《世界郵報》創刊號：聆聽習近平，聆聽修昔底德的啓迪-尼古拉斯·博古睿、內森·加德爾斯
2014年1月21日，美國《赫芬頓郵報》啓動新的新聞評論網站《世界郵報》（World Post），創刊號刊登中共十八屆三中全會前夕對中國國家主席習近平的專訪（原標題：How The World’s Most Powerful Leader Thinks）。採訪中，習近平指出，中國不會落入中等收入陷阱，並且將在未來10至20年保持高速增長的勢頭。然而，西方往往不能從中國的角度看待中國改革。全國人大常委會一名高官直言：“西方不會相信中國在進步，除非我們也出個戈爾巴喬夫。”本文作者為資深投資人、21世紀理事會創始人尼古拉斯·伯格魯恩，政治學者、《新觀點季刊》主編內森·加德爾斯，觀察者網曾翻譯出版兩人合著的《智慧治理》。以下為《世界郵報》報道全文（觀察者網王楊、張苗鳳/譯，王楊/校）。
2013年11月，21世紀理事會成員在人民大會堂專訪習近平
達沃斯-當政治精英在達沃斯齊聚一堂，共商時局時，中國越發成為一個繞不開的話題。十年之內，中國很可能成為世界最大的經濟體，它不僅改變世界經濟的重心，還將改變地緣政治甚至文明的平衡。 然而，這些塞繆爾•亨廷頓所稱的“達沃斯人”的主流觀點，依然以數世紀以來西方和美國主導的全球化為基礎，在很多方面過於偏狹。
要了解未來十年中國乃至全球化的方向，我們最好跳出西方的窠臼，從中國現任領導人的角度觀察未來。
這不是擁抱他們的世界觀，而是承認這樣的事實：他們思考和行動的方式將從根本上塑造這個時代。中國往哪走，世界也往哪走的趨勢已越發明顯。
訪問習近平
去年11月，在中共十八屆三中全會召開前夕，我們同伯格魯恩研究所21世紀理事會的其他幾名成員有幸在人民大會堂會見習近平。我們抓住這次難得的機會，與習近平進行了廣泛的交流，親身接觸到了中國新領導人的思想。
我們還會見了李克強總理、解放軍高級將領、全國人大官員，以及浙江、廣東和雲南省省長和黨委書記。
在訪談中，習近平很隨和、放鬆。他一點官僚架子都沒有，但展現出一位不畏艱難的成熟領導人的強大氣場。
跟他的前輩毛澤東或鄧小平一樣，習近平話裏有很多中國的俗語。“我們中國人説，讀萬卷書，行萬里路，”談話伊始，他就若有所思地説，“中國是有着5000多年曆史的文明古國，有時連我們自己都不清楚從哪兒算起。就像古詩所言：橫看成嶺側成峯，遠近高低各不同。不識廬山真面目，只緣身在此山中。”
習近平自信地宣稱，自170年前的鴉片戰爭以來，“我們從未如此接近”實現中華民族偉大復興的夢想。
**習近平相信中國將“避免中等收入陷阱”，實現2020年之前人均GDP翻一番的目標。他預計中國經濟將在未來“10至20年間”以最低7%的速度增長。**這一目標將不難實現，因為中國將進行以市場為導向的改革、加速城鎮化並從廉價勞動力和出口導向型轉向內需型增長。
“未來幾年，中國城鎮化率將每年上漲1個百分點，”習近平説，“數億農民工會進城……但不會出現貧民窟，因為我們能夠保持增長，創造機會。”他説，2014年，中國城市將創造1200萬工作崗位。
但是習近平強調，GDP的增長不是唯一目標。他指出中國所有的問題都是相互聯繫的，不能孤立地看。他説“以人為本”的改革將“綜合經濟、政治、社會和生態環境”，同時加強“黨的建設”。
他説，彌合收入差距、帶領2億人口走出貧困是首要目標。正如李克強總理所指出的，中國的改革之路必須從“量”向“生活質量”轉變，也包括生態環境的改善。
習近平在十八屆三中全會上提出的新政承諾廢除勞教制度，放寬計劃生育和城鎮户籍制度，保障農民財產權益並開放多個新領域，讓市場發揮“決定性作用”。
西方報告鮮有提及，關鍵的改革還包括讓地方法院不再受制於地方政府，尤其重要的是讓紀檢部門相對於黨委更具獨立性（指強化上級紀委對下級紀委的領導——觀察者網譯註）。
同時，習近平加強了對共產黨的領導，加強中央控制，統一思想，打擊聒噪的大V。
在我們訪問的共產黨領導人看來，經濟和社會自由與政治控制並不矛盾。事實上，他們認為，後者是前者的前提條件。自由和控制是一體兩面。
對他們而言，只有中央政府足夠強大才能對抗外來衝突，打破既得利益、改革國企和地方黨派集團，並收拾互聯網上的“興風作浪者”。
從這個角度來説，習近平是鄧小平的忠實追隨者，雖然今天形勢沒有那麼嚴峻，環境也更加平和。鄧小平是個實用主義者，他不斷在開放和嚴打間尋求平衡，既保證發展，也保持穩定。他放鬆對經濟的管控，使數億人擺脱貧困；同時他鐵腕鎮壓了天安門政治事件。
習近平多次援引鄧小平的話，以表明他正循着鄧小平的腳步，中國現在正處於鄧小平改革的“深水區”，而鄧小平也曾表示，這一階段“將持續100年”。
21世紀理事會成員鄭必堅也參與了會談。他是鄧小平著名“南巡”報告的主要作者。該報告重啓了天安門事件後停滯的中國改革。他的出席無疑意味着，在新一輪改革中，鄧小平道路的合法性毋庸置疑。
