高盛公司(Goldman Sachs)的吉姆•奥尼尔(Jim O'Neill)发明的“金砖四国”(Brics)一词，可谓是营销上的神来之笔。
但从逻辑分析的角度而言，这个词是否贴切呢？我的答案是，既贴切，也不贴切。
说它不贴切，是因为除了都不是高收入国家之外，这四个国家几乎没有共同之处。
说它贴切，则是因为这个概念捕捉到了我们这个时代的一个事实，即大量发展中国家都实现了持续性的“赶超式”增长。
中国和印度是迄今全球人口最多的国家，截至2009年年中，人口总数分别为13.4亿和11.8亿——而排名第三的美国只有3.08亿人口。
以这两个亚洲巨人的标准衡量，1.93亿人口的巴西和1.42亿人口的俄罗斯都微不足道。
中国如今已成为“世界工厂”——一个高投资、高增长的庞然大物，在制造业拥有强大的竞争优势。
中国的经济也比印度开放得多：2006年，即金融危机爆发前一年，中国商品贸易在国内生产总值(GDP)中所占的比例为67%，而印度仅为32%。
印度在技术密集型服务业领域相对较强，服务贸易额占GDP的比重为15%，而中国为7%。
与这两个亚洲巨人相比，巴西经济要封闭得多，2006年其商品出口占GDP的比重仅为22%，服务出口占GDP的比重为5%。半数出口产品为食品与原材料。2006年，制造业出口在俄罗斯出口总额中所占的比例还不到20%。俄罗斯是一个燃料与矿产出口大国。
然而，差异最为显著的是四国经济的规模、活力与影响。经济史学家安格斯•麦迪森(Angus Maddison)表示，按购买力平价计算，中国在全球产出中所占的份额，从1980年的8%上升到了2006年的17%。同年，中国在金砖四国总产出中所占的比例，也从1990年的42%上升到了61%。
在这段时间内，无论是巴西还是俄罗斯，其经济产出占全球GDP的份额都没有明显增长。就连印度的增幅都十分有限——从1990年的4%到2006年的6%。因此，故事的主要内容是两个亚洲巨人的崛起——尤其是中国。但“Ics”一词在吸引眼球方面就要逊色得多了。
不过，金砖四国的概念确实抓住了经济实力由老牌发达国家——特别是西欧和日本——向“新兴国家”转移的事实。本轮金融危机加速了这种变化。
首先是中国，然后还有印度，很大程度上安然渡过了这场危机。根据去年12月份的普遍预测，2009年中国经济增长了8.5%，印度增长了6.6%。但巴西经济止步不前，而俄罗斯则萎缩了7.9%。预计在2010年，中国经济将增长9.6%，印度增长7.7%，巴西增长5.1%，而俄罗斯增长4.1%。
然而，这些国家能够将自己的动力传递给整个世界吗？乍看上去，答案似乎是肯定的。以美元计价，2008年金砖四国GDP总额已相当于美国的60%，全球的14%，其中中国的产出占到半数。
高盛表示，以美元计价，2000年至2008年间，金砖四国贡献了全球经济增长的近30%，2007年危机爆发以来，贡献度更是高达45%。
无疑，这一贡献率将会随着时间的推移不断提高。不过，几乎所有的增长都将来自这些国家的内部。世界其它经济体所能获得的净需求刺激，取决于这些国家贸易顺差的下降或逆差的上升。
中国又一次成为金砖四国中唯一能够做出很大贡献的国家。尽管如此，在2008至2009年间，中国对世界其它地区的净刺激，还不到这些国家GDP总和的0.2%。
不过，在引导全球经济实现更为均衡的需求增长方面，金砖四国——尤其是中国——必须发挥重要作用。
这是全球新决策机构不得不应对的诸多挑战之一。
如果人们对金砖四国概念的关注，使得政策制定者们把重点放在这项任务上，那么，它将被证明是值得的。
译者/何黎
http://www.ftchinese.com/story/001030922
The invention of the Brics by Jim O'Neill of Goldman Sachs was a stroke of marketing genius.
But does it have analytical relevance? My answer is: no and yes.
No, because the four countries have next to nothing in common, apart from the fact that none is a high-income country.
Yes, because the notion captures a reality of our era, which is sustained “catch-up” growth across large parts of the developing world.
China and India are by far the world's two most populous countries, with 1.34bn and 1.18bn inhabitants in mid-2009 respectively – compared with the 308m of the next-largest, the US.
By the standards of the Asian giants, Brazil, with 193m people, and Russia, with 142m, are minnows.
China is now the “workshop of the world” – a high-investment, high- growth behemoth, with a powerful competitive position in manufacturing.
The country's economy is also far more open than that of India: in 2006, the year before the financial crisis broke, the ratio of merchandise trade to China's gross domestic product was 67 per cent, compared with 32 per cent for India.
India is relatively stronger in skill-intensive services: the ratio of trade in services to GDP was 15 per cent, against 7 per cent for China.
Brazil has a far more closed economy than either of the Asian giants, with a ratio of merchandise exports to GDP of a mere 22 per cent in 2006 and a ratio of service exports to GDP of 5 per cent. Half of its exports were of food and raw materials. In 2006, manufactures made up less than a fifth of Russia's exports. It is an exporter of fuels and minerals.
Yet it is in the size, dynamism and impact that differences are most marked. According to Angus Maddison, the economic historian, China's share in world output at purchasing power parity rose from 8 per cent in 1980 to 17 per cent in 2006. By then, China's share of Bric output was 61 per cent – up from 42 per cent in 1990.
Neither Brazil nor Russia achieved a significant rise in their share of world GDP over this period. Even India's rise was modest – up from 4 per cent in 1990 to 6 per cent in 2006. The story, then, has been of the rise of the two Asian giants and especially of China. But the “Ics” would have been far less sexy a term.
Yet the notion of the Brics does capture the reality of a shift in economic power away from the old developed countries, particularly western Europe and Japan, to “emerging countries”. The financial crisis has accelerated this change.
China, above all, and also India, to a marked degree, have survived the crisis unscathed. In 2009, according to the December consensus of forecasts, China's economy grew by 8.5 per cent and India's by 6.6 per cent. But Brazil's stagnated and Russia's shrank by 7.9 per cent. For 2010 the forecasts are for 9.6 per cent growth in China, 7.7 per cent in India, 5.1 per cent in Brazil and 4.1 per cent in Russia.
Yet can these countries impart dynamism to the world as a whole? The answer would, at first glance, appear to be yes. By 2008, the aggregate GDPs of the Brics in dollar terms were already 60 per cent of that of the US and 14 per cent of the global figure, with China generating half this total.
Goldman Sachs says the Brics contributed almost 30 per cent to global growth, in dollar terms, between 2000 and 2008, and 45 per cent since the crisis began in 2007.
That will, no doubt, intensify over time. Yet nearly all of this growth will occur inside these countries. The net stimulus to demand imparted to the rest of the world depends on a decline in their trade surpluses or rise in their deficits.
China is, again, the only Bric to have been able to do much. Even so, the net stimulus imparted between 2008 and 2009 was less than 0.2 per cent of the rest of the world's GDP.
Nevertheless, the Brics – and, above all, China – must play a significant part in generating a more balanced growth in demand across the global economy.
This is one of the many challenges the world's new policymaking machinery has to tackle.
If the attention paid to the notion of the Brics makes policymakers focus on that task, it will prove worthwhile.
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