外刊精读:没有信任的贸易
本文仅供语言学习使用,不代表本平台观点。
Trade without trust
没有信任的贸易
The West doesn’t trust China at all any more. It still has to find a way to do business with Chinese firms
西方根本不再信任中国。它仍然必须找到与中国公司开展业务的方式。
Nineteen years ago an unknown Chinese company set up its first European sales offices, in a suburb of Frankfurt and an English commuter town, and started bidding to build telecoms networks. Today Huawei symbolises the daunting rise of China Inc—and a global trading system in which trust has col- lapsed. With sales of $123bn, it is known for its razor-sharp prices and dedication to the industrial goals of China’s rulers. Since 2018 America has subjected it to a legal assault, making it a flash-point in the trade war. Now Britain has said that it will block Huawei from its 5g networks (see Briefing). Other European countries may follow. But far from showing the West’s resolve, the saga reveals its lack of a coherent strategy. If open societies and authoritarian China are to keep their economic links and avoid a descent into anarchy, a new trade architecture is needed.
十九年前,一家不为人知的中国公司在法兰克福郊区和一个英国通勤小镇设立了第一家欧洲销售办事处,并开始竞标建立电信网络。今天,华为象征着中国公司的惊人崛起以及信任崩溃的全球贸易体系。它的销售额高达1230亿美元,以敏锐的价格和对中国统治者工业目标的执着闻名于世。自2018年以来,美国对其进行了法律攻击,使其成为贸易战中的燃点。现在英国已经表示将阻止华为使用其5g网络(请参阅简报)。其他欧洲国家可能会跟随。但这个传奇故事并没有显示出西方的决心,而是表明其缺乏连贯的战略。如果开放的社会和中国要保持经济联系并避免陷入混乱状态,则需要一种新的贸易架构。
Commute
n.(远距离)上下班往返的人
例句:The number of commuters to London has dropped by 100,000.
往返于伦敦的上班族减少了10万。
...a commuter train.
通勤列车
Bid
v.出(价);(尤指拍卖中)喊价;投标;努力争取;企图获得
n.买方的出价;投标;努力争取
v.向(某人)问候、道别等;告诉(某人做某事);吩咐ATTEMPTING OR OFFERING尝试或出价
例句:Singapore Airlines is rumoured to be bidding for a management contract to run both airports...
据传,新加坡航空公司正在争取签下两家机场的经营权。
△bidding
n.(尤指拍卖中的)出价,喊价;投标;叫牌
v.出(价);(尤指拍卖中)喊价;投标;努力争取;企图获得
△ bid up抬高…的价格
...the British passion for bidding up the price of each other's houses...
英国人哄抬彼此房价的热情。
Daunting
adj.使人畏惧的;令人胆怯的;让人气馁的
v.使胆怯;使气馁;使失去信心
例句:They were faced with the daunting task of restoring the house...
他们面临着修复房子的艰巨任务。
Razor-sharp
adj.极锋利的;极其敏锐的
Assault
n.侵犯他人身体(罪);侵犯人身罪;攻击;突击;袭击;(向困难或危险事物发起的)冲击
v.猛烈攻击,袭击,侵犯人身(尤指构成罪行);使(感官)难受
例句:The rebels are poised for a new assault on the government garrisons...
叛军准备好要对政府驻军发起新一轮的猛攻。
Saga
v.(讲述许多年间发生的事情的)长篇故事,长篇小说;一连串的事件(或经历);一连串经历的讲述(或记述)
Descent
n.下降;(形势的)恶化;(人的)堕落,沦落;斜坡;血统;出身
例句:The only lasting solution lies in a political settlement. Without it, their descent into chaos will be guaranteed.
