英国退欧给美国的六点教训

Until recently, my politically obsessed friends in America did not express much interest in British elections. No wonder. Although the iconic figure of Margaret Thatcher had inspired fascination a few decades ago, as had, a little later, the white-toothed Tony Blair, the 2015 British election elicited barely a yawn. Westminster politicians — men such as David Cameron — seemed too dull to hold any lessons for the US.

直到不久前，我那些痴迷于政治的美国朋友们还从没表现过对英国大选有太多兴趣。这一点也不奇怪。尽管几十年前的标志性人物玛格丽特•撒切尔(Margaret Thatcher)，以及她之后不久的一口白牙的托尼•布莱尔(Tony Blair)都曾大放异彩，但是2015年的英国大选可以说让人哈欠连天。威斯敏斯特(Westminster)的政客——戴维•卡梅伦(David Cameron)等人——似乎太过乏味，不足以让美国有任何借鉴。

No longer. Right now, Republican and Democratic strategists are gearing up for the 2016 US election campaign. And, sitting around dinner tables in recent days listening to the anguished, endless debates among pollsters, campaigners and pundits, I’ve often heard the question: what lessons does the Brexit vote hold for the US? Does the “shock” result of the UK referendum suggest that an outsider such as Donald Trump might win? Or is that comparison too simplistic?

而现在，时过境迁了。美国共和党和民主党的策略师正在为2016年美国总统竞选摩拳擦掌。近日我坐在晚餐桌边听着民调专家、竞选活动者和权威人士之间痛苦而无休止的辩论时，我常听到一个问题：美国能从英国退欧(Brexit)公投中学到什么教训?英国公投的“震撼性”结果是否意味着像唐纳德•特朗普(Donald Trump)这样的门外汉可能赢得美国大选?抑或这种比较过分简单化了?

To my mind, the answer is both “yes” and “no”. Brexit was a very different vote but there are about half a dozen lessons from the UK referendum that could matter in the US this November.

依我看来，答案既是肯定的又是否定的。英国退欧是一次非比寻常的投票，但是从中可以学到大概六点教训，可能对11月的美国大选有用。

First — and most obvious — Brexit shows just how blind a political elite can be in a socially and economically polarised world. As my colleagues Gideon Rachman and Edward Luce have recently written, the Brexit vote was partly a protest vote — a howl of rage against economic pain, immigration and a loss of cultural identity. The only thing more surprising than this vote was that the UK elite was surprised by it; and the Democratic camp could easily repeat that mistake.

第一点、也是最明显的一点是，英国退欧表明，在一个社会和经济两级分化的世界，政治精英会失明到什么程度。正如我的同事吉迪恩•拉赫曼(Gideon Rachman)和爱德华•卢斯(Edward Luce)最近写到的那样，英国退欧公投在一定程度上是一次抗议性投票——是针对经济创痛、移民和失去文化认同感的怒吼。唯一比此次公投更令人震惊的是英国精英竟然对此感到惊讶，美国民主党阵营很可能会重复同样的错误。

The second lesson is that the electorate is losing its fear of leaping into the unknown. Nobody can assume that Trump will lose “just” because he presents a risk. In a world where voters feel angry, taking a risk no longer seems so risky. And there is another important psychological issue at work: the electorate has just experienced a decade in which most of the rules of finance and economics have been turned upside down, as a result of the financial crisis. Turning the political rules on their head no longer seems so strange — at least, no stranger than seeing rates turn negative and big banks collapse.

