美國距離“基列國”有多遠？

A lot of television drama these days has been made redundant by the Trump administration. Why watch House of Cards when you can see the real thing rolling 24/7 on CNN? But the recent MGM-Hulu adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s 1984 dystopian novel The Handmaid’s Tale has me mesmerised. I’ve been binge watching it lately, not because I think that Trump’s America is about to become a religious autocracy in which fertile females are forced into child-bearing servitude, but because Atwood was so prescient about how political extremism of any kind, coupled with a loss of trust in existing institutions, can quickly result in political milieus that one never thought possible.

由于特朗普政府的存在，眼下很多電視劇都變得多余了。既然現實版政治劇在有線新聞網(CNN) 24小時不間斷播出，何必看《紙牌屋》(House of Cards)呢?但最近MGM-Hulu根據瑪格麗特•阿特伍德(Margaret Atwood) 1985年發(fā)表的“敵托邦”(dystopian)小說《使女的故事》(The Handmaid’s Tale)改編的電視劇讓我入迷。我近來一直在追這部劇，不是因為我覺得特朗普領導的美國很快會變成那種有生育能力的女性被迫提供生孩子苦役的宗教專制主義國家，而是因為阿特伍德的先見之明：任何類型的政治極端主義，再加上人們對現有制度失去信任，都可能迅速導致人們原以為不可能的政治環(huán)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.

在阿特伍德的虛擬世界里，晚期資本主義無情地出生率極低的環(huán)境危機。憤怒、未充分就業(yè)的男人被自私自利的精英階層操控，后者決定讓“讓美國再次偉大”(Make America Great Again)的辦法不是回到1950年代，而是回到1650年代。在國會、白宮和最高法院遭到“恐怖分子”襲擊后，美國從一個自由民主政體轉向嚴格依據《圣經》(Bible)的神權獨裁制(比你厲害吧，史蒂夫•班農(Steve Bannon))。為了防止統治階層沒有領會意思，由清教徒創(chuàng)辦的哈佛大學(Harvard University)成了隨后出現的駭人場面的原點。

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.

阿特伍德明智地譴責政治陣營兩邊的極端主義。宗教狂熱分子受到辛辣抨擊，但激進女權主義者也難逃譴責——她們從焚燒色情圖書的老社會正經女性，太快地蛻變成在新的“基列”(Gilead)共和國“紅衛(wèi)兵”式的再教育中心里虐待叛逆的使女。這有些夸張地反映了上世紀90年代以來美國文化出現的根本分歧，這一分歧最終造就在夏洛茨維爾抗議期間發(fā)生對抗的新納粹組織和左翼“反法西斯”(antifa)陣營。

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.

阿特伍德一針見血揭示的另一個問題是自由民主制度有多脆弱。成為“基列國”前的美國充斥著不平等現象，但也有的是不關心政治的淡漠的人，他們把自由當作理所應當的權利。但在混亂降臨后，他們很快放棄自由以換取秩序——準軍事力量由此接管一切。這一點與當下美國令人不安地相像——不僅圍繞在總統身邊的都是將軍，而且大多數人(包括自由派人士)都匪夷所思地樂見這樣的安排?；蛟S這是因為特朗普的新幕僚長、退役將軍約翰•F•凱利(John F Kelly)是本屆不穩(wěn)定白宮里的定海神針，或許是因為很多軍方官員譴責特朗普災難性地處理帶有種族主義色彩的夏洛茨維爾暴力事件——陸軍參謀長馬克•米萊(Mark Milley)利用特朗普本人最愛的交流平臺Twitter來指責他。

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.

在從土耳其到阿根廷這樣的新興市場國家，一直有這樣的說法：在腐敗甚至瘋狂的政治領導者當道的世界里，不如讓軍隊作為秩序的維護者。但正如這些國家所表明的那樣，最終結果通常不好。這一點應該讓人深思，尤其是因為6月蓋洛普(Gallup)民調顯示，盡管僅有12%的美國人對國會有信心、32%的人對總統有信心，但高達72%的美國人“非常”信任軍隊。我猜測，當我長期以來的消息來源、行為經濟學家彼得•阿特沃特(Peter Atwater)在8月中旬發(fā)布投資者簡報時指出這些數字，并提出市場和專家完全忽略美國發(fā)生政變的可能性太過幼稚時，我本不應該那么驚訝。

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.”

沒錯，這是極端情況，但不一定只有新興市場那樣的流血政變才有效。人們可以想象由特朗普內閣的將軍們策劃的一場第25修正案程序(美國憲法第25修正案規(guī)定了總統職位空缺時的繼任順位與程序——譯者注)，或者只是在事后才披露細節(jié)的被迫辭職。無論如何，阿特沃特絕不是唯一覺得美國政局正在靠近危險的崩潰邊緣的人。橋水公司(Bridgewater)創(chuàng)始人、美國最著名的對沖基金經理雷蒙德•戴利奧(Ray Dalio)最近在領英(LinkedIn)公開發(fā)表的帖子中宣布，針對美國的政治風險，他正在重新調整投資組合。“在我看來，我們如今在經濟和社會層面都處于分裂狀態(tài)并承受壓力，大體上與1937年類似，”他寫道，“在這種時候，沖突(包括內部和外部的沖突)增加，民粹主義抬頭、民主制度受到威脅，戰(zhàn)爭可能爆發(fā)。我說不出這一次情況會有多糟。我正在關注沖突得到了怎樣的處理，視其為一種指引，目前我感覺不樂觀。”

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.

美國政局不穩(wěn)導致很多投資者猜想，美國的資產是否應該像新興市場的資產那樣，帶有某種價格折扣。當然，你也可以提出完全相反的主張;畢竟，美國的許多機構，比如媒體和司法體制，都保持得不錯，而且當我們抱怨總統時，沒人上門找我們的麻煩。我們距離“基列國”還很遠。然而，這種距離也不是如此之遠，以至于“敵托邦”社會的部分特征完全不可想象。當阿特伍德寫這本書時，她給自己定了兩條規(guī)則：第一，她不會寫入當時不存在的科技;第二，她不會描寫在任何國家歷史上從未發(fā)生過的政治事件。但愿她創(chuàng)作的未來景象留在小說里。

Rana Foroohar is the FT’s global business columnist and an FT associate editor.

插圖由肖納格•雷(Shonagh Rae)提供

Illustration by Shonagh Rae

譯者/馬柯斯