2018年：悲惨的世界领袖年【中英文】

全球顶级金融会议

三千政商领袖相聚香港

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来源： 人民币交易与研究（ID： Trading_CNY）

作者： 路闻卓立编译

原标题：2018: The Year of the Woeful World Leader

图|AFP

各大词典已陆续公布了其2018年关键词。牛津词典的是“有毒”( “toxic”)。梅里厄姆-韦伯斯特词典的是“正义”(“justice”)。柯林词典则是“一次性使用”(“single-use”)。彭博专栏作家Leonid Bershidsky则选了一个词“治国无方”(“misgovernment”)。确实，2018年有如此多的国家处在近期历史上表现最糟糕的领导人的不善统治下。

The dictionaries have decided on their 2018 words of the year. Oxford picked “toxic.” Merriam-Webster went for “justice.” Collins chose “single-use.” I’d zero in on “misgovernment.” Surely, 2018 saw a staggering number of countries woefully misruled by the worst crop of world leaders in recent memory.

每天都能从新闻中看到最令人惊讶的例子。美国总统特朗普（Donald Trump）位列榜首，他已没有什么可以用来试着说服美国人相信选他当总统是件好事。他非常引以为傲的股市牛市行情正在消失。财政赤字是自2012年以来的最高水平。尽管发动了贸易战，但贸易逆差却达到10年来的最高水平。
The most egregious examples are in the news every day. U.S. President Donald Trump tops the chart as he runs out of straws to clutch in trying to convince Americans that his election has been good for them. The stock market bump of which he was so proud is disappearing. The fiscal deficit is the highest since 2012. Trade wars notwithstanding, the trade deficit is at a 10-year high.

白宫官员的更迭率已经达到灾难性水平：据布鲁金斯学会的统计，截止12月14日，特朗普“核心团队”成员自其上任以来的替换率达到了65％，这甚至还没将内阁成员的更迭计算在内(内阁24名官员中已有12人被撤换，而现在马上将有第13名官员--国防部长马蒂斯--离开。特朗普无法填补这些曾经令人垂涎的职位，那些他解雇的以及自己辞职的官员时不时地自发批评他 - 这种情况如果发生在一家公司，则会令公司股价大跌。
The turnover on the presidential staff has reached catastrophic levels: 65 percent of Trump’s “A Team” had been replaced since his election as of Dec. 14, according to the Brookings Institution, and that doesn’t even include cabinet members (12 of the 24 officials in the cabinet have been replaced and now a 13th, Defense Secretary James Mattis, is leaving). Trump is having trouble filling once-coveted positions, and the officials he fired and those who have resigned are sometimes unconstrained in criticizing him — a situation that, were it to occur in a corporation, would have tanked its stock.

所有这些甚至都没有触碰到特朗普所做的事情的表面。他对美国在世界上所扮演的角色所造成的伤害才刚刚开始显现。几乎所有地方（除了以色列和韩国等少数例外），对美国的正面看法都在减少，人们开始相信美国并不关心其他国家的利益。联盟正在涣散，多边世界秩序正在产生裂缝。
All this doesn’t even scratch the surface of what Trump has done. The damage he has wreaked on the U.S. role in the world is only beginning to manifest itself. Almost everywhere (with a few exceptions such as Israel and South Korea) favorable views of the U.S. are declining, and people are becoming convinced that the U.S. doesn't care about other countries’ interests. Alliances are loosening and the multilateral world order is creaking.

几乎同样显而易见的是英国的治理不善。对经济增长正在消退、企业投资放缓以及贸易逆差不断扩大的现实情况视若无睹，首相特蕾莎梅(Theresa May)政府坚持试图让该国退出欧盟，并对欧盟从一开始就拒绝的退出条款抱有幻想。被由能力超强的谈判代表组成的欧盟梦之队挫败后，特蕾莎梅的笨拙且准备不足的代表们喋喋不休、愤怒地辞职，最终双方达成了一项没人真正想要的协议，甚至连欧盟都是这样，尽管协议对它有利。由于特蕾莎梅获得的支持很少就连其所在政党内也是如此，而且她已没有什么谈判选项，她现在让英国为无协议退欧做准备，这将给数以百万计的民众带来巨大的破坏性影响，所有一切都避开了今年发现的唯一合理的选择，即英国公众对该国是否留在欧盟重新举行公投。对退欧结果说谎的英退支持者在英退公投时误导了民众。
Almost as obvious is the misgovernment of the U.K. Blind to the reality of disappearing economic growth, slowing business investment and a growing trade deficit, Prime Minister Theresa May’s government has persevered in trying to pull the country out of the European Union and in fantasizing about withdrawal terms that the EU rejected from the start. Destroyed by the EU’s dream team of super-competent negotiators, May’s bungling, ill-prepared representatives flailed about, resigned in exasperation and finally produced a deal nobody really wants — not even the EU, though it’s skewed heavily in its favor. With her support weak even within her own party and her negotiating options exhausted, May now is setting up the country for a no-deal Brexit scenario that would cause massive disruption to millions of lives — anything to avoid the only reasonable option, a new vote on EU membership for a U.K. public that found out this year it had been misled by Brexit campaigners who lied about the consequences of withdrawal.

