According to Article 9 of the constitution, drafted by American lawyers in 1946, when Japan was under Allied occupation, Japan renounces “war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as means of settling international disputes.”	根据由美国律师起草于1946年的该宪法第九条，当日本处于盟军占领状态时，日本放弃“将战争作为国家主权以及将威胁使用武力作为解决国际争端手段”的权利。


The new interpretation would allow Japan to use military force in support of an ally if Japanese security is under threat.	重新解释后，日本将能够在日本人安全受到威胁时使用武力支持盟国。


Abe chose to reinterpret the constitution because revising it would require the approval of two-thirds of the Japanese Diet.	安倍之所以选择重新解释，是因为修改宪法需要获得日本议会三分之二多书批准。


Given that most Japanese are still allergic to military force, securing the necessary votes would have been impossible.	考虑到大部分日本人仍对武力深恶痛绝，想要保证获得必要的赞成票几无可能。


The reinterpretation will almost certainly result in protests from China and South Korea against resurgent Japanese militarism.	重新解释宪法几乎可能会导致中国和韩国抗议日本军国主义死灰复燃。


Because Abe is the nationalist grandson of a former prime minister who was once arrested as a war criminal, and because he has paid public tribute to soldiers who died for the emperor in World War II, these protests might seem reasonable.	由于安倍是前战犯的外孙，又由于他公开参拜在二战中为大日本帝国捐躯的士兵，因此中韩的抗议十分合理。


Abe’s break with Japan’s pacifist consensus is beyond doubt.	安倍与日本和平主义共识的决裂是显而易见的。


But the circumstances under which Japan would use force are so restricted that a revival of militarism is still a very long way off.	但日本能够使用武力的条件十分严格，因此军国主义复辟难于上青天。


More worrying is the effect on Japanese democracy: Elected governments do not simply change the meaning of the constitution without even bothering to get parliamentary support.	更可担忧的是这对日本民主的影响：民选政府不会在连议会支持都不屑争取的情况下悍然修改宪法含义。


There is, however, an odd contradiction in Abe’s nationalism.	但是，安倍的民族主义有一个奇怪的矛盾。


Constitutional pacifism was part of the postwar order imposed by the United States during occupation and largely supported by the Japanese people, who were tired of war.	宪法规定的和平主义乃是美国占领日本期间所施加的战后秩序的一部分，并受到绝大部分厌恶战争的日本人的支持。


Unlike in Germany, Japan had no Hitler or Nazi party on which to blame their wartime atrocities.	与德国不同，日本没有希特勒和纳粹党来承担战时暴行罪责。


What needed to be purged instead, postwar reformers believed, was a specific form of Japanese militarism, rooted in emperor worship, the samurai tradition, authoritarian “feudalism,” and so on.	相反，战后改革者相信，需要清除的乃是植根于帝国崇拜、武士道传统和极权“封建制度”等的具体的军国主义形式。


Much in the remaking of Japan after 1945 is still to be admired: democracy, women’s suffrage, land reform, freedom of speech.	1945年以来的日本重建过程至今仍有不少令人尊敬之处：民主、妇女选举权、土地改革、言论自由等。


But taking away Japan’s sovereign right to use military force had one major consequence: Japanese security was put almost entirely into American hands, reducing Japan to the status of a vassal state.	但将动武权从主权权利中剔除具有一个重要后果：日本的安全几乎完全交给了美国，这让日本沦为附庸国地位。


That is why the main goal of nationalist-minded Japanese leaders, starting with Abe’s grandfather, Nobusuke Kishi, has been the return of full Japanese sovereignty by revising Article 9.	正因如此，从安倍的外祖父岸信介开始，日本民族主义领导人的主要目标一直是通过修改宪法第九条恢复日本的完全主权。


That was not possible when Kishi was prime minister in the late 1950s.	这在20世纪50年代末岸信介出任首相时根本不可能。


The Japanese were not ready for it and Kishi was tainted by his wartime record as Minister of Munitions.	日本人还未做好准备，而岸信介本人也有污点——他在战时担任军需大臣。


Abe’s dream is to make it happen now – and to go further.	安倍的梦想是让它在现在成为可能——并且还要走的更远。


He would like to restore some aspects of an older Japan, discredited by Japanese military behavior, such as patriotic pride, a more central role for the imperial institution, and even a reappraisal of Japan’s wartime record itself.	他想恢复被日本的军事行为毁掉的昔日日本的某些方面，如爱国自豪、帝国主义制度发挥更核心的作用，甚至重新评价日本的战争记录本身。


Hence his tributes to the Yasukuni Shrine, where the souls of imperial soldiers, including notorious war criminals, are worshipped.	因此，他参拜供奉帝国军士（包括臭名昭著的战犯）的靖国神社是出于敬仰。


Many Asians, including some Japanese, see this as a sign of new militarism.	许多亚洲人（包括一些日本人）将此视为新军国主义信号。


Abe would like it to be viewed as an attempt to restore Japan’s international reputation as a “normal country.”	安倍希望他的参拜被视为重塑日本作为“正常国家”的国际形象。


But Abe’s idea of normality is not yet shared by the majority of Japanese, let alone other Asians.	但安倍的正常化思维并不为大部分日本人所认同，更不用说其他亚洲人了。


The contradiction in Abe’s nationalism is this: even as he talks about sovereignty regained and patriotic pride, he has done nothing to distance Japan from the postwar dominance of the US.	安倍民族主义的矛盾在于，虽然他大谈主权回归和爱国自豪，但他并未让日本脱离美国的战后主宰。


On the contrary, his reinterpretation of the constitution is meant to help the US in its military policing of East Asia.	相反，重新解释宪法的初衷是协助美国在东亚的军事决策。


In fact, what appears to be driving Abe’s endeavors even more than the desire to revise the postwar order in Japan is a widely shared fear of China’s increasing regional dominance.	事实上，除了渴望改变战后日本秩序，安倍的举动背后的更大原因是对中国地区主宰力日升的普遍担心。


A cursory glance at the Japanese press, or even the kind of books piled high in Japanese bookstores, shows just how frightened the Japanese are.	只消稍稍扫一眼日本媒体，或者看一看日本书店里堆积如山的这方面的著作就可以看出日本人有多么害怕。


All of the talk in Tokyo is about Chinese aggression in the East and South China Seas.	东京的谈论话题全都是关于中国在东海和南海的进犯的。


Abe’s reinterpretation, then, is not really a radical departure from the postwar order at all.	因此，安倍重新解释宪法完全不是真正与战后秩序决裂。


China’s growing power has actually reinforced Japanese dependence on the US for its security.	中国实力的增加确实加大了日本对美国的安全依赖。


Japan’s main worry is that the US may not wish to risk a war with China over territorial disputes in the East China Sea.	日本的主要担忧是美国不愿意冒与中国因为东海领土争端而开战的风险。


What is feared most, in addition to the rise of China, is the possible decline of the US.	除了中国的崛起，最令人担心的可能就是美国的衰落了。


The Japan-US alliance is an irritation to the Chinese, who would like the US to get out of the way, in order to be Asia’s dominant player.	日美同盟是对中国的刺激因素，中国希望美国不要插手，从而让它成为亚洲的主宰者。


Or so they say in public.	或者说他们的公开说辞是如此。


In fact, Chinese attitudes may be more complicated and less unified than they seem.	事实上，中国的态度要比表面上更复杂、更不一致。


Indeed, China faces a rather stark choice.	事实上，中国面临着残酷的选择。


Either it must live with the continued Pax Americana in Asia, for as long as it lasts, or face a more independent, nuclear-armed Japan.	它要么继续生活在已经维持了很久的亚洲美式和平之下，要么直面更加独立的、拥有核武器的日本。


Privately, many Chinese might still prefer the former.	私下里，许多中国人可能更希望是前者。


This may seem to be the most stable solution.	这或许是最稳定的解决办法。


In fact, it is fraught with danger.	事实上，这充满了危险。


To be sure, the US military presence still imposes a certain order with which most parties can live; but it risks dragging the world’s largest military power into petty regional conflicts, a prospect that should alarm us one century after 1914.	平心而论，美军的存在仍然提供了大部分行动方都能共存的秩序； 但也有可能将世界最大军事强国拖入琐碎的地区冲突，在1914年后一百年的今天，这一前景应该引起我们的警觉。


Reading Israel from Left to Right	从左到右阅读以色列


NEW YORK – Israel’s current government and its supporters in the West are quick to denounce criticism of Israeli policies as anti-Semitism.	纽约—以色列现任政府及其西方支持这十分矫健地斥对以色列的批评为反犹主义。


This can be inaccurate and self-serving, but it is not always wrong.	这可能不准确，也是自私的，但并不总是错的。


Israel’s defenders are right to point out that public opinion in Europe, and to a much lesser extent in the United States, tends to be much more critical of Israeli atrocities in Gaza than about bloodier violence committed by Muslims against Muslims in other parts of the Middle East.	以色列正确地指出，欧洲的公共观点——在很小的程度上，美国也是——倾向于大力抨击以色列在加沙的暴行，而不去指责中东其他地方穆斯林针对穆斯林的更加血腥的暴力。


This can be explained by the fact that Israel is supported by Western governments and generously subsidized by American taxpayers.	这可以用一个事实来解释：以色列受西方政府支持，还得到美国纳税人的慷慨解囊。


There is not much that public outrage can do about the behavior of Iranian mullahs or Syrian thugs.	对于伊朗毛拉和叙利亚暴徒的行径，公共的愤怒没有什么效果。


But Israel is “one of us.”	但以色列是“我们当中的一员”。


To be sure, excessive zeal in denouncing Israel, and cheap comparisons between Israeli violence and Nazi mass murder, betray a dubious urge to throw off the burdens of guilt.	平心而论，过度热衷于谴责以色列、将以色列的暴力与纳粹的大规模屠杀简单地相提并论有急于摆脱愧疚包袱之嫌。


After decades of feeling obliged to drop the collective European head in shame for what was done to the Jews, people can finally say with an element of glee that Jews can be murderers, too.	几十年来，欧洲有一种集体愧疚，觉得应该为此前对犹太人所做的事感到羞愧，如今，人们终于可以带着幸灾乐祸的心理说，犹太人也可能是杀人犯。


But, though unseemly, this is not necessarily anti-Semitic.	但是，尽管这不太合适，却并不一定是反犹主义。


Anti-Zionism takes a nasty turn to anti-Semitism when it conflates Jews with Israelis – for example, when the British Liberal Democratic politician David Ward criticized “the Jews” for inflicting horrors on the Palestinians.	将犹太人与以色列人相混淆导致了反锡安运动演变为反犹主义。 比如，英国自由民主党政治家大卫·沃德（David Ward）批评“犹太人”给巴勒斯坦人带去恐怖。


And, while one can be skeptical about Zionism as a historical project, to deny Israel’s right to exist is hard to distinguish from anti-Semitism.	你可以质疑作为历史性计划的锡安主义，但否认以色列的生存权很难与反犹主义区分开来。


The most sinister form of anti-Zionism is to be found among leftists who see Israel and the US as the planet’s twin evils.	反锡安运动的最阴险的形式存在于左翼分子中间，他们视以色列和美国为地球的双生恶魔。


Those who see dark American forces behind all that is wrong with the world, from financial crashes to the violence in Ukraine, are prone to detect the malign hand of Israeli or even Jewish lobbies in every US policy.	有些人认为，全世界每一件坏事背后都有美国的黑暗势力，从金融危机到乌克兰暴力莫不如此，并不懈地寻找每一项美国政策背后的以色列甚至犹太人的邪恶之手。


The link between corrupting Jewish influence and the US was originally a right-wing trope.	腐败的犹太影响和美国之间的关系最初是右翼提出的隐喻。


Jews were supposedly rootless, clannish, and omnipotent, with no loyalty to any nation.	犹太人被认为是无根的民族，他们抱团排他，无恶不作，不对任何一个国家效忠。


The immigrant society of the US was seen as rootless by definition.	美国的移民社会顾名思义也是无根的。


In the view of early-twentieth-century right-wing European nationalists, Anglo-American capitalism, controlled by Jews, undermined the sacred ties of blood and soil.	在二十世纪初欧洲右翼民族主义者看来，犹太人所控制的盎格鲁-美利坚资本主义破坏了血与土的神圣联系。


This worldview also blamed the Jews for Bolshevism, which might seem like a contradiction, but is not.	这一世界观还把布尔什维克主义归咎于犹太人，这看似矛盾，实则一致。


Bolshevism, like capitalism, was internationalist, at least in theory.	布尔什维克主义与资本主义一样，都是国际主义，至少在理论上是如此。


(Joseph Stalin was actually a Soviet nationalist who also denounced Jews as rootless cosmopolitans.)	（约瑟夫·斯大林实际上是苏维埃民族主义者，他也谴责犹太人是无根的四海为家者。 ）


The dangers of zealous anti-Semitic attacks on Israel are obvious.	针对伊斯兰的狂热的反犹主义攻击是显而易见的。


If Israel was not just a fearful nation oppressing the Palestinian people, but the source of all evil, any form of violence, however destructive of self and others, could be justified.	如何以色列不仅仅是一个镇压巴勒斯坦人民的可怕的国家，而是所有罪恶之源，那么不论什么形式的暴力，不论对己对彼产生多么破坏性的影响，都可以得到论证。


If the Israel Defense Forces were the modern equivalent of the Nazis, it should be smashed with maximum force.	如果以色列国防军是当代纳粹，那么就应该以万钧之力将其摧毁。


If all Jews were responsible for the oppression of Arabs, attacks on Jews in Europe, or anywhere else, should be condoned, if not actively encouraged.	如果所有犹太人都对镇压阿拉伯人负有责任，那么针对欧洲和其他地区犹太人的攻击就无可厚非，甚至应该积极支持。


The number of people in the West who really hold such beliefs is, I believe, small.	我相信，西方真的持有这一信念的人是极少的。


Such people exist in universities.	这些人存在于大学中。


They write blogs.	他们写博客。


They march together in demonstrations with some indisputably anti-Semitic Islamist militants.	他们聚集在一起游行，和顽固反犹的伊斯兰军人一起示威。


But they are far from the mainstream.	他们绝不是主流。


Remarkably, some of Israel’s most ardent admirers are now to be found on the right – and even the far right.	值得注意的是，一些最热心的以色列崇拜者目前存在于右翼甚至极右翼。


Quite a few are members of political parties with a profoundly anti-Semitic provenance, such as Austria’s Freedom Party, whose early members included former Nazis.	他们中不乏有着深刻反犹传统的政党的党员，如奥地利自由党（Freedom Party，早期党员中包括不少前纳粹分子）。


The Freedom Party leader, along with such luminaries of the populist right as Filip Dewinter, the Flemish nationalist leader, and the Dutch demagogue Geert Wilders, have visited the West Bank and voiced their support for Israeli settlements.	自由党领导人与弗兰芒民族主义领导人菲利普·德温特（Filip Dewinter）和荷兰政治煽动家吉尔特·怀尔德（Geert Wilder）等民粹主义右翼明星一道，访问了约旦河西岸，并发表了支持以色列定居点的讲话。


This can be explained partly by antagonism against Islam.	这部分可以用对伊斯兰教的敌意解释。


Right-wing populists in Europe regard Islam as the greatest threat to the West.	欧洲右翼民粹主义者将伊斯兰教视为西方最大的威胁。