唯一的长久之计是通过政治手段解决。否则,他们势必会陷入一片混乱。
Anarchy
n.无政府状态;混乱;无法无天
America’s security chiefs have always worried that Huawei’s equipment was designed to aid spying and would make its customers dependent on subsidised Chinese technology. But over 170 other countries decided the risks were manageable. Britain, which works closely with America on intelligence, created a “cell” of cyber-experts to monitor Huawei’s gear in 2010 and, later, confined it to less sensitive parts of the network. Other countries mirrored this approach. It offered a middle way between a naive embrace of Chinese state capitalism and a cold war.
美国安全负责人一直担心,华为的设备旨在协助间谍活动,并使其客户依赖受补贴的中国技术。但是其他170多个国家认为风险是可以控制的。与美国在情报方面密切合作的英国于2010年创建了一个网络专家“小组”,以监视华为的设备,随后将其限制在网络中较不敏感的部分。其他国家也采用了这种方法。它提供了在天真的拥抱中国国家资本主义和冷战之间的中间道路。
Subsidise
v.补助;资助;给…发津贴
例句:In promoting research, it is likely to improve conditions for all rather than subsidise pet technologies.
在促进研究方面,自民党可能会提高所有技术的研究条件,而不是只对重点技术进行补助。
Cyber
adj.电脑(网络)的
Gear
n.(某种活动的)设备,用具
State capitalism
n.国家资本主义
Such a finely balanced judgment has proved untenable. The Trump administration has urged the world to ditch Huawei and enforced a unilateral embargo on its suppliers, preventing sales of some components as well as chips made abroad using American tools. Forced to choose between an ally and a supplier, Britain was inevitably drawn to this week’s decision. It has become riskier for anyone to do business with a firm Uncle Sam wants to cripple. Huawei, for its part, has failed to reassure Britain’s cyber-experts, who have complained that its buggy software is getting harder to monitor, or to reform its opaque governance and ownership. Any remaining illusions that China’s leaders respect the rule of law when it really matters have been shattered by events in Hong Kong.
事实证明,如此精细的判断是站不住脚的。特朗普政府已敦促世界放弃华为,并对其供应商实施单方面禁运,以防止某些组件以及使用美国工具在国外制造的芯片的销售。英国被迫在盟友和供应商之间进行选择,这不可避免地吸引了本周的决定。任何人与山姆大叔(美国)想要削弱的公司开展业务都变得越来越危险。就华为而言,它未能使英国的网络专家们放心,他们抱怨其漏洞百出的软件变得越来越难以监控,或对其不透明的治理和所有权进行改革。关于中国领导人在真正重要的时候尊重法治的任何幻想,都被香港事件粉碎了。
Unilateral
adj.单方的
例句:They had campaigned vigorously for unilateral nuclear disarmament.
他们曾致力于单方面裁减核武器运动。
Embargo
n.禁止贸易令;禁运
v.禁止…的贸易;禁运
a trade embargo against certain countries
对某些国家的贸易禁运
Cripple
v.严重毁坏(或损害)
crippling debts
导致经济瘫痪的债务
Reassure
v.使…安心;打消…的疑虑
Shatter
v.(使)破碎,碎裂;(使感情、希望或信念等)粉碎,破灭;
n.碎片;碎块;落花(叶等)
例句:Her experience of divorce shattered her illusions about love.
她的离婚经历使她对爱情的幻想破灭了。
The direct cost of ripping Huawei out of European networks is tolerable—adding less than 1% to Europeans’ phone bills if amortised over 20 years. Ericsson and Nokia, two Western suppliers, can ramp up production and new competition may emerge as networks come to depend more on software and open standards.
