新月罗马音歌词:书评：《解密中国经济》

林毅夫(Justin Lin)代表着一种相对新兴的现象：他既是一位自信的中国学者，也是一位全球政策制定者。他现在是世界银行(World Bank)首席经济学家兼高级副行长。虽然获得过芝加哥大学(University of Chicago)博士学位，但他却是一位地道的中国人：专业、爱国，最重要的是务实。

The book is a translation of lectures Professor Lin gave at Peking University. It offers an insider’s view of the biggest economic event of our era: the rise of China. Whether one agrees, or not – I find much of his argument persuasive – we have to understand how such a man thinks.

《解密中国经济》(Demystifying the Chinese Economy)一书由林毅夫教授在北京大学授课的讲义翻译而成，为读者呈现了一位“局内人”对我们这个时代最重大经济事件——中国之崛起——的见解。我发现他的许多见解很有说服力。不管读者是否认同他的见解，我们都有必要了解一下像他这样的人是怎么想的。

So what does the book tell us?

那么，该书告诉了我们什么呢？

First, China’s performance has been astonishing: “Since 1978 China has maintained rapid economic growth for 33 consecutive years. The average annual .?.?. growth is 9.9 per cent and the average annual growth of foreign trade is 16.3 per cent.”

首先，中国的成就是惊人的。“自1978年以来，中国经济连续33年保持快速增长。年均……增长率为9.9%，对外贸易的年均增长率为16.3%。”

Second, China’s growth has also benefited the world. Thus, “China’s strong growth during the crisis was the most important driving force for the global economy.” Similarly, “over 2000-07 two-thirds of the economies in Africa grew at more than 5.5 per cent a year, and nearly one-third reached 7 per cent. Again, such unprecedented growth in Africa was in large part thanks to China.”

其次，中国的增长也惠及整个世界。因此，“危机期间中国的强劲增长是全球经济最重要的推动力。”同样，“在2000-07年间，非洲有三分之二的经济体的年增长率超过5.5%，有将近三分之一的经济体达到7%。这种增长速度在非洲是史无前例的，它同样可以在很大程度上归功于中国的带动。”

Yet there is far more here than this.

然而，书中所说的远不止这些。

One intriguing discussion is of why China fell behind the west in the 19th century. Prof Lin does not ascribe this, as some now do, to western luck in having the right resources in the right places. He argues, instead, that the west made the big breakthrough of the scientific method. China failed to match this because its intellectuals were caught in the demands of its civil service examinations.

该书讨论了一个耐人寻味的问题：为什么中国在19世纪落到了西方的后面？今天有些人把这归结于西方的运气，认为西方幸运地把合适的资源配置到了合适的地方。林毅夫却不然。他认为个中的原因是西方在科学方法上取得了重大突破。中国知识分子被科举考试的要求束缚住了手脚，所以中国才在这方面落了下风。

A point more relevant to policy is the distinction Prof Lin draws between “comparative-advantage-defying” and “comparative-advantage-following” development strategies. The former, he argues, have characterised most developing countries. The results included unviable enterprises, huge subsidies, distorted finance, pervasive corruption and feeble growth. In his view, the basis of Chinese contemporary success is that its policymakers encouraged the economy to evolve in the direction of its dynamic comparative advantage. That is what “reform and opening up” means.

与政策关系更大的一个论点是，林毅夫把发展战略分为“违背比较优势”和“遵循比较优势”两种。他认为，采用前一种战略是大多数发展中国家的特点。这种战略会催生缺乏生命力的企业、巨额的补贴、扭曲的财政、普遍的腐败和虚弱的增长。在他看来，中国在当代取得成功的根源，就在于政策制定者鼓励经济朝着有利其强大比较优势发挥的方向发展。这正是“改革开放”的真义。

Nevertheless, the book argues, policy must be flexible. It rejects “shock therapy”, for example. The argument seems to be partly that society cannot cope with huge disruption, which is strange, given the shocks imposed on the Chinese people by the Communist party. But it is also that policymakers too often simply do not know what is going to work. The book contains many examples of experiments that failed because people did not understand the incentives at work. The caution shown in China’s two-track approach to reform, which had controls and liberalisation side by side for a long time, is justified by its success

但该书还认为，政策必须具有灵活性。例如，该书反对“休克疗法”。一个理由似乎是，社会没有能力应对巨大的动荡。考虑到中共加诸于人民身上的诸多“休克”，这个理由听上去很不可思议。还有一个理由是，政策制定者往往不知道什么因素会起作用。书中列举了许多失败实验的例子，这些实验之所以失败，就是因为人们不明白哪些动因在起作用。中国长期以来实行“双轨制”改革，也就是“控制”与“放开”并行。中国所取得的成功，证明采取这种谨慎态度是有道理的。

An important discussion is of innovation. A “catch-up” country, such as China, should focus on absorbing technology that already exists. This lowers the costs of development. Much of this innovation will be embodied in new machinery, which is why high investment is so important.

创新是书中的一个重要话题。像中国这样的“后发国家”应该把重点放在吸收已有的技术上。这样做会降低发展的成本。许多这类创新体现在新机器上，正因如此，大举投资引进新机器才有着至关重要的意义。

Prof Lin is not blind to what still needs to be done. He is concerned about rising inequality, for example. He stresses that a further widening of the urban-rural income gap, already 3.3:1, would be explosive. But he is no fan of redistribution. He believes, instead, that further improvement of the market mechanism will be more effective. One policy he emphasises is development of small and medium banks, to support small and medium enterprises. Another is “building a new socialist countryside”, with stress on rural infrastructure, in support of investment and consumption.

林毅夫并未忽视那些尚需努力的地方。例如，他担心不平等加剧的问题。他强调，城乡收入差距（目前为3.3:1）的进一步扩大将是爆炸性的。但他并非再分配理论的拥趸。相反，他认为，进一步改善市场机制会更有效。他强调的一个政策是发展中小银行，以扶持中小企业。另一项政策是“建设社会主义新农村”，着重建设农村基础设施，扶持投资和消费。

He also pays close attention to “the three excessives” – excessive investment, excessive credit and excessive trade surpluses. That the economy is indeed unbalanced is all too clear,

他还密切关注“三个过度”——过度投资、过度信贷以及过度的贸易顺差。中国经济确实处于失衡状态，这一点再明显不过了。

This is far from a definitive work on China’s development. Many important topics are left to one side: China’s role in the world economy is just one example. Inevitably, it also largely ignores politics. Nonetheless, the book is informative and insightful. Above all, it comes from what is a depressingly rare intellectual stance: Prof Lin firmly believes in the beneficial power of market forces. But he is also aware of the need for a pragmatic approach to policy: the world is not to be found in textbooks. I suspect that this is the attitude the world should expect from the Chinese technocrats who will exercise increasing influence on global affairs in coming decades. If so, it could do a great deal worse.

本书决非中国发展问题的权威著述。许多重要议题都被遗漏了，比如中国在世界经济中扮演的角色。不可避免的是，它基本上也忽略了政治议题。但该书还是提供了丰富的信息，见解也很深刻。最重要的是，它源自一种稀罕得令人沮丧的思想立场：林毅夫教授坚信市场的益处。但他也认识到在政策上需要采取务实做法：在教科书中是找不到现实世界的。我想，这正是世界应该期许中国技术官僚领导人会抱持的态度——在未来几十年里，中国领导人将在全球事务中施加越来越大的影响。假如真是这样的话，这未尝不是一种好的态度。

The writer is the FT’s chief economics commentator

本文作者是英国《金融时报》首席经济评论员

译者/何黎