中國不會向世界關閉大門
習近平強調，中國只有參與到今天這個相互依存的世界中，才能實現“中國夢”。“中國越發達，就會越開放。”他説，“中國不可能把早已打開的大門再關上。”
在這二十年裏，中國將在全球事務上“變得更主動”，會和其他國家一道制定新的規則。“我們會擔負起更多的國際責任，在國際事務和國際體系改革中扮演更積極主動的角色。”在回答英國前首相戈登•布朗關於未來幾年G20領導人問題時，習近平答道。
“歷史的趨勢”是發展而不是衝突，用鄭必堅的話來説，就是建立“基於不斷擴大的利益匯合點的利益共同體”，涉及的領域包括自由貿易、金融體系穩定和應對氣候變化等。
李克強總理和21世紀理事會成員鄭必堅
避免修昔底德陷阱
習近平同意鄭必堅著名的中國“和平崛起”論。“強國一定會尋求霸權的論斷並不適用於中國。”習近平認為，“回顧我們悠久的歷史和文化背景，這並不是中國的文化基因。”他甚至提到了斯巴達和雅典的歷史：“我們都要團結一致，避免修昔底德陷阱——即新興國家和發達國家之間，或是發達國家與發達國家之間破壞性的緊張關係。”（“修昔底德陷阱”由古希臘史學家修昔底德在闡述雅典和斯巴達兩國戰爭時提出來。長達30年的戰爭毀滅了兩個希臘國家，修昔底德總結説，“使得戰爭無可避免的原因是雅典日益壯大的力量，還有這種力量在斯巴達造成的恐懼”。——觀察者網譯註）
然而，從和平發展是歷史必然的角度來看，我們所接觸的解放軍領導人的言談充滿挑釁，頗有見地卻也令人不安。
中日兩國從未同時強大過。用以賽亞•伯林關於自信國家主義的説法，如今，它們都是被屈辱“壓彎的嫩枝開始反彈”。雖然中國現在驕傲地站了起來，但正如習近平所言，回溯鴉片戰爭和日本侵華時期，中國仍很受傷。
近幾十年來的經濟停滯讓日本的自信心受挫，如今它正努力走出陰影，包括採取更果斷的“積極和平主義”的軍事姿態。這是和中國在東海更明確的“主動防禦”對着幹。2013年12月，中國單方面制定“東海防空識別區”。
一黨執政，戈爾巴喬夫和中國開放
在兩天的密集對話中，我們的中國同行表達了對西方的無奈。西方無法從中國的角度看待中國改革，也不能不把自己捧成像雷音霍爾德•尼布爾（Reinhold Niebuhr，美國神學家——觀察者網譯註）所説的那樣，是人類通往圓滿的朝聖之路上的導師。
全國人大常委會一名高官直言：“西方不會相信中國在進步，除非我們也出個戈爾巴喬夫。”
在他們看來，這一爭論的核心是西方不願將一黨制視為一種合法的治理模式。
甚至中國當今很多自由主義人士也在質疑，對於中國這樣又龐大又複雜的國家而言，一人一票的多黨制民主是否是治理社會的最佳方式。雖然他們也希望終止腐敗和政府專斷濫用職權，但沒有人想要複製政黨無能、政治僵局和整體失靈。西方民主歷史上的三個範本——雅典、羅馬和華盛頓都在重複這一局面。
在他們眼中，共產黨可能受腐敗和太子黨特權困擾，但它不是獨裁政黨。對於他們而言，這是一個7800萬人口的強大共識體系，該體系能夠在長期政策上達成一致，並賦予領導層權力以果斷落實。
他們通過不斷與利益相關各方協商、權衡，達成內部一致，而不是像西方那樣分裂全體國民、製造對立，或因外部競爭走向兩極分化和癱瘓。這是中國治理的高明之處。只要有競爭激烈的選賢任能機制做保障，而不被特殊利益集團綁架，該體制就能良好運行下去。
正如北京大學教授潘維所言：“選賢任能原則在中國治理歷史上所佔的地位，和多數投票制在西方民主中所佔地位一樣重要。”
人們似乎不太確定的是，必須保持其統治話語的一黨制該如何處理在社交媒體和微博帶來的個人言論表達的爆炸。
數億人在微博上抱怨有毒牛奶、動車事故、被掠奪的土地和腐敗的官員。微博已取代了鄧小平時期的天安門，成為當代中國更具影響力的公共廣場。關鍵問題是，是黨成功“制衡”微博，還是相反。
習近平能否靈活處理這種權力的轉移，是事關成敗的未知因素之一。目前，任何兩個在網上發泄不滿的人，連在大街上碰面都不行。三位著名的反腐人士最近因未經許可上街“聚集”被捕。
新法規還規定，轉發“謠言”500次以上的將構成犯罪。
在許多因越線而被請去“喝茶”的大V中，寒蟬效應在擴散。針對擁有數百萬粉絲“大V”的嚴厲打擊已經展開。即使他們只是在響應政府打擊腐敗、維護憲法權威的號召。憲法保障的正是言論自由以及法律面前人人平等。
由於擔心重蹈戈爾巴喬夫領導下蘇聯共產黨的覆轍，中國共產黨努力避免前蘇聯的“開放政策”（glasnost），或透明政策。但微博卻提供了這種可能性。
矛盾的是，這樣下去，他們可能招致竭力要避免的厄運。當蘇聯共產黨謊言和虛偽的幌子被揭穿時，國家已被掏空。但是中國和蘇聯有很大不同。中國領導人不是《皇帝的新裝》裏的皇帝，黨和政府過去30年都在為社會服務，貢獻卓著。
確實，如果中國共產黨允許公眾公開言論，“中國特色的開放”將支持而非削弱中共。
