美国精英统治恐踏上末路

What is in a word? When it is packed with as much moral zeal as “meritocracy”, the answer is a lot. A meritocrat owes his success to effort and talent. Luck has nothing to do with it — or so he tells himself. He shares his view with everyone else, including those too slow or indolent to follow his example. Things only go wrong when the others dispute it.

一个词里包含什么？如果这个词充斥着和“精英统治”一样多的道德热情，答案是包含很多。一名精英会将自己的成功归因于努力和天分。他的成功和运气毫无关系——或者他是这样告诉自己的。他与其他所有人分享他的观点，包括那些太迟钝或者太懒惰以至于无法效仿他的人。只是当其他人提出异议时，问题就出现了。

Now magnify that to a nation of 320m people — one that prides itself on being a meritocracy. Imagine that between a half and two-thirds of its people, depending on how the question is framed, disagree. They believe the system’s divisions are self-perpetuating. They used not to think that way.

现在，把这种情况放大到一个拥有3.2亿人口的国家——一个以实行精英统治而自豪的国家。想象一下，根据问题的表达方式不同，有一半到三分之二的人表示异议。他们现在相信，体系的分化是自我持续的。他们过去并不这么想。

Imagine, also, that the meritocrats are too enamoured of their just rewards to see it. The fact that they are split — one group calling itself Democratic, the other Republican — is detail. They are two sides of a debased coin. Sooner or later something will give.

再想象一下，精英们太过醉心于自己得到的合理回报，因而并没有看到这一点。他们分裂成两个集团——一个自称民主党，另一个自称共和党，这个事实只是细枝末节。他们是同一块劣质硬币的两面。迟早会出事。

An exaggeration? Financial Times readers might be inclined to think so. The fact that Donald Trump has completed a hostile takeover of one of those groups — the Republicans — is a shock to everyone, including, I suspect, the property billionaire himself. The rest should not be a surprise.

夸张吗？英国《金融时报》的读者可能倾向于这么认为。唐纳德•特朗普(Donald Trump)完成了对其中一个集团——共和党——的“敌意收购”，这让所有人都感到震惊，我怀疑也包括这位地产亿万富翁本人在内。事情的其他部分就不应令人惊讶了。

Since the late 1960s both parties, in different ways, have turned a blind eye to the economic interests of the middle class. In 1972 the McGovern-Fraser Commission revamped the Democratic party’s rules for selecting its nominee after the disastrous 1968 convention in Chicago. The overhaul changed the party’s course. It included obligatory seats for women, ethnic minorities and young people — but left out working males altogether. “We aren’t going to let these Camelot Harvard-Berkeley types take over our party,” said the head of the AFL-CIO, the largest American union federation. That is precisely what happened. Democrats cemented the shift from a class-based party to an ethnic coalition by enshrining affirmative action for non-whites. Getting a leg up to university, the ultimate meritocratic vehicle, was based on your skin colour rather than your economic situation.

自上世纪60年代末以来，两党以不同的方式对中产阶层的经济利益视而不见。在1968年在芝加哥举办的灾难性民主党代表大会后，1972年，麦戈文-弗雷泽委员会(McGovern-Fraser Commission)修改了民主党选择被提名人的规则。这次彻底改革改变了该党的方针。该规则规定必须为女性、少数族裔和年轻人提供一些席位——却完全忽略了工薪阶层的男性。“我们不会让这些高高在上的哈佛(Harvard)-伯克利(Berkeley)人掌控我们的党，”美国最大的工会联合会美国劳工联合会-产业工会联合会(AFL-CIO)的负责人说。而这恰恰发生了。通过把针对非白人的平权行动奉为圭臬，民主党加强了从基于阶层的党派到种族联盟的转变。大学是成为精英的终极手段，申请大学时的优势不是基于你的经济状况，而是基于你的肤色。

Unsurprisingly, swaths of the white middle class turned Republican. Forty years on, many Democrats, not least Bernie Sanders’ supporters, are suffering buyer’s remorse. Before he became president, Barack Obama argued it would be fairer to base affirmative action on income not colour. “My daughters should probably be treated by any admissions officer as folks who are pretty advantaged,” he said.

毫不奇怪，大批美国白人中产阶层转向了共和党。40年后的今天，很多民主党人，尤其是伯尼•桑德斯(Bernie Sanders)的支持者们，都感到了一种“买家的懊悔”。在当选总统前，巴拉克•奥巴马(Barack Obama)表示，基于收入而非肤色来实施平权行动更为公平。“我的女儿们或许应该被任何招生人员视为相当有优势的人，”他说。

Last week it was announced that Malia Obama had been accepted into Harvard, her father’s alma mater. About a third of legacy applicants, those whose parent attended, are accepted into Harvard. No one suggests she is not deserving of her place. However, there are plenty of lower-income black and white children who do not benefit from the advantages Malia Obama or Chelsea Clinton (Stanford and Oxford) had from birth.

