中国像一个十几岁的男孩?

美国《福布斯》杂志网站1月19日发表Shaun Rein文章,题为China Is Just Like A Teenage Boy(中国就像一名十几岁的男孩),摘要如下(英语原文附后):

48670cb2g7dca399acafe&690 尽管中国有着5000年的灿烂历史,但在很多方面它就像个十几岁的男孩。

它只是刚刚坐上成人的席位,尝试着如何以20国集团成员乃至超级大国的身份与别国交往。其他国家和企业都需要反思他们与中国打交道的方式。同样,中国也需要反思如何与世界打交道。

就像个十几岁的男孩一样,中国未必总是能妥善

处理自己新的责任和地位。不能如愿以偿时它有时会发脾气,就像在哥本哈根气候峰会上那样。有时它显得笨手笨脚。在涉及西藏和其他政治敏感话题时,中国总使用陈词旧调,因而引起外界的害怕、愤怒和困惑。

但中国在一天天长大。它对谷歌的反应就显示了一种新的成熟。政府没贸然行事,一举关闭谷歌或口头威胁,而是由商务部而非外交部率先做出官方回应。它试图平息事态,坚称外国互联网公司在华受欢迎,但必须遵守东道国的法律。

相反,许多人以为中国仍是把弄玩具、爱看动画的小孩。他们不晓得中国已长大许多,他们不知道怎么跟它打交道。他们为几十年前的事责骂它,就好比冲着一个18岁的人吼叫,因为他4岁时打翻了牛奶。他们就这样用老套方式对待中国,结果碰了钉子。但他们反而在多边场合批评中国做得不够。

与许多少年一样,中国仍有不少“青春痘”。它需要在大学里再修炼数年才能彻底长大成人。它长出了新肌肉,但还有很多地方要向美国和其他国家学习。它需要大幅改善过时的教育体制,因为那已不适合培养全球化的杰出人才。它需要学着更有底气。毕竟,中国百姓日子过得不错,他们支持它。

美国及其企业需要继续对华打交道。这将有助于中国成长为一个世界所需要的成熟、负责任的超级大国,中国就像一个在成人堆里寻找一席之地的强壮少年,世界没有理由居高临下地把它推开。

英文原文:

China Is Just Like A Teenage Boy
Shaun Rein, 01.19.10, 5:20 PM ET
China has its share of shortcomings. Far too many families live hundreds of miles apart and are struggling to make ends meet. Soaring medical and housing costs prevent too many from getting adequate medical care. Too many live in cramped, intolerable conditions.
But life is getting better for the average Chinese. Much better. Real poverty is pretty much gone. China has emerged as a net donor to places like Africa, rather than a recipient of aid. Nearly 90% of the people recently interviewed by my firm, the China Market Research Group, said they approved or strongly approved of the government’s handling of the financial crisis. The nation buzzes with optimism and can-do attitude, especially among the young, the way America did in the 1950s and 1960s. Despite the furor over censorship Google has unleashed, even the Internet is far freer than ever before.
Seven years ago Chinese citizens couldn’t access The New York Times. A year ago Wikipedia, the Huffington Post and WordPress were all blocked. All are accessible now. China’s government fears content less than it used to. It fears technology, like Twitter or Facebook, that it believes dangerous elements can use to band together for protests like those that have occurred in Iran. It fears pornography as a polluter of morals. Such fears are undeniably disproportionate to actual risk, but no official wants to get the blame for having let something bad happen under his watch. For them, it is better to overreact than to appear lax at the controls. (See my article "In China, Reputation Rules" for more on this.)
The Chinese people are undoubtedly better off with Google in China than out, as I wrote in "Google’s Act of War Against China." Active engagement and promotion of change from within a system always works better than outright isolationism. I fear Google’s move will feed China’s distrust of foreign Internet companies and make life harder for those that still operate there. And I don’t want the Chinese search company Baidu to monopolize the market, since some of its business practices have been found wanting. The result would be bad for the Chinese people. My personal plea to Google: If you really want to improve the quality of life for Chinese, and you’re not just looking for an excuse to mask terrible business performance, please follow Chinese law and stay in China.
Despite having a wonderful 5,000-year history, China is in many ways like a teenage boy. It has just gotten its seat at the adults’ table and is trying to learn how to deal with other nations as not just a fellow G20 member but as a superpower. (See my article "Yes, China Has Fully Arrived As A Superpower.") Nations and businesses all need to rethink the ways they deal with China. Similarly, China needs to rethink how it deals with the world.
Like a teenage boy, China doesn’t always know how to handle its new responsibilities and status. It sometimes lashes out when it doesn’t get its way, as happened at the climate summit in Copenhagen. It still sometimes presents itself awkwardly. When addressing Tibet and other politically sensitive topics, it uses outdated Cultural Revolution terminology about cliques, and that language provokes fear, anger and confusion in the rest of the world.
But it is growing up. The way it responded to Google showed a newfound maturity. Rather than act impetuously and shut down Google–or even just threaten to do so–the government issued its first official reaction from the Ministry of Commerce, not the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. It tried to calm the situation by insisting foreign Internet firms were welcome in China but simply had to follow the rules of the country.
Conversely, many in the world still look at China as a youngster playing with toy soldiers and cartoon characters. They don’t understand how it has grown, and they’re unsure how to deal with it. They blame it for things that happened decades ago, which is like yelling at an 18-year-old for having spilled milk when he was 4. So they treat it pedantically and get pushback. Yet they criticize it for not stepping up enough in multilateral situations.
Like many teenage boys, China still has a few pimples. It needs a few more years in college to fully emerge as an adult. It has new muscles, but it also has much to learn from the U.S. and the rest of the world. It needs to vastly improve an outdated education system that doesn’t properly train its best and brightest for a globalized world. It needs a system more like the American liberal arts one, which focuses on analysis rather than rote memory and test-taking. It needs to learn to be less fearful. After all, its citizens are happy and support it.
The U.S. and its businesses need to remain actively engaged with China. That will help it mature into the responsible, adult superpower the world needs it to become. The world cannot afford to disenfranchise and push away a nation that is like a powerful teenage boy looking for his place among the grown-ups.
Shaun Rein is the founder and managing director of the China Market Research Group, a strategic market intelligence firm. He writes for Forbes on leadership, marketing and China.

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