So, naturally, they applaud the Israeli government for using harsh measures to keep the Arabs down.	因此，他们自然要为以色列政府采用严厉手段镇压阿拉伯人喝彩。


As Wilders put it, the Israelis “are fighting our fight.	正如怀尔德所指出的，以色列“在为我们而战。


If Jerusalem falls, Amsterdam and New York will be next.”	如果耶路撒冷陷落，阿姆斯特丹和纽约也会跟着陷落。 ”


But the main reason for this new solidarity between Western right-wing populists and the state of Israel might lie deeper than shared antipathy toward Islam.	但西方右翼民粹主义者和以色列国的这一新兴团结之势的主要原因或许比对伊斯兰教的共同厌憎之情更加深刻。


No state is static, and Israel has changed a great deal since the heroic decades after its founding in 1948.	没有一个国家是一成不变的，以色列自1948年建国以来经历了几十年的英雄时期，它改变了许多。


In the early years, Israel was admired by Western leftists for being a progressive state, run by Polish and Russian socialists.	早年，以色列被西方左翼当作进步之国崇拜，治理以色列的是波兰和俄罗斯社会主义者。


Today’s Israeli leaders, however, in their rhetoric and behavior, often sound more like the old European anti-Semites.	但是，今天的以色列领导人不论言行都像是昔日的欧洲反犹主义者。


Israeli Jews are now firmly rooted in their own national soil.	以色列犹太人如今深深地植根于属于自己的民族土壤。


But the ruling ideology is no longer socialism; it is a form of ethnic nationalism, with a great deal of military swagger.	但治国思想已不再是社会主义； 而是某种形式的种族民族主义辅之以耀武扬威。


No wonder, then, that Israel’s current admirers have a distinctly illiberal cast.	因此，毫不奇怪以色列当前的崇拜者无不是一些极端偏执之徒。


They reflect current mainstream opinion more than leftist anti-Zionists do.	他们比左翼反锡安运动者更多地反映了主流观点。


The world is increasingly fragmenting, with fearful people embracing smaller, defensive identities: Scottish, Catalan, Flemish, Sunni, Shia, Kurdish, and so on.	世界正在日益分裂，恐慌的人们纷纷寻求更狭隘、更保守的身份：苏格兰人、加泰罗尼亚人、弗兰芒人、逊尼派、什叶派、库尔德人，等等。


The idealistic internationalism of the early postwar years is collapsing fast.	战后早期的理想化国际主义正在快速崩塌。


Tribal feelings – national, ethnic, and religious – are filling the vacuum.	部落感——民族的、种族的、宗教的——正在填补真空。


And, most ironic of all, Israel, a nation-state built by a people despised for their cosmopolitanism, has become a prime symbol of this disturbing trend.	而最讽刺的是，以色列本是一个由因世界主义观点饱受歧视的建国者所建立的民族国家，现在却成了这一危险区是的主要象征。


Sorry for Nothing	拒不道歉


NEW YORK – Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is once again stirring Asia’s cauldron of national rivalries and historical resentments.	纽约——日本首相安倍晋三再度激起了亚洲各国间的民族对立和历史仇恨。


This time, he has instructed a committee of historians to reexamine the official apology delivered in 1993 to World War II-era sex slaves held in Japanese military brothels.	此次安倍授意由历史学家组成的委员会重新审查1993年关于二战期间日本军事妓院性奴隶问题的正式道歉。


It is clear from various recent statements that some of Abe’s closest advisers believe that the apology was not in order, so the committee might well conclude that Japan was never officially involved in prostitution, and that its “sincere remorse” should therefore be withdrawn.	最近各色言论明确显示安倍某些最亲密的顾问认为该道歉不合理，因此委员会可能会确认日本从未正式参与卖淫，因此应该撤回其“真诚忏悔”的道歉。


What perverse reason could Abe have for pursuing such an outcome?	究竟是什么变态理由导致安倍试图做出这样的结论？


Glossing over, or denying, dark chapters of national history is not unique to Japan, of course.	当然，粉饰或否认国家历史黑暗部分并不是日本的专利。


There is no room for Stalin’s mass murders in the kind of “patriotic” education favored by Russian President Vladimir Putin.	俄罗斯总统弗拉迪米尔·普京青睐的“爱国主义”教育容不下斯大林屠杀。


And the Tiananmen Square Massacre, to name but one bloody event in China’s recent past, has been officially forgotten.	而中国官方也绝口不提前些年发生的天安门广场屠杀血腥事件。


Still, Japan is a democracy, with freedom of expression.	但日本却是个言论自由的民主国家。


The official apology made in 1993 was prompted by a Japanese historian’s discovery of documents showing that the Imperial Japanese Army had been directly involved in setting up, though not necessarily in running, what were known as “comfort stations.”	一位日本历史学家发现显示日本皇军虽然不一定直接参与所谓“慰安所”的经营，但却直接参与其设立的史料促成了1993年的官方道歉。


One of the official reasons was that widespread rape of Chinese women by Japanese soldiers was provoking too much resistance among the local population.	设立慰安所的官方理由之一是日本士兵大范围强奸中国妇女引起了当地居民激烈的反抗行动。


Various means were used to stock the brothels with young women.	当时日本用尽各种手段将年轻女性送进妓院。


But, because there was no escape, the women, once ensnared in the system, were effectively slaves.	但因为无处可逃，进入系统的女性实际相当于奴隶身份。


This has been officially admitted, so why reopen the ghastly business now, at a time when rescinding the apology would make Japan’s already-strained relations with China and South Korea many times worse?	这是已经得到正式承认的史实，那么为什么要在撤回道歉会让日本与中韩本已紧张的关系再次急转直下的时刻又重新拿出来讨论？


If Abe and his allies were cosmopolitan in their outlook, with a deep understanding of, or concern for, other countries, the decision to revisit the 1993 apology would indeed be extraordinary.	如果安倍及其盟友拥有国际视野、深刻了解和关注其他国家，那么重新审视1993年道歉的决策的确有些无法理喻。


But, as is true of many political leaders, especially on the nationalistic right, they are chauvinistic provincials whose concerns are almost entirely domestic.	但像很多政治领袖一样，尤其在民族权力问题上，他们不过是崇尚沙文主义的乡巴佬，几乎只关注国内事务。


In their efforts to revise the historical record, they are not really thinking of Koreans or Chinese, but of political adversaries at home.	修改历史记录时他们所想的并不是韩国和中国，而是国内的政治对手。


The views of the Japanese on their country’s wartime history are deeply divided, reflecting political battle lines drawn in the immediate aftermath of the war, when Japan was under Allied occupation.	日本人对本国侵略史意见严重分歧是战后日本在盟军占领下划定政治战线的直接结果。


The United States, which ran the occupation, was keen to reform Japanese society in such a way that another war would be unthinkable.	当时的实际占领国美国想把日本社会改造成再次发动战争是不可想象的。


Worship of the emperor was abolished, though Hirohito remained on his throne.	忠君思想被废除，虽然裕仁依旧留在王位上。


Education was purged of all militaristic and “feudal” elements, including favorable references to the samurai spirit.	日本教育被清除了所有军国主义和“封建”元素，包括对武士道精神的正面宣扬。


A new pacifist constitution, written by the Americans, banned the use of armed force.	美国制定的和平宪法禁止使用武力。


And Japan’s wartime leaders were tried in Tokyo by Allied judges for “crimes against peace” and “crimes against humanity.”	日本战时领袖在东京接受盟军法官“反和平”及“反人类”罪的审判。


Most Japanese, heartily sick of war and military bullying, were happy to go along with all of this.	多数日本人真心厌恶战争和军事侵略，因此很高兴接受这样的安排。


But there was always a right-wing minority that felt humiliated and resentful of the loss of national pride and, more important, national sovereignty, for Japan’s security would henceforth have to depend entirely on the protection offered by the US.	但总有少数右翼分子为丧失民族自豪感、更重要的还有国家主权而倍感屈辱。 因为日本的安全将从此依赖于美国所提供的保护。


One of the main leaders of this group of disgruntled nationalists was Nobusuke Kishi, Abe’s grandfather.	这伙心怀不满的民族主义者其主要领导人是岸信介，也就是安倍晋三的祖父。


Kishi’s aim was to regain Japanese pride and sovereignty by revising the constitution and reviving old-fashioned patriotism, thus undoing some of the American educational reforms.	岸信介的目的是修改宪法、恢复旧式的爱国主义，从而在某种程度上化解美国的教育改革，并恢复日本的主权和民族自豪感。


He failed, because most Japanese were still allergic to anything that smacked of militarism.	他失败了，因为多数日本人仍然对带有军国主义味道的东西非常敏感。


Until not long ago, there was a strong left-wing current in education and some of the media that used Japan’s horrendous wartime record as an argument against any kind of revisionism.	直到不久前，在教育及部分传媒界仍然存在着一股强大的左翼力量，利用日本可怕的战争纪录反对任何形式的修宪企图。


But, as long as the Japanese left used history to make this political argument, the nationalists pushed back by claiming that stories of wartime atrocities had been greatly exaggerated.	但只要左翼用历史证明自己的政治观点，民族主义者就拼命反击，称战时暴行的故事被极度夸大了。


Books about the infamous Nanking Massacre of 1937, or the enslavement of “comfort women” in military brothels, were denounced as “historical masochism” or dismissed as “the Tokyo Trial View of History.”	关于臭名昭著的1937年南京大屠杀和日本军事妓院奴役“慰安妇”的书籍被斥为“历史受虐狂”或“东京审判历史观”。


The left was accused of being complicit in spreading foreign – Chinese, Korean, or American – propaganda.	左翼被指合谋传播外国——中国、韩国或美国式宣传。


This, then, is the modern Japanese version of populism: the “liberal elites,” by falsifying the history of Japan’s glorious war to “liberate Asia,” undermined the Japanese people’s moral fiber.	于是就成就了现代版的日本民粹主义：“自由精英”通过伪造日本“解放亚洲”的光荣战争史损害了日本民众道德。


Because the ideological collapse of left-wing politics in Japan has been as precipitous as in much of the Western world, the so-called liberal elites have lost much of their former influence.	因为日本左翼政治的意识形态崩溃像很多西方国家一样急转直下，所谓自由派精英已经失去了他们曾经的���响力。


As a result, the voice of the nationalist right has grown louder in recent years.	结果导致近年来右翼民族主义的声音变得愈加响亮。


That is why Abe can get away with appointing cronies to the board of NHK, the national broadcasting company, who openly claim that the military brothels were an entirely private enterprise and that the Nanking Massacre was a foreign fabrication.	安倍因此得以任用亲信操纵日本全国广播公司NHK董事会，此人公开宣扬军队妓院是彻头彻尾的私营企业，而南京大屠杀是外国的虚假宣传。


Historical truth is not the point; political mastery is.	政治掌控、而非历史真相才是他们的目标。


Japan’s prime minister is playing a risky game.	日本首相正在玩一场危险的游戏。


He is upsetting allies in Asia, embarrassing the US, and making bad relations with China even worse.	他惹恼了亚洲盟国、让美国倍感尴尬、并进一步恶化了本已糟糕的中日关系。


Like Putin, he is driving himself and his country into further isolation for entirely domestic reasons.	像普京一样，他完全出于国内原因让自己和国家陷入到更加孤立的境地。


In a region increasingly dominated by Chinese power, he will be without Asian friends.	在一个中国势力日益占主导地位的地区，他将失去所有的亚洲朋友。


And that is where Abe’s behavior becomes truly perverse.	安倍的所作所为就此演变为极度的乖张。


After all, a Japan that is isolated in Asia will be even more dependent on the US, the wartime victor, which Abe and his nationalist allies hold responsible for the postwar order that they seek to revise.	毕竟，被亚洲国家孤立的日本将更加依赖二战战胜国美国，而安倍及其民族主义盟友不满并试图修改的恰恰是由美国建立的战后秩序。


Diplomats Behaving Badly	外交官行为不端


NEW YORK – Diplomats, normally discreet figures who rarely court publicity, have been in the news a lot lately, for all the wrong reasons.	纽约——外交官一般都非常谨慎，极少跟出名有关，但近来却因为错误的原因而频繁见诸报端。


Two recent arrests of diplomats by their host countries have put a spotlight on the justification for, and limits of, the immunity from local law that such officials typically enjoy.	最近发生的两起东道国逮捕外交官的案件让人们开始关注上述官员通常以何种理由及限度享有当地法律豁免权。


In the first case, Dmitri Borodin, the minister counselor at the Russian embassy in The Hague, was arrested late one night in October of last year, after neighbors alerted the Dutch police that Borodin, allegedly in a drunken state, was beating his two small children.	首先要提的是俄罗斯驻海牙大使馆公使衔参赞德米特里·鲍罗廷，他于去年10月的一个深夜被捕，因为邻居向荷兰警方举报称鲍罗廷在醉酒状态下殴打自己的两个小孩。


He was handcuffed in his own home and taken to the police station.	他在寓所被拷上手铐，带回警察局。


According to the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, diplomats cannot be prosecuted according to a host country’s laws.	维也纳外交关系公约规定，不能依据东道国法律对外交官提起诉讼。


So Russian President Vladimir Putin immediately demanded an official apology from the Dutch government for ignoring Borodin’s diplomatic immunity.	因此，俄罗斯总统普京立即要求荷兰政府就无视鲍罗廷的外交豁免权做出正式道歉。


The rabble-rousing Russian politician Vladimir Zhirinovsky called on his followers to smash the windows of the Dutch embassy in Moscow.	蛊惑人心的俄罗斯政客弗拉基米尔·日里诺夫斯基呼吁其追随者砸碎荷兰驻莫斯科使馆的玻璃窗。


A week later, a Dutch diplomat in Moscow was beaten up at his home by armed thugs (no connection between the two cases has been proved).	一周后，一名驻莫斯科的荷兰外交官在家中遭到武装暴徒的殴打（没有证据证明这两起案件有关）。


The timing of all of this was awkward. The Dutch king, Willem Alexander, was about to visit Russia to celebrate the two countries’ friendly relations in the so-called “Netherlands-Russia Year.”	上述事件的时机非常尴尬，恰恰发生在荷兰国王威廉·亚历山大准备出访俄罗斯庆祝所谓“荷兰—俄罗斯年”两国友好关系之前。


The Dutch foreign minister duly apologized to Russia for the conduct of his country’s police, and Borodin was recalled to Moscow.	荷兰外交大臣为本国警方的行为向俄罗斯正式道歉，而且鲍罗廷则被召回莫斯科。


Then, in December, the New York City police arrested an Indian consular official, Devyani Khobragade, for paying a domestic worker less than the minimum wage in the United States and for falsifying the worker’s visa application.	之后，在12月，纽约警方以在美给付佣人薪水低于美国最低工资、并伪造该佣人签证申请为由逮捕了印度领馆官员科巴拉加德。


Because consular officials do not enjoy the same degree of immunity as higher-ranking diplomats, the police were acting within their authority, even if their methods – strip-searching Khobragade, for example – might be considered excessive.	领馆官员并不享有与高级外交官同等的豁免权，因此虽然手段（比方说对科巴拉加德进行脱衣搜查）可能有越轨之嫌，但警方并未越权行事。


