的理论。


Since then, astounding technological developments have contributed to revolutionary progress in physics, astronomy, cosmology, and the life sciences.	自此以后，日新月异的技术发展给物理学、天文学、宇宙学和生命科学带来了革命性进步。


Today, physics stands at a new threshold.	如今，物理学站在了新的门槛上。


On July 4, 2012, the international physics community witnessed a monumental discovery in the history of high-energy physics: a Higgs boson.	2012年7月4日，国际物理学界目睹了高能物理学史上划时代的发现：希格斯波色子。


The long-hypothesized Higgs boson is the necessary component that validates the Standard Model of elementary particles as a “blueprint” for the real universe.	希格斯波色子假说由来已久，它是作为现实宇宙“蓝图”的基本粒子标准模型成立的必要条件。


The Higgs boson provides mass for these particles; without it, the physical world, as we understand it, would have no atoms, chemistry, or life.	希格斯波色子为基本粒子提供质量； 没有它，我们所理解的真实世界就不会有原子，不会有化学，也不会有生命。


Finding what was, until then, just a theoretical prediction required one of the largest and most complex scientific undertakings ever attempted: the creation of the particle accelerator, the Large Hadron Collider, near Geneva.	此前，找到希格斯波色子只不过是一个理论预言。 这个预言需要人类所尝试过的最大、最复杂的科学实验：建立粒子加速器——位于日内瓦的大型强子对撞机（简称LHC）。


The research carried out at the LHC is now likely to steer our understanding of the universe from the smallest elementary particles to our study of cosmology.	目前，依靠LHC所进行的研究有望引导我们理解从最小的基本粒子到宇宙学研究的全部物理学。


From 2010 to 2012, the LHC produced the highest-energy proton-proton collisions ever; and even higher-energy collisions are anticipated in 2015.	2010—2012年间，LHC进行了最高能量的质子对撞； 2015年将进行更高能量的对撞。


Physicists had long expected the LHC to reveal a new sector of particles and fields associated with “electroweak symmetry breaking” and the dark matter of the universe.	长期以来，物理学家一直期待LHC揭示与“电弱对称性破缺”和宇宙暗物质有关的新的粒子和场的类别。


Two major experimental observations underpinned this expectation.	两个重要的实验发现支持了这一预期。


The first was the masses of the W and Z bosons – the messengers of the weak nuclear interactions, responsible, for example, for the shining sun.	首先是W玻色子和Z玻色子的质量。 W玻色子和Z玻色子是弱相互作用的介质，比如阳光照射就是有它们传递的。


The second was a large set of astrophysical observations, pointing to the necessity of a gravitational “scaffolding” in the universe: that is, the dark matter needed to prevent the stars and galaxies from flying apart.	其次是一大类天文物理学发现，指向宇宙中引力“脚手架”的必要性：即防止星系和银河分崩离析的暗物质。


Although the Higgs discovery may help us to understand the source of elementary particles’ mass (including its own), nature has surprised us in two further respects.	尽管希格斯波色子的发现有助于我们理解基本粒子质量（包括其本身）的来源，但大自然在两个更进一步的方面给了我们惊喜。


First, the measured mass of the Higgs boson renders the full theory “metastable” in the absence of any new physics phenomena.	首先，希格斯玻色子的测得质量带给我们整个理论的“亚稳态”，不需要任何新的物理现象。


In other words, the universe might have other, more energetically favorable configurations.	换句话说，宇宙可能有其他积极有利的设定。


Second, the LHC data seem to disfavor, though not exclude, the most aesthetically and mathematically pleasing new physics phenomenon, “supersymmetry,” which was theorized along with the Higgs boson before its actual discovery and is necessary to address quantum corrections.	其次，LHC数据似乎不支持（尽管没有排除）最具美感、在数学上最完美的新物理现象——“超对称”。 超对称现象在实际发现前便与希格斯玻色子一起得到了理论化，并且是解决量子修正的必要条件。


The persistence of the dark-matter conundrum, in combination with these considerations, might alter our fundamental ideas and predictions about what might follow the discovery.	长期存在的暗物质之谜以及这些问题可能改变我们的基本思想以及对该发现会带来什么的预测。


New ideas are now being formulated about the Higgs boson itself, opening a direct portal to the dark matter of the universe.	现在，新的思想围绕希格斯波色子本身产生，开启了通向暗物质和宇宙直接通到。


A concerted experimental and theoretical program has taken shape in the fields of particle physics, cosmology, astrophysics, and gravitational physics to discover a dark-matter particle candidate in the next decade or so.	粒子物理学、宇宙学、天文物理学和引力物理学等领域展开了联合实验和理论研究，以期发现下一个十年的暗物质例子候选。


What is at stake are paradigms that have held for the past 76 years, and that have been supported recently by spectacular measurements of the cosmos.	过去76年来所采用的、并且得到最新的宇宙宏观测量支持的范式岌岌可危。


Some in the world of physics might call this a crisis.	物理学界中有人称之为危机。


However, it is quite common for a theory to lack experimental backing.	但是，一个理论缺少实验支持乃是稀松平常之事。


All research into the universe and the physical world struggles to achieve a complete understanding.	所有对宇宙和现实世界的研究都致力于实现完全的理解。


In that sense, we are in perpetual crisis and at the threshold of discovery.	从这个角度讲，我们处于永恒的危机中，并且永远站在发现的门槛上。


It might be fairer to describe physics as being at a turning point or a crossroads.	说物理学正站在转折点或十字路口更加合适。


Physics provides the evolving core framework on which other fields of science are built.	物理学为其他科学领域提供了不断演化的核心基础框架。


And now, with the technological armory and plethora of data currently available, science can go far beyond any previous expectation and extrapolation. Indeed, in coming decades, everything will be susceptible to major revision as new cross-disciplines – and undisciplined threads of study – emerge.	如今，有了先进的技术和海量数据，随着交叉科学的兴起——并且研究不设边界——任何东西都有可能做出重大修正。


