资本主义不再受民主束缚

To whom will monuments be built a century from now? Among them, perhaps, will be Lee Kuan Yew. He will be remembered not only as the first prime minister of Singapore, but also as the creator of authoritarian capitalism, an ideology set to shape the next century much as democracy shaped the last.

百年之后，人们会为谁树起纪念碑？在这许多座丰碑之中，或许有一座会属于李光耀。人们铭记他，将不仅因为他是新加坡第一任总理，还因为他创造了威权资本主义——这一思想将决定下一世纪的面貌，就像民主决定上一世纪的面貌那样。

It was, after all, to Singapore that Deng Xiaoping came before enacting his far-reaching economic reforms in China. Until then, capitalism and democracy had seemed inextricably linked. Now the link is broken.

毕竟，在中国实施影响深远的经济改革之前，邓小平访问的是新加坡。在那之前，资本主义和民主仿佛有着千丝万缕的联系。如今，这种联系已荡然无存。

It is often said that the west has failed in its attempt to export its civilisation to the rest of the world. That is only part right. No one dreams any longer of a global liberal democracy that marks the end of history. But economic models have proved more portable than political ideas, and capitalism has triumphed. Poor countries that endorsed it are growing at spectacular rates.

人们常说，西方没能实现向世界其他地方输出自己的文明。这句话只说对了一部分。已不再有人梦想代表历史终结（end of history，福山的“历史终结论”——译者注）的自由民主制度在全球取得胜利。现实已证明经济模式比政治理念更容易推广，资本主义也取得了胜利。接受了资本主义的贫穷国家正在以惊人的速度增长。

Market-based economics has no problem accommodating local religions, cultures or traditions. It is easily reconciled with the primacy of an authoritarian state. No longer wedded to western cultural values, it is arguably divorced from them; critically reinterpreted, many of the ideas that westerners hold dear — egalitarianism, fundamental rights, a generous and universal welfare-state — can be deployed as weapons against capitalism.

市场经济适应起当地宗教、文化或传统来毫无问题。它很容易地实现了与威权国家和谐共处。市场经济与西方文化价值观不再是一对儿，两者可以说已经分道扬镳。以批判的眼光重新解读，西方人所珍视的许多理念，比如平等主义、基本权利、慷慨且普惠的的福利国家，都可以被用作反对资本主义的武器。

It is not that free enterprise automatically pushes its people towards the single-minded pursuit of hedonic pleasure. Consider India, a country that has single-mindedly followed the capitalist path. Yet there has been no universal rejection there of traditional social structures. People give preference to community ties over individual achievement. Respect for one’s elders remains a powerful check on the autonomy of the young.

这并不是说自由事业必然促使人们一心追求享乐。想想印度吧，这个国家一心一意地走着资本主义道路。但印度迄今未出现对传统社会结构的普遍排斥。相比个人成就，印度人更看重社会关系。尊重长辈仍有力地制约着年轻人的自由思想。

Some see in the persistence of these traditions a form of resistance against global capitalism. They are wrong. Fidelity to such values is, paradoxically, the reason why the harsh logic of capitalism has been embraced even more radically in countries such as China, Singapore and India than it has in the west.

有些人认为，这些传统的继续存在是反抗全球资本主义的一种形式。他们错了。吊诡的是，正是因为忠实于传统价值观，中国、新加坡和印度等国家才更彻底地接受了资本主义的残酷逻辑。

The market is a ruthless place where people sustain grievous injuries. It is hard to reconcile yourself to this, if all you are offered in return is the opportunity to satisfy your whims. It is far easier if you can fall back on traditional values to justify your indifference to other people’s fate in ethical terms. “I did it for my parents.” “I did it so my cousins will be able to study.” Such rationales are far more palatable than “I did it for myself”.

市场是个无情的地方，在这里人们要忍受严重的伤害。如果所能得到的全部回报，不过是有机会满足你的任性想法，那么你很难说服自己。如果你能用传统价值观来证明，你对他人命运的冷漠在道德上是站得住脚的，那么你心里会好过得多。“我这么做是为了父母。”“我这么做是为了让兄弟能上学。”这样的理由远比“我这么做是为了我自己”容易接受。

It is no accident that freedom is a weak foundation for capitalism in the west, for it is also a hollow one. Liberty survives there, but in a strangely twisted form. Since free choice has been elevated into a supreme value, social control can no longer appear as infringing on it. Often, however, the accommodation is merely rhetorical.

西方资本主义以自由为基础是不牢固的，这并不令人意外，因为这自由也是空洞的。西方虽有自由，却是一种奇怪的、扭曲的自由。由于自由选择已经被抬高成一种至高无上的价值观，社会控制再也不能显示出在侵犯自由。然而，这种对自由的容忍往往仅是口头上的。

When the hope of long-term employment is taken away, it is sold as a “flexible” labour market, one that offers the perpetual opportunity to reinvent ourselves. When state provision for retirement is taken away, it is to give us the freedom to plan our old age. We are constantly forced to make “free” choices — decisions we must make alone, though we do not know enough to make them wisely. If this is freedom, it is a burden.

长期雇佣的希望被拿走，被包装为“灵活的”劳动力市场，这个市场为我们提供永久的自我重塑机会。国家的养老保障被拿走，被说成给了我们自己规划老年生活的“自由”。我们不断被迫作出“自由”的选择，即我们必须自己做出的选择，尽管我们缺乏做出明智选择所需的知识。如果这就是自由，那么它是个负担。

Many westerners sense there is something defective about this freedom. We sense it most when we witness the choices of people who are not free, yet who take control of their futures in ways that we cannot. What was fascinating about the protesters in Maidan Square who demanded a new political order for Ukraine was not that they stood up for the mirage of the European way of life. It was simply that they stood up.

许多西方人都感觉到这种自由存在某些缺陷。尤其当我们看到，那些并没有自由、却能以我们做不到的方式掌控自己未来的人，做出了怎样的选择。乌克兰独立广场(Maidan square)上的示威者要求乌克兰有新的政治秩序，他们的吸引人之处并不在于他们为过上幻想中的欧式生活站起来反抗，而仅在于反抗本身。

They acted. They made things change. They were not free, and yet they had powers of agency that westerners, for all their freedom, lack.

他们采取了行动。他们改变了局面。他们不自由，然而他们的行动力是西方人所缺乏的，尽管后者拥有一切自由。