The reaction in India, however, was much fiercer than in Russia.	但印度的反应远比俄罗斯更为强烈。


Outrage was voiced in the press. Apologies were demanded.	此事遭到媒体的愤怒声讨并要求道歉。


Demonstrations were held.	印度举行示威游行。


US diplomats were stripped of customary privileges.	美国外交官被剥夺了按惯例应有的特权。


Threats were made to arrest same-sex partners of US diplomats, because Indian law criminalizes homosexuality.	印度威胁要逮捕同性恋美国外交官，因为印度法律将同性恋视为犯罪。


All of this might seem over the top and childish.	所有这些行为似乎都过分而且幼稚。


But, because diplomats are their countries’ official representatives abroad, their symbolic function is much more important than their individual personalities.	但因为外交官是国家在国外的官方代表，他们的象征意义远远超过自己的个性。


They are like national flags: insult them, and you insult the “nation.”	他们就如国旗般神圣：侮辱他们就是侮辱这个“民族”。


And when it comes to preserving national “face,” Russia and India are perhaps touchier than most countries; Russia has always felt looked down upon by western European powers, and India is still reckoning with a legacy of colonial humiliation.	而且在涉及维护国家“颜面”的问题上，俄罗斯和印度或许比许多国家都要坚决； 俄国一直感觉被西欧列强看不起，而印度则仍然无法放下殖民年代所受的屈辱。


A writer for the Times of India expressed Indians’ sensitivity succinctly: “The sad truth is that India is now viewed abroad as a third-rate banana republic.”	印度时报一位作者直言不讳地表达了印度在这个问题上的敏感：“可悲的现实是印度现在在国外被看做一个三流的香蕉共和国”。


Whether or not this is true is beside the point.	这句话正确与否并不是重点。


Many Indians, especially among the Delhi elite, believe it.	重要的是很多印度人，尤其是德里精英们相信这句话。


The behavior of the New York City police played into their deepest fears.	纽约警察的行为恰恰触动了他们内心最深的恐惧。


One of the most interesting aspects of these two diplomatic incidents is what it tells us about the new Russian and Indian elite.	这两起外交事件的有趣之处是可以借此了解新的俄国和印度精英。


Diplomats have always represented the face of their country, but their own faces have changed.	外交官始终代表自己国家的颜面，但他们自己却发生了变化。


In the past, diplomats did not actually represent nation-states, but royal courts (in most monarchies this is still officially the case).	过去，外交官实际代表的并不是民族国家，而是皇家宫廷（多数君主制国家现在这种状况依然成立）。


As a result, European diplomats, for example, were mostly aristocrats, who all spoke French to one another.	因此欧洲外交官大都是贵族出身，彼此交流时都讲法语。


Diplomatic incidents often had to do with the relative status of kings and queens.	外交事件往往牵涉到国王和王后的相对地位。


One famous incident in the late eighteenth century was Lord Macartney’s British mission to the Imperial Court of China.	十八世纪末曾发生过一次著名事件，即马戛尔尼勋爵率领英国使团出访中国宫廷。


Macartney refused to conform to Chinese imperial protocol by declining to kowtow to the emperor, because he was not required to do the same to his own sovereign.	马戛尔尼拒绝按皇家礼仪向中国皇帝跪叩，因为他在自己君主面前无需遵守这样的礼仪。


This, too, was very much a case of “keeping face”: the Chinese expected tribute; the British lord insisted on the equal status of his king.	这在很大程度上其实也是为了“保存颜面”：中国皇帝要求进贡，而英国勋爵则坚持英国国王的平等地位。


As a result, the mission broke down.	这次出使因此以失败告终。


Diplomatic immunity from local prosecution was an idea that sprang directly from another incident, almost a century earlier, involving the arrest of a Russian aristocrat, Andrey Matveyev, who represented Peter the Great in London.	外交官得到当地诉讼豁免权是另一次事件的直接结果，这次事件发生在近一个世纪前，事关彼得大帝驻伦敦代表俄国贵族安德烈·马特维耶夫的被捕。


Matveyev was detained and roughed up by bailiffs who demanded money from him.	马特维耶夫遭到向其勒索钱财法警的拘留和粗暴对待。


The Russians complained. The British apologized.	俄国人强烈抗议，英国也为此道歉。


And the British parliament enacted a new law protecting diplomats from suffering similar treatment in the future.	英国议会因此颁布了保护外交官今后免遭类似对待的全新法案。


Borodin and Khobragade are not aristocrats.	鲍罗廷和科巴拉加德均非贵族。


Far from it.	实际情况甚至相去甚远。


They represent a very different age, which one is tempted to call democratic, even if Russia today is more like a soft dictatorship.	他们代表了一个截然不同的时代，人们更愿意用民主来形容这个时代，就连今天的俄国也实行软性独裁。


Perhaps Borodin was just enjoying a rare night out and is normally an abstemious man, but his thuggish behavior is perhaps not entirely atypical of a new class of Russians that has accumulated a great deal of money and power since the Soviet Union collapsed.	或许鲍罗廷只是享受了一个难得的外出夜晚，或许他通常很有节制。 但其残暴行为或许在苏联解体后积累了大量金钱和权力的俄罗斯新贵一族中并不罕见。


Khobragade’s case is more interesting.	科巴拉加德的案例则更加有趣。


She was born into the Dalit caste, the “untouchables,” who in former times would never have gotten anywhere near the elite, except to sweep their floors.	她出身于不可靠近的“贱民”种姓，以前除扫地外绝不可能与精英有任何接触。


Since Indian independence, the government has done much to improve the Dalits’ status, and the deputy consul general is one of the beneficiaries of this policy.	印度独立后，政府做了很多工作来改善贱民“地位”，而这项政策恰恰惠及了这位副总领事。


She is a member of the new Indian elite, increasingly wealthy and proud to represent a rising power in the world.	她是印度新精英阶层的一员，这些人越来越富裕、越来越骄傲地代表一个正在崛起的大国。


If the allegations that Khobragade systematically underpaid her domestic worker are true, this shows how fully she has adopted the customs of the class to which she has risen.	如果科巴拉加德一贯克扣佣人薪水的指控确有其事，这表明她在多大程度上保有着原有阶层的习惯。


In all the Indian protests about the terrible blow dealt by the Americans to Indian self-esteem, only a few mentioned the habitual exploitation of the poorer classes.	在印度有关美国人损害印度自尊的所有抗议活动中，仅有少数几次提到了出身贫困阶层人士的习惯性剥削。


As with their politicians, a country’s people, it seems, often have the diplomats they deserve.	像政治家一样，一个国家的民众往往会拥有他们应得的外交官。


Getting Globalization Right	正确认识全球化


OXFORD – Recent evidence suggests that much of the world has entered a period of low financial-market volatility.	牛津—最新证据表明，世界大部已进入低金融市场波动时期。


But this is no time for complacency; more turbulent times are likely to lie ahead.	但我们不能因此满足； 未来或许将更加动荡。


Over the last quarter-century, rapid technology-driven globalization – characterized by the physical and virtual integration of the global economy, including the opening of world markets – has contributed to the fastest increase in incomes and population in history.	过去四分之一世纪中，技术推动全球化快速发展——其特征是实体和虚拟经济的全球一体化，包括世界市场的开放——造就了史上最快的收入 和 人口增长。


But, while globalization has created unprecedented opportunity, it has also unleashed a new form of systemic risk – one that threatens to devastate political institutions and national economies.	但是，尽管全球化创造了前所未有的机会，但也引发了新形式的系统危机——这一危机有可能摧毁政治制度和国家经济。


Systemic risk is intrinsic to globalization.	系统危机是全球化的固有特征。


Greater openness and integration necessarily increase the potential for cascading crises and amplification of shocks.	更大的开放和一体化难免引起危机串联和冲击放大。


As individuals and societies become richer, they come into closer contact with one another – virtually, through communication technologies, and physically, through population growth, urbanization, and travel.	随着个人和社会的富裕，他们彼此之间的联系也日益紧密——既包括通过通信技术实现的虚拟联系，也包括通过人口增长、城市化和旅行实现的实体联系。


Meanwhile, rising consumption of products like food, energy, and medicine enhances the externalities, or spillover effects, of individual choices, with the connectivity of global systems increasing these effects’ range and impact.	与此同时，粮食、能源和药品等产品消费量的增加增强了个体选择的外部性或溢出效应，而全球系统的连通性又增加了这些效应的范围和影响。


For example, taking an antibiotic may be a rational individual decision.	比如，使用抗生素或许是个体的理性选择。


But when billions of people take antibiotics, and livestock producers use them to boost efficiency, they often become ineffective.	但如果数十亿人都使用抗生素，畜牧业者也使用抗生素增产，抗生素就会失去效果。


The same paradox applies to energy use, owing to the destructive impact of large-scale carbon emissions.	同样的悖论也适用于能源，因为大规模碳排放会导致破坏性影响。


Even the consumption of basic necessities like food (production of which can have major environmental consequences) and water (given limited supplies) is not exempt.	甚至粮食（其生产可能带来严重环境后果）和水（供给有限）等基本必需品也不例外。


Furthermore, increased openness and market integration, driven by rapid technological change, is exacerbating divisions within and among societies.	此外，由快速技术变迁所驱动的开放性和市场一体化程度的增加加剧了社会内部和之间的分歧。


Those who miss the globalization train at the start often are unable to catch up later.	一开始错失全球化大势的很难在此后实现赶超。


Nowadays, the world’s most pressing challenges – from climate change to cyber-crime – increasingly transcend national borders, making them extremely difficult to address effectively.	如今，世界最紧迫挑战——从气候变化到网络犯罪——日益超越国界，这使得它们很难有效解决。


Worse, they can have a cascading effect, with, say, a pandemic or cyber-attack provoking a financial or political crisis and imposing costs disproportionately on those who can least afford them.	更糟糕的是，它们有可能造成串联效应，比如传染病和导致金融或政治危机的网络袭击，给最脆弱人群带来最沉重的伤害。


The vectors of connectivity – such as the Internet, financial markets, airport hubs, or logistics centers – facilitate “super-spreading” of globalization’s effects, both positive and negative.	连通性因素——如互联网、金融市场、航空枢纽或物流中心——助长了全球化效应的“超级传播”，有利也有弊。


Though the systemic risks brought about by globalization cannot be eliminated, they can be mitigated, if world leaders work together and learn from past mistakes.	全球化带来的尽管系统风险无法消除，但可以减轻，只要世界领导人精诚合作并从过去的错误中汲取教训。


Unfortunately, neither appears likely.	不幸的是，这两点都无从实现。


For starters, national politics in key countries is largely moving away from cooperation, with rising inequality and social fragmentation making it difficult for governments, especially in democracies, to make tough decisions.	首先，在许多关键国家，加剧的不平等性和社会分化使政府（特别是民主国家政府）难以做出艰难决策，合作之势日渐减弱。


At the same time, populations are rejecting regional and global institutions.	与此同时，群众不再愿意接受地区和全球机构。


Europe, for example, is witnessing an upsurge in support for nationalist parties, like Britain’s UK Independence Party, and increasingly loud calls for self-determination, such as in Scotland and Catalonia.	比如，在欧洲，英国独立党（Independency Party）等民族主义政党支持率节节攀升，苏格兰 和 加泰罗尼亚等地的自决呼声也一浪高过一浪。


Equally problematic, the world has largely failed to learn from globalization’s most obvious and far-reaching consequence yet: the 2008 financial crisis.	同样严重的问题还在于世界几乎没有从全球化最显而易见、影响最为深远的后果——2008年金融危机中汲取教训。


While it is impossible to safeguard the system fully, sound regulation and effective oversight could have prevented the crisis, or at least reduced its impact on millions of people’s livelihoods.	尽管完全的系统保护是不可能的任务，但可靠的监管和有效的监督本可以预防危机，或至少减轻危机对数百万人生活所造成的冲击。


The problem was that central banks, finance ministries, and multilateral organizations like the International Monetary Fund – the pillars of the global economy’s institutional framework – failed to grasp globalization’s emerging characteristics and effects, owing partly to the difficulty of discerning structural shifts in the huge mass of data now available.	问题在于中央银行、财政部和国际货币基金组织等多边组织——它们构成了全球经济制度框架的基石——没有认识到全球化的新特征和影响，而部分原因就在于要在目前所能获得的海量数据中识别结构变化十分困难。


In this sense, the crisis should have served as a wake-up call, spurring the financial sector, policymakers, and multilateral organizations to take action to enhance systemic stability.	从这个角度讲，此次危机本应成为警世钟，促使金融业、决策者和多边机构采取行动强化系统稳定性。


But, despite employing tens of thousands of highly educated economists whose primary job is to determine how best to protect the financial system from globalization’s destabilizing effects, these institutions seem to be even less willing to act now than they were before the crisis.	但是，尽管这些机构聘用了成千上万名高学历经济学家专职从事研究如何最好地保护金融系统免受全球化破坏效应影响��但似乎如今它们采取行动的意愿还不如危机前。


This is particularly true in the advanced economies, where depleted financial reserves and political paralysis are preventing constructive investments in areas like infrastructure and education, which can enable citizens to take advantage of globalization’s benefits.	发达经济体尤其如此，金融储备的耗尽和政治瘫痪使得基础设施等教育等领域的建设性投资无从下手，公民也因此难以利用全球化带来的好处。


Making matters worse, some of these countries have reduced their contributions and commitment to the reform of regional and global institutions, which are essential to managing systemic risks.	更糟糕的是，这些国家中有不少不再为地区和全球机构的改革贡献力量，而这些机构的改革对于管理系统风险来说至关重要。


In this context, it is not surprising that ordinary citizens feel uncertain about the future and frustrated with their governments, which have so far failed to protect them from globalization’s fallout.	在这样的环境下，毫不奇怪普通公民会对未来深感不确定，对政府没有保护他们免受全球化副作用伤害深感失望。


But wresting power back from regional and international institutions – however shadowy and distant they may seem – would only compound the problem, for it would reduce the ability to guide the supranational trends that are shaping the world’s future. More, not less, cooperation is necessary to manage growing complexity and integration.	但地区和国际机构开始的权力角力——不管多么隐蔽、看起来离我们多么遥远——只能让问题恶化，因为这样做削弱了引导决定世界未来的超国家趋势的能力。


It is time for our leaders to recognize new systemic risks and work together to mitigate them.	我们的领导人应该认清新的系统风险，并合力遏制它们。


Otherwise, the recent past will be prologue, with those risks likely to get the better of the global economy.	否则，最近所发生的事情只是个开端，全球经济未来也将受到严重威胁。


If Fish Could Scream	如果鱼能惨叫的话……


PRINCETON – When I was a child, my father used to take me for walks, often along a river or by the sea.	发自普林斯顿——当我还是个孩子的时候，父亲喜欢带着我在水边漫步。


We would pass people fishing, perhaps reeling in their lines with struggling fish hooked at the end of them.	我们经常都会看见一些正忙着收紧鱼线将猎物从水底扯上岸的垂钓者。


Once I saw a man take a small fish out of a bucket and impale it, still wriggling, on an empty hook to use as bait.	我还曾经看见有人将一条苦苦挣扎的小鱼拦腰刺穿挂在钩子上，当作给大鱼的诱饵。


Another time, when our path took us by a tranquil stream, I saw a man sitting and watching his line, seemingly at peace with the world, while next to him, fish he had already caught were flapping helplessly and gasping in the air.	还有一次，当我们路过一条平静的小溪的时候，我看见一个人静静地坐着盯着浮标，似乎与世无争，但他身边却摆着一堆垂死挣扎着的鱼。


My father told me that he could not understand how anyone could enjoy an afternoon spent taking fish out of the water and letting them die slowly.	父亲说，他不明白为什么一个人能花费整个下午的时间，就是为了想方设法把鱼从水里弄出来并看着它们慢慢死去。


These childhood memories flooded back when I read Worse things happen at sea: the welfare of wild-caught fish, a breakthrough report released last month on fishcount.org.uk.	当我在阅读《海中的恶行：野生捕捞鱼类的福利》这份由fishcount. org.


