The Economist-2014-8-23-What China wants-中英对译

China

中国

What China wants

中国想要什么

After a bad couple of centuries, China is itching to regain its place in the world. How should America respond?

经历了两个世纪的磨难后，中国正心痒痒想恢复其世界地位。美国应该怎样回应？

Aug 23rd 2014 | From the print edition

1 AN ALARMING assumption is taking hold in some quarters of both Beijing and Washington, DC. Within a few years, China’s economy will overtake America’s in size (on a purchasing-power basis, it is already on the cusp of doing so). Its armed forces, though still dwarfed by those of the United States, are growing fast in strength; in any war in East Asia, they would have the home advantage. Thus, some people have concluded, rivalry between China and America has become inevitable and will be followed by confrontation—even conflict.

在北京和华盛顿的一些地方一种骇人的猜测盛行。几年之内，中国经济总量将超过美国（经济总量是根据购买力计算的，中国正处于赶超美国的转折点）；尽管不敌美国，但中国军队实力正在迅速增强，在任何东亚战争中都会拥有主场优势。因此有些人下结论说：中美敌对已不可避免，双方会对峙甚至发生冲突。

2Diplomacy’s task in the coming decades will be to ensure that such a catastrophe never take s place. The

question is how?

接下来几十年的外交任务将是确保这种灾难不会发生。问题是应该怎么做呢？

Primacy inter pares

首位平等

3Some Western hawks see a China threat wherever they look: China’s state-owned businesses stealing a march in Africa; its government covering for autocrats in UN votes; its insatiable appetite for resources plundering the environment. Fortunately, there is scant evidence to support the idea of a global Chinese effort to upend the international order. China’s desires have an historical, even emotional, dimension. B ut in much of the world China seeks to work within existing norms, not to overturn them.

一些西方鹰派人物无论从哪个角度出发都把中国视为威胁：中国国企在非洲市场抢占先机；中国政府在联合国投票时维护专制政权；中国对资源无止尽的需要危害着环境。幸运的是，鲜有证据能够证明中国力图颠覆国际秩序。中国的愿望是有历史甚至情感原因的，但是在许多领域中国都努力遵循现有规定，而不是推翻它们。

4 In Africa its business dealings are transactional and more often led by entrepreneurs than by the state. Elsewhere, a once-reactive diplomacy is growing more sophisticated—and helpful. China is the biggest contributor to peacekeeping missions among the UN Security Council’s permanent five, and it takes part in anti-piracy patrols off the Horn of Africa . In some areas China is working hard to lessen its environmental footprint, for instance through vast afforestation schemes and clean-coal technologies.

中国在非洲的生意都只是单纯交易，更多的是由企业家而非政府主导的。在其他地方，中国这个一度被动的民主国家正在变得更成熟老练、热于助人。中国是联合国安理会5个常任理事国中对维和贡献最大的，它参与了非洲之角的反海盗巡逻。在某些领域中国努力减少环境危害，例如进行大规模植树造林项目及采用清洁煤技术。

5 The big exception is in East and North-East Asia—one of the greatest concentrations of people, dynamism and wealth on Earth. There, both its rhetoric and its actions suggest that China is unhappy with Pax Americana . For centuries China lay at the centre of things, the sun around which other Asian kingdoms turned. First Western ravages in the middle of the 19th century and then Chi na’s defeat by Japan at the end of it put paid to Chinese centrality. Today an American-led order in the western Pacific perpetuates the humiliation, in the eyes of Chinese leaders. Soon, they believe, their country will be rich and powerful enough to seize back primacy in East Asia.

突出的例外存在于东亚和东南亚，世界上人口最密集、最繁荣富庶的地方之一。中国在此地的言行都说明了它对美式和平的不满。几个世纪以来中国在该地区一直处于中心地位，是其他亚洲国家簇拥的太阳。先是于19世纪中叶惨遭西方国家蹂躏，后又在19世纪末战败于日本，中国的中心地位毁于一旦。在中国领导人眼中，如今的西太平洋秩序由美国主导使中国人的耻辱继续，他们相信中国很快将会变得十分富裕强大，足以夺回在东亚的主导地位。

6China’s sense of histo rical grievance explains a spate of recent belligerence. China has deployed ships and planes to contest Japan’s control of islands in the East China Sea, grabbed reefs claimed by the Philippines in the South China Sea and moved an oil rig into Vietnam’s cl aimed exclusive economic zone. All this has created alarm in the region. Some strategists say America can keep the peace only if it is firm in the face of Chinese expansionism. Others urge America to share power in East Asia before rivalries lead to a disaster.

