中国现在被誉为大国，得益于人们对未来的预期。如今，某些中国年轻人正利用这种预期，要求世界给予中国更大的权力，有些美国人则敦促为一场将要到来的冲突做好准备——这场冲突将与一百年前英德两国间的冲突相似。
人们有理由对这种预期表示怀疑。1900年时，德国的工业实力已超过英国，而且德国皇帝当时奉行的是一种冒险的外交政策，这种政策势必带来与其它大国的冲突。相比之下，中国的经济和军事实力仍远远落后于美国，政策重心也主要放在本国范围内和本国经济发展上。尽管在威权国家中，中国的“市场列宁主义”经济模式（即所谓的“北京共识”）带来了软实力，但它在不少民主国家产生了相反的效果。
即使如高盛(Goldman Sachs)所预期的，中国的国内生产总值(GDP)在2030年前后超过美国，这两个经济体也只会在规模方面旗鼓相当，在构成方面仍不可同日而语。届时，中国仍将有大片农村地区处在欠发达状态，而且它还将开始面临独生子女政策的滞后效应所带来的人口结构问题。此外，随着各国不断发展，经济增速将出现减缓的趋势。假设在2030年后，中国的经济增速为6%，而美国仅为2%，那么中国的人均收入要到本世纪下半叶的某个时候才能赶上美国。
人均收入可作为衡量经济发达程度的一个指标。由于中国经济增速惊人且人口众多，其经济总规模超过美国是板上钉钉之事，但这并不意味着中国可与美国平起平坐。此外，由于美国不太可能在此期间原地踏步，中国将很难像上世纪初德意志帝国对英国构成挑战那样，对美国构成同样的挑战。尽管如此，中国的崛起仍让我们想起修昔底德(Thucydides)的警告：那种认为冲突将不可避免的想法，可能会成为导致冲突的一个主要原因。
在过去十年里，中国从全球第九大出口国成长为全球最大的出口国。但在本次金融危机之后，全球贸易和金融平衡引发的争议越来越大，中国可能必须要对其出口导向型发展模式做出调整。虽然中国拥有巨额外汇储备，但在它建立有足够深度和开放度的金融市场、且让市场（而非政府）决定利率之前，它将很难通过向海外放贷来扩大本国的金融影响力。
与建国之时即拥有民主宪法的印度不同，中国迄今仍未找到办法来满足人民对政治参与（如果还算不上民主制度的话）的诉求，这种诉求往往随着人均收入的增长而增强。共产主义的意识形态早已成为过去，执政党的合法性建立在经济增长和汉族民族主义的基础上。有些专家认为，中国的政治制度缺乏合法性，且饱受腐败横行的困扰，如果经济发生衰退，就很容易出现政治不稳定。中国能否找到一种模式，管理好不断扩大的城市中产阶级、地区间的不平等以及少数民族的不满情绪，仍有待观察。根本的一点在于，包括中国领导人在内，没人知道中国的政治前景将会如何，也没人知道它将给中国的经济增长带来怎样的影响。
1974年，邓小平在联合国大会上表示：“中国现在不是，将来也不做超级大国。”当前这代中国领导人意识到，快速增长是保持国内政治稳定的关键，于是他们致力于经济发展，并努力营造他们所谓的“和谐”国际环境，以避免其干扰本国增长。但随着世代更替，实力往往滋生狂妄，胃口有时会越吃越大。有些分析人士警告称，正在崛起的大国不可避免的会利用它们新获得的经济实力，去追求更广泛的政治、文化和军事目标。
即使上述警告是对中国意图的准确评估，中国是否具备足够的军事能力去实现上述目标也颇令人怀疑。亚洲有其内部的实力平衡，就这点而言，许多国家对美国在该地区的存在持欢迎态度。中国领导人将不得不应对其它国家的反应，应对由本国增长目标和对外部市场及资源的需求带来的限制。采取过于强硬的军事姿态，可能促使邻国结成反制联盟，从而削弱自己的硬实力和软实力。皮尤(Pew)近期对16个国家进行的一项调查发现，这些国家对中国的经济崛起持正面态度，对它的军事崛起则不然。
尽管中国不太可能在全球范围内成为与美国平起平坐的竞争对手，但这并不意味着它不能在亚洲挑战美国。我们永远不能排除两国有爆发冲突的可能性。不过，比尔•克林顿(Bill Clinton)在1995年对江泽民所说的话大体上是正确的，即美国更担心一个羸弱的中国，而不是一个强大的中国。考虑到中美两国面临的全球挑战，双方进行合作将获益颇多。但是，某些中国人的狂妄自大和民族主义情绪，以及某些美国人对本国衰落不必要的担心，为这一前景增添了许多变数。
本文作者是美国哈佛大学“大学杰出服务”教授，他的新作《21世纪的实力展望》(The Future of Power in the 21st Century)即将出版
译者/汪洋
http://www.ftchinese.com/story/001032701
China's current reputation for power benefits from projections about the future. Some young Chinese use these projections to demand a greater share of power now, and some Americans urge preparation for a coming conflict similar to that between Germany and Britain a century ago.
