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| 2010年9月10日 |
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疑义相析
马丁·雅克对未来的超级大国的潜能做出勇敢的预测，但是他无法自圆其说──威尔·胡顿
这本书的第一个问题就是书的标题。中国毫无统治世界的前景。无论是软实力还是硬霸权中国都没戏，因为这个国家的身份不确定，经济又脆弱。它的维权机关远不是强大的源泉，而是虚弱的肇始。中国既庞大又贫穷，既强大又虚弱。尽管它还能保持客观的增长率和经济成果，也只是大规模政治变动之前的事儿了。实际上，它现在依赖高出口高储蓄的经济模式已经开始破碎，一如国内人和仔细的观察家所发现的。（相关链接：裴敏欣：为什么中国不会统治世界 (补译本)；两位西方人关于中国崛起的对话）
尽管马丁·雅克不停地为中国背书，把中国近来“不可能的”经济爆炸性增长大大推进到多年之后，他依然部份承认了经济问题的确存在。他的问题在于：他需要弄明白：他对中国统治世界堂皇的吹捧，可惜他理解的“西方式的现代性”（即民主、启蒙价值、资本主义和进步的联姻）即将第一次和一个非西方势力角逐。
他写道：中国不是一个民族国家，而是一个文化国家。同样地，它的崛起不会和其他国家融合。它非但不会服从多国法律和制度，还会因为忠于自己的历史而备受谴责。它将会“如同其他文明国家一样，只会沿袭自己的历史，和自我理解去行动”
历史上，中国自认为是世界中心，从其他国家里索取贡物，以确认自己与生俱来的优越感。雅克煽情地论证：种族主义深藏于中国人的灵魂。这种本能保存于早期儒家里：一个强大的中央政府为增益黎民福祉，求仁善保集体。共产主义是儒家的现代版。
最吸引眼球的部分来了（本质上是“小心中国崛起亚洲价值最高……”之类书籍改头换面）但是，儒家和共产主义的紧密关系并非新想法：40年代中共五大领导人之一的刘少奇曾说：合格的共产党员要像儒家学者一样自律，自我学习。雅克因此声称：中国是中华文明引领着前进，而非党的领导。
我越是细想文化国家和民族国家之间的关系，我越觉得没多少区别。英、法、德、美也是文化国家，文化不同，历史不同，还有他们的管辖边境，语言，国民大会都不一样。这些区别都是欧陆启蒙运动的产物，可以上溯至罗马共和国和希腊哲学。
相比中国，西方国家经常不符合自己的标准。但是我同意卢梭、康德和潘恩的见解：所有人类都有自主权，因此人人平等。我也同意亚里士多德和柏拉图推崇的正义之罚。这些价值是普适的，不因什么神秘的亚洲价值，就被拒于中国境外。我们都想过有价值的生活──无论是中国人还是英国人。
实际上，西方国家所崇尚的法治精神、追求实验和创新，辩论和思想交流的自由正是经济长久成功的杠杆。中国可以逐渐逼近别人发明的技术的边沿，但是并不能超越。它非常腐败，缺少创新，无视环境污染，所有这些畸形发展都是因为中国缺少由启蒙主义运动推崇的价值所建立的制度。中国缺少制衡权力的机制和法律。
伟大的革命家孙逸仙曾为之呼喊，中国许多仁人志士曾为之奋斗并献出生命，台湾人取得了部分成功。雅克声称中国工人不想要利益代表，中国的股东也不想对公司管理上施加影响，中国的老百姓没有兴趣对自己的政府问责。这真是大错特错。这些都是中国的大多数人上下求索而不得的东西，而中国的发展也因此受到了制约。
中国不能把自己的经济永远建立在占GDP40%的储蓄率上，也不能依赖出口增长率上（2020年中国将占有世界商品出口的一半）。这个模型正在分崩离析，因为它必须崩溃。正如雅克所承认的：中国必须少储蓄，多消费。
但是：如果没有政治变动，什么变化也不会发生。因为不信任未来，中国人才开始存钱。他们知道中共的掌控是不可靠的。下一代人的真实故事是：政治的动乱伴随着经济的困难。需要考量的问题不是中国统治世界，它将为西方和其他地区正在加深的鸿沟架起桥梁。马丁·雅克此书的中心主题和他广泛的研究息息相关。他过于怀疑西方能具有对未来的洞察力了。
注：威尔·胡顿，是《恶兆：中国经济降温之后》一书的作者
英文原文：
China is in crisis, not in the ascendantMartin Jacques makes some bold claims for the future strength of the would-be superpower, but he fails to justify them, argues Will Hutton
The first problem with this book is its title. There is no prospect of China ruling the world. This is a country whose uncertainties of identity and economic frailties prevent it from ever projecting hegemonic hard and soft power. Its authoritarian institutions, far from being a source of strength, are a source of weakness. China is simultaneously big but poor, powerful but weak. And there, until wholesale political change occurs, it will stay, notwithstanding its considerable growth rates and economic achievement. Indeed, its current economic model, dependent on high exports and mountainous savings, is disintegrating, as both insiders and close observers recognise.