我們在北京公開討論了社交媒體，每個人都對個人經歷有所體會，並願意與他人分享。審查這一事實只會進一步瓦解政府的話語權，而不是加強其權威性。
歷史的正面還是反面？
冷戰結束後的數十年來，常常有人預言中國模式要崩潰了，但到如今，中國不僅沒有崩潰，還躋身頂尖經濟強國之列。
達沃斯論壇上的精英們要拓展眼界，要看到中國道路，這樣才算得上真正的國際視野。習近平領導下的未來十年將最終決定中國治理體系的成敗。兩種結果都將對世界產生根本性的影響。
（翻頁請看英文原文）
How The World’s Most Powerful Leader Thinks
DAVOS - As the power elite gathers in Davos for their annual confab on the state of the world, China looms larger than ever. Within a decade it is likely to be the world’s largest economy, shifting not only the economic center of gravity, but also the geo-political and even civilizational balance.
Yet, the dominant worldview of what Samuel Huntington once called “Davos man,” still rooted in the centuries-long ascent of the West and American-led globalization, tends in many ways to remain more provincial than global.
To understand where China -- and globalization -- are headed in the next decade, it is best to take off the Western lenses and look at the future from the standpoint of the country’s present Communist Party leadership.
It is not a matter of embracing their view of the world. It is a matter of acknowledging the reality that the way they think and act will fundamentally shape the times ahead. Increasingly, where China goes, so goes the world.
MEETING XI JINPING
Along with other members of the Berggruen Institute’s 21st Century Council, we had the opportunity to gain a firsthand glimpse into the mindset of China’s new leadership during a rare, wide-ranging discussion with Xi Jinping at the Great Hall of the People in November on the eve of the Central Committee Plenum.
We also met with Premier Li Keqiang as well as top generals of the People’s Liberation Army and other ranking officials from National People’s Congress as well as governors and Party secretaries from Zhejiang, Guangdong and Yunnan provinces.
In our conversation, Xi was informal and relaxed. He hadn’t the least air of the usual stolid technocrats, but rather that of a fully formed leader prepared to take up what everyone acknowledges are towering challenges.
