【双语】比尔盖茨2020年度公开信：放手一搏

Our 2020 annual letter

2020 年度公开信

Why weswing for the fences

放手一搏

Reflecting on the first two decades of our foundation

盖茨基金会成立二十年来的思考

When we started our foundation 20 years ago, the world was, in many ways, very different from the one we live in now. It was before 9/11, before the Great Recession, and before the rise of social media.

二十年前我们创办盖茨基金会时，9·11事件尚未发生，全球经济还没有大规模衰退，社交媒体也仍待兴起，当今的世界早已不可同日而语。

Then, as now, there was no shortage of worthy causes, and there was a good argument to be made for investing in many of them. We’d known for a while that we wanted to give away the majority of our wealth from Microsoft and use it to make people’s lives better. The challenge, of course, was how to do that in a meaningful and high-impact way.

然而无论当时还是现在，世界上都有很多值得关注的问题，针对其中任何一个进行投资都有充分的理由。我们很早就知道，会把从微软获得的大部分财富捐赠出来，用于改善他人的生活。挑战在于，怎样才能以一种有意义且影响力大的方式进行回馈。

As we were thinking about what our philanthropic priorities would be, we spent a lot of time meeting with experts and poring over reports. What we learned convinced us that the world should be doing more to address the needs of its poorest people. At the core of our foundation’s work is the idea that every person deserves the chance to live a healthy and productive life. Twenty years later, despite how much things have changed, that is still our most important driving principle.

在寻找合适的慈善方向过程中，我们花了很多时间与专家们交流，并阅读了大量报告。过程中我们认识到，需要把更多的关注放在世界上最贫困的人群身上，满足他们的需要。盖茨基金会的核心理念是每个人都应该有机会过上健康而富有成效的生活。二十年过后，尽管很多事情都发生了变化，这仍是驱动我们工作的首要原则。

“At the core of our foundation’s work is the idea healthy that every person deserves the chance to livea and productive life.”

 “盖茨基金会的核心理念是每个人都应该有机会过上健康而富有成效的生活。”

There is no question that this new decade is beginning at a time of tremendous unrest and uncertainty around the world. But even in a moment as challenging as this one—in fact, especially in a moment like this one—were main committed to supporting advocates, researchers, government officials, and front line workers who are making a healthy and productive life possible for more people in more places.

随着我们迈入新的十年，世界依然充斥着许多动荡和不确定。然而，即使处在这样一个挑战重重的时刻——其实也恰好是在这样的时刻，我们更需要一如既往地支持那些倡导者、研究人员、政府领袖，还有那些奋斗在一线的工作者们，他们的努力让更多地方的人过上健康且富有成效的生活成为可能。

For the last 20 years, our foundation has focused on improving health around the world and strengthening the public education system in the United States because we believe that health and education are key to a healthier, better, and more equal world. Disease is both a symptom and a cause of inequality, while public education is a driver of equality.

过去二十年里，盖茨基金会一直重点关注改善全球健康和提升美国的公共教育体系，因为健康和教育是实现一个更健康、更美好、更平等的世界的关键。疾病既是不平等的症状，也是不平等的原因，而公共教育是推动平等的动力。

We know that philanthropy can never—and should never—take the place of governments or the private sector. We do believe it has a unique role to play in driving progress, though.

我们很清楚慈善事业不会——也不应该——代替政府或私营板块的角色。不过我们确信，慈善事业能在推动社会进步上能发挥其独特的作用。

At its best, philanthropy takes risks that governments can’t and corporations won’t. Governments need to focus most of their resources on scaling proven solutions. Businesses have fiduciary responsibilities to their share holders. But foundations like ours have the freedom to test out ideas that might not otherwise get tried, some of which may lead to breakthroughs.

在最好的情况下，慈善可以承担政府无法承担和企业不愿承担的风险。政府需要将大多数资源集中在那些已被证实有效的解决方案上，企业对股东负有受托责任，而像我们这样的基金会则拥有一定的自由，可以去尝试那些他们不会尝试的想法，其中有些或许会带来突破。

As always, Warren Buffett—a dear friend and longtime source of great advice—put it a little more colorfully. When he donated the bulk of his fortune to our foundation and joined us as a partner in its work, he urged us to “swing for the fences.”

我们的挚友沃伦·巴菲特对此有个生动的说法。他一直都给我们很多绝佳的建议。当他把大部分财富捐赠给盖茨基金会，并加入我们共同开展慈善工作时，他鼓励我们“竭尽全力，放手一搏（swing for the fences）”。

That’s a phrase many Americans will recognize from baseball. When you swing for the fences, you’re putting every ounce of strength into hitting the ball as far as possible. You know that your bat might miss the ball entirely—but that if you succeed in making contact, the rewards can be huge.

很多美国人是从棒球比赛中了解这个说法的。当你放手一搏时，你会用上全身所有的力气，将球打向最远的地方。虽然你知道球棒可能会挥空、完全碰不到球——然而一旦碰到了球，回报将十分丰厚。

That’s how we think about our philanthropy, too. The goal isn’t just incremental progress. It’s to put the full force of our efforts and resources behind the big bets that, if successful, will save and improve lives.

