美国距离“基列国”有多远？
由于特朗普政府的存在，眼下很多电视剧都变得多余了。既然现实版政治剧在有线新闻网(CNN) 24小时不间断播出，何必看《纸牌屋》(House of Cards)呢?但最近MGM-Hulu根据玛格丽特•阿特伍德(Margaret Atwood) 1985年发表的“敌托邦”(dystopian)小说《使女的故事》(The Handmaid’s Tale)改编的电视剧让我入迷。我近来一直在追这部剧，不是因为我觉得特朗普领导的美国很快会变成那种有生育能力的女性被迫提供生孩子苦役的宗教专制主义国家，而是因为阿特伍德的先见之明：任何类型的政治极端主义，再加上人们对现有制度失去信任，都可能迅速导致人们原以为不可能的政治环境。
In Atwood’s fictional world, late-stage capitalism has led inexorably to an environmental crisis in which birth rates are radically diminished. Angry, underemployed men are manipulated by self-serving elites who decide that the way to Make America Great Again is to take it back not to the 1950s but to the 1650s. After a “terrorist” attack on Congress, the White House and the Supreme Court, the US goes from being a liberal democracy to a theocratic dictatorship based on a literal interpretation of the Bible (take that, Steve Bannon). Just in case the ruling establishment didn’t get the message, Harvard University, founded by Puritans, becomes ground zero for the ensuing horrors.
在阿特伍德的虚拟世界里，晚期资本主义无情地出生率极低的环境危机。愤怒、未充分就业的男人被自私自利的精英阶层操控，后者决定让“让美国再次伟大”(Make America Great Again)的办法不是回到1950年代，而是回到1650年代。在国会、白宫和最高法院遭到“恐怖分子”袭击后，美国从一个自由民主政体转向严格依据《圣经》(Bible)的神权独裁制(比你厉害吧，史蒂夫•班农(Steve Bannon))。为了防止统治阶层没有领会意思，由清教徒创办的哈佛大学(Harvard University)成了随后出现的骇人场面的原点。
Atwood is, wisely, an equal opportunity condemner of extremism on either side of the political aisle. Loony religious fanatics get slammed but so do radical feminists, who go all too quickly from porn-burning in the old society to abusing rebellious handmaids in a Red Guard-like retraining centre in the new republic of Gilead. It’s an amped-up version of the radical divides that have coursed through US culture since the 1990s, culminating in both the neo-Nazi groups and the leftwing “antifa” that protested in Charlottesville.
阿特伍德明智地谴责政治阵营两边的极端主义。宗教狂热分子受到辛辣抨击，但激进女权主义者也难逃谴责——她们从焚烧色情图书的老社会正经女性，太快地蜕变成在新的“基列”(Gilead)共和国“红卫兵”式的再教育中心里虐待叛逆的使女。这有些夸张地反映了上世纪90年代以来美国文化出现的根本分歧，这一分歧最终造就在夏洛茨维尔抗议期间发生对抗的新纳粹组织和左翼“反法西斯”(antifa)阵营。
Another thing Atwood nails is just how fragile liberal democracy is. Pre-Gilead America is rife with inequality, but it is also filled with careless, apolitical people who take their freedoms for granted. When chaos ensues, they quickly trade freedom for order — which is how a paramilitary force takes over. This point feels uncomfortably familiar in the US right now, where not only has the president surrounded himself with generals, but the majority of people, liberals included, are bizarrely happy that he has. Perhaps that’s because retired general John F Kelly, Trump’s new chief of staff, seems a safe pair of hands in an unstable White House, or because numerous military officials have condemned Trump’s disastrous handling of the racially charged violence in Charlottesville, with army chief of staff General Mark Milley taking to the president’s own preferred communications platform, Twitter, to do so.
阿特伍德一针见血揭示的另一个问题是自由民主制度有多脆弱。成为“基列国”前的美国充斥着不平等现象，但也有的是不关心政治的淡漠的人，他们把自由当作理所应当的权利。但在混乱降临后，他们很快放弃自由以换取秩序——准军事力量由此接管一切。这一点与当下美国令人不安地相像——不仅围绕在总统身边的都是将军，而且大多数人(包括自由派人士)都匪夷所思地乐见这样的安排。或许这是因为特朗普的新幕僚长、退役将军约翰•F•凯利(John F Kelly)是本届不稳定白宫里的定海神针，或许是因为很多军方官员谴责特朗普灾难性地处理带有种族主义色彩的夏洛茨维尔暴力事件——陆军参谋长马克•米莱(Mark Milley)利用特朗普本人最爱的交流平台Twitter来指责他。
The idea of the military as an enforcer of order in a world filled with corrupt and even crazy political leaders has long been a theme in emerging markets from Turkey to Argentina. But as those countries also show, it usually doesn’t end well. This should give pause at a time when a June Gallup poll shows that while only 12 per cent of Americans have confidence in Congress, and only 32 per cent in the president, a whopping 72 per cent have “a great deal” of faith in the military. I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised when a long-time source of mine, behavioural economist Peter Atwater, released an investor note in mid-August pointing out these numbers, and suggesting that markets and experts were naive to dismiss entirely the possibility of an American coup d’état.