中国的历史耻辱感是其近来剑拔弩张的原因。中国在东海部署军舰和战机以对抗日本对钓鱼岛的控制，抢夺了菲律宾宣称为菲方领土的南海岛礁，在越南声称的专属经济区建造油井，这些都震惊了东亚各国。一些战略家指出美国只有坚决反对中国扩张主义才能维护和平，其他人敦促美国和中国分享在东亚的权利，避免敌对引发灾难。

7 America cannot walk away without grave consequences for the region and its own standing. Since the end of the second world war, American security has been the basis of Asian prosperity and an increasingly liberal order. It enabled Japan to rise from the ashes without alarming its neighbours. Indeed, China’s race to modernity could not have happened wit hout it. Even Vietnam, America’s old foe, is clearer than ever that it wants America’s stabilising, reassuring presence.

美国如果一走了之必然会给东亚地区及其自身地位带来严重后果。二战结束以来，美国提供的安全保障一直是亚洲繁荣和国际秩序不断自由化的基础。它促使日本在不惊动邻国的情况下从灰烬中崛起；事实上中国的现代化之路也离不开它；甚至是美国的宿敌越南也更清楚地认识到了自身需要美国这个稳定局势、安定人心的存在。

8Yet, if the liberal order is to survive, it must evolve. Denying the reality of China’s growing power would only encourage China to reject the world as it is. By contrast, if China can prosper within the system, it will reinforce it. That is why the United States needs to acknowledge one increasingly awkward aspect of its leadership: American advantage is hard-wired into the system in ways that a rising power might justifiably resent.

然而，自由的国际秩序若想长存，就必须与时俱进。否认中国实力不断增强的事实只会导致中国敌对世界。相比之下，如果中国能在体制内发展壮大，它就会巩固这个体制。这也是为什么美国需要承认其领导的一方面正在变得越来越尴尬：美国在体制内的优势如此根深蒂固，正在崛起的强国会对它抱有敌意也是情有可原的。

9 For a great power to find a new equilibrium with an emerging one is hard—because every adaptation looks like a retreat. Three principles should guide America.

超级大国要和新兴大国寻求新的平衡并非易事，因为每次调整看上去都像是退缩。美国应该遵循三个原则。

10First, it should only make promises that it is prepared to keep. On the one hand, America would be foolish to draw red lines around specks of reef in the South China Sea. On the other, if America is to count fo r anything, its allies need to know that they can depend on it. Although Taiwan is central to China’s sense of its own honour, America should leave Beijing in no doubt that it would come to the island’s defence.

第一，一旦做出承诺就必须遵守。一方面，美国若是在中国南海的零星岛礁划下红线，那将是愚蠢的；另一方面，美国盟友需要知道自己是可以依赖美国许下的诺言的。尽管台湾问题有损中国的荣誉感，但美国应该清楚，北京会捍卫台湾一事是毫无疑问的。

11 Second, even in security, America must make room. China’s participation in America’s recent RIMPAC naval exercises off Hawaii was a start. China could be invited to join Asian exercises, including for disaster relief. And America should avoid a cold-war battle for the loyalty of regional powers.

第二，即使是在安保方面，美国也应为中国腾出空间。中国最近参与了美国在夏威夷附近的环太平洋军事演习，这是个良好开端。美国还可以邀请中国加入亚洲军演，包括抢险救灾等活动。美国还应避免双方为争夺区域各国的忠心发生冷战。

12 Lastly, America will find it easier to include China in new projects than to give ground on old ones—and should make more effort to do so. It is nonsensical that America should be leading the formation of the region’s biggest free-trade area, the Trans-Pacific Partnership , without the inclusion of the region’s largest economy. And there is no reason to exclude China from co-operation in space. Even during the cold war American and Soviet astronauts worked together.

