直说 | 前英国国会议员：西方民主虚伪不堪
Editor’s note: The exclusion of China from the Summit for Democracy by the Biden administration is clear evidence of the U.S.’s smear campaign against China’s form of democracy. According to George Galloway, former British MP, democracy is about output more than input, and by that standard, the landscape of democracy in the Western world appears to be less encouraging.
Chinese democracy is a matter entirely for the Chinese people. I wouldn’t dream of lecturing people many thousands of miles away in a totally foreign culture to me on how they should run their country. That’s a matter for them. Neither would accept China dictating to the British people how they should govern themselves. That’s the principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of other people, to which, old fashioned as I am, I continue to cling. It has the benefit of being international law ignored by some.
中国民主完全是中国人民自己的事，我不会妄想给千里之外，对我而言，陌生文化中的人们授课，告诉他们应该如何管理自己的国家，这是中国人民自己的事情。同样的，英国人民也不会接受中国人民教他们如何治国。这就是不干涉内政的原则，我很老派，所以我仍然坚持这一原则。作为国际法，它的益处往往被一些人忽视。
The Western democracy I am qualified to speak about, and that’s why I call it shamocracy. To run for president of the United States of America, just to run, you have to raise a billion dollars in campaign contributions to be able to effectively fight for the presidency of the United States. That means you have to fundraise amongst the already vastly rich and powerful. You have to produce the goods for the corporates and for the rich oligarchs that effectively control the American political system. So is that democracy? Well, if it is, count me out. I cannot be a supporter of that description of democracy.
关于西方的民主，我有发言的资格，这就是为什么我称它为虚伪的民主。要参加美国总统竞选，只是参加，你就必须筹集十亿美元的竞选捐款，才能真正地竞选美国总统。这意味着你必须向已经非常富有和有势力的人筹集资金。你必须为这些企业和实际上控制美国政治体系的富有寡头们创造价值。那是民主吗？好吧，如果是的话，别带上我。我无法支持这种民主。
Not only that. The revolving door between politicians and the very corporations that fund them is now so obvious as to be almost a caricature. A minister in a government hands out vast contracts of public money to private corporations, and political offices being transitory in our country. Very soon, you’re in that revolving door, and you emerge on the payroll of the corporations that you yourself gave vast and very profitable public contracts at, too. If that’s democracy, count me out. I’m not remotely ready to be associated with that kind of democracy.
不仅如此。政治家和为他们提供资金的公司之间的旋转门问题明显至极，旋转门问题已经成为了一种讽刺。政府中的官员向私人公司发放大量公共资金合同，一些政府职位只是昙花一现。很快，你就会落入这种旋转门机制，你的名字将会出现在由你自己签署的，拥有大量且非常有利可图的公共资金合同公司的工资单上。如果那是民主，请别带上我，我还没有准备好与这种民主绑定在一起。
And of course, the absolute hegemony over the public sphere of the prevailing orthodoxy – political, economic [and] systemic orthodoxy – makes it very, very difficult indeed to swim against the tide. To stand against the prevailing orthodoxy is a very difficult thing to do, because not only does the prevailing orthodoxy control the television networks, the radio stations [and] the influential newspapers, but they have recently shown us that they control the internet also. The changing-of-the-guard that Twitter has tightened the control of the oligarchy over that platform. The blatant subjugation of companies like Facebook, like Google, to the prevailing orthodoxy, has recently become much [clearer]. The algorithmic suppression of alternative points of view all leaves the pretense that we are some kind of superior democracy rather threadbare.
当然，在政治、经济和系统方面的主流正统学说，对公共领域有绝对的霸权，这使得逆流而上变得非常困难。反对主流正统观念是非常困难的一件事，因为正统的权威不仅控制着电视网络、广播电台和有影响力的报纸，最近它们也向我们展示，它们也控制着互联网。推特的换帅加强了寡头集团对该平台的控制。脸书和谷歌等公司公然屈从于主流正统观念，这一点最近变得更加明显。算法对不同观点的压制，都让人觉得我们是某种更高级的民主国家，这一说法相当老套。
For me, democracy is about outcomes, about output more than about input. It’s about both, but the output is more important than the input.
对我来说，民主关乎结果，关乎产出而非投入。两者都有关系，但输出比输入更重要。
Each country will decide what kind of system it has, and the rest of us should measure the efficacy of its system from afar by what its outcomes are. Are the people living better? Are they living longer? Are they living healthier? Do their children have a better country to be born into than they did, and their parents did? Is the economic, social and cultural cohesion of the society improving or not improving? Are people more united than they were before? These are all measures of outcome.
每个国家都可以决定自己的政治体系，而我们其他人则应该通过其结果来衡量其体系的有效性。比如，人们生活得更好了吗？他们的寿命变长了吗？他们生活得更健康了吗？他们的孩子是否比他们自己和自己的父母出生在更好的国家了？社会的经济、社会和文化凝聚力是否在提高？人们变得比以前更加团结了吗？这些都是衡量民主制度结果的标准。
By those comparisons, China is doing very, very much better than Western countries, which is the reason why. If Boris Yeltsin was still the president of Russia, if Russia was still lying drunk on the floor, [and let] everyone pick its pockets, there would be no anti-Russian feeling in Western political circles. If China was tearing itself apart, if its life expectancy was falling, if its infant mortality was rising, if the health of its people was failing, if its economic situation was going in the opposite direction to the direction that it is going, if China was becoming poorer, if the Chinese people were beginning to go hungry, there would be no anti-Chinese feeling in Western circles.
通过这些比较，中国显然比西方国家做得好得多，这就是原因。如果鲍里斯·叶利钦仍然是俄罗斯总统，如果俄罗斯仍然醉醺醺地躺在地上，让每个人都从中捞一笔，那么西方政界就不会有反俄情绪。如果中国自暴自弃，如果中国人民的寿命下滑，如果中国的婴儿死亡率攀升，如果中国人民的健康状况每况愈下，如果中国的经济状况朝着与现在相反的方向发展，如果中国变得贫穷，如果中国人民开始忍饥挨饿，那么西方政界就不会有任何的反华情绪。
It’s because of the opposite that the Western rulers hate China and hate Russia. Because of the opposite, because Russia has picked itself up from the floor, because President Putin has made Russia great again. That’s what they cannot stomach, because President Xi and the Chinese leadership is delivering the goods for the Chinese people and beginning to help other people in other parts of the world. That’s why they hate China.
正因为中国的现状与之恰恰相反，所以西方统治者憎恨中国，憎恨俄罗斯。因为恰恰相反，因为俄罗斯站了起来，因为普京总统让俄罗斯再次强大起来，这是他们无法忍受的，因为习近平主席和中国领导人为中国人民谋福祉，并且开始帮助世界其他地区的人们。这就是为什么西方不喜欢中国。
In other words, to quote another Chinese leader, “It doesn’t really matter whether the cat is black or white. What matters is if it catches mice.” And I want to look at the output of a system of before I call it democratic. And as I gaze around me in the Western sphere, I must say the outputs are not very encouraging at all.
换言之，引用另一位中国领导人的话，“不管黑猫白猫，捉到老鼠就是好猫”。在我称一个国家是否是民主之前，我都会看看他们政治制度的成果。而当我在西方世界环顾四周，我必须说西方的成果着实令人颦眉蹙额。