从雅典到北京 今年属于中国

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发信人: Augustine (WORDS WILL ALWAYS RETAIN THEIR POWER), 信区: Military
标  题: 从雅典到北京  今年属于中国
发信站: BBS 未名空间站 (Sat Oct 16 00:25:16 2010, 美东)


WSJ专栏文章。作者Bret Stephens是守派（保）论家（政）。他的评论很有见地，特译
成中文供你们学习。

从雅典到北京

今年本来是希腊之年。大约2500年前，在这个国家，在批判探索的精神之中，西方文明
应运而生。而现在，希腊破产、被赎救，深深地浸淫于一个自满、贪腐和无能的文化。
忽然间，这似乎就是西方文明即将堕落至的结局。

然后刘晓波上个星期五荣获诺贝尔和平奖。今年现在属于中国。

自由或纪律，雅典或斯巴达：这是基本的政治问题。像中国或伊朗、 古巴这样的基于政
治纪律理念的政权，几乎每个生活在其统治之下的人都想要更多的自由。没有自由，生
活在道德上不能容忍，也常非血肉之躯能够承受。

诚然，所有的自由社会都唯恐缺乏纪律会在长远之后导致其覆灭。这就是为什么历代的
某些西方思想家如萧伯纳，海德格尔，萨特，福柯，乔姆斯基等被极权主义的政权所吸
引。这就是为什么在保守主义运动中有那么强大的一个文化悲观主义的流派。这就是为
什么那么多环保主义者为了和假想的气候变化威胁斗争而欣然摒弃民主的准则。

这也是为什么那么多西方人对中国及其所谓优越的方式奉若神明。他们埋头苦干，我们
怨天尤人。他们为了将来储蓄，我们透支未来。他们似乎一夜之间就能建好大厦，核电
站，机场，城市。我们成年累月地估测石棉泄露，然后贪婪地诉讼。

基本结论：他们牺牲自由为他们的文明付出无形的代价。而我们以可见的方式为了我们
的文明牺牲了效率。通情达理的人们有权利思量：权衡利弊，我们这样值得吗？

至少，直到刘晓波获奖之前他们有权利这样思量。刘晓波是谁？问这个问题（以及随之
而来的其他问题）就像从一匹锦缎上拉扯一根开了的线。这匹锦缎就是所谓现代、自信
、正在崛起的中国。

刘晓波是个文学评论家。他在天安门事件时期成为了一名持不同政见者。他的罪行是什
么？他屡次犯法，但最近一次是因为参与了零八宪章运动。什么是零八宪章？这是一篇
以77宪章运动为样板的人权宣言。捷克斯洛伐克的哈维尔在77宪章运动中崭露头角。零
八宪章宣示：中国人民"清楚地认识到自由、平等、人权是普世价值。" 为了签名支持这
个宣示，刘晓波被判了什么刑？监禁11年。判刑的理由是什么？"煽动颠覆国家政权。"


线越拉越长。还有谁签署了零八宪章？迄今有超过8000位中国人签了名。中国还有其他
政治犯吗？国会及行政当局中国委员会存有关于2010年7月时正在坐监或被拘押的1383名
政治犯的文件证据。这是总的数字吗？否：美国国务院关于中国的人权报告估计"数以万
计的政治犯"（包括宗教罪犯）在押。

这些政治犯中有哪些人？有老牌民主活动家王炳章。他被判无期徒刑，单独关押。有新
闻记者师涛。他因为把编委会议的文件交给一个美国网站被判10年徒刑。有活动家胡佳
。他因为在奥运会前写了些批评共产党的文章被判3年徒刑。有维权律师高智晟。从200
9年起他干脆就杳无音讯。政治犯们在什么地方服刑？一般在中国星罗棋布的劳改农场里
。这样的劳改农场有多少？根据劳改研究基金的数字，至少有909个。里面关押着多少犯
人？据估计，至少25万，可能多可达5百万。劳改农场的存在对广大的中国社会有什么影
响？关于这个问题，哥伦比亚大学教授黎安友最近写了一本震撼之作《劳改》。他在书
中写道，"在劳改农场里，殴打、 医疗需求被忽视、强制劳动，但那里不仅仅是一个人
权被直接侵犯的地方，劳改是这个政权为了贯彻其统治方式而使用的一系列侵犯着人权
的手段中的最大法宝。

最后的两个问题：第一，这些情况揭示了中国的什么？去年，希拉里坚称人权问题不会
影响中美关系的大局。这是不可能的。暴政并非只是插曲，它是中国式生活的根基。这个
政权使出浑身解数来掩盖这个事实，就像掩盖它的其他弱点那样。但是刘晓波的诺贝尔
奖以中国的而不是西方的方式拨云见日。如果一个政府畏惧孤胆之人，它能有多强大呢
？

第二个问题是关于西方的。希腊经历的艰辛无疑暴露了西方的软肋。但是真正考验西方
的不是财政，而是道德。一个孤独的异见者，为了坚持对我们的信仰作出了巨大的牺牲
。我们愿意付出小小代价表示对他的忠诚吗？上个星期我们这样做了。这就是为什么西
方毕竟气数未尽。这就是为什么今年属于中国--刘晓波的中国。

原文：

From Athens to Beijing
How strong can China be if it is terrified of Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu
Xiaobo?


