“大英帝国2.0”不合时宜

As a piece of branding, it was unfortunate. The fact that some British officials refer to their efforts to sign new trade deals with Commonwealth nations as “Empire 2.0” started life as an internal office joke. But the phrase has been seized upon by critics of Brexit as confirmation that the whole idea is driven by nostalgia for empire.

作为一张名片，“大英帝国”是不合时宜的。一些英国官员把他们与英联邦国家签订新的贸易协定的努力称作“大英帝国2.0”(Empire 2.0)，这只是始于一个办公室内部玩笑。但这个词已被英国退欧的批评者牢牢抓住，认为这证实了整个想法是由对大英帝国的怀念引发的。

This strikes me as a serious misunderstanding of Britain’s relationship with its past. Rather than being obsessed by empire, the British have largely consigned the whole imperial experience to George Orwell’s “memory hole”. Most British people, including leading politicians, are profoundly ignorant of the country’s imperial history.

我认为这是对英国与其过往之间关系的一种严重误解。英国人非但没有沉迷于帝国，反而已经在很大程度上把全部帝国经历抛进了乔治•奥威尔(George Orwell)口中的“记忆空洞”(memory hole)。包括政治领袖在内的大多数英国人对于大英帝国的历史都相当无知。

This imperial amnesia does, however, have a crucial bearing on Brexit. It means that leading Brexiters and advocates of “Global Britain” misunderstand the past — with dangerous consequences for the future. They speak warmly of returning to Britain’s historical vocation as a “great trading nation”, when it was actually a great imperial nation. That important distinction leads to overconfidence about the ease of re-creating a global trading destiny, in a world in which Britannia no longer rules the waves.

然而，这种对帝国的记忆缺失对英国退欧产生了至关重要的影响。这意味着，退欧派领袖以及“全球化的英国”的倡导者误读了英国的过去——这将给未来造成危险的后果。他们热烈地讨论英国回归老本行，做一个“伟大的贸易国”，但实际上那时英国是一个伟大的帝国。这一重要区别导致了对于轻而易举即可重现全球贸易辉煌的过度自信，而大不列颠已不再是当今世界的海洋主宰。

In the imperial age, Britain was in the habit of blasting its way into global markets. The East India Company went to war when its trading privileges were threatened, and ended up extending its rule over most of India. And when China tried to stop the opium trade in the 19th century, Britain went to war again — sinking the Chinese fleet and forcing the Qing dynasty to cede Hong Kong.

在帝国时代，英国习惯借助枪炮打进全球市场。每当贸易特权受到威胁，东印度公司(East India Company)便会发动战争，最终将统治扩大到了几乎整个印度。而中国19世纪试图阻止鸦片贸易时，英国再次发动战争——击溃中国舰队并迫使清政府把香港割让给英国。

The British ignorance of their own imperial history is captured by a passage in Tony Blair’s autobiography. The former prime minister records that when the UK handed Hong Kong back to China in 1997, Jiang Zemin, the Chinese president at the time, suggested that Britain and China could now put the past behind them. Mr Blair admits that: “I had, at the time, only a fairly dim and sketchy understanding of what that past was.”

托尼•布莱尔(Tony Blair)自传中的一段话清楚地反映了英国人对帝国史的无知。这位前首相写道，当英国1997年把香港交还给中国时，时任中国国家主席江泽民暗示，中英两国现在可以将过去放下了。但布莱尔坦承：“当时，我对他所说的过去只有非常模糊和粗略的理解。”

But while the British elite may have largely forgotten their own imperial history, the countries that Britain sees as crucial to its future as a trading nation most decidedly have not.

但是，虽然英国精英或许多半已经忘了英帝国史，那些被英国视为对其作为贸易国的未来至关重要的国家却绝对没有忘记。

Shashi Tharoor, head of the foreign affairs committee of the Indian parliament, has just published an excoriating account of Britain’s imperial rule in India, Inglorious Empire. Those Brits who speak confidently about how Britain’s “historical and cultural ties” to India will make it easy to strike a great new trade deal should read Mr Tharoor’s book. It would help them to see the world through the eyes of the emerging economic superpowers of the 21st century — India and China — countries once colonised or defeated by Britain; and that, in consequence, harbour decidedly ambivalent feelings about the UK.