Quantum engineering teams are already springing up in academic and research institutes all around the world.	量子工程团队已开始在全世界学术和研究机构兴起。


The merging of computer science and engineering with neuroscience has already produced results that not long ago belonged only to science fiction.	计算机科学与工程和神经科学的结合已经产生了不久前还只存在于科幻小说中的成果。


Nature can seem complex, haphazard, and tricky; and it can strike us as simple, symmetrical, and beautiful.	大自然或许看似十分复杂，充满了狡黠和偶然； 它也可以通过它的简单、对称和优美震撼我们。


Either way, the quantum universe will continue to surprise us.	无论如何，量子世界将继续给我们带来惊奇。


Patriotism in the Age of Globalization	全球化时代的爱国主义


LONDON – The new fault line in politics, according to Marine Le Pen, leader of France’s far-right National Front, is between globalists and patriots.	伦敦—政治中的新断层线，用法国极右翼政党国民阵线领导人马琳·勒庞（Marine Le Pen）的话说，在于全球主义者和爱国主义者之间。


It is an argument similar to those being made by euroskeptics in the United Kingdom and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump in the United States.	这一观点和英国的欧元怀疑派和美国的共和党总统候选人唐纳德·特朗普（Donald Trump）类似。


It is, however, as false as it is dangerous.	但是，这一观点既错误，又危险。


Judging by the results of the second and final round of France’s regional elections on December 13, it is also an argument that French voters, at least, roundly rejected.	从12月13日的法国第二轮和最后一轮地区选举结果看，至少法国选民也有力地拒绝了这一观点。


They cast 73% of their ballots for the National Front’s rivals, depriving the party of even a single victory.	他们将73%的选票投给了国民阵线的对手，让该党连一场胜利都没有得到。


Le Pen accused the mainstream parties of ganging up on her, describing their cooperation as a denial of democracy.	勒庞指责主流政党结派反对她，称它们的合作是对民主的否定。


Her argument is, of course, a classic example of sour grapes; the entire point of a two-round voting system is to force parties and their supporters to seek a consensus and form partnerships.	当然，她这是典型的酸葡萄心理； 两轮选举制度的全部意义就在于迫使政党和它们的支持者寻找共识，形成合作。


Unless and until the National Front finds a way to win allies, it will not achieve an electoral breakthrough.	除非国民阵线设法赢得盟友，否则它就无法在选举中取得突破。


(The same is likely to prove true about Trump.)	（对特朗普来说也许也是如此。 ）


That is not to say that Le Pen’s claim – that those who vote for her party are the only true patriots – should be casually dismissed.	这并不是说勒庞的观点——投票支持她的政党的选民才是真正的爱国者——一无是处。


She has homed in on a powerful message, one with the potential to attract supporters from other parties.	她种下了一个强大的信念，有可能吸引其他党派的支持者。


That’s why it must be rebutted, both in France and elsewhere.	因此，必须从法国内部和外部反驳她的观点。


The assumption underlying such nationalist bombast – that a country’s interests are better served by being closed rather than open – is extremely dangerous.	这一民族主义的夸大其词——封闭比开放更有利于国家利益——的基本假设是非常危险的。


The belief that openness is treason and closure is patriotic is a rejection of the entire post-1945 framework of politics and policy in the developed world.	开放就是卖国，封闭就是爱国，这一信念是对1945年后发达世界政治和政策框架的全盘否定。


It is an attempt to turn back the clock to the interwar period, when the focus was on closing off: imposing onerous trade restrictions and persecuting or expelling minority groups.	这是试图开历史的倒车，回到两次大战之间的时代，当时的主题就是封闭：采取严厉的贸易限制，迫害或驱逐少数群体。


This was true even in the United States, which enacted the most restrictive immigration laws since the country’s founding.	就连美国也是如此——它实施了建国以来最严格的移民法。


The postwar years marked a complete change of direction, as countries opened up, allowing freer flows of trade, capital, ideas, and people.	战后几年标志着完全不同的方向，各国纷纷打开大门，允许更加自由的贸易、资本、思想和人事流动。


This process became known as globalization only after China and India joined in during the 1980s, but it had started long before.	这一过程在20世纪80年代中国和印度加入之后才被称为全球化，但其实早就已经开始。


It was globalization, after all, that created what in France became known as Les Trente Glorieuses – the 30 glorious years of rapidly rising living standards following the end of WWII.	毕竟，是全球化带来了法国人所谓的“光辉的三十年”（Les Trente Glorieuses）——二战结束后生活水平快速提高的三十年。


Le Pen and her fellow populists claim that globalization was either an act of foolish generosity that helped the rest of the world at the expense of the nation, or a phenomenon that benefited only the elites and not ordinary people.	勒庞和她的民粹主义追随者宣称，全球化要么是愚蠢的慷慨行为，慷国家之慨帮助全世界； 要么是只有利于精英而无益于人民的现象。


For them, patriotism means being harder-headed about protecting the national interest and adopting more democratic policies that help the working masses, not jet-setting fat cats.	对他们来说，爱国主义意味着强硬地保护国家利益，采取有助于工作的群众而不是坐地分赃的“肥猫”的更加民主的政策。


The second part of this argument – that the interests of ordinary people have been subordinated to those of the elite – must be heard and responded to.	这一观点的第二部分——普通人的利益需要顺从精英的利益——必须听进去并有所反应。


A democracy in which a majority feels neglected or exploited is not sustainable.	一个大多数人感到被忽视或被剥削的民主是难以为继的。


Either the government or the entire system will be overturned.	要么政府被推翻，要么整个制度被颠覆。


Elected officials clearly need to find answers to high unemployment and declining living standards.	当选官员显然需要找到失业率升高、生活水平降低的问题的答案。


What mainstream parties need to be make clear, however, is that the answers to those problems do not lie in closing borders or minds.	但是，主流政党需要澄清的是，这些问题的答案绝不在于关闭边境或头脑。