Like Deng or Mao before him, Xi’s remarks were peppered with classical allegories. “As we Chinese say, one needs to read ten thousand books and journey ten thousand miles to gain understanding,” he mused at the outset of our dialogue. “Since China is an ancient civilization with over 5000 years of history, sometimes we ourselves don’t even know where to start. There is a famous poem about Lushan Mountain that says when you view it from different directions you get a different impression. And maybe my own perspective has limitations. As the poem also says, you won’t have the whole picture of the mountain when you yourself are on it.”
From his personal vantage point, Xi proclaimed with evident pride, “we have never been closer” to realizing the Chinese dream of rejuvenation after the long climb back from humiliation in the Opium Wars 170 years ago.
Expressing confidence that China could “avoid the middle-income trap” and meet its goal of doubling per capita income by 2020, Xi predicted the economy would grow for the “next ten to twenty years” at a rate of at least 7 per cent. This would be possible because of the more market-oriented structural reforms, accelerated urbanization and the shift from low-wage exports toward domestic consumption.
“For years to come, there will be a 1 per cent increase in China’s urbanization rate every year,” Xi said, “as several hundred million farmers migrate to the cities…. but there are no slums precisely because we have been able to maintain growth and provide opportunities.” In 2014, he said, 12 million new job opportunities will be created in China’s cities.
But raising GDP does not stand alone as a goal, Xi emphasized. Noting that all of China’s problems were related to each other and could not be tackled piecemeal, he declared that the “people-centered” reforms he was introducing would be “comprehensive economic, political, social and ecological” --- bolstered by “Party building.”
Closing the inequality gap and ending poverty for the 200 million people who have been left behind during the decades of rapid growth are at the top of the agenda, he said. As Premier Li noted, China’s reform path must also shift from “quantity” to “quality of life,” including on the ecological front.
Xi’s new policies, adopted at the Central Committee Plenum, promise to end labor re-education camps, ease the one child policy and migrant residency requirement in cities, grant property rights to farmers and open up many new areas to a “decisive role” for the market.
Though barely mentioned in Western reports, key reforms also include making local courts accountable to circuit courts instead of remaining under the control of local authorities and, critically, separating the corruption-fighting Central Disciplinary Inspection Commission from Party oversight.
At the same time, Xi has strengthened the grip of the Communist Party, accumulated more power at the center, asserted ideological orthodoxy and clamped down on raucous bloggers.
There is no contradiction, in the view of the Party leaders we met, between economic and social liberalization on the one hand and more political control on the other. In fact, in their minds, the latter is the condition for the former. Lightening up and tightening up are two sides of the same coin.
For them, only a strong state-Party at the center can forestall conflicts abroad and see the reforms through against vested interests of the state enterprises, local party bosses and what they see as the virtual “manufacturers of chaos” on the Internet.
In this respect, Xi is a true disciple of Deng Xiaoping, albeit in these less harsh, more tempered times. Deng was a pragmatist who continuously calibrated opening up and cracking down to both move forward and maintain stability. His loosened grip on the economy raised hundreds of millions out of poverty; his iron fist crushed the Tiananmen Square protests.
Xi invoked Deng Xiaoping more than enough to make the point that he was treading in his stead, noting that China was now in the “deep end” of Deng’s reforms, which the former leader said “would last 100 years.”
Our interlocutor in these meetings was Zheng Bijian, also a member of the 21st Century Council, who was a key author of Deng’s famous “southern tour” report which re-launched China’s reforms in 1992 after they were stalled by the Tiananmen episode. His presence was no doubt meant to confer Deng’s legitimacy on the new wave of reforms.
CHINA WILL NEVER CLOSE ITS DOORS TO THE WORLD
Realizing “the Chinese Dream” the Party chief stressed, can only take place by remaining engaged in today’s interdependent world. “The more developed China becomes,” he said, “the more open it will be. It is impossible for China to shut the door that has already been opened. "
On this score China is “ready to become more active” in global affairs and work with others to shape the new rules of the game. “We will shoulder more international obligations and play a more proactive role in international affairs as well as the reform of the international system,” Xi said in response to a question from former British prime minister Gordon Brown about taking on the G-20 chairmanship in the coming years.
The “trend of the times” is to avoid conflicts damaging to development and instead seek to build, in Zheng Bijian’s words, “communities of interest on the basis of expanding on the convergence of interests” in areas ranging from open trade to financial stability and battling climate change.
AVOIDING THE THUCYDIDES TRAP
Xi echoed Zheng’s famous doctrine of China’s “peaceful rise.” “The argument that strong countries are bound to seek hegemony does not apply to China,” Xi posited. “This is not in the DNA of the country given our long historical and cultural background.” He even offered this surprising historical reference to Sparta and Athens: “We all need to work together to avoid the Thucydides trap - destructive tensions between an emerging power and established powers, or between established powers themselves.”
