美國爲什麼對英國退歐如此驚慌大綱

Why is America so alarmed by Brexit? Lest the reader be in doubt, remind yourself of this. Never before has a sitting US president visited a fellow democracy in a bid to sway an election. Nor, until now, have 13 former US secretaries of state and defence risked addressing a letter to a foreign electorate with the same motive. Ditto eight former Treasury secretaries and five former supreme commanders of Nato. Not only has the US establishment broken its non-interference rule over Brexit, it is stamping on its smithereens. If we did not know better, it might seem the UK was uniquely important to the future of the world.

美國爲什麼對英國退歐如此驚慌？爲避免讀者生疑，提醒你自己這一點。在此之前，從未有過在任美國總統爲影響一場投票而出訪兄弟民主國家，也從未有過13名美國前國務卿和國防部長以同樣動機冒險給外國選民寫信。這樣做的還有8名前財政部長以及5名北約(Nato)前最高指揮官。美國的體制內人士不僅在英國退歐問題上打破了不干涉原則，還在上面踩上一腳。如果我們不懂的話，我們還以爲英國真的對世界的未來具有獨特的重要性。

Seductive though that thought may be — particularly for a Brit living in Washington — there is a domestic subtext that can be summarised in two words: Donald Trump. If the British are foolish enough to leave Europe, perhaps Americans are crazy enough to elect Mr Trump. Of course, no one would claim a causal link between what happens in Britain on June 23 and the US presidential election in November. Most American voters have never heard of Brexit. Nor would most feel strongly either way if they had.

儘管這種想法或許誘人——尤其是對居住在華盛頓的英國人而言——但美國國內有個兩個詞的潛臺詞：唐納德•特朗普(Donald Trump)。如果英國人愚蠢到選擇脫離歐洲，也許美國人真會瘋狂到選舉特朗普當總統。當然，沒人會斷言英國6月23日的退歐公投結果與11月的美國總統大選之間存在因果關係。多數美國選民從未聽說過英國退歐。即使聽說了，他們中多數人對公投結果也會無動於衷。

Yet there are sufficient echoes to trouble America’s besieged elites. In much the same way US music companies test products in the British market, or TV production companies simply borrow what works, the Brexit referendum has become a trial balloon for the health of western democracy. Think of The Office, that dystopian Slough-set comedy that captivated British viewers. Not long after, the US Scranton-based version pulled off a similar hit. For decades, US and UK political trends have tracked each other. Margaret Thatcher swept to power in 1979, the year before Ronald Reagan was elected president. Bill Clinton’s New Democrats paved the way in 1992 for Tony Blair’s New Labour five years later.

然而，兩件事之間存在足夠的回聲，讓已經被特朗普搞得焦頭爛額的美國精英感到不安。就像美國音樂公司在英國市場測試產品，或是電視製作公司借用成功的節目模式一樣，英國退歐公投已成爲西方民主政體健康狀況的試探氣球。想想《辦公室風雲》(The Office)，這部場景設在斯勞市(Slough)的反烏托邦喜劇迷住了英國觀衆。不久之後，美國以賓西法尼亞州斯克蘭頓市(Scranton)爲背景的翻拍版本同樣掀起了收視熱潮。幾十年來，美英兩國的政治趨勢相互追隨。1979年，瑪格麗特•撒切爾(Margaret Thatcher)在英國上臺執政，一年後，羅納德•里根(Ronald Reagan)當選美國總統。比爾•克林頓(Bill Clinton)的新民主黨人(New Democrats)在1992年爲5年後託尼•布萊爾(Tony Blair)的新工黨(New Labour)開闢了道路。

The demographic parallels between those backing Brexit and Mr Trump’s supporters are too close to ignore — almost eerily so. Their motives are equally simplistic. Leaving Europe is to Brexiters what building a wall with Mexico is to Trumpians — a guillotine on the cacophonous multiculturalism of 21st-century life. From an empirical point of view, Mr Trump’s beautiful wall is no different to the splendid isolation of Boris Johnson, the leading Brexit campaigner: both are reckless illusions. From a poetic standpoint, however, they offer a clean solution to the alienations of the postmodern society. Winston Churchill joked that Britain and America were divided by a common language. Today blue-collar whites on both sides of the Atlantic are speaking in the same idiom. They both yearn for the certainties of a lost age.