There is no example, anywhere in history, of a society or an economy that has prospered over the long term by rejecting globalism.	纵观历史，从未有哪个社会或经济体通过拒绝全球化实现长期繁荣。


Moreover, though openness may not guarantee prosperity, it has always been a prerequisite for growth.	此外，尽管开放未必带来繁荣，它永远是增长的前提条件。


To be sure, the optimal amount of openness is a matter of debate.	诚然，最优开放程度是一个可以争论的话题。


But the bigger, more productive arguments are about how to shape education, labor markets, scientific research, and social-welfare policies in order to help societies adapt to the world around them.	但更大、更有建设性的话题是如何制定教育、劳动力市场、科学研究和社会福利政策以帮助社会适应周边世界。


The patriotic choice – the national interest – has always consisted in crafting domestic policies that best take advantage of globalization.	爱国主义选择——即国家利益——永远是制定能最好地利用全球化的国内政策的组成部分。


For mainstream parties in France, the Conservatives in the UK, and Trump’s more internationally minded Republican rivals in the US, there is nothing to be gained from copying the arguments of their extremist counterparts.	对法国主流政党、英国保守党和美国特朗普的更有国际头脑的共和党对手而言，复制他们的极端主义对手的观点无济于事。


Doing so would yield crucial ground in the political battle over how best to serve the country and its people.	这样做只能丢掉政治斗争的关键领域——如何最好地服务于国家和人民。


Mainstream parties must reclaim the mantle of patriotism and redefine the national interest accordingly.	主流政党必须夺回爱国主义的大旗，据此重新定义国家利益。


In today’s world, the national interest lies in managing openness – not in throwing it away.	在当今世界，国家利益在于如何管理开放，而不在于放弃开放。


Mario Draghi’s Guns of August	马里奥·德拉基的八月炮火


WASHINGTON, DC – August has been a dangerous month in European history, but this year it could be the turning point for the eurozone – and perhaps for the world economy.	华盛顿——欧洲历史上8月一直是个危险的月份，但今年却有可能成为欧元区——甚至世界经济的转折点。


On July 26, Mario Draghi, President of the European Central Bank, declared that his institution would do “whatever it takes” to preserve the euro, and added: “Believe me, it will be enough.”	7月26日，欧洲央行行长马里奥·德拉基宣布欧洲央行将“不惜一切代价”保住欧元，并补充说：“相信我，我们肯定有足够的方法确保实现目标。 ”


Draghi’s strong – indeed, unprecedented – statement was widely interpreted as signaling that the ECB would soon revive its bond-purchase program, focusing on Spanish debt in particular.	德拉基前所未有的强势声明被广泛视为欧洲央行将很快重启债券购买计划的标志，而此次重启该计划西班牙债券将成为主要目标。


Stock markets around the world soared.	世界各地股市因此出现飙升。


Jens Weidemann of the Bundesbank immediately expressed reservations, but the next day German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President François Hollande issued a joint statement expressing their determination “to do everything in order to protect the eurozone.”	德意志银行行长魏德曼立刻表达了保留意见，但第二天，德国总理安格拉·默克尔和法国总统弗朗索瓦·奥朗德迅速发表联合声明，表达了“竭尽全力保护欧元区”的决心。


I recently argued that the ECB, working with the nascent European Stability Mechanism (ESM), was the only institution that could save the eurozone.	我不久前曾经提出欧洲央行与新成立的欧洲稳定机制（ESM）联手，才是拯救欧元区的唯一方法。


It could do so by buying Italian and Spanish bonds in the secondary market with the pre-announced intention of keeping their sovereign interest rates below a certain threshold for a certain time.	上述机构可以提前公布目标，在一段时间内从二级市场买入意大利和西班牙等国的债券，从而使两国的主权利率保持在设定的界限以下。


It is likely that Draghi’s statement will indeed be followed by ECB purchases of Spanish (and Italian) sovereign bonds.	德拉基发表声明后欧洲央行实际购买西班牙（和意大利）主权债券的可能性很大。


A man like Draghi would not have issued such a statement without believing that he could follow through on it.	像德拉基这样的人如果无法肯定能兑现承诺，就不会发表这样的声明。


But, if this is to become a decisive turning point in the eurozone crisis, three things must happen.	可如果想成为欧元区危机的决定性转折点，还必须具备三个条件。


First, the ECB’s renewed bond purchases must express the clear intention of reducing sovereign interest rates to sustainable levels, which are at least 200 basis points below their July averages.	首先，欧洲央行重启债券购买时必须明确要将主权利率降低到可持续水平的目标，而可持续水平至少要比七月份的平均利率低200个基点。


A high-level German diplomat reportedly dismissed Spain’s 6.5-7% interest rates recently, on the grounds that Spain borrowed at nearly the same rates in the 1990’s.	据悉一位德国高层外交官最近拒绝了西班牙提出的6. 5-7%的利率，理由是西班牙在20世纪90年代就以近乎相同的利率借过钱。


But that statement, amazingly, ignored Spain’s higher pre-euro inflation – thus confusing real and nominal rates – and more rapid GDP growth.	但令人惊讶的是，这种说法忽视了西班牙加入欧盟以前较高的通胀率，进而混淆了实际和名义利率，以及更快的GDP增长。


For countries that are following agreed reform programs, the ECB should commit itself to bringing down interest rates to levels compatible with projected inflation and growth rates, and announce how long (say, nine months) this will continue.	对那些执行既定改革方案的国家，欧洲央行应当致力于使利率下降至与预期通胀率和增长率相配套的水平，而且必须公布实现上述目标的期限（比方说九个月）。


A sporadic program without such announced objectives is unlikely to work, and could even be counterproductive, as private investors might well demand even higher returns because the growing ECB share of the debt would be considered senior, augmenting their risk.	缺少了上述公开目标的分散计划不太可能生效，甚至有可能产生副作用，因为私人投资者完全可以要求更高的回报，理由是欧洲央行不断扩大的债务份额完全可以视为优先债务，从而导致普通投资者的风险有所增强。