在从土耳其到阿根廷这样的新兴市场国家，一直有这样的说法：在腐败甚至疯狂的政治领导者当道的世界里，不如让军队作为秩序的维护者。但正如这些国家所表明的那样，最终结果通常不好。这一点应该让人深思，尤其是因为6月盖洛普(Gallup)民调显示，尽管仅有12%的美国人对国会有信心、32%的人对总统有信心，但高达72%的美国人“非常”信任军队。我猜测，当我长期以来的消息来源、行为经济学家彼得•阿特沃特(Peter Atwater)在8月中旬发布投资者简报时指出这些数字，并提出市场和专家完全忽略美国发生政变的可能性太过幼稚时，我本不应该那么惊讶。
Extreme, to be sure, but coups need not be of the bloody emerging-market variety to be effective. One could imagine a 25th amendment process organised by the generals in the president’s cabinet, or a forced resignation with details revealed only after the fact. In any case, Atwater isn’t alone in feeling that the political situation in the US is nearing a dangerous breaking point. In a public post on LinkedIn, Ray Dalio, Bridgewater founder and America’s most famous hedge funder, recently announced that he was rejigging his portfolio in reaction to political risk in the US. “It seems to me that we are now economically and socially divided and burdened in ways that are broadly analogous to 1937,” he wrote. “During such times conflicts (both internal and external) increase, populism emerges, democracies are threatened and wars can occur. I can’t say how bad this time around will get. I’m watching how conflict is being handled as a guide, and I’m not encouraged.”
没错，这是极端情况，但不一定只有新兴市场那样的流血政变才有效。人们可以想象由特朗普内阁的将军们策划的一场第25修正案程序(美国宪法第25修正案规定了总统职位空缺时的继任顺位与程序——译者注)，或者只是在事后才披露细节的被迫辞职。无论如何，阿特沃特绝不是唯一觉得美国政局正在靠近危险的崩溃边缘的人。桥水公司(Bridgewater)创始人、美国最著名的对冲基金经理雷蒙德•戴利奥(Ray Dalio)最近在领英(LinkedIn)公开发表的帖子中宣布，针对美国的政治风险，他正在重新调整投资组合。“在我看来，我们如今在经济和社会层面都处于分裂状态并承受压力，大体上与1937年类似，”他写道，“在这种时候，冲突(包括内部和外部的冲突)增加，民粹主义抬头、民主制度受到威胁，战争可能爆发。我说不出这一次情况会有多糟。我正在关注冲突得到了怎样的处理，视其为一种指引，目前我感觉不乐观。”
The precariousness of US politics has led many investors to wonder if the country should have some kind of emerging-market discount attached to its assets. Of course, you can also make just the opposite argument; after all, many of our institutions, such as the media and the judicial system, are holding up well, and nobody is kicking in the door when we complain about our president. We’re quite a long way from Gilead. And yet not so far as to make parts of this dystopian society unimaginable. When Atwood wrote her book, she gave herself two rules; first, she wouldn’t include any technology that didn’t already exist, and second, she wouldn’t write about any political event that hadn’t already happened in some country or another, throughout history. Let’s hope her resulting vision remains fiction.
美国政局不稳导致很多投资者猜想，美国的资产是否应该像新兴市场的资产那样，带有某种价格折扣。当然，你也可以提出完全相反的主张;毕竟，美国的许多机构，比如媒体和司法体制，都保持得不错，而且当我们抱怨总统时，没人上门找我们的麻烦。我们距离“基列国”还很远。然而，这种距离也不是如此之远，以至于“敌托邦”社会的部分特征完全不可想象。当阿特伍德写这本书时，她给自己定了两条规则：第一，她不会写入当时不存在的科技;第二，她不会描写在任何国家历史上从未发生过的政治事件。但愿她创作的未来景象留在小说里。
Rana Foroohar is the FT’s global business columnist and an FT associate editor.
插图由肖纳格•雷(Shonagh Rae)提供
Illustration by Shonagh Rae
译者/马柯斯