支持退歐的羣體在人口結構上與特朗普支持者如此相近（這一點近乎詭異），令人無法忽視。他們的動機也同樣簡單化。脫離歐盟之於退歐派就像在美墨邊境修築隔離牆之於特朗普的支持者——與21世紀喧鬧多元文化的生活現實決裂。從實證角度看，特朗普的壯麗隔離牆與退歐陣營靈魂人物鮑里斯•約翰遜(Boris Johnson)描繪的“光輝孤立”景象並無不同：兩者都是魯莽的癡想。然而，從詩意角度看，他們爲後現代社會的疏遠提供了一種乾脆的解決辦法。溫斯頓•丘吉爾(Winston Churchill)曾開玩笑說，英美兩國被共同的語言割裂。如今，大西洋兩岸的藍領白人操着同樣的慣用語。他們都渴望另一個時代的確定性。

Both also rely on the specious legalese of their plutocratic champions. Mr Johnson wants to liberate the UK from an often fictitious web of European regulations. Mr Trump insists he is opposed only to illegal Hispanics. Legal ones are apparently welcome. Their true appeal, however, is based on nationalist populism. Both can legitimately point to the hypocrisy of the elites they campaign against. Mr Cameron vowed to cap net UK immigration at 100,000 a year — a promise he failed to keep. Successive US administrations have promised to enforce America’s borders before offering amnesty. As a test of market conditions, Britain’s contest between elite hypocrisy and populist sincerity could not be bettered.

這兩個羣體也都依賴各自有錢有勢的領導者口中似是而非的法律措辭。約翰遜希望將英國從歐洲法規的蛛網（大部分是虛構的）中解脫出來。特朗普堅稱，他反對的只是非法的西語裔移民。依法移民美國的顯然受歡迎。然而，他們真正的吸引力建立在民族主義和民粹主義基礎上。他們指出精英階層的虛僞，在這一點上他們是站得住腳的。卡梅倫曾誓言將每年流入英國的淨移民人數控制在10萬人以內，但他未能兌現這一承諾。歷屆美國行政當局都承諾加強邊境管控，但搞到最後都宣佈大赦。就測試市場行情而言，英國在精英虛僞與民粹主義真誠之間的較量堪稱一絕。

Then there is the future of the west. On his UK visit in April, Barack Obama made an eloquent pitch for Britain’s role in Europe. He reminded Britons that the vision of a united Europe was conceived by Churchill as a means to prevent a recurrence of humanity’s two bloodiest wars. There was a grander context, even romance, to the President’s words that Mr Cameron could never emulate. Britain’s prime minister has spent too long denigrating Europe — and validating the concerns of those against immigration — to make a positive case, which is why he asked Mr Obama to do it for him. It is worth noting that Mr Cameron hired Jim Messina, the manager of Mr Obama’s 2012 re-election campaign, to help make his fear-based economic case against Brexit; even the product managers are interchangeable.

還有就是對西方未來的擔憂。今年4月訪問英國期間，巴拉克•奧巴馬(Barack Obama)有力捍衛了英國在歐洲的作用。他提醒英國人，歐洲統一的願景最初是丘吉爾想出來的，爲的是防止人類歷史上最血腥的兩次大戰重演。美國總統把自己的演講放在宏大的背景下，甚至帶有一絲浪漫，這是卡梅倫永遠模仿不出來的。英國首相用了太長時間詆譭歐洲——並且肯定那些反移民人士的擔憂——以至於他無法用“正能量”闡述留歐的邏輯，這就是他爲什麼請奧巴馬出面爲他說話。值得注意的是，卡梅倫聘請了奧巴馬2012年連任競選經理吉姆•麥西納(Jim Messina)，幫他策劃反對退歐的基於恐慌的經濟理由；美英之間就連“產品經理”也是可以互換的。

Beyond doing a favour for a friend, Mr Obama had larger motives. Washington’s elites rightly fear that Brexit could spark a chain reaction that could lead to the disintegration of the EU. That, in turn, could trigger the collapse of the transatlantic alliance. US global power has always been magnified by the strength of its alliances. The self-inflicted isolation of America’s closest European ally could be the start of a great unravelling.

除了爲朋友幫忙，奧巴馬還有更大的動機。華盛頓的精英階層有理由擔憂，英國退歐可能引發連鎖反應，最終導致歐盟解體。這進而可能引發跨大西洋聯盟的解體。美國的全球實力一直得到其強大同盟的放大。作爲與美國關係最密切的歐洲盟友，英國自我強加的孤立可能意味着一場大解體的開始。

Here, too, Mr Trump plays the ghost at the banquet. For the first time since Nato was formed, the US is fielding a presidential candidate who would be indifferent to the demise of the military alliance. Moreover, Mr Trump stands alone among US public figures in supporting Britain’s exit from the EU. “Oh yeah, I think they should leave,” he said recently. He added that it would be Britain’s decision to make alone. The latter was true enough. But Mr Trump’s insouciance crystallised what troubles Washington. There are points in history when all that is solid melts into air. Will 2016 be one of those moments?

在這方面，特朗普同樣扮演了宴會上的幽靈的角色。特朗普是自北約成立以來首位對這一軍事同盟的存亡漠不關心的總統候選人。此外，在美國的公衆人物中，只有特朗普支持英國退出歐盟。特朗普最近稱：“噢，是的，我認爲他們應該離開。”他補充說，那應該是英國自己的決定。後半句說的沒錯。但特朗普漫不經心的態度凸顯了華盛頓的不安心情。歷史上多次出現過貌似堅固的東西一下子煙消雲散的時刻。2016年會成爲那些時刻之一嗎？