That would not happen if the ECB announced – and demonstrated – its determination to bring down interest rates, whatever it takes, for a significant period of time.	如果欧洲央行宣布——并且展示出在很长一段时间内不惜一切代价降低利率的决心，实际情况就不会是这样。


Doing so would allow the eurozone to establish the institutional and legal means to achieve greater cooperation and integration, as agreed at the European Council’s meeting in June.	这样做将使欧元区建立起进一步合作及一体化的制度和法律手段，就像欧洲议会在6月会议上达成一致的那样。


The second thing that must happen is that eurozone leaders and parliaments, with the cooperation of the courts, must be seen to push ahead with institutional reforms to establish not only the ESM, but also a banking union and partial debt mutualization.	必须做到的第二件事情是欧元区的领导人和议会必须与法院合作积极推进机构改革，从而在建立欧洲稳定机制的同时建立银行工会，实现部分债务共同化。


But, while greater merging of economic sovereignty is the only long-term solution to the eurozone’s woes, such reforms cannot happen very quickly, which is why the ECB’s role is so crucial.	但因为继续加深经济主权一体化是解决欧元区困境的唯一长期方案，所以这样的改革不会很快达到目标。 欧洲央行的作用也因此变得极为关键。


The eurozone can no longer sustain continued uncertainty and high real interest rates in the peripheral countries, so the ECB must provide a solid and credible bridge to the future.	欧元区再也无法承受周边国家持续的不确定性和高企的实际利率，因此欧洲央行必须搭建起通往未来的坚实可靠的桥梁。


Finally, the adjustment programs themselves must be carefully re-calibrated.	最后，调整计划本身必须经过仔细的验证。


It should be clear by now that excessive, front-loaded austerity measures tend to be self-defeating, because they trigger a downward spiral of output, employment, and tax revenues.	我们应该清楚的看到，前紧后松的过度紧缩措施往往有可能弄巧成拙，因为这些措施会引发产量、就业和税收的螺旋式下降。


Indeed, the International Monetary Fund’s most recent report on the eurozone says as much (if cautiously).	其实，国际货币基金组织欧元区的最新报告也谨慎地表达了类似的看法。


The pace of deficit reduction must be slowed, particularly in Spain, because output is determined in the short run by demand, and private demand cannot replace public demand until a degree of faith in the future is restored.	削减赤字的步伐必须放缓，特别是在西班牙，因为产量在短期内由需求决定，而除非对未来的信心在一定程度上得以恢复，否则私人需求就无法替代公共需求。


This move toward support of effective demand must be combined with the kind of structural reforms that will allow more rapid, supply-side growth in the longer term.	上述支持有效需求的行动从长远看必须与能实现快速供应增长的结构性改革相结合。


If these three steps – an ECB bond-buying program to hold down sovereign interest rates, concrete progress on establishing a real economic union, and realistic revision of current adjustment programs – could be achieved as a package, the resources that the ECB would need to use for its bond purchases would drop, because credibility would be restored.	如果这三个步骤——即欧洲央行控制主权利率的债券买入计划，建立真正经济联盟的具体进展以及对当前调整方案从实际出发的修改——能够最终一揽子实现，那么欧洲央行需要用于债券购买的资源将会下降，因为信誉将会有所恢复。


Even if there is further bad news for Europe – from Greece, for example, or from a sharper-than-expected slowdown in China – the eurozone could begin to move out of crisis mode this month.	即使将来欧洲还将面对更多的坏消息——比方说希腊问题，或者中国经济放缓的幅度超出预期——欧元区也可能从本月开始走出危机模式。


But that is possible only if, this time, the “big bazooka” really is put in place.	但这次只有“重型武器”真正到位才有可能实现这样的目标。


Otherwise, the eurozone’s position – financially, politically, and socially – will soon become undefendable.	否则，欧元区的经济、政治和社会地位将很快变得不可救药。


Brilliant Blunders	杰出的错误


BALTIMORE – Thomas Edison is reputed to have said, “I have not failed.	巴尔的摩—据说托马斯·爱迪生曾说：“我从没有失败过。


I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”	我只是发现了10,000种不对的办法。


This statement sums up a fundamental – but often misunderstood – truth about scientific inquiry.	”这句话总结了一条科学研究的基本真理——但这条真理经常被错误地理解。


Progress in science – as in any creative discipline – is not a direct march to the answer, but a complex, zigzag path, involving many false starts and blind alleys.	科学——以及其他所有创造性学科——的进步并不是通往答案的笔直大道，而是一条曲折坎坷的道路，其中包括了各种错误的起点和歧路。


Blunders are not only inevitable; they are essential to innovative thinking, because they point the way for other explorers.	错误不但是不可避免的； 也是创新性思想的必要条件，因为它们为其他探索者指明了方向。


One may wonder whether today’s highly competitive, funding-starved scientific atmosphere, in which publications and citations have become a primary criterion for success, can accommodate such mistakes.	你也许会感到好奇，当今高度竞争、争抢资金、以发表数量和引用数量作为成功的首要标准的科学界能否容忍这些错误。


The simple answer is yes.	简单的回答是肯定的。


Indeed, they are as important as ever – and not only in academia.	事实上，这些错误和过去一样重要——并且不仅仅是学术界才是如此。


In fact, the entire scientific method is based on the notion that discovering what does not work is vital to learning what does.	事实上，整一套科学方法都建立在发现什么不管用是寻找什么管用的关键这一概念的基础上。


Any scientific theory must be falsifiable – that is, based on existing observations or experimental results.	任何科学理论都必须是可证伪的，即建立在已有的观察或实验结果的基础上。


For a theory to be considered scientific, it must yield specific predictions of future observations or experimental results.	对于被认为是科学的理论，必须能够产生关于未来观察或实验结果的具体预测。


If those observations or results contradict the predictions, the theory is discarded, or at least must be modified.	如果这些观察或结果与预测相矛盾，理论就被推翻，或至少需要作出修改。


