FT社評：特朗普貿易舉措“走錯棋”

There is nothing that the attendees at the World Economic Forum in Davos like better than a news event that fits a narrative and confirms a prejudice. Donald Trump, the showman in the White House, has obliged.

達沃斯世界經濟論壇(World Economic Forum)的與會者最喜歡的莫過于符合某種敘事、又證實某一偏見的新聞事件。白宮作秀大師唐納德•特朗普(Donald Trump)滿足了他們。

On Monday Mr Trump announced emergency “safeguard” tariffs against imports of solar panels and washing machines, citing jobs being lost among American producers.

周一，特朗普宣布了針對進口太陽能電池板和洗衣機的緊急“保護性”關稅，理由是它們讓美國生產商流失了就業(yè)崗位。

The narrative is obvious: Mr Trump is following through on his promise to tear up the rule book and punish China for dumping cheap products on the American market, even at the risk of starting a trade war. That conclusion would, however, be mistaken. Mr Trump’s actions are foolish and counter-productive, to be sure. But they are neither wildly unusual nor, by themselves, desperately damaging. This particular decision says as much about the degree of destructive licence afforded by the US’s trade laws as it does about Mr Trump’s aggressive eccentricities.

敘事是顯而易見的：特朗普正在履行撕毀規(guī)則、就中國在美國市場傾銷廉價產品懲罰中國的承諾，甚至不惜冒著挑起貿易戰(zhàn)的風險。然而，這個結論是錯誤的。毫無疑問，特朗普的做法是愚蠢和適得其反的。但這些做法既不是極不尋常，就其本身而言，也并非極其有害。這一特別決定，不但體現(xiàn)了特朗普那咄咄逼人的怪癖，而且道出了美國貿易法所能承受的破壞性任意妄為的程度。

It is important to be accurate about the tariffs announced on Monday. Rather than being an arbitrary unilateral initiative, they employ an existing (if rarely used) provision in US trade law and largely follow advice from the independent official agency, the International Trade Commission. Nor are they targeted against China: they affect imports from a range of countries.

準確解讀周一公布的關稅措施是很重要的。這些措施并非武斷的單邊行動，而是援引美國貿易法中既有(盡管很少使用)的條款，并在很大程度上遵循了獨立的官方機構——國際貿易委員會(International Trade Commission)的建議。這些措施也不單單指向中國：從一系列國家進口的產品都會受影響。

The duties on domestic washing machines, for example, will hurt mainly South Korean exporters. And as “safeguards”, rather than anti-dumping or anti-subsidy duties, they do not involve judgments about unfair pricing or subsidy by a foreign company or government.

例如，對進口洗衣機征繳的關稅將主要損害韓國出口商。而作為“保護性”、而不是反傾銷或反補貼關稅，并不需要對外國企業(yè)或政府的不公平定價或補貼做出判定。

We have been here before, under the previous two presidents. In 2009, using a tool specific to China, Barack Obama put safeguard tariffs on tyres. In 2002 George W Bush did the same more broadly to imports of steel. In both cases, critics howled that the sky was about to fall in. In both cases, the tariffs served a relatively short-term political goal of being seen to protect a particular domestic industry. Neither presaged a general surge of protectionism, still less a global trade war.

前兩位總統(tǒng)都曾經這么做過。2009年，巴拉克•奧巴馬(Barack Obama)使用一項專門針對中國的工具，對輪胎征收了保護性關稅。2002年，小布什(George W Bush)對鋼鐵進口征收了更廣泛的保護性關稅。那兩次，批評人士高聲嚷道，天空即將坍塌。那兩次，關稅都服務于一個相對短期的政治目標——讓自己看起來在保護國內某個特定產業(yè)。那兩次，保護性關稅并未引起普遍的保護主義浪潮，更不用說挑起全球貿易戰(zhàn)。

With regard to trade, Mr Trump is a far more reckless and misguided president than either Mr Obama or Mr Bush. He has the opportunity in the weeks and months ahead to create more serious damage, with separate investigations into alleged Chinese abuses of intellectual property rights and into whether aluminium imports constitute a threat to national security. Those could more readily be used as broader tools to punish individual trading partners for perceived misdemeanours and to protect whole swaths of domestic industry on bogus security grounds.

在貿易方面，比起奧巴馬和小布什，特朗普是一個魯莽和迷糊得多的總統(tǒng)。在未來幾周和幾個月里，通過對中國涉嫌侵犯知識產權、以及進口鋁是否對國家安全構成威脅進行單獨調查，他有機會造成更嚴重的損害。這些可能更容易被用作更廣泛的工具，以懲罰美國認定的個別貿易伙伴的不當行為，并以虛假的安全理由保護國內所有產業(yè)。

Still, it does need to be said that most of the administration’s actions on trade so far have remained in the realm of the wrong-headed rather than the absurd, and that there has been some degree of calibration in their use. The solar tariffs, for example, are set below the maximum level permitted, and their level will be reduced in coming years. There appears to be at least some recognition of the damage that will be done to the US’s big solar-installation industry by suddenly increasing the price of its inputs.

盡管如此，確實需要指出的是，美國政府迄今大多數(shù)貿易行動仍停留在想法錯誤、但還不至于荒謬的層面，而且在實施過程中也有一定程度的調整。例如，太陽能電池板關稅被設定在允許的最高水平之下，并且在未來幾年將會降低。他們似乎至少有一些認識到了突然提高投入價格將對美國龐大太陽能安裝行業(yè)造成的損害。

What one should think of Mr Trump’s trade policy depends on one’s expectations. Compared to previous administrations, it is seriously worrying. Compared to the extraordinary rhetoric about across-the-board 45 per cent tariffs he articulated before his election, it is a blessed relief. The world trading system is not infinitely resilient. It can, however, absorb blows like the one Mr Trump dealt it this week.

人們應該如何看待特朗普的貿易政策取決于各自的期望。與前幾屆政府相比，他的貿易政策是非常令人擔憂的。與他在當選之前提出的關于全面征收45%關稅的驚人言論相比，他的貿易政策讓人感到欣慰。世界貿易體系并非有無限彈性。然而，它可以吸收特朗普本周發(fā)出的沖擊。