Martin Jacques partially acknowledges that economic problems exist even as he breathlessly rehearses the economically impossible extrapolations of China's recent growth far into the future. His intellectual difficulty is that he needs to make the grandiose claim that China will rule the world to drive home his interesting thesis that western-defined modernity - the belief in the marriage of democracy, Enlightenment values, capitalism and progress - is about to be contested seriously for the first time by a non-western power.
China is not a nation state, he writes, but a civilisation state. As such, it cannot make accommodations with others as it rises. It will be condemned to be true to its past; rather than submit to multilateral law and institutions, it will "feel free to be what it thinks it is and act accordingly to its history and instincts which are those of a civilisation state".
Historically, China has regarded itself as being at the centre of the world and has sought tribute from others as acknowledgement of its inherent superiority, a racism that is embedded in the Chinese psyche, Jacques argues provocatively. Its instincts remain essentially Confucian: a strong central state seeking benevolently and collectively to improve the condition of the people. Communism is a contemporary expression of Confucianism.
This is the most eyecatching part of what is in essence another of the Beware China is coming, Asian values are superior books. However, the affinity between Confucianism and communism is hardly a new insight. Liu Shaoqi, one of the party's five leaders in the 1940s, drew a parallel between the self-discipline and self-cultivation needed to be a Confucian scholar and becoming an effective communist. Where Jacques scores is in arguing that it is Chinese civilisation, rather than the Communist party, that will drive China.
Yet the more I reflect on the idea of a civilisation state standing in tension with a conventional nation state, the less am I persuaded the distinction holds. Britain, France, Germany and the US are also civilisation states, defined as much by their different cultures and histories as their jurisdictional boundaries, languages and national assemblies. All in varying ways are creatures of the European Enlightenment; all can trace core values to republican Rome and the philosophers of Greece.
Western states frequently do not meet their own standards any more than China does. But I agree with Rousseau, Kant and Paine that all human beings have a sense of self and are thus worthy of equal respect as individuals, as I agree with Aristotle and Plato about the importance of due desert underpinning justice. There is a universal hunger for these values which does not stop at China's borders because of some mystical adherence to Asian values. We all want to live lives we have reason to value - whether we are Chinese or British.
Indeed, the processes thrown up by the western tradition - the rule of law, the drive to experiment and innovate, the prevalence of free argument and exchange of ideas - also drive successful, long-term economic performance. China can approach the frontier of technological knowledge developed by others, but it has a limited capacity to get beyond it. It is deeply corrupt, deeply uninnovative, deeply environmentally wasteful and these deformations can be traced back to its lack of institutions rooted in Enlightenment values. China has no checks and balances; it needs them.
The great reforming revolutionary Sun Yat-Sen wanted them for China; the Tiananmen protesters in Beijing and other cities across China risked their lives for them; Charter 08, instigated by more than 300 Chinese intellectuals last December, campaigns for them; and the Chinese in Taiwan have succeeded partially in implanting them. Jacques's argument implies that Chinese workers don't want representation at work, nor Chinese shareholders any influence on company managements, nor Chinese citizens to hold their government to account. It is profoundly mistaken. The majority do want these things and the fact they don't have them holds China back.
China cannot build its economy for ever on a savings rate of 40 per cent of GDP, or exports growing at such a rate that by 2020 they will constitute half of the world's merchandise exports. The model is cracking because it must. China must save less and consume more, as Jacques acknowledges.
But it will not make the transition without political change. The Chinese save because they do not trust the future. They know the Communist party's grip is unsustainable. The real story of the next generation will be of the west drawing ahead of a China facing political turmoil and increasing economic difficulties. The problem we will have to manage is not China ruling the world. It will be of bridging the already high and growing gap between the west and the rest. Martin Jacques's extensive research is marred by the book's central thesis. He is too suspicious of the west to offer real insight into the future.
Will Hutton is the author of The Writing on the Wall: China and the West in the 21st Century (Abacus)