The mistakes that are integral to scientific progress are not those that result from haste, sloppiness, or inexperience.	成为科学进步一部分的错误并不是那些因为轻率、马虎或经验不足所产生的错误。


Rather, they are the mistakes that arise from thoughtful, meticulous experimentation based on bold ideas – the kind of ideas that can lead to major breakthroughs.	相反，它们是来自深思熟虑、大胆假设、小心实验求证的错误——来自那些可能带来重大突破的思想。


Fred Hoyle, one of the twentieth century’s greatest astrophysicists, provided a perfect example of such a “brilliant blunder.”	二十世纪最伟大的天体物理学家之一弗雷德·霍伊尔（Fred Hoyle）提供了这一“杰出的错误”的完美例子。


Hoyle and two of his colleagues proposed what became known as the Steady State model of the universe, according to which the universe did not evolve following the so-called “big bang” (a term that Hoyle coined); instead, it was constant, remaining the same throughout eternity.	霍伊尔和两位同事提出了现在被称为稳态（Steady State）的宇宙模型，根据这一模型，宇宙在所谓的“大爆炸”（这个术语也是霍伊尔先使用的）并没有发生演化； 而是保持恒定状态并一直维持到永恒。


The idea was brilliantly elegant: just as our universe is homogeneous (the same at every point in space) and isotropic (looking the same in all directions), it remains the same at every point in time.	这一思想非常漂亮：正如我们的宇宙是同质的（空间的每一点都是相同的）、各向同性的（所有方向看上去都一样），因此它在每一个时点都是相同的。


While the Steady State theory was eventually falsified – our universe is expanding, and it most likely started from a big bang – it energized the entire field of cosmology, because it brought into sharp focus the questions that had to be addressed.	尽管稳态理论最终被证伪了——我们的宇宙是扩张的，并且极有可能以大爆炸为起点——但它刺激了整个宇宙学，因为他把必须解决的问题拿到了聚光灯下。


In fact, currently fashionable models of the multiverse – the concept that our universe is but one of a huge ensemble of universes – are consistent with the idea that they are collectively in a kind of steady state.	事实上，最新流行的多元宇宙论——我们的宇宙是多个宇宙的巨大合体——便与它们总体上处于一种稳态的观点相符。


The nineteenth-century physicist William Thomson, later known as Lord Kelvin, made his own brilliant blunder when he calculated that the Earth was less than 100 million years old – about fifty times younger than the age deduced from modern radiometric measurements.	十九世纪物理学家威廉·汤姆孙（William Thomson），即后来的开尔文勋爵（Lord Kelvin）也犯过杰出的错误——他测算地球的寿命不超过1亿年——比用现代辐射测量测定的年龄年轻五十倍。


Though Kelvin’s estimate was seriously flawed, the effort remains central to the history of knowledge, because it applied real science – the laws of physics – to what had long been a subject of vague speculation.	尽管开尔文的估算出现了严重的错误，但他的努力仍在知识史中占有中心地位，因为他将真正的科学——物理学定律——应用于长期以来只靠模糊猜测的问题。


Kelvin’s insights helped to launch a fruitful dialogue between geologists and physicists – a dialogue that eventually resolved even problems related to the length of time needed for Darwin’s theory of evolution to operate.	开尔文的洞见帮助引发了地质学家和物理学家间卓有成效的对��——这场对话的甚至解决了关于达尔文的进化论实施起来需要多久的问题。


And the oversight that warped Kelvin’s estimate – the possibility that fluid motion could efficiently transport heat within the Earth’s interior – turned out to be critical to understanding plate tectonics and continental drift.	而导致开尔文测算失准的疏忽——流体运动可以在地球内部有效传热的可能性——后来也成为理解板块构造论和大陆漂移学说的关键。


Startup companies exemplify the potential benefits of risk-taking.	创业公司则是冒险的潜在收益的范例。


While only about 49% of manufacturing startups and 37% of information startups survive for four or more years, those that do have managed to produce breakthrough innovations.	只有49%的制造业创业企业和37%的信息产业制造企业能活过四年，但越过了这个门槛的企业都能推出突破性创新。


Tom Watson, Jr., who led IBM through decades of strong growth, is known for having supported brilliant blunders.	领导IBM实现几十年强劲增长的小汤姆·沃森（Tom Watson, Jr. ）是著名的支持杰出的错误的例子。


As he put it, “We should have the courage to take risks when they are thoughtful risks….We must forgive mistakes which have been made because someone was trying to act aggressively in the company’s interest.”	他说：“我们应该有勇气冒险，只要所冒之险是有思想的……我们必须原谅错误，只要错误原因是有人为了公司利益而采取了激进行为。 ”


Funding agencies for academic research should adopt a similar philosophy, awarding a certain share of financing to thoughtful, unconventional proposals – those deemed risky, owing to a relatively low probability of success, but that could lead to important discoveries.	学术研究的出资机构也应该采取类似的思想，拿出一部分资金用于有思想的、非常规的方案——由于成功概率较低，这些方案被认为风险很高，但它们可能带来重要发现。


Such a scheme would create opportunities to take advantage of serendipity – a major component of scientific discovery.	这样的机制能够为抓住意外发现创造机会，而意外发现乃是科学发现的主要组成部分。


Until about a decade ago, the Space Telescope Science Institute adopted a similar policy for allocating observation time for the Hubble Space Telescope.	直到大约十年前，空间望远镜科学研究所（Space Telescope Science Institute）才采取了类似的政策分配哈勃空间望远镜的观测时间。


In addition, each year, the institute’s director was allotted a certain amount of discretionary time to grant to special projects that he or she deemed worthwhile.	此外，每年该研究所主任都能获得一定数量自由裁量观测时间分配权，可以授予他所认为有价值的特别项目。


In 1995, Robert Williams used that time to take a major risk: he aimed the telescope at a seemingly uninteresting area for nearly ten days.	1995年，罗伯特·威廉姆斯（Robert Williams）用这笔时间冒了一个很大的险：将望眼镜对准一个看似令人兴味阑珊的区域长达十天时间。