上周，据悉马莉娅•奥巴马(Malia Obama)被哈佛——她父亲的母校录取。那些父母曾就读哈佛的申请者中，有三分之一的人也被哈佛录取。没人说马莉娅•奥巴马不够格被录取。然而，有很多低收入的黑人孩子和白人孩子不享有她或者切尔西•克林顿(Chelsea Clinton)（就读于斯坦福大学(Stanford)和牛津大学(Oxford)）与生俱来的优势。

The US labour market remains impressively meritocratic. But what happens to a worker in the 25 years before he or she enters it is anything but. Hence the term “hereditary meritocracy”. Richard Reeves of the Brookings Institution calls them “dream hoarders”.

美国劳动力市场仍然非常举人唯贤。但劳动者在进入劳动力市场之前的25年中的经历绝非如此。因此，就出现了“世袭精英制”这个术语。布鲁金斯学会(Brookings Institution)的理查德•里夫斯(Richard Reeves)把他们称为“囤梦者”。

Judged by aptitude, almost half those in America’s top two-fifths income bracket are there because of the luck of family background. Think of the value of those unpaid internships. A big share of those in the bottom fifth would be in the top if they had the same life chances.

从天资来判断，处于美国收入水平前五分之二的人中近半都是因为家族背景才有幸拥有这样的收入。想想那些无薪实习劳动的价值。如果在生活中拥有同样的机会，处于收入水平最底端五分之一的人中有很大一部分人本该进入最高收入阶层。

Middle-class whites derived no greater benefit from voting Republican. For years strategists such as Karl Rove played on cultural fears — often stoking racial resentment — to galvanise the vote.

中产阶级白人没有从支持共和党中得到太大好处。多年来，卡尔•罗夫(Karl Rove)这样的谋划高手利用文化担忧——通常会煽动种族仇恨——来刺激中产阶级投票。

Once in office, Republicans pursued tax cuts for the rich. Ignored by both parties and disproportionately hit by the downsides of globalisation, blue-collar whites fell into depression. For the first time, life expectancy among American whites is falling.

一旦上台，共和党便为富人谋求减税。被两党忽视的蓝领白人受到了全球化负面影响的极大冲击，陷入困境。美国白人群体的预期寿命首次出现下滑。

To add insult to injury, poor whites alone are still fair game for ridicule. They are excluded from the rules of political correctness. This is the demographic that eats itself into obesity in front of bad TV — reality shows such as The Apprentice, which brought Mr Trump into their lives. Here was a man who spoke his mind and fired people. He may have been a schmuck but he was an open book. “I love the poorly educated,” he said after one primary victory. Mr Trump knows his market.

雪上加霜的是，只有贫困白人仍然是可被嘲笑的对象。他们被政治正确性的规则排除在外。该群体看着糟糕的电视节目——把特朗普带入他们生活的《学徒》(The Apprentice)这样的真人秀——从自己的窘境中取乐。节目中，特朗普会直言自己的想法，也会炒人鱿鱼。他或许曾经是一个笨蛋，但他就像一本摊开的书一样。“我爱受教育程度低的人，”他在一次初选胜利后表示。特朗普知道自己的市场所在。

Which brings us back to that supercharged word. Michael Young, the British sociologist who coined it in his 1958 book, The Rise of the Meritocracy, would feel vindicated. Though the term soon lost its irony, Young meant it as a satire on the imagined ruling classes of the future. Meritocratic elites “can be insufferably smug”, he said in a 2001 critique of Prime Minister Tony Blair’s misuse of the word. The rest, meanwhile, “can easily become demoralised by being looked down on so woundingly by people who have done well for themselves”.

这把我们带回到那个超带劲的词。英国社会学家迈克尔•杨(Michael Young)在其1958年出版的著作《精英统治的崛起》(The Rise of the Meritocracy)中发明了这个词，他会认为自己是无辜的。杨发明这个词的原意是讽刺那些想象中的未来统治阶级，尽管这个词很快失去了讽刺意味。他在2001年批评时任英国首相托尼•布莱尔(Tony Blair)错误地使用该词时表示，精英统治中的精英“可能自以为是得令人无法忍受”。与此同时，其他人“可能很容易会因为被那些飞黄腾达之人以一种伤人的方式看不起而意志消沉”。

Young forecast his meritocracy would break down by 2033. The chances are it will survive 2016. Hillary Clinton, this year’s meritocratic standard-bearer, looks likely to win in November. But polls say Mr Trump would win a clear majority of the white vote. Think about that. Mr Trump is the president white America wants. It is hard to believe it would be on merit.

杨预测，精英统治会在2033年之前瓦解。它很有可能会撑过2016年。今年精英统治的旗手希拉里•克林顿(Hillary Clinton)，似乎可能会在11月赢得大选。但是，民调显示，特朗普将赢得明显多数的白人选票。想一想这个问题。特朗普是美国白人所希望的总统。很难相信这是因为他的贤能。