In most of the world, it is accepted that if animals are to be killed for food, they should be killed without suffering.	hk网站发布的开创性报告之时，这些童年往事又浮现在了眼前。


Regulations for slaughter generally require that animals be rendered instantly unconscious before they are killed, or death should be brought about instantaneously, or, in the case of ritual slaughter, as close to instantaneously as the religious doctrine allows.	在全世界大多数地方，人们都认同如果要杀动物来作为食物的话，那么就应让动物毫无痛苦地死去。 在屠宰方面的法规一般要求动物在不经意的情况下被瞬间杀死，就算是某些宗教的屠宰者，也要在教规允许的范围内尽快杀死动物。


Not for fish.	但这一切都跟鱼类无关。


There is no humane slaughter requirement for wild fish caught and killed at sea, nor, in most places, for farmed fish.	没有任何人道规定适用于对于那些在野外被捕杀的鱼类，而大多数鱼类养殖业也自行其是。


Fish caught in nets by trawlers are dumped on board the ship and allowed to suffocate.	那些被拖网渔船捕获的鱼都被倾倒到甲板上，任其窒息死亡。


Impaling live bait on hooks is a common commercial practice: long-line fishing, for example, uses hundreds or even thousands of hooks on a single line that may be 50-100 kilometers long.	将活饵挂在钩子上是司空见惯的商业捕鱼行为：比如说，长线捕鱼法就是将数百个甚至数千个钩子挂在一条长达50公里甚至100公里的鱼线上。


When fish take the bait, they are likely to remain caught for many hours before the line is hauled in.	而那些不幸咬钩的鱼就要一直挂在钩子上长达数小时，直到渔民收线为止。


Likewise, commercial fishing frequently depends on gill nets – walls of fine netting in which fish become snared, often by the gills.	同样，商业捕鱼经常使用刺网——就是一张的可以卡住鱼鳃的大网。


They may suffocate in the net, because, with their gills constricted, they cannot breathe.	网中的鱼常常会窒息，因为鱼鳃无法开合。


If not, they may remain trapped for many hours before the nets are pulled in.	这些鱼也会被卡住很长时间，直到收网。


The most startling revelation in the report, however, is the staggering number of fish on which humans inflict these deaths.	而该报告揭露出来的最令人震惊的事实，则是人类杀死的鱼数量竟然如此庞大。


By using the reported tonnages of the various species of fish caught, and dividing by the estimated average weight for each species, Alison Mood, the report’s author, has put together what may well be the first-ever systematic estimate of the size of the annual global capture of wild fish.	通过采集各种鱼类的捕捞数量，再除以该种鱼的平均重量，报告执笔人艾丽森·穆德提供了一个关于全球每年野生鱼类捕捞数量的史无前例的系统性估计。


It is, she calculates, in the order of one trillion, although it could be as high as 2.7 trillion.	据她计算大概有1万亿条，甚至可能高达2. 7万亿。


To put this in perspective, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that 60 billion animals are killed each year for human consumption – the equivalent of about nine animals for each human being on the planet.	可以侧面印证这一点的则是联合国粮农组织的估计数字，大概每年有600亿动物被屠杀以满足人类的消费需要——大概每人要夺去9只动物的生命。


If we take Mood’s lower estimate of one trillion, the comparable figure for fish is 150.	如果我们只采纳穆德的最低估计（1万亿）的话，每个人都要消费150条鱼。


This does not include billions of fish caught illegally nor unwanted fish accidentally caught and discarded, nor does it count fish impaled on hooks as bait.	这还不包括那些被非法捕捞，被渔民抛弃的低经济价值鱼类，以及被用作诱饵的鱼类。


Many of these fish are consumed indirectly – ground up and fed to factory-farmed chicken or fish.	这些鱼类中的大多数都被间接消费了——捞来作为饲料来喂养人工饲养的鸡或者是鱼。


A typical salmon farm churns through 3-4 kilograms of wild fish for every kilogram of salmon that it produces.	一个典型的三文鱼（鲑鱼）渔场每生产1公斤鱼肉，就要消耗3~4公斤野生小鱼。


Let’s assume that all this fishing is sustainable, though of course it is not.	让让我们假设所有这些捕捞都是可持续的（虽然显然不是）。


It would then be reassuring to believe that killing on such a vast scale does not matter, because fish do not feel pain.	人们就会安慰自己说捕杀如此庞大数量的鱼其实没有什么，因为鱼是不会感觉到痛苦的。


But the nervous systems of fish are sufficiently similar to those of birds and mammals to suggest that they do.	但鱼的神经系统其实和鸟类或者其他哺乳动物一样。


When fish experience something that would cause other animals physical pain, they behave in ways suggestive of pain, and the change in behavior may last several hours. (It is a myth that fish have short memories.)	当鱼感觉到某种能令其他动物感觉到“痛”的刺激的时候，它们也会表现出某种被认为是痛楚的行为方式，而且往往会持续几个小时（鱼只有短期记忆的说法是荒谬的）��鱼类也会学会躲避痛苦的经历，比如电击。


Fish learn to avoid unpleasant experiences, like electric shocks. And painkillers reduce the symptoms of pain that they would otherwise show.	而止痛片则减少了它们所表现出来的痛苦症状。


Victoria Braithwaite, a professor of fisheries and biology at Pennsylvania State University, has probably spent more time investigating this issue than any other scientist.	宾夕法尼亚州立大学水产和生物学教授维多利亚·布莱夫维特在这方面的研究似乎比其他同行要多。


Her recent book Do Fish Feel Pain? shows that fish are not only capable of feeling pain, but also are a lot smarter than most people believe.	她最近的著作《鱼会疼吗？ 》不但证明鱼类可以感觉到痛楚，而且比许多人想象的要聪明。


Last year, a scientific panel to the European Union concluded that the preponderance of the evidence indicates that fish do feel pain.	根据去年欧盟的一个研究小组的研究结论，大多数证据都证明鱼类是有痛觉的。


Why are fish the forgotten victims on our plate?	那么为什么鱼类会成为我们这个星球上的被遗忘的受害者？


Is it because they are cold-blooded and covered in scales?	是因为它们是冷血动物而且全身布满鳞片吗？


Is it because they cannot give voice to their pain?	还是因为它们无法用声音表达自己的痛苦？


Whatever the explanation, the evidence is now accumulating that commercial fishing inflicts an unimaginable amount of pain and suffering.	不管做何解释，如今有越来越多的证据证明商业捕捞制造了超乎想象的痛苦和折磨。


We need to learn how to capture and kill wild fish humanely – or, if that is not possible, to find less cruel and more sustainable alternatives to eating them.	我们必须学会如何人道地捕捞和屠宰野生鱼类——如果这不可能实现的话，去寻找一个没那么残忍和更可持续的方法去食用它们。


Ignorance Today	当今世界的无知


NEW YORK – Ignorance is the root of all evil, according to Plato, who also famously gave us a still-current definition of its opposite: knowledge.	纽约——柏拉图认为无知是一切罪恶的根源，而他对无知反义词知识的定义我们今天还在沿用。


For Plato, knowledge is “justified true belief.”	柏拉图认为知识是“合理的真实信念”。


That definition is worthy of consideration as we reflect on the perils of ignorance in the twenty-first century.	反省二十一世纪无知所带来的危险能让我们意识到这个定义的宝贵。


Plato thought that three conditions must be met in order for us to “know” something: the notion in question must actually be true; we must believe it (because if we do not believe something that is true, we can hardly claim that we know it); and, most subtly, it must be justifiable – there must be reasons why we believe the notion to be true.	我们必须相信（因为如果我们不相信这是真实的事物，就很难说得上了解）； 还有最微妙的一点就是必须合理——我们必须有理由相信概念的真实性。


Consider something that we all think we know: the earth is (approximately) round.	以我们都认为了解的事物为例：地球（大致）呈圆形。


This is as true as astronomical facts get, particularly because we have sent artificial satellites into orbit and seen that our planet is indeed roundish.	这在天文学上属于事实，特别是因为我们已经把人造卫星送入轨道，亲眼目睹了我们的星球呈圆形。


Most of us (except for a lunatic fringe of flat-earthers) also believe this to be the case.	绝大多数人（除认为地球是平的狂热份子外）也相信地球呈圆形。


What about the justification of that belief?	这种信念的理由是什么？


How would you answer if someone asked you why you believe that the earth is round?	如果有人问你为什么相信地球是圆的你会怎么回答？


The obvious place to begin would be to point to the aforementioned satellite images, but then our skeptical interlocutor could reasonably ask if you know how those images were obtained.	显然可以从上面提到的卫星图片开始，但接着我们持怀疑态度的对话者就会理所当然地问我们是否了解图片的出处。


Unless you are an expert on space engineering and imaging software, you may have some trouble at that point.	除非你是航天工程和图像处理软件的专家，否则你可能感觉很难说清。


Of course, you could fall back on more traditional reasons to believe in a round earth, like the fact that our planet projects a round-looking shadow on the moon during eclipses.	当然，你可以转而拿出地球呈圆形的传统理由，比如日蚀和月蚀期间我们的星球在月球表面投射出圆形的阴影。


Naturally, you would have to be in a position to explain – if challenged – what an eclipse is and how you know that.	自然，如果对方向你提问，你必须能够向他解释什么是日蚀和月蚀，你是怎么知道的。


You see where this could easily go: if we push far enough, most of us do not actually know, in the Platonic sense, much of anything.	这样你很容易预见到结果：如果刨根问底，多数人在柏拉图的意义上对任何事物都并不真正了解。


In other words, we are far more ignorant than we realize.	换句话说，我们远比自己意识到的更加无知。


Socrates, Plato’s teacher, famously goaded the Athenian authorities by maintaining that he was wiser than the Oracle at Delphi, who claimed to be the wisest, because he, unlike most people (including the Athenian authorities), knew that he did not know anything.	柏拉图的老师苏格拉底坚持自己比德尔斐神谕更有智慧，因为后者声称自己是无上智者，而苏格拉底却与多数人（包括雅典当局）不同，清楚自己并不是无所不知。 苏格拉底的言论众所周知地惹怒了雅典当局。


Whether Socrates’ humility was sincere or a secret joke at the expense of the powers that be (before said powers put him to death after tiring of his irreverence), the point is that the beginning of wisdom lies in the recognition of how little we really know.	无论苏格拉底的谦卑是表里如一还是让当权者付出代价的秘密笑话（在上述当权者厌倦了他的大不敬将他处以死刑之前），关键在于智慧的起点在于承认我们其实一无所知。


Which brings me to the paradox of ignorance in our era: on the one hand, we are constantly bombarded by expert opinion, by all sorts of people – with or without Ph.D. after their name – who tell us exactly what to think (though rarely why we should think it).	由此就引出我们这个时代的无知悖论：一方面，我们不断受到各路专家意见的轰炸，不管在名字后面有没有博士头衔，他们都不断向我们灌输“正统”想法（尽管他们很少提及个中原因）。


On the other hand, most of us are woefully inadequate to practice the venerable and vital art of baloney detection (or, more politely, critical thinking), which is so necessary in modern society.	而另一方面，绝大多数人都不具备施行谬论检验（更礼貌的说法是批判性思维）这门古老而重要艺术的能力，而这种能力在现代社会中是如此重要。


You can think of the paradox in another way: we live in an era when knowledge – in the sense of information – is constantly available in real time through computers, smart phones, electronic tablets, and book readers.	你可以从另外的角度思考这一悖论：我们生活的时代可以通过电脑、智能手机、电子书写板和图书阅览器不断实时获得以信息为载体的知识。


And yet we still lack the basic skills of reflecting on such information, of sifting through the dirt to find the worthy nuggets.	可我们仍然缺乏反思这些信息的基本能力，无法拨去表面的浮土找到真正的黄金。


We are ignorant masses awash in information.	我们是被铺天盖地信息所包围的无知愚民。


Of course, it may be that humanity has always been short on critical thinking.	当然，也许人类向来缺乏批判性思维。


That’s why we keep allowing ourselves to be talked into supporting unjust wars (not to mention actually dying in them), or voting for people whose main job seems to be to amass as much wealth for the rich as they can get away with.	因此我们一次次被说服支持非正义战争（更不要说为此丢掉性命），或者投票给主要目标似乎是尽可能为富豪聚敛财富的人。


It is also why so many people are duped by exceedingly costly sugar pills sold to them by homeopathic “doctors,” and why we follow the advice of celebrities (rather than real doctors) about whether to vaccinate our kids.	如此多人也因此被主张顺势疗法的“医生”卖给他们的极其昂贵的糖衣药丸所欺骗，我们也因此在孩子是否接种疫苗的问题上听从名人（而不是医生）的建议。


But the need for critical thinking has never been as pressing as in the Internet era.	但从来没有哪个时代像互联网时代那样迫切地需要批判性思维。


At least in developed countries – but increasingly in underdeveloped ones as well – the problem is no longer one of access to information, but of the lack of ability to process and make sense of that information.	至少发达国家的问题不再是信息获取，而是不具备处理和消化这些信息的能力，落后国家也越来越多地面对这一问题。


Unfortunately, colleges, high schools, and even elementary schools are unlikely to mandate introductory courses in critical thinking on their own.	遗憾的是，大学、高中甚至是小学都不太可能自发地推广批判性思维这项入门必修课。


Education has increasingly been transformed into a commodity system, in which the “customers” (formerly students) are kept happy with personalized curricula while being prepared for the job market (rather than being prepared to be responsible human beings and citizens).	教育越来越转化为一种商品制度，其中的“客户”（也就是之前的学生）满足于在修习个性化课程的同时为就业市场做好准备（而不是准备成为负责任的人和公民）。


This can and must change, but it requires a grassroots movement that uses blogs, online magazines and newspapers, book clubs and meet-up clubs, and anything else that might work to promote educational opportunities to develop critical-thinking skills.	这种状况可以而且必须改变，但这需要发起草根运动，运用博客、在线杂志和报纸、读书会和见面会、以及推广教育机会，发展批判性思维能力的其他任何方法。


After all, we do know that it is our future.	归根结底我们确信一点：未来属于我们自己。


Ignoring the Storm	对风暴视而不见


The most recent G7 finance ministers’ meeting in October was an utter failure.	西方七国集团最近在十月份召开的会议毫无成果。


The only thing that they agreed on was to admonish China to revalue its currency.	会议所达成的唯一的一致就是劝告中国对其货币重新估价。


The yuan’s value, while important, is not the central question facing the world economy today.	人民币的价格尽管重要，但并不是当今世界经济所面临的中心问题。