第二点是，选民正在丧失对跳入未知后果的恐惧。没有人可以假定特朗普会“单纯”因为代表一种风险而输掉大选。当选民感到愤怒时，冒险对他们似乎不再那么危险。其中还有另外一个重要的心理问题在起作用：由于金融危机，选民刚刚经历了多数金融和经济规则被彻底颠覆的10年。颠覆政治规则也就不再那么奇怪——至少，没有负利率和大型银行破产那么奇怪。

That leads to a third lesson: revolution cannot be crushed by mere statistics or scare stories. Politicians such as Cameron tried to defeat the Brexit vote by citing economic data showing how dangerous Brexit might be; but voters dismissed it because they were too angry to listen — and too distrustful of the elite. The Brexit vote was decided on the basis of emotion — and the Remain camp failed to give voters a really positive vision of Europe. The Brexit camp, by contrast, invoked an image of an independent, proud sovereign nation that appealed to many voters.

这引出了第三点教训：单纯依靠数据或恐怖故事是无法击垮变革的。卡梅伦等政治人士尝试引用经济数据来表明英国退欧的危险性;但是选民置之不理，因为他们太愤怒了，听不进去——也不信任精英。英国退欧的结果是由选民情绪决定的——留欧阵营没能给选民提供一个真正积极的欧洲愿景。相比之下，退欧阵营营造了一幅独立而自豪的主权国家的景象，吸引了很多选民。

This highlights a crucial fourth lesson: if the Democrats want to beat Trump, they cannot rely only on a US version of “Project Fear”; they need a positive and upbeat image too. Last week, the Democrats tried to create this at the Philadelphia convention. But they must recognise that Trump is campaigning on both negative and positive emotions; somehow the Democrats need to find a slogan as memorable and upbeat as Trump’s “Make America Great Again”.

这凸显了至关重要的第四点教训：如果民主党想打败特朗普，他们无法单纯依靠美国版的“恐惧计划”(Project Fear);他们还需要一个积极向上的愿景。上月，民主党试图在费城召开的全国代表大会上缔造这一愿景。但是他们必须意识到，特朗普的竞选既针对消极情绪也针对积极情绪;民主党需要想办法找到一个口号，就像特朗普的“让美国再次伟大”(Make America Great Again)一样令人难忘和鼓舞人心。

A fifth lesson is that it is not just emotions that matter: the geeky details of the electoral process do too. One reason why the Remain camp lost in the UK was that turnout was low among potential young voters (who generally favoured Remain). Another issue was a little-noticed technical detail: parents used to be able automatically to register their teenage kids to vote, but this has recently changed. There are numerous “technical” details in the US electoral process that could turn out to be even more important; particularly since strategists — on both sides — are skilled at using all the loopholes they can find to get their supporters out, or suppress the other side. Pundits who want to predict the November results must look hard at the electoral weeds.

第五点教训是，重要的不仅是情绪：选举过程中繁杂的细节也很重要。在英国，留欧阵营失败的一个原因是潜在的年轻选民(他们一般倾向留欧)的投票率很低。另一个问题是一个很少有人注意到的技术细节：过去父母可以自动为青少年子女登记投票，但是这一点最近发生了改变。美国选举过程中有很多可能会变得极重要的“技术”细节;特别是由于双方策略师擅于利用他们能找到的所有漏洞来鼓励其支持者投票或压制对方。想预测11月大选结果的权威人士必须认真审视选举细节。

And that brings us to the sixth and most important lesson from Brexit: that democracy, by its nature, is unpredictable, particularly as social polarisation is increasing. Elites might hate this. So might investors or businesses, which need to plan for the long term. But if the whole point of democracy is to give people a voice, there will always be a risk that this voice will either howl in rage — or sit at home and not speak at all. Americans had better hope that the pundits learn this lesson ahead of time and — crucially — that politicians are ready to listen.

这也就引出了第六点、也是最重要的教训：从本质上讲，民主是不可预测的，特别是当社会两极分化不断加深的情况下。精英阶层可能痛恨这一点。需要长远打算的投资者和企业可能也一样。但是，如果民主的关键在于让民众发声，那么就总是存在一种风险：民众要么发出愤怒的咆哮，要么留在家中保持沉默。美国人最好盼望着权威人士尽快学到这点教训，并且政治人士准备好听取教训，后一点是关键。