这也是我们对于慈善事业的想法。我们不能仅仅追求一点一滴的进步，而是要将我们全部的力量和所有的资源倾注于那些一旦成功，便能拯救生命、改善生活的大赌注。

To be clear, the risks we take are different from the ones the true heroes of global progress take all the time: the health workers who brave war zones to get vaccines to children who need them, the teachers who sign up to work in the most challenging schools, the women in the world’s poorest places who stand up against cultural norms and traditions designed to keep them down. What they do requires personal sacrifices we never have to make—and we try to honor them by supporting innovations that might one day make their lives easier.

需要清楚的是，我们所承担的风险和那些推动世界进步的真正的英雄们时刻面临的风险不可相提并论，譬如深入战区为孩子们接种疫苗的医疗工作者们，志愿前往那些最具挑战性的学校工作的老师们，在全球最贫困的地区挺身而出、反抗压迫她们的陈规陋俗与传统观念的女性们。他们所做的事情需要个人牺牲，而我们不需要——我们要做的是去支持和尊敬他们和她们，希望我们的创新有朝一日能让他们和她们的生活更加轻松、更有尊严。

Altogether, our foundation has spent $53.8 billion over the last 20 years. On the whole, we’re thrilled with what it’s accomplished. But has every dollar we’ve spent had the effect we’ve hoped for?No. We’ve had our share of disappointments, setbacks, and surprises. We think it’s important to be transparent about our failures as well as our successes—and it’s important to share what we’ve learned.

在过去的二十年中，盖茨基金会总共捐赠了538亿美元。总的来说，我们为取得的成果感到激动。但是，我们所花出去的每一元钱是否都产生了预期的效果呢？也不尽然。我们失望过、挫败过、也意外过。但我们相信，无论是成功还是失败，开诚布公都非常重要，分享我们的经验教训也很重要。

In this year’s letter, we write about the work we’ve done on health and education and why we think the risks we’ve taken have set us up for future progress. We also write about two issues that have emerged as priorities for us—the climate crisis and gender equality—and how they will factor in to our next 20 years.

在今年的年信中，我们会谈到我们在健康和教育领域的工作，以及我们所承担的风险如何为未来的进步奠定基础。我们也会分享后来才成为工作重点的另外两个议题——气候危机与性别平等——以及它们将如何影响我们未来二十年的工作。

Some of th every first investments we made as philanthropists were aimed at correcting inequities in global health. So,we’ll begin this letter there, too.

我们最初开始慈善事业时开展的几项投资，都旨在减少全球健康领域的不平等现象。因此，这封信就从这里开始。

Global health

全球健康

Melinda: When we first started working in global health, we were shocked to learn how many children in low-income countries were still dying from diseases that could have been prevented with vaccines that were widely available in countries like the U.S. It drove home for us that the challenges of poverty and disease are always connected.

梅琳达：最初开展全球健康领域的工作时，我们震惊地发现，在美国等发达国家早就因为广泛使用疫苗而得以预防的许多疾病，仍然在导致低收入国家的大量儿童死亡。这令我们深刻意识到，贫穷与疾病息息相关。

Since this wasn’t something that markets and governments were solving on their own, we saw an opportunity for philanthropic dollars to help.

市场和政府都无法独自解决这个问题，我们从中看到了慈善资金发挥作用的机会。

We worked with the World Health Organization, the World Bank, and UNICEF to create Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance. Gavi brings together governments and other organizations to raise funds to buy vaccines and support low-income countries as they deliver them to children.

我们与世界卫生组织、世界银行和联合国儿童基金会合作，共同创立了全球疫苗免疫联盟（Gavi）。Gavi号召各国政府与其他机构，共同筹措资金购买疫苗，并将这些疫苗提供给低收入国家的儿童。

Bill: After World War II, the world came together to create a series of international organizations aimed at increasing economic and military cooperation among nations, including the UN, WHO, and NATO. Gavi was achance to drive similar cooperation around getting vaccines to kids.

比尔：第二次世界大战后，全世界先后创办了一系列国际组织，希望国际社会在经济和军事等方面增进合作，包括联合国（UN）、世界卫生组织（WHO）和北大西洋公约组织（NATO），等等。Gavi也是为了推动类似性质的合作，目的是为了让更多的儿童获得疫苗。

We weren’t entirely sure what to expect. Thanks to Microsoft, I was familiar with the risks of starting a new organization. The risks we were taking with Gavi were different, though. Instead of trying to introduce a new product and appeal to customers, we were trying to prove to the world that an international partnership for vaccines was not only possible but necessary. If we failed, we could discourage governments and other funders from investing in future efforts.

我们当时并不确定能取得哪些效果。多亏了微软的经历，让我了解创立一个新组织要承担的风险。诚然，这和我们为Gavi承担的风险是不一样的——我们不是为了推出新产品来吸引客户，而是要向世界证明，建立一个疫苗的国际合作伙伴关系不仅可行，而且很有必要。如果我们失败，政府或其他资助方或许会就此止步，不再投资类似的项目。

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