The real immediate problem concerns what is happening and what will happen to the dollar.	真正急迫的关切是美元的动向。


But the real issue for prosperity concerns the foundations of the global financial system.	但是，事关经济繁荣的实际问题关系到全球金融体系的基础。


How low will the dollar go?	美元会走低多少？


How can we undo the imbalances of economies – China, followed far behind by Europe – exporting massively to the United States or to the dollar zone?	在向美国或者美元区出口上中国把欧洲远远甩在后面，我们如何解决这一不平衡问题？


Will the US mortgage market, which is expected to become even more difficult in 2008, subside into calm afterwards, or will it contaminate the whole international financial system?	美国的房贷市场预计在2008年变得更为困难，它是否会随后平缓下来，还是把整个国际金融体系搅乱？


Is there a risk that rising oil prices – already reaching all-time highs – will cause further debt defaults worldwide?	不断上升的石油价格已经达到了历史最高点，是否会有造成世界范围的进一步拖欠债务问题的风险？


The spate of earning reports from America’s biggest banks suggests that there are real worries here.	美国最大的各家银行纷纷做出的收益报告表明确实存在担忧。


The condition of the world economy nowadays is very strange.	当今世界经济状况非常奇怪。


There are no great shocks but various declines and crises.	没有巨大的冲击，但是却有不同的下降和危机。


Central bankers try to soothe and reassure, but they are not very convincing.	中央银行试图平息和安定市场，但是并不令人信服。


Governments are silent, acting more or less as if nothing important is happening.	各国政府保持沉默，好像什么重要事也没有发生一样。


And, according to many economists, commentators, and journalists, today’s worries are temporary, solvable difficulties.	而且，根据许多经济学家、评论员或者记者的观点，现今的担心只是暂时的、可以解决的困难。


There is no general crisis on the horizon.	并不存在总体的危机。


I disagree.	我并不同意。


I believe that we have entered a period of weakening across the different parts of the global economic system, and that this may lead to a global recession.	我相信，我们已经进入了遍布全球经济体系不同部分的衰弱时期，而且这可能导致全球衰退。


This weakening calls for a strong international public response, including tighter regulation, if we are to avoid such a crisis.	我们要想避免这一危机，那么，这一衰弱情况就要求采取强大的国际公共反应，包括更为有力的法规。


Why does the world economy look so flimsy?	世界经济为何看似如此不定？


First, the way capitalism operates nowadays has changed mightily from just 30 years ago.	首先，资本主义的运作方式与仅仅30年前已经截然不同了。


In developed countries from 1945 to 1975, capitalism brought rapid growth, an average of 5% per year for long periods.	在1945年到1975年期间，发达国家的资本主义带来了快速增长，很长一段时间都是每年5%。


Of course, it was subject to ups and downs, but it was not subject to financial crises of the type that we see regularly today.	当然，还是有波动起伏，但是并没有我们定期见到的这样的金融危机。


Moreover, capitalism in the post-WWII decades maintained full employment, with unemployment often hovering around 2% in Europe, North America, and Japan.	而且，二战以后几十年来的资本主义维持了全民就业，欧洲、北美和日本的失业率经常在2%左右。


Job insecurity back then was mostly unknown and mass poverty had disappeared.	那时候，工作不稳定几乎没有听说，而且大规模的贫困已经消失。


The keys to that period of growth and happiness were a strong social welfare system and mainly Keynesian domestic and foreign economic policies in all the world’s big states.	那一时期的增长和幸福生活的关键是世界所有大国强大的社会福利体系和以凯恩斯主义为主导的国内和国际经济政策。


Above all, every developed economy pursued policies designed to provide high wages, which would guarantee high consumption and thus rapid growth.	最为重要的是，每个发达国家都实行提供高工资的政策，这一政策保证了高消费，从而带来快速经济增长。


Shareholders used to put up with relatively meager dividends compared to today.	与当今相比，股东们大多容忍了相对较低的股息。


Thirty years on, shareholders have broken definitively with this system.	三十年以来，股东们已经完全脱离了这一体系。


Pension, investment, and hedge funds have taken the lead in this revolution.	养老金、投资以及对冲基金在这一巨变中一马当先。


In all developed economies, profits have leaped spectacularly in the past 25 years, by between 8% and 10% of GDP.	在过去25年里，所有的发达经济体中的利润巨幅增长，达到了GDP的8%和10%。


But wages and social security revenues have suffered an equivalent cut.	但是工资以及社会保障收入却受到了同样幅度的削减。


As a result, growth has weak underpinnings.	结果，经济增长存在薄弱环节。


Everywhere, labor is becoming insecure and mass poverty has reappeared in developed countries.	在所有地方，工作变得不稳定，而发达国家中有重新出现了大范围的贫困。


As economic deregulation increased, financial crises began erupting: since 1990, there have been three distinct crises in Latin America, one each in Russia and Asia, the Internet bubble, and now the sub-prime crisis.	经济管制解除增加之际，金融危机开始爆发。 从1990年以来，拉美、俄国和亚洲出现三起突出的危机，又有互联网泡沫，现在又是次级房贷危机。


Second, over the past 6-7 years, strong GDP growth in the US and Great Britain has been offset by staggering debt.	第二，在过去六七年间，庞大的债务抵销了美英两国强劲的GDP增长。


The US now borrows $2 billion a day, 95% of it from Asia and 45% of that amount from China’s central bank.	美国现在每天借债二十亿美元，95%来自亚洲，45%来自中国的中央银行。


America’s total debt exceeds 39 trillion dollars, or roughly 3.5 times US GDP.	美国的整体债务超过39万亿美元，大致相当于美国GDP的3. 5倍。


This situation will remain manageable only if oil prices stop increasing.	只有石油价格停止上升，这一形势才会得以控制。


And yet, the opposite is more likely, with domestic inflation – a danger aggravated by central banks’ loosening of money supply to help commercial banks – bringing the threat of higher interest rates.	但是，更为可能的是相反的情况，美国国内通货膨胀正在威胁带来更高的利率。 通货膨胀的危险由于各中央银行放松银根来帮助商业银行而加剧。


Finally, while assets nowadays are much more liquid, this has not boosted long-term productive investment.	最后，如今的资产更为具有流动性，这并未提高长期生产性投资。


Instead, the profitable carving up of healthy companies has freed up capital to flow to intangible assets, houses and other forms of real estate, fueling a speculative crisis.	相反，运营良好的企业瓜分利润，释放了资本流入无形资产、房产以及其他形式的地产，促进了投机性危机。


In short, the global economy – replete with get-rich-quick schemes, overpaid bosses, and corporate fraud – has lost its moral bearings.	简而言之，全球经济充满了快速致富的途径，报酬过于丰厚的老板以及企业诈骗，已经失去了其道德标准。


We cannot let those dangerous trends continue unchecked.	我们不能对这些危险的趋向听之任之。


We are obviously sailing toward the rocks, and the whole developed world should be concerned.	我们明显地在走向危险境地，整个发达世界都应该予以关注。


There is an urgent need for a global conference – a Bretton Woods II – to adopt strict rules to contain today’s wayward financial markets.	现在继续召开全球会议来制定严格的规则限制当今失控的金融市场。 我们可以称之为第二次布雷顿森林会议。


Unfortunately, as the most recent G7 meeting showed, the world’s major governments are not yet ready to act.	不幸的是，正如最近的七国集团会议所显示的那样，世界各主要国家政府还没有打算采取行动。


Illiberal Democracy in Latin America	拉美的不自由民主


SANTIAGO – In an influential 1997 essay, Fareed Zakaria coined the term “illiberal democracy” to describe those countries that hold elections (of varying fairness) to choose their leaders, yet restrict civil liberties and political freedom.	圣地亚哥—在1997年的著名文章中，法利德·扎卡利亚（Fareed Zakaria）创造了“不自由民主”一词来形容用（公正度各异的）选举选择领导人、但限制公民自由和政治自由的国家。


At the time, such practices were common mostly in Asia and Africa, with a sizeable concentration of illiberal democracies among the ex-Soviet states.	当时，这类行为在亚洲和非洲最为普遍，集中出现不自由民主的则是前苏联国家。


Zakaria described illiberal democracy as a “growth industry,” and he was right: in the past 15 years, it has come with full force to Latin America.	扎卡利亚将不自由民主称为“成长行业”，这么做不可谓不正确：在过去15年中，不自由民主在拉美蓬勃发展。


This might seem surprising, because most countries south of the Río Bravo (known to North Americans as the Rio Grande) moved from right-wing dictatorship to democracy in the 1980’s and 1990’s.	这可能令人惊奇，因为在20世纪八九十年代，大部分布拉沃河（Rio Bravo，北美称为格兰德河，Rio Grande）以南国家从右翼独裁过渡到民主。


Some of these democracies were initially imperfect, to be sure, but optimists hoped that it was only a matter of time until all elections would be fair and restrictions on civil liberties fully lifted.	平心而论，其中一些民主国家诞生之初并不完美，但乐观者认为所有选举都能公正进行、对公民自由的限制完全消除只是时间问题。


That was not to be.	并非如此。


On the contrary, the quality of democracy has deteriorated sharply in several countries in the region.	相反，民主平等度在该地区的不少国家迅速恶化。


Venezuela’s late president, Hugo Chávez, was the chief exponent of this trend.	委内瑞拉已故总统查韦斯便是这一趋势的最佳写照。


According to the democracy watchdog Freedom House, in the 2012 election, “the opposition candidate, Henrique Capriles, was able to hold rallies and engage in traditional forms of campaigning.”	据民主观察组织自由之家（Freedom House）透露，在2010年选举中，“反对派候选人卡普里莱斯（Henrique Capriles）能够构筑选举联盟，并进行传统竞选活动。


But “Chávez benefited from massive use of state resources that enabled him to dominate media time by a margin of 25-to-1, distribute household goods to constituents, and convince many voters that the state could punish them for casting a ballot for the opposition.”	”但“查韦斯从大规模使用国家资源中获益良多，这让他能够以25比1的优势主宰媒体时段，向选民分发家庭用品，并威胁众多选民投票给反对者将受到国家的惩罚。 ”


Much the same – along with accusations of widespread vote-counting irregularities – could be said about the recent election held after Chávez died, which installed his handpicked successor, Nicolás Maduro.	查韦斯死后进行的最新选举大致也是如此——此外还有大规模的计票伎俩，查韦斯的指定接班人马杜罗顺利当选。


Press freedom is also on the decline.	言论自由也有所退步。


In another report, Freedom House notes that the number of Latin American countries classified as “not free” when it comes to the media has risen to its highest level since 1989.	自由之家的领一份报告指出，被归为媒体“不自由”拉美国家数量上升至1989年以来的最高水平。


The report highlights deterioration in Paraguay (where a “parliamentary coup” removed an elected president) and Ecuador, where President Rafael Correa’s government withdrew “official advertising from privately-owned media that are critical of the government” and “placed limitations on media coverage of electoral campaigns.”	报告特别强调了巴拉圭（一场“议会政变”推翻了当选总统）和厄瓜多尔（总统科雷亚的政府撤回了“私人所有媒体批评政府的官方广告”，并“限制媒体报道选战”。


He has also engaged in “legal and regulatory harassment, and physical intimidation of journalists.”	他还参与了“干扰法律和监管，并对记者进行人身恐吓。 ”


Argentina is another country where journalists are on the defensive.	阿根廷是另一个冒犯记者的国家。


A 2009 law that aimed to diversify media ownership has been used to put pressure on media outlets that are critical of President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner.	2009年的一项旨在实现媒体所有权多元化的法律被用于向对总统基什内尔持批评态度的新闻媒体施压。


Fernández’s supporters in Congress recently attempted to limit the judiciary’s independence and pack the upper echelons of the court system, but the country’s Supreme Court struck down their law as unconstitutional.	基什内尔在国会的支持者最近还试图限制司法独立，将法院系统高层一锅端，但阿根廷最高法院裁定他们的法律违宪。


Illiberal democratic policies and practices are present almost everywhere in Latin America: a distortive electoral system in Chile, persistent violence in Mexico and Colombia, and endemic corruption among lawmakers in Brazil all limit citizens’ ability to express their views effectively and shape policy.	不自由民主政策和行为在拉丁美洲随处可见：智利的扭曲选举制度、墨西哥和哥伦比亚的持续暴力，以及巴西的腐败顽疾都制约着公民有效表达观点、影响政策的能力。


But the left-wing populists influenced by Chávez – who ruled Venezuela for 14 years – have perfected a particularly illiberal practice: bending constitutional rules to allow themselves to be reelected again and again.	但受查韦斯影响（他统治委内瑞拉长达14年）的左翼民粹主义者已经对一项特别不自由的行为驾轻就熟：篡改宪法规则允许他们自己一次又一次连任。


In Bolivia, President Evo Morales’s new 2009 constitution banned reelection to a third consecutive term, but now the Constitutional Court has allowed him to run, arguing that the Bolivian state has been “refounded.”	在玻利维亚，总统莫拉莱斯的2009年新宪法禁止三度连选连任，但如今宪法法院批准他连任，指出玻利维亚国已经“重建”。


Morales’s previous terms, according to this reasoning, occurred in a different state and thus do not count toward current term limits.	根据宪法法院给出的理由，莫拉莱斯的前几个任期发生于不同的国家，因此不受现有任期限制约束。


In Ecuador, Correa used the same trick right from the start: his 2008 constitution explicitly stated that the time Correa had served as President under the previous constitution did not bar him from seeking reelection, enabling him to remain in office until 2017.	在厄瓜多尔，科雷亚从一开始就玩起了这一套：他的2008年宪法明文规定，科雷亚根据此前宪法规定担任总统的任期不能禁止他追求连任，这使得他能够担任总统直到2017年。


Similarly, in Nicaragua – like Ecuador, also in Venezuela’s sphere of influence – the Supreme Court decided that President Daniel Ortega can run again, even though many legal scholars believe otherwise.	类似地，在尼加拉瓜——与厄瓜多尔一样，尼加拉瓜也在委内瑞拉的影响力圈之内——最高法院裁决总统奥尔特加可以再次连任，尽管许多法律学者对此并不认同。


In Argentina, Fernández and her late husband Néstor Kirchner have held power for 12 years combined, and it remains unclear whether she will attempt to amend the constitution in order to seek yet another term in 2015.	在阿根廷，基什内尔及其已故丈夫内斯托尔·基什内尔加起来已掌权12年，目前仍不清楚她是否会追求修改宪法从而在2015年继续追求连任。


The phenomenon of quasi-constitutional reelection has become so widespread in Latin America that Georgetown University professor Héctor Schamis has dubbed it “the new authoritarianism” in the region.	准宪法连任的现象在拉丁美洲如此普遍，以助于乔治敦大学教授赫克特·夏米斯（Héctor Schamis）将其称为该地区的“新正统”。


Other elected leaders in Latin America have been curiously tolerant of these anti-democratic practices.	有意思的是，其他拉美民选领导人一致容忍着这些反民主行为。


Speeches at regional summits can go on for hours, but hardly a word is uttered about democracy’s decay.	地区峰会的演讲常常一讲就是几个小时，但很少会有内容涉及到民主倒退。