不只英美两国
Not Just an Anglo-Saxon Thing

即使超出这两个最明显的治理不善和无能的例子，事情看起来也不会好很多。去年，凭借全面的改革计划和对团结欧盟的宏伟愿景，法国总统马克龙（Emmanuel Macron）看来像是西方世界的巨大希望。但在西方国家迄今为止看来最有效的由Facebook驱动的反抗活动——黄背心运动面前，他不得不在今年收官之际做出退让。这场运动起初是为了抗议燃油税的小幅上调，但之后却演变成一场反精英的暴力叛乱。马克龙向黄背心做出每年价值高达110亿欧元（125亿美元）的让步，损害了他的改革野心，而他的支持率仍没有恢复，据民调显示仍只有可怜的27％。
Even beyond these two most obvious examples of mismanagement and incompetence, things aren’t looking much better. Last year, Emmanuel Macron of France looked like the Western world's great hope with his sweeping reform plans and a grand vision for a tighter-knit EU. He ends the year in retreat before what’s looking like the most effective Facebook-driven revolt in a Western nation to date, the Yellow Vest movement that started as a protest against a small increase in fuel taxes but grew into a violent anti-elite rebellion. Macron has undermined his reform ambitions by making concessions to the Yellow Vests worth up to 11 billion euros ($12.5 billion) a year, and his popularity hasn’t recovered, remaining at a dismal 27-percent approval in public opinion polls.

西方国家的另一位具有潜力的领导人德国总理默克尔（Angela Merkel）今年的大部分时间都在其所在党基督教民主联盟及其巴伐利亚姊妹党基督教社会联盟内部成员的公开反抗中蹒跚而行。保守党内反叛分子使政府无力要求更严格的移民政策，并迫使默克尔在后院之争中精疲力竭。联盟在两次重要的州选举中表现糟糕，默克尔被迫放弃党内领导。虽然她选择了继任者Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer，但党内分歧并未被弥合，默克尔看起来也不像是卸下政党负担后变得更加像一位首相一样坚定自信。她所能做的最好的事就是确保经济稳定。在德国在技术方面落后于其他国家而且教育和基础设施等领域投资不足之际，经济对许多德国人来说似乎是停滞不前。
Another potential leader of the west, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, spent most of the year hobbled by an open revolt within her party, the Christian Democratic Union, and its Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union. The conservative rebels paralyzed the government demanding tougher immigration policies and forcing Merkel into exhausting backroom battles that left her drained, sometimes even apathetic. The Union performed badly in two important state elections, and Merkel was forced to give up the party leadership. Though her chosen successor, Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer,, the split in the party hasn't been healed and a lame-duck Merkel hasn't acted as though the lifted burden of party politics has freed her up to be more assertive as chancellor. The best she's been able to do is ensure stability, which looks to many Germans like stagnation at a time when the country is falling behind others in technology and underinvesting in areas such as education and infrastructure.

对其他民主国家来说这也是混乱的一年。
This was a year of chaos in other democracies, too.

意大利的民粹主义政府制定了一个充满幻想的预算案，并与欧盟就该案发生争执，（最终只落得降低其不切实际的预测），与此同时经济却在滑向衰退。
The populist government in Italy drew up a fantasy budget and fought with the EU over it (only to end up lowering its unrealistic projections) while the economy slid toward recession.