One should be sceptical about such projections. By 1900, Germany had surpassed Britain in industrial power, and the Kaiser was pursuing an adventurous foreign policy that was bound to bring about a clash with the other great powers. By contrast, China still lags far behind the US economically and militarily, and has focused its policies primarily on its region and on its economic development. While its “market Leninist” economic model (the so-called “Beijing Consensus”) provides soft power in authoritarian countries, it has the opposite effect in many democracies.
Even if Chinese gross domestic product passes that of the US in about 2030 (as Goldman Sachs projects), the two economies would be equivalent in size, but not equal in composition. China would still have a vast underdeveloped countryside and it will begin to face demographic problems from the delayed effects of its one-child policy. Moreover, as countries develop, there is a tendency for growth rates to slow. Assuming Chinese growth of 6 per cent and American growth of only 2 per cent after 2030, China would not equal the US in per capita income until sometime in the second half of the century.
Per capita income provides a measure of the sophistication of an economy. While China's impressive growth rate combined with the size of its population will surely lead it to pass the US economy in total size, that is not the same as equality. And since the US is unlikely to be standing still during that period, China is a long way from posing the kind of challenge to America that the Kaiser's Germany posed when it passed Britain at the start of the last century. Nonetheless, the rise of China recalls Thucydides' warning that belief in the inevitability of conflict can become one of its main causes.
During the past decade, China moved from being the ninth-largest exporter to the largest in the world, but China's export-led development model will probably need to be adjusted as global trade and financial balances become more contentious in the aftermath of the financial crisis. Although China holds huge foreign currency reserves, it will have difficulty raising its financial leverage by lending overseas in its own currency until it has deep and open financial markets in which interest rates are set by the market, not the government.
Unlike India, which was born with a democratic constitution, China has not yet found a way to solve the problem of demands for political participation (if not democracy) that tend to accompany rising per capita income. The ideology of communism is long gone, and the legitimacy of the ruling party depends upon economic growth and ethnic Han nationalism. Some experts argue that the Chinese political system lacks legitimacy, suffers from a high level of corruption and is vulnerable to political unrest should the economy falter. Whether China can develop a formula that can manage an expanding urban middle class, regional inequality and resentment among ethnic minorities remains to be seen. The basic point is that no one, including Chinese leaders, knows how the country's political future will evolve and how that will affect its economic growth.
In 1974, Deng Xiaoping told the United Nations General Assembly: “China is not a superpower, nor will it ever seek to be one.” The current generation of Chinese leaders, realising that rapid growth is the key to domestic political stability, has focused on economic development and what they call a “harmonious” international environment that will not disrupt their growth. But generations change, power often creates hubris and appetites sometimes grow with eating. Some analysts warn that rising powers invariably use their newfound economic strength for wider political, cultural and military ends.
Even if this were an accurate assessment of Chinese intentions, it is doubtful that China will have the military capability to make this scenario possible. Asia has its own internal balance of powers and, in that context, many states welcome a US presence in the region. Chinese leaders will have to contend with the reactions of other countries as well as the constraints created by their own goal of growth and the need for external markets and resources. Too aggressive a military posture could produce a countervailing coalition among its neighbours that would weaken both its hard and soft power. A recent Pew poll of 16 countries found a positive attitude towards China's economic rise, but not its military rise.
The fact that China is not likely to become a peer competitor to the US on a global basis does not mean that it could not challenge the US in Asia, and the dangers of conflict can never be ruled out. But Bill Clinton was basically right when he told Jiang Zemin in 1995 that the US has more to fear from a weak China than a strong China. Given the global challenges that China and the US face, they have much to gain from working together. But hubris and nationalism among some Chinese, and unnecessary fear of decline among some Americans make it difficult to assure this future.
The writer is University Distinguished Service professor at Harvard, and author of the forthcoming book The Future of Power in the 21st Century
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