Capriles, who claims that victory in the post-Chávez election was stolen from him, was recently in Chile, but President Sebastián Piñera agreed to meet with him only at a private dinner, not at an official meeting in La Moneda Palace.	声称其查韦斯死后选举的胜利被窃走的卡普利亚斯最近身在智利，但智利总统皮涅拉只同意在私人晚餐上与他会晤，而不是在拉莫内达宫（La Moneda Palace）举行正式会晤。


Former Chilean President Michelle Bachelet, the front-runner in the country’s upcoming presidential election in November, did not meet with Capriles at all, citing “agenda problems.”	前智利总统巴切莱特、11月大选的领先者则不会接见卡普利亚斯，原因是“日程安排问题”。


Augusto Pinochet, Chile’s former dictator, ruled for 16 years in the name of “authoritarian democracy,” and then attempted to leave behind what he called a “protected democracy.”	智利前独裁者皮诺切特曾以“威权民主”的名义统治该国16年，并试图在此后留下他所谓的“受保护的民主”。


Today’s would-be strongmen speak of “popular” or “Bolivarian” democracy.	如今的准强人们大谈“民粹”或“玻利瓦尔”民主。


Times have changed, but one thing remains the same: true democracy needs no qualifiers.	时代在变化，但有一点没有改变：真正的民主不需要定语。


The Illusions Driving Up US Asset Prices	推升美国资产价格的幻觉


NEW HAVEN – Speculative markets have always been vulnerable to illusion.	纽黑文—投机性市场总是容易受到幻觉的影响。


But seeing the folly in markets provides no clear advantage in forecasting outcomes, because changes in the force of the illusion are difficult to predict.	但看清市场中的愚蠢并不能为预见结果提供明显的优势，因为幻觉力量的变化难以预测。


In the United States, two illusions have been important recently in financial markets.	在美国，最近金融市场中有两股重要的幻觉。


One is the carefully nurtured perception that President-elect Donald Trump is a business genius who can apply his deal-making skills to make America great again.	其一是一个精心培育的感觉：当选总统唐纳德·特朗普是一位商界天才，能够用其做交易的技能让美国再次伟大。


The other is a naturally occurring illusion: the proximity of Dow 20,000.	其二是自然发生的幻觉：道指逼近20,000点。


The Dow Jones Industrial Average has been above 19,000 since November, and countless news stories have focused on its flirtation with the 20,000 barrier – which might be crossed by the time this commentary is published.	11月，道琼斯工业平均指数已站上19,000点，数不清的新闻报道都聚焦于它向20,0000点的冲击——也许这篇评论发表的时候已经实现了。


Whatever happens, Dow 20,000 will still have a psychological impact on markets.	无论如何，道指20,000点都将对市场产生心理冲击。


Trump has never been clear and consistent about what he will do as president.	特朗普从未对如何当总统有过明确且一致的想法。


Tax cuts are clearly on his agenda, and the stimulus could lead to higher asset prices.	减税显然在其日程中，刺激则可能带来资产价格上涨。


Lower corporate taxes are naturally supposed to lead to higher share prices, while cuts in personal income tax might lead to higher home prices (though possibly offset by other changes in the tax system).	降低公司税自然会被认为将推高股价，而降低个人所得税可能导致更高的住房价格（尽管其效果可能被税制的其他变化抵消）。


But it is not just Trump’s proposed tax changes that plausibly affect market psychology.	但貌似合理地影响市场心理的不只有特朗普的税收改革方案。


The US has never had a president like him.	美国从未有过像他这样的总统。


Not only is he an actor, like Ronald Reagan; he is also a motivational writer and speaker, a brand name in real estate, and a tough deal maker.	他不但是一个演员，就像罗纳德·里根那样； 他也是鼓动人心的作家和演说家、房地产业如雷贯耳的名字，和难缠的交易推手。


If he ever reveals his financial information, or if his family is able to use his influence as president to improve its bottom line, he might even prove to be successful in business.	如果他果真公布他的财务信息，或他的家庭能够利用他作为总统的影响力让财富更上一层楼，那么他在商业上无疑是成功的。


The closest we can come to Trump among former US presidents might be Calvin Coolidge, an extremely pro-business tax cutter.	与特朗普最相似的美国前总统也许是凯文·柯立芝。 柯立芝是极端亲商的减税派。


“The chief business of the American people is business,” Coolidge famously declared, while his treasury secretary, Andrew Mellon – one of America’s wealthiest men – advocated tax cuts for the rich, which would “trickle down” in benefits to the less fortunate.	“美国人民的主业就是商业，”这是柯立芝的一句名言，而他的财政部长安德鲁·梅隆（Andrew Mellon，美国最有钱的富豪之一）鼓吹为富人减税，说这将让好处“渗透”给穷人。


The US economy during the Coolidge administration was very successful, but the boom ended badly in 1929, just after Coolidge stepped down, with the stock-market crash and the beginning of the Great Depression.	柯立芝执政时期的美国经济非常成功，但1929年柯立芝一下台，繁荣便戛然而止，股市崩盘，大萧条开始。


During the 1930s, the 1920s were looked upon wistfully, but also as a time of fakery and cheating.	20世纪30年代，人们翘首期盼20年代的日子重现，但同时也把20年代看成假货和欺诈横行的年代。


Of course, history is never destiny, and Coolidge is only one observation – hardly a solid basis for a forecast.	当然，历史绝非宿命，柯立芝也只是一个观察——而绝非预测未来的可靠基准。


Moreover, unlike Trump, both Coolidge and Mellon were levelheaded and temperate in their manner.	此外，和特朗普不同，柯立芝和梅隆的行事风格是冷静而稳健。


But add to the Trump effect all the attention paid to Dow 20,000, and we have the makings of a powerful illusion.	但除了特朗普的影响，还有人们对道指20,000点的关注，这就集齐了强大幻觉的要素。


On November 10, 2016, two days after Donald J. Trump was elected, the Dow Jones average hit a new record high – and has since set 16 more daily records, all trumpeted by news media.	2016年11月10日，唐纳德·特朗普当选后两天，道琼斯平均指数创出历史新高——此后又16次刷新日内新高纪录，每一次都被新闻媒体大书特书。


That sounds like important news for Trump.	这听起来像是特朗普的大新闻。


In fact, the Dow had already hit nine record highs before the election, when Hillary Clinton was projected to win.	事实上，道指在大选前、人们预测希拉里·克林顿将胜出时便已经九次刷新新高。


In nominal terms, the Dow is up 70% from its peak in January 2000.	以名义值衡量，道指较2000年1月的高点上涨了70%。


On November 29, 2016, it was announced that the S&P/CoreLogic/Case-Shiller National Home Price Index (which I co-founded with my esteemed former colleague Karl E. Case, who died last July) reached a record high the previous September.	2016年11月26日，标普/核心逻辑/凯斯-希勒（S&P/CoreLogic/Case-Shiller）全国住房价格指数（由我和我素来敬重的前同事卡尔·凯斯（Karl E. Case）共同编制，凯斯于1去年7月逝世）公告该指数在9月创下的历史新高。


The previous record was set more than ten years earlier, in July 2006.	历史前高发生在十多年前的2006年7月。


But these numbers are illusory.	但这些数字都是幻觉。


The US has a national policy of overall inflation.	美国有整体通胀的国策。


The US Federal Reserve has set an inflation “objective” of 2% in terms of the personal consumption expenditure deflator.	美联储制定的通胀“目标”是个人消费支出平减指数每年上涨2%。


This means that all prices should tend to go up by about 2% per year, or 22% per decade.	这意味着所有价格都应该每年上升2%，或每十年上升22%。


The Dow is up only 19% in real (inflation-adjusted) terms since 2000.	2000年以来，道指真实（经通胀调整的）涨幅只有19%。


A 19% increase in 17 years is underwhelming, and the national home price index that Case and I created is still 16% below its 2006 peak in real terms.	17年上涨19%的成绩平庸无奇，而凯斯和我所编制的全国住房价格指数的真实值较2006年前高仍低了16%。


But hardly anyone focuses on these inflation-corrected numbers.	但很少有人关注这些经通胀修正的数字。


The Fed, like the world’s other central banks, is steadily debasing the currency, in order to create inflation.	和世界上其他央行一样，美联储正在实行货币稳步贬值，以制造通胀。


A Google Ngrams search of books shows that use of the term “inflation-targeting” began growing exponentially in the early 1990s, when the target was typically far below actual inflation.	图书搜索引擎Google Ngrams显示，“通胀目标”一词的搜索量自20世纪90年代以来呈现指数增长趋势，当时，这一目标往往远低于实际通胀。


The idea that we actually want moderate positive inflation – “price stability,” not zero inflation – appears to have started to take shape in policy circles around the time of the 1990-1991 recession.	我们其实想要温和正通胀——“物价稳定”而非零通胀——的思想似乎从1990—1991年衰退期间开始影响政策。


Lawrence Summers argued that the public has an “irrational” resistance to the declining nominal wages that some would have to suffer in a zero-inflation regime.	拉里·萨默斯（Lawrence Summers）认为公众会“不理性”地抵制名义工资下降，而在零通胀机制中，必须有人承受这一损失。


Many people appear not to understand that inflation is a change in the units of measurement.	许多人似乎不理解通胀时衡量单位的变化。


Unfortunately, although the 2% inflation target is largely a feel-good policy, people tend to draw too much inspiration from it.	不幸的是，尽管2%的通胀目标是一项总体令人感觉满意的政策，但人们总是从中汲取过多的灵感。


Irving Fisher called this fixation on nominal price growth the “money illusion” in an eponymous 1928 book.	欧文·费雪（Irving Fisher）在其1928年的同名著作将这一固定的名义价格增长称为“货币幻觉”。


That doesn’t mean that we set new speculative-market records every day.	这并不意味着我们要每天刷新投机市场的记录。


Stock-price movements tend to approximate what economists call “random walks,” with prices reflecting small daily shocks that are about equally likely to be positive or negative.	股价波动倾向于经济学家所谓的“随机游走”，反应日间微小冲击的价格上涨和下跌的可能性差不多。


And random walks tend to go through long periods when they are well below their previous peak; the chance of setting a record soon is negligible, given how far prices would have to rise.	当价格接近前高时，随机游走倾向于发生较长时期； 考虑到价格需要上涨的幅度，立刻创出新高的可能性微乎其微。


But once they do reach a new record high, prices are far more likely to set additional records – probably not on consecutive days, but within a short interval.	但一旦价格真的创出新高，其继续创出新高的可能性就会大幅增加——也许不是连日创出新高，但在较短时期内创出新高可能性很大。


In the US, the combination of Trump and a succession of new asset-price records – call it Trump-squared – has been sustaining the illusion underpinning current market optimism.	在美国，特朗普和资产价格频创新高的组合——称之为“特朗普平方”（Trump-squared）——持续了支撑当前市场乐观情绪的幻觉。


For those who are not too stressed from having taken extreme positions in the markets, it will be interesting (if not profitable) to observe how the illusion morphs into a new perception – one that implies very different levels for speculative markets.	对那些没有因为仓位过重而饱受压力的人来说，观察幻觉演变为新观念——从而让投机市场发生剧烈涨跌——是一件饶有兴味（甚至有利可图）的事情。


Images of Scarcity	短缺画面


NEW HAVEN – Could the television image we’ve all seen of the Greenland ice cap crumbling into the ocean because of global warming somehow – indirectly and psychologically – be partly responsible for high oil and other commodity prices?	纽黑文－我们都看到过的格林兰的冰冠因为全球变暖而消融进海里的电视画面——间接及在心理上——可能是造成石油及其它商品的高价的部分的原因吗？


The usual explanation of today’s scarcity and high prices focuses on explosive growth in emerging countries, China and India in particular, whose demand for scarce resources is “insatiable.”	对当今的短缺和商品高价的解释专注于新兴国家的爆炸式增长，特别是中国和印度的增长，并认为这两个国家对稀缺资源的需求是“无底洞”。


But psychology also matters in speculative markets, and perhaps that image of the Greenland ice disappearing makes it seem all too plausible that everything else– land, water, even fresh air – is running out too.	但是，心理学在投机市场上也会起作用，或许格林兰冰川的消融使所有其它的事物——土地，水，甚至是新鲜空气——也都快用完了似乎成为事实。


Let’s take a case study, the last generalized boom-bust cycle in commodity prices, which caused these prices generally to rise (more or less) from some time in the 1960’s until the 1980’s, and then generally to fall until the mid-1990’s.	我们来进行一个个案研究，最近一次总体性的商品价格繁荣－崩溃周期导致商品价格从20世纪60年代到20世纪80年代普遍上涨（虽然涨幅或大或小），然后开始普遍下跌直到20世纪90年代才结束。


Maybe images matter just as much as substance in explaining that.	或许画面和实质在解释这一现象上同样重要。


The conventional “fundamental” explanation for that cycle relates it to political events.	对这个周期的传统的“基本”解释是将它和政治事件联系起来。


The 1973-1974 oil crisis is said to have been due to the cutoff of oil following the Arab-Israeli Yom Kippur War.	1973-1974年的石油危机据说是因为阿拉伯－以色列赎罪日战争之后的石油停产。


The 1979-1981 oil crisis is said to reflect the cutoff in oil due to the Iranian Revolution and the Iran-Iraq war.	1979-1981年的石油危机据说反映了因为伊朗革命和伊朗－伊拉克战争导致的石油停产。


The drop in oil prices after the mid-1980’s is said to be due to the collapse of the OPEC oil cartel.	20世纪80年代中期的石油价格下跌据说是因为欧佩克石油卡特尔的崩溃。


But some economists doubt that these events tell the whole story.	但是，有些经济学家怀疑这些事件是否说明了所有的问题。


Sure, there were sharp movements in oil prices corresponding to these events, but maybe there were other, even more important factors affecting general trends in oil prices.	当然，石油价格进行了剧烈地波动，来对这些事件做出反应，但是，或许有其它的或者甚至更重要的因素在影响着石油价格的总体趋势。


After all, these events don’t really explain why prices of other commodities often followed that of oil.	毕竟，这些事件不能真正地解释为什么其它商品的价格经常追随着油价。


Maybe more important than those wars in the 1970’s was that people throughout the world got worried about running out of things.	或许比20世纪70年代的战争更重要的是全世界的人们都开始担心资源会用完。


This was the time of the “great population scare,” which transformed thinking worldwide, no doubt contributing to higher commodity prices while the fear lasted.	那时是一个“巨大的人口恐惧”时期，它使人们在全球范围内思考，所以难怪会在担忧持续的时候导致商品价格上涨。


There seemed to be some basis for this scare.	这种短缺似乎有一些基础。


The rate of increase in the world’s population rose from 1.8% in 1951 to 2.1% in 1971.	全球人口的增长率从1951年的1. 8%上升到1971年的2.