将华为从欧洲网络中剔除的直接成本是可以忍受的,如果分20年摊销,那么欧洲的电话费将增加不到1%。两家西方供应商,爱立信和诺基亚,可以提高产量,随着网络越来越依赖于软件和开放标准,新的竞争可能会出现。
Amortise
v.分期偿还;摊还(债券等)
Ramp up
上升; 增加; 提高
The true burden has nothing to do with antennae but stems from the decay of the world’s trading system. Perhaps a dozen countries might end up banning Huawei—Germany is sitting on the fence (see Europe section). But it will still be used in much of the emerging world, hastening the splintering of the tech industry. Trade relies on common rules but Britain’s decision has been made amid a swirl of lobbying and threats. It is hard to elicit a principle behind it that can be usefully applied more broadly. If the problem is gear made in China, then Ericsson and Nokia do that, too. If it is Chinese firms building systems which connect devices (in the case of 5g, robots and machines), then a similar logic could be applied across a digitising world economy. German cars and Apple phones sold in China are packed with software, data and sensors. Is China entitled to ban them, too?
真正的负担与触角无关,而是源于世界贸易体系的衰落。也许有十几个国家可能最终禁止使用华为——德国正坐在栅栏上(请参阅欧洲部分)。但它仍将在许多新兴世界中使用,从而加剧了科技行业的崩溃。贸易依赖共同的规则,但英国的决定是在游说和威胁漩涡中做出的。很难找到可以广泛应用的原理。如果问题出在中国制造的齿轮上,那么爱立信和诺基亚也会这样做。如果是中国公司构建连接设备(就5G、机器人和机器来说)的系统,则可以在数字化的世界经济中应用类似的逻辑。在中国销售的德国汽车和苹果手机上装有软件、数据和传感器。中国也有权禁止它们吗?
Sitting on the fence
进退两难的地步,左右两难
Splinter
n.(木头、金属、玻璃等的)尖碎片,尖细条
v.分裂;分离出来
Lobby
n.(公共建筑物进口处的)门厅,前厅,大厅;(英国议会的)民众接待厅;(就某问题企图影响从政者的)游说团体
v.游说(从政者或政府)
Elicit
v.引出;探出;诱出
例句:Mr Norris said he was hopeful that his request would elicit a positive response...
诺里斯先生说希望他的请求能够引起积极反响。
This feeds a spiralling sense of lawlessness. The average tariff on Sino-American trade is 20%. Direct investment flows from China to Europe have dropped by 69% from the peak in 2016, ac- cording to Rhodium, a research firm. Other firms are caught in the crossfire. TikTok faces a ban in India and, perhaps, America. China plans to impose sanctions on Lockheed Martin for selling arms to Taiwan. Now that President Donald Trump has ended Hong Kong’s special status, HSBC, a bank with huge interests there, could be subject to punishment by both China and America. Some Chinese lenders may be banned from dealing in dollars.
这滋生了不断上升的无法无天感。中美贸易的平均关税为20%。研究公司Rhodium的数据显示,从中国流向欧洲的直接投资比2016年的峰值下降了69%。其他公司陷入了交火中。TikTok在印度甚至美国面临禁令。中国计划对Lockheed Martin公司向台湾出售武器实施制裁。现在,唐纳德·特朗普总统已经结束了香港的特殊地位,在香港拥有巨大利益的汇丰银行可能会受到中国和美国的惩罚。一些中国贷方可能被禁止交易美元。
Sanction
n.制裁;(正式)许可,批准;约束;处罚
v.许可;准许;准予;惩罚;实施制裁
例句:As an ultimate sanction, they can sell their shares.
作为最高的处罚,他们可以出售他们的股份。
The logic of the Huawei ban is one of disengagement and containment. But this will not work if it is applied across the entire economic relationship. The West’s last great authoritarian rival, the Soviet Union, was a trade minnow. China accounts for 13% of world exports and 18% of world market capitalisation, and is the dominant economic force in Asia.
华为禁令的逻辑是脱离接触和遏制。但这不适用于整个经济关系。西方的最后一个威权主义大国苏联是贸易小鱼。中国占世界出口额的13%,占世界市值的18%,是亚洲的主要经济力量。
Minnow
n.无足轻重的(小)公司
Capitalisation
n.投资(利用);资本化;市值;资本市值
例句:State-owned companies account for more than half the capitalisation of the stock market.