印度议会外交事务委员会主席沙希•塔鲁尔(Shashi Tharoor)刚出版了一本新书《无耻帝国》(Inglorious Empire)，痛斥了英国在印度的帝国统治。那些满怀信心声称英国与印度的“历史和文化纽带”将使两国很容易达成一项新的伟大贸易协议的英国人，应该读一读塔鲁尔这本书。它可以帮助他们从21世纪新兴经济超级大国——印度和中国——的视角看世界;这两国曾受英国殖民统治或败给英国，因而对英国产生了明显的矛盾感情。

British vagueness about the country’s imperial past reflects the history that is taught at schools and universities. The standard curriculums stress British political history and the development of parliamentary democracy. As for Britain’s interactions with the rest of the world, students will learn about wars against Napoleon and Hitler — but very little about the empire.

英国人对本国帝国史的模糊认识反映了中小学和大学教授的历史。学校的标准课程强调的是英国政治史及议会民主制的发展。至于英国与世界其他国家的互动，学生们学习的是抵抗拿破仑(Napoleon)、希特勒(Hitler)的战争——但很少涉及大英帝国。

For a Martian historian, the most interesting thing about modern British history would surely be that the country built a massive global empire. But for the Brits themselves, shaping a national story that centres around the war against the Nazis — rather than the empire — makes psychological sense. It has allowed Britain to nurture a national self-image as champions of freedom and plucky underdogs (captured in the eternal popularity of the television programme Dad’s Army) rather than imperialist oppressors.

对一名历史门外汉而言，近代英国史最有趣的事当然是英国建立了一个庞大的全球帝国。但在英国人自身看来，塑造以反法西斯战争——而非大英帝国——为中心的国家叙事在心理上具有意义。这样做可以让英国塑造一种作为自由斗士和勇敢反抗的受压迫者(比如一直受欢迎的电视剧《爸爸的部队》(Dad's Army)中的角色)的国家形象，而不是作为帝国主义压迫者的形象。

The fact that victory in the second world war and loss of empire more or less coincided was also helpful. Victory in Europe was a moment of national triumph that cushioned the psychological blow of the loss of empire. All British opinion formers have 1945 stamped on their memory — the year that marked victory in Europe. Few would be able to tell you that 1947 was the year of the independence of India.

大英帝国解体或多或少与二战胜利在时间上重合，这一事实也起到安慰作用。在欧洲战胜纳粹是英国全民胜利的时刻，这缓和了帝国解体对英国人心理造成的打击。所有英国意见领袖都记住了1945年——欧洲反法西斯胜利之年。很少有人能告诉你，1947年是印度独立之年。

Victory in two world wars has also cemented the role of parliament as a symbol of the nation and of freedom. It was from the floor of the House of Commons that Winston Churchill made his famous vow to “fight them on the beaches”. The domestic history that the British elite revere is the story of parliament: Oliver Cromwell, William Gladstone, the great reform acts and the like. The mental imprint of this on modern British politicians is reflected in the arch decision to call the bill pulling Britain out of the EU “the Great Repeal Act”, which is presumably a deliberate reference to the Great Reform Act of 1832.

在两次世界大战中获胜还巩固了议会作为英国以及自由的象征的角色。温斯顿•丘吉尔(Winston Churchill)正是站在下议院发出了著名的誓言：“在海滩上与他们战斗”。英国精英敬畏的国内史是英国议会的历史：奥利弗•克伦威尔(Oliver Cromwell)、威廉•格拉德斯通(William Gladstone)、大改革法案等。这对现代英国政治家的思想造成的影响，反映在决定将英国退欧法案称为《大废除法案》(Great Repeal Bill)，想必是有意参照1832年的《大改革法案》(Great Reform Act)。

If Prime Minister Theresa May truly wants to forge a future for a “global Britain”, she might consider changing the kind of history that its citizens are taught. It would be helpful if future British politicians understood the significance not just of 1939, the year that the second world war broke out, but also of 1839, the year that the first opium war broke out.

如果英国首相特里萨•梅(Theresa May)真的想为“全球化的英国”打造一个未来，她或许可以考虑改变向英国公民教授的历史。如果未来的英国政治家不仅理解二战爆发的1939年的意义，也能理解第一次鸦片战争爆发的1839年的意义，将是有益的。

Still, it would be unfair to say that the British establishment has entirely forgotten the great empire builders of the past. Palmerston, who was prime minister at the time of the second opium war in the 1850s, is still remembered at the Foreign Office. The office cat has been named after him.

不过，如果说英国建制派完全忘记了昔日大英帝国的缔造者，是不公平的。英国外交部仍记得1850年代第二次鸦片战争时期担任首相的帕默斯顿(Palmerston)。外交部的猫就以他的名字命名。