The result was an image of more than 3,000 galaxies some 12 billion light-years away – the so-called Hubble Deep Field.	结果看到了120光年外相当于3,000多个银河大小的影像——即所谓的哈勃深空（Hubble Deep Field）。


Likewise, closer to home, as many as half of our discoveries of new medicines have originated from accidents.	类似地，在与我们距离更近的医疗领域，多大一半的新药最都是源于偶然。


For example, isoniazid was initially tested as a tuberculosis drug; iproniazid, one of its derivatives, later proved to be effective in the treatment of depression.	比如，异烟肼最初是作为结核病药物接受测试的； 而其衍生药物异烟酰异丙肼后来证明在治疗抑郁症方面很有效果。


Space for brilliant blunders is vital to achieving the kind of creative breakthroughs that drive scientific progress.	杰出的错误能获得多大空间是实现创造性突破、推动科学进步的关键。


It is time for funding institutions to recognize that.	出资机构应该认识到这一点。


The Bank of England’s Knockout Artist	英格兰银行的“出局”艺术家


LONDON – In Canada, if you say you come from London, the natives often ask if you mean London, Ontario, or London, England.	伦敦—在加拿大，如果你说你来自伦敦，本地人会问你是安大略的伦敦还是英格兰的伦敦。


I always find the question somewhat irritating, perhaps revealing the persistence of an arrogant imperial mindset.	这个问题总让我感到相当懊恼，这或许是顽固的帝国主义无知心态吧。


But soon, perhaps, they will no longer need to ask: in London, we are all Canadians now.	但是，或许没过多久，他们就不必再出此问了：在伦敦，我们现在都是加拿大人。


With what one commentator described as “his rock star looks and PR charm,” Mark Carney, the former governor of the Bank of Canada, has taken the city by storm in his first weeks as Governor of the Bank of England.	一位评论家说他：“和摇滚明星一样帅，和公关一样有魅力。 ”前加拿大银行行长马克·卡尼（Mark Carney）履新英格兰银行行长第一周就带来了一场风暴。


Change is the order of the day at the Old Lady of Threadneedle Street.	变革是当下英格兰银行的主题。


Out goes the fusty old inflation-targeting regime, with its fixation on the consumer price index and disregard for financial-sector imbalances.	过时的通胀目标机制已经一去不返，紧盯消费物价指数、无视金融部门失衡的日子已经结束。


In comes a brave new world of “state-contingent threshold-based forward guidance,” complete with three conditional “knockouts” that would cause the guidance to be changed.	到来的是一个全新的“或有的、基于阈值的前瞻性指引”世界，它还有三个导致指引改变的“出局条件”（knockout）。


We have had to learn a whole new lexicon of central-bank speak.	我们得迎来对央行用词的新解释了。


These are heady times at the BoE (in the heart of the financial district of Ontario-on-Thames).	这是英格兰银行（位于泰晤士河畔的安大略的金融区核心）的兴奋期。


The simple point that Carney made in his first policy pronouncement was that interest rates will remain unchanged, and the BoE’s variant of quantitative easing will remain in place, at least until unemployment falls below 7% (from its current rate of 7.8%).	卡尼在其第一次政策公告中只说了很简单的一点，即利率将维持不变，英格兰银行版量化宽松将继续实施，至少在失业率降至7%以下（当前为7. 8%）之前是如此。


Though it all sounded straightforward, markets were confused.	尽管卡尼的话非常直白，但市场还是感到困惑。


The pound initially fell sharply, and then recovered, while long-term government borrowing rates have risen by around 30 basis points.	英镑先是暴跌，然后反弹，而长期政府借贷利率上升约30个基点。


This outcome may not have been what the new governor intended, but it is perhaps not surprising.	这样的结果或许不是新行长的初衷，但或许也不令人惊奇。


Though forward guidance is a useful part of the modern central banker’s tool kit, the Anglo-Canadian version on display in London is highly complex, mainly because it has been shoehorned into a policy framework designed for another purpose.	尽管前瞻性指引是现代央行行长工具箱中颇为有用的组成部分，但在伦敦出现的这个盎格鲁-加拿大版本相当的复杂，这主要是因为它是被强行塞入一个为了其他目的设计的政策框架内的。


There are four related problems.	有四个相关问题。


The first is that the United Kingdom retains policymaking by committee.	第一个问题是英国的决策仍是委员会制。


To his credit, Carney has succeeded in persuading most of his new colleagues on the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) to sign up to the new approach (we now know there was one holdout).	卡尼成功地说服了货币委员会（MPC）大部分新同事同意了新方针（现在我们知道有一个人没有同意）。


That could not be taken for granted.	这并非理所当然之事。


Their views have often been split in recent years.	近几年来，MPC成员常常意见相左。


But individual voting remains in place, so Carney is not in sole charge of policymaking, as he was at the Bank of Canada.	但个人投票机制仍在，因此卡尼并不能像他在加拿大银行时独力决定政策。


Any future commitments are conditional on keeping a majority of the committee in line.	任何未来承诺都必须以获得委员会多数同意为前提。


That leads to the second problem: the so-called knockouts – the other factors that can change the direction of policy – are clearly matters of judgment, not of fact.	这就导致了第二个问题：所谓的出局条件——其他可能改变政策方向的因素——显然是判断问题，而不是事实问题。


The first knockout would occur if, “in the MPC’s view, it is more likely than not that CPI inflation 18 to 24 months ahead will be 0.5 percentage points or more above the 2% target.”	第一个出局条件将在“MPC认为未来18到24月的CPI通胀率高出2%的目标率0. 5个百分点的可能性大于50%”时发生。


The second is that “medium-term inflation expectations no longer remain sufficiently well anchored.”	第二个出局条件是“中期通胀预期不再能够充分锚定”。


There is plenty of scope for different judgments on both issues, neither of which lends itself to definitive answers based on solid numbers.	对于这两个问题，都存在产生不同判断的足够空间，两者都没有基于具体数字的确定回答。