But those were just dry statistics.	1%。 但是这只是枯燥的统计数据。


Images likely mattered more.	画面可能更起作用。


In 1948, the astronomer Fred Hoyle said, “Once a photograph of the Earth, taken from outside, is available – once the sheer isolation of the earth becomes plain – a new idea as powerful as any in history will be let loose.”	在1948年，天文学家佛瑞德·霍伊尔（Fred Hoyle）说，“一旦有了从外部给地球拍摄的照片——一旦地球的绝对孤立变得众所周知——和历史上那些有影响力的观点一样强大的新观点就会产生。 ”


A generation later, he was proven right.	一代人之后，事实证明他是正确的。


The first photograph of the earth from space came as part of the Apollo project in November 1967.	从太空给地球拍摄的第一张照片是1967年11月的阿波罗计划的一部分。


One of the Apollo astronauts, James B. Irwin, who landed on the moon in 1971, said of his view of the earth, “It was so far away…a little ball in the blackness of space.	曾为阿波罗计划宇航员之一的詹姆斯·B·欧文，在1971年登上月球，并说出了他对地球的观点，“它很遥远…是黑暗的太空中的一个小星球。


That does something to your soul….We all came back humanitarians….We saw how fragile our planet is and yet how beautiful.	这会触动你的灵魂…我们回来以后都成为人道主义者…我们看见了我们的星球是多么的脆弱同时又是多么的美丽。


We saw how we must learn to work together, to love each other.”	我们知道了为什么我们必须学会一起工作并且互相热爱。 ”


Let’s not discount that statement.	我们不要忽略了这段话。


That image of the earth from space had a profound psychological effect, and we all saw it.	那种从太空看到的地球图像具有深刻的心理影响，并且我们都看到了这种影响。


Maybe that image was at least part of the reason why people became so worried in the 1970’s about population running ahead of resources.	或许，这个图像至少是引起人们在20世纪70年代对人口走在资源的前面如此担心的一部分原因。


The Club of Rome’s monumental book The Limits to Growth came out in 1972, with a picture of the earth on its cover.	罗马俱乐部的不朽作品《增长的极限》在1972年问世，并以地球的照片作为其封面。


The book, written by a team of scientists, predicted disastrous shortages and mass starvation due to population pressure.	这本书由一组科学家写成，它预言由于人口压力，将会产生灾难性的匮乏和大规模的饥荒。


Despite scientific critics of the Club of Rome’s methods, the public was ready to believe the dire forecast.	尽管有对罗马俱乐部研究方法的科学批评，但是公众仍然准备相信这个可怕的预言。


The great population scare led to various birth-control efforts around the world, notably to the “one-child policy” instituted in China in 1979.	巨大的人口恐惧引发了全球内的各种生育控制措施，特别是中国在1979年确立了“独生子女政策”。


Partly due to such efforts, as well as to a change in family values, the rate of growth of the world’s population, began a long decline, to 1.1% in 2005.	部分由于这样的努力以及家庭观念的变化，世界人口的增长率开始了长期的下降趋势，到2005年只有1. 1%。


That gradual decline led to gradual loss of concern about limits to growth.	人口增长率逐渐下降导致对地球增长极限担忧的逐渐消除。


Commodity prices fell, too.	商品价格也开始下跌。


Today, we remain mostly unconcerned about global population growth.	现在，我们大多数时候仍然对全球人口增长不太担心。


But, in the last ten years or so, we have become concerned about something else: rapid world economic growth.	但是，在过去十年左右的时间里，我们开始担心其它的事情：全球经济的快速增长。


While it may seem that no image in the last decade was so dramatic as the first photo of the earth from space, think again.	虽然似乎在过去十年内没有像来自太空的第一张地球照片那样具有强烈冲击力的画面，��是，请再仔细想一想。


Try searching YouTube, for example, on Greenland ice.	例如，试着在YouTube上搜一搜格林兰冰川。


More generally, the Internet gives a sense of vastness to the world’s economic activity that was never available before.	更多的是，互联网使人们意识到世界经济活动达到前所未有的巨大规模。


The ability to communicate via e-mail to everyone in the world creates a sense of the world’s smallness relative to the abundance of people in it.	能通过电子邮件和世界上各个角落的人交流使人感到世界相对于其大量的人口来说是多么的渺小。


We have seen photographs of hurricane and typhoon activity due to global warming, affecting people in Louisiana or Myanmar.	我们已经看过因为全球变暖而产生的飓风和台风，它们给位于路易斯安那及缅甸的人们造成巨大的损失。


We have seen devastation from the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, interpreted as a sign of crowding at the coasts.	我们已经见过2004年印度洋海啸产生的破坏，它被解释为是海岸过于拥挤的信号。


The North Pole turned into a lake for the first time in 2000.	北极在2000年首次变成了一个湖。


We see aerial photos of the Aral Sea drying up.	我们可以从咸海的空中摄影中看出它正在干涸；


We practically can’t buy caviar from the Caspian Sea any more.	我们事实上再也不能从里海买到鱼子酱了；


The European Space Agency announced in September 2007 that satellite photos showed that the Northwest Passage appeared clear of ice for shipping for the first time ever, and that the Northeast Passage is almost clear.	欧洲航天局在2007年9月宣布，卫星照片显示“西北航道”第一次出现了航行时没有冰的情况，而且“东北航道”的冰也几乎没有了。


With so many vivid images of a shrinking and damaged planet, is it really any wonder that human psychology is ripe for high commodity prices?	有如此多关于一个正在萎缩和受损的星球的生动的图像，对人类心理状态引起高商品价格时机已经成熟还会有人感到任何真正的惊愕吗？


Imagining Recession	想像衰退


The world’s housing, oil, and stock markets have been plunged into turmoil in recent months.	世界房地产、石油以及股票市场在最近几个月中陷入混乱。


Yet consumer confidence, capital expenditure, and hiring have yet to take a sharp hit.	但是，消费者信心、资本开支以及招聘却尚未受到大的冲击。


Why?	这是什么原因呢？


Ultimately, consumer and business confidence are mostly irrational.	最终而言，消费者以及商业信心大多都是非理性的。


The psychology of the markets is dominated by the public images that we have in mind from day to day, and that form the basis of our imaginations and of the stories we tell each other.	市场心理受到公众形象的控制。 我们每天构想这些形象，并且它们构成我们的想像的基础以及聊天的材料。


Popular images of past disasters are part of our folklore, often buried in the dim reaches of our memory, but re-emerging to trouble us from time to time.	过往灾难的大众想像是民间传说的一部分，它们经常被掩埋在记忆的阴暗之端，但是它们不时会重新显现，给我们造成麻烦。


Like traditional myths, such graphic, shared images embody fears that are deeply entrenched in our psyche.	就像传统深化一样，这些生动共同的形象体现了深植于我们心理之中的恐惧。


The images that have accompanied past episodes of market turmoil are largely absent today.	伴随过往市场动荡的形象今天大多没有了。


Consider the oil crisis that began in November 1973, resulting in a world stock market crash and a sharp world recession.	看一看1973年11月开始的石油危机。 这一危机造成世界性的股票市场大跌以及大幅度全球衰退。


Vivid images have stuck in people’s minds from that episode: long lines of cars at gas stations, people riding bicycles to work, gasless Sundays and other rationing schemes.	那一事件生动的形象进入人们的头脑。 加油站排队的汽车长龙，人们骑车上班，星期天停止供应天然气以及其他配给措施。


Today, the real price of oil is nearly twice as high as it was at the peak of that crisis, but we have seen nothing like the images from 1973-5.	如今，石油的实际价格几乎是那一场危机顶峰时的两倍，但是我们没有见到1973年到1975年那时的情形。


Mostly we are not even reminded of them.	人们大体上甚至甚至没有提醒这些场景。


So our confidence is not shaken, yet.	所以我们的信心目前还没有晃动。


Just before the October 19, 1987, stock market crash, the biggest one-day drop in history, the image on people’s minds was the crash of 1929.	1987年10月19日股票市场大跌是有史以来单日跌幅最大的一次。 在此之前，人们头脑中德印象还是1929年的大跌。


Indeed, the Wall Street Journal ran a story about it on the morning of the 1987 crash.	实际上，1987年大跌那天早上，华尔街日报发表了一篇有关文章。


I know that those images contributed to the severity of the 1987 crash by encouraging people to sell, because I ran a survey of individual and institutional investors the following week.	我知道，那些景象鼓励人们抛售股票，对1987年股市大跌起到推波助澜的作用，因为我在随后的一周对个体和机构投资者进行了调查。


Images of 1929 – of financiers leaping from buildings, unemployed men sleeping on park benches, long lines at soup kitchens, and impoverished boys selling apples on the street – are not on our minds now.	我们已经忘记了1929年的情形。 当时，金融家门跳楼，失业者睡在公园的椅子上，救济食品站排起了长龙，而穷孩子们则在街头兜售苹果。


The 1929 crash just does not seem relevant to most people today, probably because we survived the 1987 and 2000 crashes with few ill effects, while 1929 seems not only the distant past, but another world.	1929年股市大跌对于当今的大多数人而言毫不相关，或许是因为我们从1987年后2000年的大跌中脱身而出，仅仅略有影响，而1929年不仅是遥远的过去，而且还是另一个世界了。


But images of the 1987 crash, driven by computers in tall modern steel-and-glass office buildings, do seem to be on people’s minds today.	但是1987年股市大跌的情形确实好像还在人们的头脑之中。 高大的现代化钢筋玻璃办公大楼中的电脑推动了那次事件。


The stock market suffered one of its biggest one-day drops this year on the 20th anniversary of the 1987 crash, with the S&P 500 falling 2.56%.	今年，1987年大跌的二十周年当天，股票市场经历了今年最大的单日跌幅之一。 标准普尔指数下降2.


No previous anniversary of the 1987 crash showed any such drop.	56%。 以前的1987年周年并没有显示出如此的跌幅。


The image of a bank run, of long lines of angry people lining up outside a failed bank, was briefly on our minds after the Northern Rock failure in Britain.	当英国北石银行动摇之际，银行挤兑、愤怒的人们在破产银行排长队的景象短暂出现在我们的头脑之中。


But the Bank of England’s direct intervention prevented these images from gaining a foothold on our collective psychology.	但是英格兰银行直接干预防止这些景象在我们的集体心理中扎根。


The images that are uppermost in our minds are of a housing crisis.	我们头脑中最突出的景象是房地产危机。


We imagine residential streets with one “for sale” sign after another.	我们想像街头挂着“出售”牌子一个接一个。


Worse, there are images of foreclosures, of families being evicted from their homes, their furniture and belongings on the street.	更为糟糕的是，银行没收房屋，各家被驱逐出家，家具和什物散落街头。


If home prices continue to decline in the United States and possibly elsewhere, there could be many more vivid images.	如果美国和其他国家的房产价格继续下滑，就会有更多这样的景象。


You may yet be presented with the image of your child’s playmate moving away because his parents were thrown out in a foreclosure.	和你孩子一起玩的孩子搬走，因为他的父母的房产被没收而被逐出家门。 这种景象可能还没有来到。


You may see a house down the street trashed by an angry owner who was foreclosed.	你可能会见到愤怒的屋主在房子被没收后破坏房子。


Such images become part of your sense of reality, and could disturb your sense of confidence and reduce your willingness to spend and support the economy.	这种景象称为你对现实的感受，并且可能破坏你的信心感觉，降低你的消费和支持经济的意愿。


Could such changes in psychology be big enough to tip us into a world recession?	这种心理上的变化是否会大到引起衰退呢？


While it is far from clear that they will, it is a possibility.	尽管还远不明朗，但是这是一种可能。


Psychology need only change enough to bring about a drop in consumption or investment growth of a percentage point or so of world GDP, and market repercussions can do the rest.	心理只需要足够的改变来引起消费或者投资增长降低世界GDP的一个百分点，而市场反应会完成这一过程。


The IMF’s Euro Crisis	IMF的欧元危机


OXFORD – Over the last few decades, the International Monetary Fund has learned six important lessons about how to manage government debt crises.	牛津—在过去几十年中，国际货币基金组织（IMF）学到了关于如何管理政府债务危机的六次重要教训。


In its response to the crisis in Greece, however, each of these lessons has been ignored.	但是，在应对希腊危机时，这六次教训都被忽视了。


The Fund’s participation in the effort to rescue the eurozone may have raised its profile and gained it favor in Europe.	IMF参与拯救欧元区也许提高了它在欧洲的形象和受欢迎程度。


But its failure, and the failure of its European shareholders, to adhere to its own best practices may eventually prove to have been a fatal misstep.	但它，以及它的欧洲股东没能坚守它的最佳实践，这也许将是一个致命的失误。


One key lesson ignored in the Greece debacle is that when a bailout becomes necessary, it should be done once and definitively.	在希腊危机中被忽视的一个关键教训是，当援助不得不发时，应该果断地一次性完成。


The IMF learned this in 1997, when an inadequate bailout of South Korea forced a second round of negotiations.	IMF在1997年学到了这个教训，当时，对韩国援助不足迫使其进行了第二轮谈判。


In Greece, the problem is even worse, as the €86 billion ($94 billion) plan now under discussion follows a €110 billion bailout in 2010 and a €130 billion rescue in 2012.	希腊的问题比韩国还要糟糕，在如今正在谈判中的86亿欧元援助计划之前，已经在2010年和2012年进行了1,100亿欧元和1,300亿欧元规模的援助。


The IMF is, on its own, highly constrained.	IMF本身也倍感压力。


Its loans are limited to a multiple of a country’s contributions to its capital, and by this measure its loans to Greece are higher than any in its history.	其贷款额度限定在一国对其资本贡献量的一定倍数之内，根据这个标准，其对希腊贷款已经高出了其历史上任何一笔其他贷款。


Eurozone governments, however, face no such constraints, and were thus free to put in place a program that would have been sustainable.	但是，欧元区政府没有类似的约束，因此可以自由地实施可持续的计划。


Another lesson that was ignored is not to bail out the banks.	另一个被忽视的教训是不要援助银行。


The IMF learned this the hard way in the 1980s, when it transferred bad bank loans to Latin American governments onto its own books and those of other governments.	IMF在20世纪80年代以惨痛的代价学到了这个教训。 当时，它将银行贷给拉丁美洲政府的不良贷款转移到它自己和其他政府的资产负债表上。


In Greece, bad loans issued by French and German banks were moved onto the public books, transferring the exposure not only to European taxpayers, but to the entire membership of the IMF.	在希腊，法国和德国银行贷出的不良贷款被转移到了公共部门，风险不但转移到了欧洲纳税人身上，也转移到了所有IMF成员国身上。


The third lesson that the IMF was unable to apply in Greece is that austerity often leads to a vicious cycle, as spending cuts cause the economy to contract far more than it would have otherwise.	IMF没能用在希腊身上的第三个教训是紧缩常常导致恶性衰退，因为削减支出导致经济较之不削减支出的情况大幅收缩。


Because the IMF lends money on a short-term basis, there was an incentive to ignore the effects of austerity in order to arrive at growth projections that imply an ability to repay.	IMF的贷款都是短期的，因此有激励忽视紧缩的影响，从而实现增长预测，而实现增长预测意味着有偿付能力。


Meanwhile, the other eurozone members, seeking to justify less financing, also found it convenient to overlook the calamitous impact of austerity.	与此同时，其他欧元区成员国为了论证减少融资的正确性，也心安理得地忽视紧缩的灾难性后果。


Fourth, the IMF has learned that reforms are most likely to be implemented when they are few in number and carefully focused.	第四，IMF已经知道，最有希望实施的改革必须数量很少、仔细集中。


When a country requires assistance, it is tempting for lenders to insist on a long list of reforms.	当一国需要援助时，其领导人很有可能拿出一份长长的改革清单。