国有企业占了该国股市一半以上的市值。
Instead a new trade regime is needed that acknowledges China’s nature. That is not easy. The World Trade Organisation (WTO), which aims to set universal rules, has failed to evolve with the digital economy. Nor was it prepared for President Xi Jinping’s drive to increase state and Communist Party influence over private Chinese firms and those, like Huawei, which say they are mutually owned by workers. Disillusioned with the WTO, the Trump administration’s negotiators unilaterally tried to wrestle China into liberalising its economy and cutting subsidies, using the threat of tariffs and embargoes. That has been a fiasco.
相反,需要一种承认中国性质的新贸易体制。但那并不容易。旨在设定通用规则的世界贸易组织(WTO)未能随着数字经济的发展而发展。它也没有对习近平主席通过中国私有企业或者那些像华为一样的公司(这些公司声称他们相互地被员工所拥有)通向提高国家和共产党影响力的路做好准备。特朗普政府的谈判代表对世贸组织感到失望,单方面试图利用关税和禁运的威胁,与中国争夺自由化经济并削减补贴。那真是一场惨败。
Digital economy
数字经济
Drive to
通向…的路
Disillusioned
adj.大失所望的;不再抱幻想的;幻想破灭的
Fiasco
n.惨败
So how should the trade architecture work in an age of mistrust? The goal should be to maximise trade consistent with both sides’ strategic security. That means fencing off flashpoints, such as tech, that generate lots of tension but a minority of trade: perhaps a third of Western firms’ sales to China based on our analysis of Morgan Stanley’s data, for example. These sectors will require scrutiny and international security certification of the kind Britain tried with Huawei. It may not work. But at least commerce in other areas can flourish. Chinese firms should also be required to accept open governance of their big subsidiaries in the West, including local share- holders, foreign directors and managers with real autonomy, and disclosures that all help create a degree of independence from the state. This is not hard: multinationals such as Unilever have been doing it for decades. TikTok could be a pioneer.
那么,在不信任的时代,贸易架构应该如何运作?目标应该是最大限度地提高双方的战略安全性。这意味着要抵制燃点,例如技术,这些燃点会产生很大的紧张关系,但贸易量很小:例如,根据我们对摩根士丹利数据的分析,西方公司对中国的销售额可能达到三分之一。这些领域将需要英国与华为共同尝试的审查和国际安全认证。它可能不起作用。但是至少其他领域的商业可以蓬勃发展。还应该要求中国公司接受其在西部的大型子公司的公开治理,包括具有真正自主权的本地股东、外国董事和经理,以及所有有助于建立一定程度的国家独立性的信息披露。这并不难:像联合利华这样的跨国公司已经这样做了数十年。TikTok可能是先锋。
Consistent with
与某事物并存
The ultimate network effect
终极网络效应
Open societies are stronger when they act in unison. Europe may be tempted to go it alone, ending decades of transatlantic cooperation. Yet at some point, soon if Mr Trump fails to win a second term, America will reinvigorate its alliances because it has been less effective without them. The West cannot fundamentally change China or ignore it. But by acting together, it can find a way to do business with an authoritarian state it mistrusts. Huawei marked a failure to do this. Time to start again.
当开放社会一致行动时,它们就会变得更强大。欧洲可能很想单独行动,结束了数十年的跨大西洋合作。然而在某个时候,如果特朗普先生无法连任,美国将重新振兴其同盟,因为如果没有同盟,它的效力就会降低。西方不能从根本上改变中国或忽略它。但是,通过共同行动,它可以找到与自己不信任的独裁国家做生意的方法。华为标记为无法执行此操作。是时候重新开始了。
In unison
同时; 一起; 和谐地;一致地
Reinvigorate
v.给…增添精力; 使再振作
感兴趣的小伙伴们可以扫下方二维码,阅读经济学人对华为和美国事件的看法哟!
(Open standards, not sanctions, are America’s best weapon against Huawei)
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