最后，相比在旧项目上对中国做出让步，邀请它参与新项目更加容易，美国应该加大力度这样做。美国主导建立的亚太地区最大的自由贸易区“跨太平洋伙伴关系”竟然不把该地区最大的经济体包含在内，这是极其荒谬的。在太空合作方面排斥中国也是毫无理由的，即使在冷战时期美苏宇航员也是协同合作的。

Let the dragon in

让巨龙参与其中

13 Why should China be satisfied with a bit more engagement when primacy is what it seeks? There is no guarantee that it will be. Just now the rhetoric coming out of Beijing is full of cold-war, Manichean imagery. Yet sensible Chinese understand that their country faces constraints—China needs Western markets, its neighbours are unwilling to accept its regional writ and for many more years the United States will be strong enough militarily and diplomatically to block it. And in the longer run, the hope is that the Chinese system will of itself adapt from one-party rule to some more liberal polity that, by its nature, is more comfortable with the world as it now is.

中国寻求的是主导地位，为什么要满足于多参加一点国际事务呢？我们不敢保证中国会仅止于此，现在北京的言论充满冷战、摩尼教的色彩。不过明智的中国人清楚中国面临的约束——中国需要西方市场，其邻国不愿遵从它的命令，接下来许多年内美国强大的军事和外交实力仍然足以制约它。长远看来，中国人民希望本国一党专政的体制能够自发演变成更为自由的政体，因为更为自由的政体从本质上来说与世界更为融合。

14 Drawing China into a strengthened regional framework would not be to cede primacy to it. Nor would it be to abandon a liberal order that has served Asia—and America—so well. It may, in the end, not work. But

given the huge dangers of rivalry, it is essential now to try.

将中国引入到坚固的地区结构中并非将主导权拱手相让，也不是放弃对亚洲和美国都极为有益的自由秩序。这种措施可能最终并不起效，但鉴于双方敌对会造成的巨大危险，现在尝试这样做是十分必要的。

From the print edition: Leaders

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译者注：

1 Primacy inter pares拉丁语，英语中即first among equals

2 非洲之角，有时按照其地理位置，又称东北非洲。非洲之角位于非洲东北部，是东非的一个半岛，在亚丁湾南岸，向东伸入阿拉伯海数百公里。它是非洲大陆最东的地区，非洲大陆最东端的哈丰角也位于这个地区。作为一个更大的地区概念，非洲之角包括了吉布提、埃塞俄比亚、厄立特里亚和索马里等国家。非洲之角面积约2,000,000平方公里，人口约9020万（埃塞俄比亚7500万，索马里1000万，厄立特里亚450万，吉布提70万）。

3 “美式和平”这一说法泛指美国在二战结束后取得的全球霸主地位，它是从“罗马和平”一词派生出来的。在长达200年的“罗马和平”时期，罗马帝国停止了扩张。

4 环太平洋军事演习（Rim of the Pacific，简称RIMPAC），是美国第三舰队倡议的国际上规模最大的多国海上联合军演，从1971年开始。苏联解体前每年举行一次，苏联解体后每两年进行一次。目的在于保障太平洋沿岸国家海上通道的安全以及联合反恐。2012年6月29日-8月3日，“环太平洋-2012”多国联合军事演习在夏威夷海域举行。2012年9月18日，美防长帕内塔邀请中国参加2014年环太平洋军演。2014年6月9日，中国海军海口号导弹驱逐舰?岳阳号护卫舰?千岛湖号补给舰?和平方舟号医院船共计四艘海军舰艇从三亚起航，并在14日抵达关岛与美国?新加坡等国舰艇组成特混编队向夏威夷航渡参加2014环太平洋军演。这是中国海军首次参加环太平洋军事演习。

5 跨太平洋伙伴关系（英语：The Trans-Pacific Partnership，缩写：TPP），全称跨太平洋战略经济伙伴关系协议（英语：Trans-Pacific Strategic Economic Partnership Agreement），亦译泛太平洋战略经济伙伴关系协定，是由亚太经济合作会议成员国发起，从2002年开始酝酿的一组多边关系的自由贸易协定，旨在促进亚太区的贸易自由化[7][8]。