From this perspective of peaceful development as the trend of the times, however, the belligerent tone of the PLA leaders we met was both insightful and unsettling.
Japan and China have never been great powers at the same time. Now, they are both “bent twigs springing back” from humiliation, in Isaiah Berlin’s phrase about assertive nationalism. Though proudly on its feet now, China is still wounded going back to the Opium War, as Xi mentioned, and Japanese occupation.
Japan’s pride has been damaged by the recent decades of economic stagnation from which it is now trying to recover, including through the more assertive military posture of “active pacifism.” This bumps up against China’s more assertive posture of “active defense” in the East China Sea marked most recently by its surprise, unilateral declaration in December of an “air defense identification zone.”
ONE PARTY RULE, GORBACHEV AND CHINESE GLASNOST
During two days of intensive talks in Beijing, our Chinese counterparts expressed frustration at the inability of the West to see China’s reform path on its own terms instead of acting as if we were the tutors of mankind on its pilgrimage to perfection, as Reinhold Niebuhr once put it.
The chairperson of one of the most powerful committees of the National People’s Congress lashed out on this point: “The West will never believe that China is advancing until we produce a Gorbachev.”
At the heart of this dispute, in their view, is the unwillingness of the West to accept the one-party system as a legitimate model of governance.
Even many liberals in China today doubt whether one-person-one-vote multiparty democracy is the best way to govern a society as large and complex as China. While they want an end to corruption and arbitrary abuse by authorities, few want to replicate the partisan paralysis, gridlock and general dysfunction they see today across the three historic holds of Western democracy -- Athens, Rome and Washington.
In their eyes, the Communist Party, afflicted as it may be with corruption and princeling privilege, is not a dictatorship. For them it is a 78 million strong consensus-forming body that arrives at agreement on long-term policies and then grants the collective leadership the power to decisively implement them.
To attain internal consensus through endless rounds of consultation and trade-offs with stakeholders instead of dividing the body politic against itself and inviting polarization and paralysis through external competition, as in the West, is for them a superior way to govern. As long as there is internal competition of ideas and personnel based on merit and performance instead of special interest pleading the system should work well.
As the Peking University scholar, Pan Wei, put it: “The meritocratic principle of competition holds the same central position in the history of Chinese governance as the electoral principle of the majority holds in Western democracy.”
What everyone seems unsure about is how a one party system that must maintain its ruling narrative can handle the explosion of individual expression through social media and micro-blogging.
Weibo -- where several hundred million people log on to complain about tainted milk, train wrecks, stolen land and corrupt officials -- has replaced the Tiananmen of Deng Xiaoping’s day as the far more powerful public square of modern China. The great question is whether the Party will succeed in “checking and balancing” weibo, or if weibo will balance and check the Party.
How deft Xi’s hand will be in handling this powershift is one of the game-changing unknowns in the times ahead. For now the Party aims to stop any two people who vent on the Net from ever meeting in the street. Three prominent anti-corruption critics were recently arrested for “assembling” together without a permit.
New rules also threaten to punish anyone who re-posts “mis-information” to more than 500 others.
A chilling effect has already set in as many bloggers who cross the line are hauled in “for a cup of tea served with fear.” And there has been a harsh crackdown on the so-called “big bloggers” who have millions of followers - even if they are only echoing the appeals of the leadership to tackle corruption and defend the constitution under which free expression and equal treatment under the law is guaranteed.
Fearing the fate of the Soviet Communist Party, which collapsed under Gorbachev, the Chinese Communist Party is trying to curb the “glasnost” - or transparency - that weibo has enabled.
By doing so, paradoxically, they risk inviting the very fate they seek to avoid. When the veil was lifted on the lies and false claims of the Soviet party, there was nothing left. China could not be more different. In China, the emperor does have clothes because the Party and government have performed for society over the past 30 years.
Indeed, “glasnost with Chinese characteristics” could bolster the Party instead of weaken it if it openly allows the public to air their concerns and addresses them.
As we openly discussed in a panel on social media during our Beijing visit, everyone knows what is happening in their lives and shares that with others. Trying to censor reality will only further undermine the governing narrative, not strengthen its authority.
THE RIGHT OR WRONG SIDE OF HISTORY?
In the decades since the end of the Cold War, the oft-predicted collapse of China’s model has not only not come to pass; China has advanced to the top ranks of the global economy.
To become truly global in their outlook, the Davos elites must widen their view to take into account the path set by China’s leaders. The next ten years under Xi Jinping will be the ultimate test of whether China’s system of governance ends up on the wrong or right side of history. Either outcome will fundamentally affect the state of our world.