And, sadly, when it comes to forecasting inflation, the BoE’s record has not been very good.	此外还有一个坏消息：英格兰银行预测通胀的记录可不怎么样。


The final knockout – which would occur if “the Financial Policy Committee (FPC) judges that the stance of monetary policy poses a significant threat to financial stability” – points to the third problem.	最后一个出局条件——将在“金融政策委员会（FPC）判断货币政策立场对金融稳定性构成了重大威胁”时发生——指向第三个问题。


The FPC is part of the complex new UK regulatory structure, in which the former Financial Services Authority has been split in two: a prudential and business-conduct regulator and a new body to monitor financial stability.	FPC是英国复杂的监管结构的一部分。 在英国的监管结构中，原先的金融服务局被拆成了两部分：一个审慎的商业行为监管部门和一个新的金融稳定性监视部门。


The new FPC must give its advice publicly to the MPC when it has concerns.	新的FPC必须在其有疑问时以公开方式向MPC提供意见。


The FPC, it should be emphasized, is chaired by the BoE’s governor, so there is an element of smoke and mirrors here.	应该强调的是，FPC主席由英格兰银行行长兼任，因此这里头就有可能有猫腻。


But its composition is different from that of the MPC, so its view on a particular policy stance may be different as well, and here, too, the governor has only one vote.	但其组成不同于MPC，因此其对特定政策立场的观点也可以不同，而且英格兰银行行长只有一份投票权。


Some argue that it would have been simpler to merge the two, and the unwieldiness of the new means of articulating policy suggests that this might indeed have been a good idea.	有人指出，把两者合并能让事情变得更简单，而阐明政策的新方式的笨拙表明这或许真的是个好主意。


The BoE’s governor is now in the odd position of being invited to knock himself out – and in public, too.	英格兰银行行长目前的处境相当微妙，他被要求把他自己赶出局-而且还是以公开的方式。


That would be fun to watch.	这将是个颇有意思的场面。


The fourth problem is the most fundamental.	第四个问题最为根本。


The government has chosen not to change the BoE’s formal mandate.	政府选择了不改变英格兰银行的正式使命。


Its prime objective remains price stability, with real-economy factors relegated to the second order of importance.	它的主要目标仍是价格稳定，实体经济因素被降格为第二等重要的目标。


By contrast, the US Federal Reserve has a dual mandate: price stability and full employment.	相反，美联储有双重使命：价格稳定和充分就业。


Of course it must continuously balance the two, but both have equal weight.	当然它必须时刻平衡这两个使命，但它们的重要性是一样的。


It is the failure of the UK government to amend the statute that dictates the complex structure of knockouts that the BoE’s ingenious staff has been obliged to devise.	英国政府修改约束才华横溢的英格兰银行成员负责设计的出局条件的复杂结构的法律的做法是一场失败。


The unemployment threshold, linked to forward guidance, can be seen as a backdoor way of adding a second objective.	与前瞻性指引挂钩的失业阈值可以视为添加第二目标的后门。


But one would surely not start from there if that were the long-term policy aim.	但如果这是长期政策目标，你就一定不会以此为起点。


It would have been far clearer to address the issue head on and change the BoE’s mandate.	如果正面解决这个问题并改变英格兰银行的使命，情况就会清晰很多。


That would have painted the new regime with a veneer of democratic legitimacy, giving it greater authority.	这会给新机制披上民主合法性的外衣，给予它更大的权力。


The government, however, decided not to open up the issue in parliament.	但是，政府决定不在议会中开启这个问题。


The objectives of the new monetary-policy approach are admirable.	新货币政策方针的目标值得追求。


The UK economy, while moving forward, is still operating well below capacity.	英国经济尽管仍在向前，但仍远为到达应有产能。


But to keep all these balls in the air, and avoid knocking himself out, Carney will need all the creativity and agility of that other great Canadian export – Cirque du Soleil.	但要让所有问题都不落地，同时又不让自己出局，卡尼需要像加拿大的另一样全球知名的东西——太阳剧团一样富有创造力和灵活性。


Marketing Nationalism in China	中国的市场化民族主义


Explanations abound for the fevered anti-Japanese protests that broke out across China last month.	上月中国国内爆发了群情激愤的反日抗议，原因颇多。


From the Chinese perspective, of course, the blame falls on the Japanese government for its reluctance to apologize for the crimes Japan committed in WW II.	从中国人的角度来看，日本政府迟迟不愿为二战时候它在中国所犯下的罪行道歉，当然应该谴责。


But the Chinese media also played an ignominious role, publishing slanted articles on Japan that helped to fan the fire.	但是中国媒体却通过刊登煽动群众怒火的反日本的文章，扮演了一个不光彩的角色。


Nationalism has been a prominent element in Chinese media in recent years.	民族主义是中国媒体近年来一个颇为突出的特点。


Strident articles critical of the United States, Japan, and Taiwan appear with increasing frequency and receive ever more prominent placement.	对美国、日本和台湾进行尖锐批评的报道出现频率越来越高，在版面上的位置也越来越突出。


Many see the government’s hand behind this trend, but focusing on official influence risks overlooking how market pressures have pushed China’s media in this direction.	很多人都看到了政府在此次事件背后的操纵之手，把讨论重点放在了官方影响的风险性上，而忽略了市场压力如何将中国媒体推往这个方向。


Before China began opening its economy in 1978, all newspapers and magazines were “Party newspapers” and “Party magazines.”	1978年中国开放经济之前，所有的报纸和杂志是“党报”和“党的杂志”。


Media bosses were appointed and controlled by the government.	媒体老板是由政府指定和控制的。


Journalists and editors were, in effect, government officials.	记者和编辑事实上是政府官员。


Needless to say, all operating costs were born by the Communist Party and the state, and nobody was much concerned about making money.	不用说，所有的营运成本是由共产党和国家负担，并且没人在意是否盈利。


The main concern was not attracting readers, listeners, and viewers, but avoiding political mistakes.	主要考虑的不是吸引读者、听众和观众，而是避免政治错误。