在西班牙，拉霍伊（Mariano Rajoy）的中右翼政府在腐败丑闻的压力下屈服，这位即将卸任的总理在一家餐馆度过了一整天，因为社会党党魁桑切斯（Pedro Sanchez）在一场诸如议会政变的活动中将他赶下台。然而，桑切斯的表现也不尽如人意：他的政府受到丑闻的困扰，加泰罗尼亚分离主义者又跑出来捣乱—其之前的活动就让拉霍伊几乎无法专注于其他任何事情。现在，几十年来第一次，民族主义 - 民粹主义政党Vox越来越受欢迎，并赢得了安达卢西亚地区议会的代表权。
In Spain, Mariano Rajoy's center-right government buckled under the weight of corruption scandals and the outgoing prime minister spent a whole day at a restaurant as Socialist rival Pedro Sanchez unseated him in a kind of parliamentary coup. Sanchez, however, isn’t doing too well, either: His government is beset by scandals, he faces a reprise of troublemaking by Catalonian separatists that made it almost impossible for Rajoy to focus on anything else. Now, for the first time in decades, a nationalist-populist party, Vox, is gaining popularity and has won representation in Andalusia’s regional parliament.

在没有决定性结果的选举和数月的联盟谈判过后，瑞典和拉脱维亚在没有政府的情况下即将进入新的一年，。在瑞典，成立已久的政党正在试图排除日益强大的民粹主义竞争对手。在拉脱维亚，成立已久的政党想要加入正在崛起的民粹主义政党而躲开一个被认为是亲俄罗斯的强大政党，但结果确实一样的：两国都出现了历史上前所未有的政治分裂。
Sweden and Latvia are entering the new year without governments following inconclusive elections and months of coalition negotiations. In Sweden, established parties are trying to exclude an increasingly powerful populist rival. In Latvia the establishment would like to engage the surging populists to get around a strong party that’s considered pro-Russian, but the results are the same: a political fracturing unprecedented in both countries’ history.

在比利时，政府刚刚被一个民族主义政党推翻。该党反对比利时与其他163个国家一道批准的不具约束力的联合国移民协定。
In Belgium, the government has just been toppled by a nationalist party campaigning against a non-binding United Nations migration pact that Belgium approved along with 163 other countries.

势力被削弱的独裁者
Weakening Strongmen

对于独裁者和混合体制来说，这一年也不好过。
It hasn’t been a great year for strongmen and hybrid regimes, either.

俄罗斯总统普京（Vladimir Putin）再次当选，但在极不受欢迎的延长退休年龄措施推出后支持率下降。俄罗斯的经济和俄罗斯人的收入都停滞不前，由于俄罗斯军事情报机构的一系列公开失败以及无法与美国建立工作关系，普京在海外的所为有限。
Russian President Vladimir Putin was re-elected, but has since seen a drop in popularity following a highly unpopular retirement-age increase. Russia’s economy and Russians’ incomes are stagnating, and Putin’s been constrained overseas by a string of public failures by Russia's aggressive military intelligence service and an inability to build a working relationship with the U.S.

临近2019年，印度总理莫迪（Narendra Modi）在其所在党印度人民党（Bharatiya Janata  Party）以前占主导地位的三个州中失去了选举权。莫迪的傲慢和他的政策失误的持久影响，例如2016年灾难性的“废钞令”事件，都在一定程度上削弱了其权力。由于莫迪一再试图削弱印度央行的独立性并控制其储备后，央行行长Urjit Patel在本月稍早辞职。虽然经济增长一直较为强劲，但并不如莫迪所承诺的 ; 失业率在10月达到两年来的新高。
India’s Narendra Modi goes into 2019 having lost elections in three states where his Bharatiya Janata Party was previously dominant. Modi’s hubris and the lasting effects of his policy mistakes, such as the disastrous “demonetization” of 2016 in which Modi took 86 percent of the country’s cash out of circulation, are partly responsible for his weakening hold on power. Urjit Patel, the central bank governor, resigned earlier this month after Modi’s repeated attempts to weaken the bank’s independence and get control over its reserves. Though economic growth has been strong, it hasn’t been inclusive as Modi had promised; unemployment hit a two-year high in October.

土耳其总统埃尔多安（Recep Tayyip Erdogan）通过赢得选举而巩固了他的权力，但他目前对土耳其的经济管理不善。彭博社的普遍预期显示，该国料从本季开始陷入衰退。里拉成为仅强于阿根廷披索的全球表现第二差的货币，兑美元汇率已贬值了约29％。
Turkey's Recep Tayyip Erdogan consolidated his power with an election win, but he’s mismanaging Turkey’s economy. The Bloomberg consensus forecast sees the country plunging into recession starting this quarter. The lira is the world’s second-worst performing currency after the Argentine peso, having lost about 29 percent of its value against the U.S. dollar.