This could have been the year of Greece. The country where Western civilizat
ion was born some 2,500 years ago in a spirit of critical inquiry suddenly o
ffered itself up as a model for where that same civilization may soon end up
. Namely, bankrupt, bailed out and deeply marinated in a culture of entitlem
ent, venality and incompetence.

Then Liu Xiaobo won the Nobel Peace Prize last Friday. Now the year belongs
to China.

Freedom or discipline, Athens or Sparta: That's the basic political question
. Nearly anyone who lives under a regime based on an idea of political disci
pline, such as China or Iran or Cuba, wants greater freedom. Without it, lif
e is morally intolerable and often physically so.

Also true, however, is that all free societies are haunted by the fear that
their lack of discipline dooms them in the long run. It's why generations of
Western thinkers—Shaw, Heidegger, Sartre, Foucault, Chomsky—were drawn to
totalitarian regimes. It's why there's such a powerful strain of cultural p
essimism in the conservative movement. It's why so many environmentalists wo
uld gladly suspend democratic norms to combat the notional threat of climate
change.

And it's why so many Westerners make such a fetish of China and its supposed
ly superior ways. They work; we whine. They save for the future; we borrow f
rom it. They build skyscrapers, nuclear plants, airports and cities seemingl
y overnight. We spend years neurotically measuring, then greedily litigating
, asbestos leaks.

Bottom line: They pay an invisible price for their way of civilization in th
e coin of freedom. But we pay a visible price for our way of it in the coin
of efficiency. Reasonable people are entitled to wonder: Are we really getti
ng the better part of that trade-off?

Or at least they were entitled to wonder, until Mr. Liu won his prize. Who i
s he? To ask the question (and the questions that inevitably follow) is like
pulling on a frayed thread in the otherwise seamless fabric that is suppose
d to be modern, confident and ascendant China.

Mr. Liu is a literary critic who became a political dissident around the tim
e of the Tiananmen massacre. What is his crime? He's a repeat offender, but
most recently he became involved in the Charter 08 movement. What's Charter
08? It's a human-rights manifesto, modeled on the Charter 77 movement that b
rought Czechoslovakia's Vaclav Havel to prominence, which says that the Chin
ese people "see clearly that freedom, equality, and human rights are univers
al values." To what was Mr. Liu sentenced for putting his name to that line?
Eleven years in prison. On what grounds? "Incitement to subvert state power
."

The thread grows longer. Who else has signed Charter 08? So far, more than 8
,000 Chinese have put their names to it. Are there other political prisoners
in China? The Congressional-Executive Commission on China documents 1,383 p
olitical prisoners known to be detained or imprisoned as of July 2010. Is th
at the total figure? No: the State Department's human rights report on China
estimates that "tens of thousands of political prisoners" (including religi
ous prisoners) remain incarcerated.

Who are some of these people? There's Wang Bingzhang, a longtime democracy a
ctivist serving a life sentence in solitary confinement. There's Shi Tao, a
journalist serving a 10-year sentence for passing along notes of an editoria
l meeting to a U.S.-based website. There's Hu Jia, an activist serving a thr
ee-year sentence for writing essays critical of the Communist Party in the r
unup to the Olympics. There's Gao Zhisheng, a human-rights lawyer who simply
disappeared in 2009.

Where do political prisoners serve their terms? Often in an archipelago of l
abor camps scattered across China called Laogai. How many camps are there? A
t least 909, according to the Laogai Research Foundation. How many prisoners
? The low-end estimate is 250,000; the high-end is five million. How does th
e existence of these camps affect broader Chinese society? The Laogai "is mo
re than a place where rights are violated directly, with beatings, medical n
eglect and forced labor," writes Columbia Prof. Andrew Nathan in "Laogai," a
devastating recent book on the subject. "It is also the anchor end of a con
tinuum of rights-violating methods that the regime uses to enforce its form
of rule."

Two final questions: First, what does all this say about China? Last year, H
illary Clinton insisted that human rights could not interfere with the total
ity of the U.S.-China relationship. That is not possible. Repression isn't j
ust woven into the fabric of Chinese life. It is the warp and woof. The regi
me has gone to extraordinary lengths to disguise that fact, just as it disgu
ises the rest of its weaknesses. But a Nobel for Mr. Liu is the disentanglin
g thread—not on Western terms, but on Chinese ones. How powerful can a stat
e be if it is terrified of a single man?

The second question is about the West. No doubt the travails of Greece expos
e an Achilles heel. But the real test of the West isn't fiscal. It's moral.
Are we willing to pay a small price to keep faith with a lone dissident, one
who is willing to pay a large price to keep faith with us? Last week we did
. Which is why the West may not be a spent force after all, and why the year
belongs to China—the China of Mr. Liu.
--