For newspapers and magazines, circulation was guaranteed by the government, which urged people to “study the Party newspapers” and forced work units to buy them.	对报纸和杂志来说，发行量是由政府保证的，这促使人们开始“学习党报”并迫使工作单位购买报纸。


Radio and TV enjoyed the same built-in audience.	电台和电视台也享受同样的固定受众。


In the 30 years following the establishment of the People’s Republic of China, no media outlet ran even a single commercial advertisement.	在中华人民共和国建国后的三十年内，没有任何媒体刊登过甚至一则商业广告。


As Deng Xiaoping’s reforms evolved, and especially after Deng’s “tour of the South” in 1992, when he signaled permission for high-speed marketization of the economy, China’s media changed beyond recognition.	当邓小平的改革来临，尤其是在邓小平1992年“南巡讲话”之后发出了允许经济高速市场化的信号时，中国媒体的改革开始翻天覆地。


Whereas in 1978 there were only 186 newspapers and a handful of magazines and broadcast outlets, today China has roughly 2,200 newspapers, 9,000 magazines, 1,000 radio stations, and 420 TV stations, plus a growing proliferation of cable TV outlets.	尽管1978年的时候中国仅有186份报纸、少数杂志和几个广播电台，如今却大约有2,200份报纸，9,000份杂志，1,000个电台和420个电视台，外加一个正在迅速庞大的有线电视网。


Most of these outlets no longer receive full financial support from the government and must rely on advertising revenue to survive and grow.	大部分这些媒体不再从政府那里接受所有的经济支持，并且必须依赖于广告收入来生存和扩大。


What topics do consumers most care about?	读者最关注什么话题？


One is government corruption.	一个是政府腐败。


As economic inequities and social conflict in China have grown more acute, ordinary people have become increasingly angry.	当中国的经济不平等和社会冲突变得更为尖锐时，普通民众也变得越加愤怒。


In these circumstances, many on the business side of the Chinese media regard critical reports on crime and official corruption as a powerful weapon in the fight for greater market share and profitability.	在这些环境下，很多站在中国媒体商业角度上的人把对犯罪和政府腐败的批评性报道看作争取更大市场份额和收益的有力武器。


Owing to great sensitivity about stories that cast China’s leadership in a bad light, these popular reports are frequently banned, editors are fired, and media outlets that publish or broadcast them are often punished.	由于这些对中国领导层不利的故事极为敏感，因此这些广受欢迎的报道通常被禁止，编辑因此被撤职，刊登或播报它们的媒体通常受到处罚。


In some cases, they are shut down.	有时候，甚至被关闭。


Prevented from criticizing the country’s leaders and reporting fully and objectively on domestic affairs, China’s media often finds it expedient to turn its critical gaze outwards.	由于不能批评国家领导人或详细客观地报道国内事务，权宜之下，中国媒体通常把批评矛头指向国外。


This is politically safe, since, in one sense, to criticize the outside world, especially countries such as Japan and the US, is to praise China’s government.	从政治上来说，这是安全的，因为从某种角度而言，批评外面的世界，尤其是日本和美国这样的国家，就是表扬中国政府。


It is also profitable.	这样做也有利可图。


Even as China’s position in the world continues to rise and its people become more self-confident, China’s history of weakness before the Western powers and Japan sustains a “victim culture” that leaves most Chinese sensitive to any foreign challenge.	尽管中国在世界上的地位日益提升，人民也开始变得更为自信，但是中国在西方力量和日本维持“难民文化”之前的那段衰弱的历史让大部分中国人对任何外国挑战十分敏感。


Publishing jingoistic, anti-foreign articles plays to national sensitivities that always simmer, and thus can easily be brought to a boil, with obvious benefits for the bottom line.	出版主张强硬外交政策、反外国的文章总是能引发密云不雨的民族敏感情绪，并很容易地将其演变为大爆发，其结果就是带来显而易见的利益。


A personal anecdote serves to illustrate how the market, as much as government censorship by the Department of Propaganda and the Press and Publications Administration, is often responsible for this type of editorial decision.	我的一段亲身经历能够说明市场、以及宣传部门和新闻出版管理部门的政府审查是如何影响这一类的编辑决定。


A few years ago, the editors of a Beijing-based weekly with which I am acquainted were deadlocked over which article to put on their front page.	几年前，我认识的一家北京周报的几个编辑为哪一篇文章应该放在头版而僵持不下。


The choice was between a minor story critical of Taiwan and a larger piece about a domestic issue of potentially historic significance.	他们得在一片批评台湾的小文章和一篇有关国内问题的大幅报道中做出选择，后者可能具有重大历史意义。


Unable to get his staff to reach a consensus, the chief executive decided to ask the newspaper’s distributor for his opinion.	由于主编无法使他的员工达成一致，他决定向报纸的发行人征求意见。


The distributor had not graduated from high school, but he knew readers’ tastes well.	发行人高中也未毕业，但是他对读者的口味了如指掌。


“Condemn Taiwan, of course,” he said.	“当然批评台湾，”他说。


The chief executive issued his order accordingly.	于是主编履行了他的命令。


While reports that cater to the sometimes virulent nationalist sentiments of readers, viewers, and listeners can succeed in garnering a larger market share – as in any other capitalist country – they can also mislead.	尽管有时候迎合读者、观众和听众颇为刻毒的民族主义情绪能保证成功获得更多的市场份额——就像任何其他的资本主义国家一样——但这也可能会使他们受到误导。


The media may make money, but as the recent anti-Japan protests suggests, an excess of such market-driven jingoism can damage a nation’s interests and international standing.	媒体也许能够盈利，但是正如最近的反日抗议所暗示的那样，这种市场利益驱动下的过度侵略主义会有伤一个国家的利益和国际地位。


As the old Chinese expression goes, qihu, nanxia : “Once one gets on the back of a tiger, it is hard to get off.”	这正应了中国的一句老话：骑虎难下。