沙特阿拉伯王储穆罕默德·本·萨勒曼（Mohammed bin Salman）曾被誉为一名大胆的改革者，但其信誉却因10月份华盛顿邮报专栏作家贾卡舒吉（Jamal Khashoggi）在伊斯坦布尔沙特领事馆内遇害而受到破坏。这个野蛮的行为削弱了国际社会对这位王储的支持，并给他减少沙特经济对石油依赖的计划带来了不少的麻烦。
Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, once feted as a bold reformer, has seen his reputation destroyed by the October murder of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. The brutal act has undermined international support for MBS, as the prince is known, and thrown a monkey wrench into his plans to reduce the Saudi economy’s oil dependence.

沙特阿拉伯的主要竞争对手伊朗也没有做得更好。受国内抗议活动的困扰，以及美国制裁的再次打击，最高领导人哈梅内伊的政权就算还未摇摇欲坠，也是度过了糟糕的一年。
Saudi Arabia’s arch-rival, Iran, isn’t doing much better. Beset by domestic protests and hit again by U.S. sanctions, the regime of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has had an awful year, even if it’s not teetering yet.

匈牙利总理欧尔班(Viktor Orban)似乎在一系列旨在巩固他对法院和媒体影响力的举动，以及最近颁布的允许雇主延迟三年支付加班工资的法律方面做过头。他所在Fidesz党在4月的一次选举中赢得了绝对多数席位。欧尔班现在面临着他统治下最持久的抗议活动，并被迫对抗议者采取暴力行动。
Viktor Orban in Hungary, whose Fidesz party won a supermajority in an election in April, appears to have overplayed his hand with a series of moves aimed at consolidating his power over courts and media, as well as a recent law that has the potential to force Hungarians into working overtime for pay that would be delayed for three years. He’s facing the most persistent protests of his rule and has been forced to resort to violence against the protesters.

这一批容易失误的统治者队伍可能打造出一个暴躁的世界：发生冲突的几率不断上升，无论是国内还是国际。民主和专制的精英都很弱势，他们反对这些领导人的不当管理。抗议运动和反建制政党已如雨后春笋般涌现，而且到处都是越来越多; 他们有不同的目标，但都受到会加剧愤怒和暴力的社交网络技术的支持。
The current crew of error-prone rulers makes for a fractious world with a growing potential for conflict, armed and otherwise, domestic and international. The elites, both democratic and authoritarian, are weak, and they invite backlashes against their mismanagement. Protest movements and anti-establishment parties have sprung up and are strengthening everywhere; they have different goals but are all bolstered by social-network technology that amplifies anger and violence.

表现好的领导人日子也不好过
Winners Lose Ground

就连2018年鲜少的几个典型的非治国无方例子，也没怎么激发人们的信心。
Even the few notable exceptions to the misgovernment rule of 2018 don’t inspire much confidence.

加拿大总理特鲁多没有任何重大失误，但在明年大选前他的支持率也在趋于下降。
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has made no major errors, but his popularity is trending down ahead of next year’s election.

南非总统拉马弗萨（Cyril Ramaphosa）虽然恢复了投资者的信心，但他的反腐败工作并未很快取得成果，并且土地征收活动忧虑继续笼罩全国。
Though South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has restored investor confidence, his anti-corruption efforts haven’t yielded quick results and fears of a land expropriation campaign continue to hang over the country.

当今世界，有能力，头脑清醒，毫不傲慢的领导人缺乏可能是一个意外。但如果这是新常态，那么普通人生活在这个世界上也需要新的技能。如果一个国家的情况恶化得令人无法忍受，那么保持警惕和有条件迁移就是这些新技能中的两个; 有建设性的抗议的能力则是第三个。糟糕的领导力不仅仅是我们在新闻网站上看到的消息，它可能预示着影响我们生活的全球和国内体系的恶化。
The shortage of competent, clear-headed, hubris-free leadership in today's world may be a freak accident. But if it's the new normal, living in this world will require new skills from ordinary people, too. Vigilance and easy mobility in case a country deteriorates intolerably are two of them; a capacity for constructive protest is a third. Bad leadership isn't just something we read about on news sites. It could signal the deterioration of institutions, both global and domestic, that shape our lives.（the end）

来源： 人民币交易与研究（ID： Trading_CNY）

作者： 路闻卓立编译

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