But a crisis-wracked government will struggle to manage multiple demands.	但遭到危机冲击的政府很难管理好多重需求。


In Greece, the IMF, together with its European partners, required the government not just to cut expenditures, but to undertake far-reaching tax, pension, judicial, and labor-market reforms.	在希腊，IMF和它的欧洲合作伙伴要求希腊政府不但要削减支出，还要采取深刻的税收、退休金、司法和劳动力市场改革。


And, although the most urgently needed measures will not have an immediate effect on Greece’s finances, the IMF has little choice but to emphasize the short-term spending cuts that boost the chances of being repaid – even when that makes longer-term reforms more difficult to enact.	此外，尽管最紧要的措施不会对希腊财政造成即刻的影响，但IMF别无选择，只能强调增加获得偿付概率的短期削减支出——哪怕这会导致更长期的改革更难实施。


A fifth lesson is that reforms are unlikely to succeed unless the government is committed to seeing them through.	第五个教训是，除非政府有始有终，否则改革不可能成功。


Conditions perceived to be imposed from abroad will almost certainly fail.	被国民感觉来自外国强加的条件几乎必然会失败。


In the case of Greece, domestic political considerations caused European governments to make a show of holding the government’s feet to the fire.	在希腊的例子中，国内政治环境导致欧洲政府装模作样地鞭策希腊政府。


The IMF, too, sought to demonstrate that it was being as tough with Greece as it has been on Brazil, Indonesia, and Zambia – even if doing so was ultimately counterproductive.	IMF也试图表明它对希腊与对巴西、印度尼西亚和赞比亚一样严苛——哪怕这样做最终会起到反作用。


The sixth lesson the IMF has swept aside is that bailing out countries that do not fully control their currencies carries additional risks.	被IMF束之高阁的第六个教训是援助无法完全控制其货币的国家会带来附加风险。


As the Fund learned in Argentina and West Africa, such countries lack one of the easiest ways to adjust to a debt crisis: devaluation.	IMF在阿根廷和西非了解到，这类国家缺少调整适应债务危机的最容易的办法：贬值。


Having failed to forewarn Greece, Portugal, Ireland, and Spain about the perils of joining a currency bloc, the IMF should have considered whether it was proper or necessary for it to intervene at all in the eurozone crisis.	IMF没有事先警告希腊、葡萄牙、爱尔兰和西班牙加入共同货币区的风险，既然如此，IMF应该考虑干预欧元区危机的合理性和必要性。


Its rationale for doing so highlights the risks associated with its decision.	IMF干预的理由彰显出与其决定相关的风险。


The most obvious reason for the IMF’s actions is that Europe was failing to address its own problems, and had the power and influence to drag in the Fund.	IMF采取行动的最显而易见的理由是欧洲无法解决其自身的问题，并且它有将IMF拖下水的力量和影响力。


The IMF’s managing director has always been a European, and European countries enjoy a disproportionate share of the votes on the IMF’s board.	IMF总裁永远是欧洲人，欧洲国家在IMF理事会中享有不成比例的投票权。


Equally important, however, is the fact that the IMF made its decision while facing an existential crisis.	但是，同样重要的是以下事实：IMF在做决定是面临着生存危机。


Historically, the biggest threat to the IMF has been irrelevance.	从历史上看，对IMF最大的威胁是遭到冷落。


It was almost made redundant in the 1970s, when the US floated the dollar, only to be saved in 1982 by the Mexican debt crisis, which propelled it into the role of global financial lifeguard.	20世纪70年代美国决定让美元浮动时，IMF��乎被晾在一旁，直到1982年墨西哥债务危机才得到了救赎，这场危机让IMF成为全球金融卫士。


A decade later, the IMF’s relevance had started to wane again, but was revived by its role in the transformation of the former Soviet-bloc economies.	十年后，IMF有表现出式微之势，但其在前苏联经济体转型中的作用拯救了它自己。


At the time of the euro crisis, the Fund was floundering once more in the aftermath of the East Asian crisis, as its fee-paying clients did anything they could to avoid turning to it.	欧元危机爆发时，IMF正处于东亚危机后的又一次低谷中，其付费客户纷纷对它敬而远之。


The IMF’s participation in the eurozone crisis has now given powerful emerging economies another reason to be disenchanted.	如今，IMF参与欧元区危机让强大的新兴经济体新的另起炉灶的理由。


After the US stymied their demands for a greater say within the Fund, they now find that the organization has been doing Europe’s bidding.	在美国从中作梗妨碍它们要求在IMF中获得更大的话语权后，现在它们又发现该组织一直是欧洲的应声虫。


It will be difficult for the IMF to regain the trust of these increasingly prominent members.	IMF将很难重获这些日益重要的成员的信任。


Unless the US and the EU relinquish their grip, the Fund’s latest bid for relevance may well turn out to be its last.	除非美国和欧洲放松它们对IMF的把持，否则IMF重获重要性的最新努力也许将是最后一次。


The IMF Still Misunderstands the Euro Crisis	依然误解了欧元危机的IMF


WASHINGTON, DC – In July, the International Monetary Fund’s Independent Evaluation Office released a major report on how the Fund handled the euro crisis after 2010.	发自华盛顿——今年七月，国际货币基金组织下属的独立评估办公室发布了一份关于2010年后基金组织如何应对欧元危机的重要报告。


The IEO report is critical of Fund behavior; but, as with previous IMF self-evaluations, it misses many substantive issues.	虽然这份报告的目的是对基金过往的行为提出批评指正； 但是跟以往该组织发布的许多自我评估一样，它忽略了许多实质性问题。


Specifically, the IEO argues that the Fund was captive to European interests – hardly surprising, given that Europeans constitute one-third of the Fund’s executive board.	具体来说，独立评估办公室认为基金组织被欧洲利益绑架了——这不足为奇，因为基金组织执行委员会中有1/3是欧洲人。


Moreover, the Fund was mistaken in assuming that “Europe is different,” and that “sudden stops could not happen within the euro area.”	此外，基金组织错误地假设“欧洲是不同的”，并认为“欧元区内部不会出现突然崩盘状态”。


In a financial crisis, authorities must act fast to address the problems that caused it and restore confidence.	金融危机中的政府当局必须迅速采取行动以解决导致金融危机的根源并恢复信心。


The United States government did just that in the fall of 2008; European leaders, meanwhile, dithered – a point the IEO neglects to mention.	美国政府在2008年危机中正是采取了这个做法； 而欧洲领导层却乱成一团——但独立评估办公室并未在报告中提及这一点。


The IEO report also doesn’t assess IMF programs’ effectiveness.	同时，独立评估办公室的报告未能评估国家货币基金组织应对方案的有效性。


Consider Greece, where the Fund’s response was clearly insufficient.	以希腊为例，基金组织对当地局势的反应明显不足。


In 2009, the Greek budget deficit was 15% of GDP; with an IMF program, the deficit fell in 2010, but only to 11% of GDP.	2009年时希腊预算赤字相当于GDP的15％； 参与国际货币基金组织项目后的2010年赤字有所下降，但仅跌至11％。


Meanwhile, the three Baltic countries – Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania – carried out budget tightening of 9% of GDP in 2009.	与此同时，波罗的海三国 ——爱沙尼亚、拉脱维亚和立陶宛——在2009年就将预算赤字成功缩减至相当于GDP的9％了。


The Fund and the European Union have long been oblivious to many EU countries’ excessive fiscal burdens.	长期以来，基金组织和欧盟一直对许多欧盟国家过度的财政负担视而不见。


The Fund was lenient toward Greece because Greece is a eurozone member; but this favoritism was unjustified and ultimately costly.	基金组织对希腊宽容是因为希腊是欧元区成员； 但这种偏袒是没有道理的，也最终付出了代价。


Greek public expenditures have fluctuated between 50% and 59% of GDP since 2010, creating a massive debt overhang and hindering growth.	2010年以来，希腊公共支出与GDP的比率在50％至59%之间波动，产生了巨大的债务负担并阻碍了该国的经济发展。


By comparison, Germany and the United Kingdom have kept public expenditures at a reasonable 44% of GDP.	相比之下，德国和英国就将公共支出合理控制在了相当于GDP44％的水平。


The IEO report ignores this and focuses instead on the need to restructure public debt, in order to make it sustainable.	独立评估办公室的报告忽略了这一点而转而关注重组公共债务从而使其具备可持续性的需求。


But this didn’t necessarily apply to Greece in 2009, when its public debt was high – at 127% of GDP – but not unsustainable.	但这并不一定适用于2009年的希腊，虽然其公共债务与GDP的比率高达127％——但并非不可持续。


Greek debt surged and became insurmountable only under the IMF’s financing plan concluded in May 2010.	希腊的债务水平是在2010年5月国际货币基金组织的融资计划执行完毕后才出现猛增并变得无以为继的。


At the end of 2015, Italy’s public debt was 133% of GDP, and the ratio for Portugal was 129%. Should Italy and Portugal now be forced to restructure their debt, too?	倘若这是必需，那么在2015年年底意大利的公共债务相当于GDP的133％而葡萄牙则为129％，试问这两个国家现在也得被迫进行债务重组吗？


The European economy grows slowly because it is overtaxed and overregulated.	欧洲经济增长缓慢的原因是因为税负过重且过度管制。


Rather than being told to restructure debt, European countries should be told to deregulate markets for labor, products, and services; and southern countries such as Italy, Greece, Spain, and Portugal should be told to expand secondary education and vocational training.	相对于债务重组，针对欧洲国家的指导方针更应注重于放开劳动力，产品和服务市场； 意大利，希腊，西班牙和葡萄牙等南欧国家应该扩大中等教育和职业培训。


As the Baltic example shows, quicker fiscal adjustments can drive structural changes.	波罗的海各国的例子也显示更迅速的财政调整是可以推动结构性变化的。


Instead, policymakers miss the forest for the trees, as the IEO report shows.	但独立评估办公室的报告显示决策者一叶障目不见泰山。


Any accounting of European economic oversight in recent years should ask why the Greek crisis erupted in the spring of 2010, almost two years after the global financial crisis.	对近几年欧洲经济监察行为绩效的任何评估都应该质问为何希腊危机会在全球金融危机爆发近两年后的2010年春才爆发。


The answer is that when the European Central Bank flooded eurozone countries with cheap liquidity, governments dispensed with serious reforms and splurged instead.	答案是当欧洲央行用廉价流动性冲塞欧元区各国之时，这些政府都放弃了认真改革的决心，转而大肆挥霍。


This was partly because, in the fall of 2008, the G20 and the Fund issued desperate appeals for debt-financed fiscal stimulus.	这一方面是因为2008年秋天20国集团和国际货币基金组织基金共同发出了实施���务融资型财政刺激政策的绝望呼吁。


Many European countries heeded the call; but, rather than stimulating economic growth, deficit spending jeopardized several countries’ financial stability.	欧洲国家群起响应； 但这种赤字开支并未刺激经济增长，反而危害了多国的金融稳定。


Before it was all over, at least eight of the then 27 EU member states required IMF financing and restructuring programs.	在一切尘埃落定之前，27个欧盟成员国中至少有八个需要国际货币基金组织提供融资和重组方案。


The obvious lesson should have been that fiscal expansion does not stimulate economic growth when there is financial instability.	其中最明显的教训应该是金融不稳定状况下的财政扩张是无法刺激经济增长的。


But the IMF, blinkered by its Keynesian orthodoxy, still refuses to acknowledge this fact.	但国际货币基金组织被其凯恩斯主义正统教条所蒙蔽，至今仍然拒绝承认这一事实。


Many EU countries were vulnerable because they had accumulated excessive and unnecessary public debts by maintaining budget deficits during the pre-crisis boom years.	许多欧盟国家之所以弱不禁风，是因为它们在危机前繁荣时期的预算赤字累积了过多不必要的公共债务。


By the end of 2007, the average public debt in the eurozone was 65% of GDP, five points above the ceiling set in the Maastricht treaty for countries seeking eurozone membership.	截至2007年底，欧元区平均公共债务相当于GDP的65％，比《马斯特里赫特条约》规定的欧元区成员国家资格上限还高5个点。


This partly reflected the decision by France, Germany, and Italy in 2003 to violate and later “reform” the Maastricht rules, effectively declaring them null and void.	法国，德国和意大利在2003年对马斯特里赫特规则的违犯和随后的“改革”就在某种程度上体现了这一点，基本上让这一规则变成了一纸空文。


The IMF did not object to these countries’ flouting of the public debt rules.	而国际货币基金组织对这些国家肆意践踏公共债务规则的行为却视而不见。


In fact, if one compares the Fund’s own positions with that of its internal watchdog, they are strikingly similar, raising doubts about the IEO’s independence in writing its report.	事实上如果比较一下基金自身与其内部监察机构的立场，你会发现它们惊人地相似，令人不禁对独立评估办公室在撰写这份报告时的独立性表示怀疑。


The IMF and the IEO both ignore the same central problems in the official response to the euro crisis so far.	国际货币基金组织及其独立评估办公室都在它们各自对欧元危机的官方回应中忽略了同样的核心问题。


A financial crisis should be met with swift action, and budget deficits should be slashed instantly, mainly through spending cuts.	一场金融危机应该迅速采取行动来应对，同时主要通过削减开支的方式来大幅削减预算赤字。


Rapid fiscal adjustments drive structural reforms, which lead to faster economic growth.	快速的财政调整措施能推动经济结构改革，从而催生更快的经济增长。


The IMF’s acronym used to stand informally for “It’s Mostly Fiscal.”	人们过去将国际货币基金组织（IMF）的英文首字母缩写非正式地理解为“主要是财政（It’s Mostly Fiscal）。


Following its inadequate response to the euro crisis, the Fund should admit that the time has come to return to its roots.	”在经历了欧元危机的应对失误后，该组织应承认该是回归本源的时候了。


The Fund that Cried Wolf?	喊“狼来了”的IMF？


LONDON – If you ask Google to find the text of the International Monetary Fund’s Global Financial Stability Report for April 2006, it helpfully asks whether you are really looking for the April 2016 version.	伦敦—如果你通过谷歌寻找2006年4月的国际货币基金组织（IMF）的全球金融稳定报告，谷歌会很贴心地询问你要找的是否是2016年4月的版本。


I am sure the IMF would never seek to manipulate a search engine, but I imagine that the Fund’s public affairs officials are happy if as few people as possible can access the 2006 version.	我肯定IMF不会试图操纵搜索引擎，但我想，尽可能地让最少的人获得2006版会让IMF公关官员感到很高兴。


It was not one of the IMF’s most prescient publications.	这是IMF最拙劣的预测报告之一。


Issued just as the first doubts about the subprime mortgage market in the United States were emerging, it presented a rosy view of the present and the future.	2006年4月的金融稳定报告发行正逢美国次级按揭市场质疑声音刚刚兴起之时，该报告对现状和未来表示非常乐观。


The authors did address whether global imbalances, derivatives, and subprime mortgages posed a threat to financial stability.	作者确实讨论了全球失衡、衍生品和次级按揭是否对金融稳定构成威胁的问题。


But they liked what they saw.	但他们对所见十分欣喜。


In the mortgage market, the IMF saw prospects of a soft landing.	对按揭市场，IMF认为会出现软着陆。


It believed that global imbalances would unwind gradually.	它相信全球失衡会逐渐消失。