不管从哪方面来说，2010年都是传统观念遭到挑战、重塑乃至彻底颠覆的一年。在英国，保守党与自由民主党联盟重新掌权，而天也没塌下来；欧元区不再是一个庇护所，反而成了不稳定的源头；巴拉克•奥巴马(Barack Obama)成功地完成了众多前人的未竟事业，推动了医疗和金融服务业改革；西尔维奥•贝卢斯科尼(Silvio Berlusconi)陷入一连串性丑闻却安然无事；托尼•布莱尔(Tony Blair)——据说是英国最遭人恨的男人之一，出了本畅销的回忆录；卡塔尔这个日益崭露头角、拥有丰富石油的酋长国，夺得2022年世界杯主办权，而早前俄罗斯击败英格兰，将主办2018世界杯。
全球金融危机及其余波继续让政策制定者伤透脑筋。在新德里、新加坡或圣保罗，危机似乎没有在迪拜、马德里或华盛顿等地那么严重。美国带头采取非常规货币政策措施以防范通缩，造成了无可避免的影响，引发了很大争议。新兴市场货币对美元汇率大幅走高，金价飙涨，印尼和韩国等相对开放的经济体尝试以资本管制遏制热钱流入。
自雷曼兄弟(Lehman Brothers)破产后——2010年9月是该事件两周年，全球各地没有举行任何"庆祝"活动——全球化不可阻挡的势头似乎不再那么确然无疑。英澳矿业巨擘必和必拓(BHP)放弃以400亿美元收购加拿大钾肥(Potash)，主因是遭到加钾总部所在地萨斯喀彻温省(Saskatchewan)的大力反对。鲁珀特•默多克(Rupert Murdoch)全盘收购BSkyB计划遭英国政府阻挠——默多克在英国很少遭遇挫折，这次可能也只是暂时现象。全球范围内，在信贷繁荣时期大坐冷板凳的监管者再次出头。
2010年出现了一些非凡的英勇事迹，比如33名智利矿工被埋在地下2300英尺（700米）近70天依然幸存，缅甸反对党领袖昂山素季(Aung San Suu Kyi)表现出反抗到底的凛然姿态——在过去21年里，昂山素季有近15年的岁月被软禁家中。不过，总的来说，2010年有七大主题：
一、从银行业危机到主权债务危机
2009年银行业的资本重整行动，加之大规模的赤字开支，把世界从一场堪比上世纪30年代"大萧条"的危机中拯救了出来。2010年，"账单"到期，一场主权债务危机扑面袭来。市场醒悟了过来，认识到债务和风险不过是从私人部门转移到了政府头上。欧元区陷入成立12年来最严重的危机之中。负债累累的希腊被迫申请援助，银行体系陷入资不抵债境地的爱尔兰也步其后尘，纾困规模总计2000亿欧元。
德国公众又惊又怒。该国总理安格拉•默克尔(Angela Merkel)坚持应出台新规则，用以对付财政上的挥霍行为，并规范未来的纾困行动。市场被外围经济体吓坏了，西班牙和葡萄牙岌岌可危。到年底时，欧洲央行(ECB)不得不推迟"逐步停止为受损银行提供紧急流动性"的计划，并出手购买政府债券（虽说其规模尚不足以让德国人不爽，或是让市场相信此举真的有"震慑"作用，以后还会继续出台）。
事实证明，欧元区最初的管理规章不是欠缺力度，就是不具有可执行性。《马斯特里赫特条约》(Maastricht treaty)中没有为成员国纾困的相关条款，可在危机中处于水深火热境地的希腊和爱尔兰却不能不救。该条约规定，预算赤字占GDP比例不得超过3%，可法国和德国早就无视此项规则。这些法规也未能解决欧元区危机核心地区所面临的问题：即希腊、西班牙、葡萄牙和爱尔兰等国在"盛世"中累积的庞大经常账户赤字。
2010年，德国开始改写规则，法国则小心翼翼地唱和。许多人断定，欧元区要想继续生存下去，就必须按照德国人说的办，包括明年任命一位德国人——或许是埃克塞尔•韦伯(Axel Weber)——接替让-克劳德•特里谢(Jean-Claude Trichet)出任欧洲央行行长。
二、美国衰落 中国崛起
2010年，中国取代日本，成为全球第二大经济体，并且将很快跃居全球最大的制造国。中国也变得更为强势，令邻国很是不安。日本以擅入本国海域为由，拘捕了一名中国拖网渔船船长，最终却被迫忍辱退让。对于美国吁请调整人民币汇率的呼声，中国政府基本上未予理睬，而在首尔二十国集团(G20)峰会上，美国倡导的旨在解决全球失衡的努力，也遭到了中国组织的阵营的反对。
在这种趾高气扬的新姿态背后，中国的一切也并非都在按照计划进行。年中前后，一波工潮席卷了中国多家工厂，不过受影响最大的是外资企业。粮价上涨，让人想起了1989年一轮恶性通胀之后，在天安门广场周边爆发的街头抗议事件。当局进一步加强对互联网的管制，逼走了谷歌(Google)。诺贝尔和平奖被授予长期投身人权活动的刘晓波，惹得中国大为光火，突显了中国政府的不安全感。
在美国，经济复苏步履蹒跚，迫使美联储(Federal Reserve)启动了新一轮量化宽松，被称为"二次量化宽松"(QE2)。奥巴马支持率下降，民主党在中期选举中"一败涂地"。走民粹路线的"茶叶党"(Tea Party)获得了议会席位；莎拉•佩林(Sarah Palin)的支持率有所上升。福克斯新闻频道(Fox News)善于煽动人心、时常指责总统"不是美国人"的节目主持人格林•贝克(Glenn Beck)同样人气飙升。不过，不管是在民主党内还是在共和党内，目前还没有人具备挑战奥巴马的实力。
在海外，美国在阿富汗的军事行动加快了脚步，但该国的腐败和脆弱的政府机构削弱了这一策略的效果。在和以色列围绕约旦河西岸定居点的僵局中，奥巴马起初曾束手无策。从长远来看，意义更为重大的是希拉里•克林顿(Hillary Clinton)有关美国在太平洋拥有重要利益的言论，这表明美国终于认识到，中国在该地区的势力正在不断扩大。
三、卡梅伦和克莱格演"双簧"击破悲观流言
5月份英国举行大选之前，主流观点认为，一个"悬浮议会"（即没有一个政党获得议会多数席位）将是灾难性的。金融市场会做出负面反应，而英国人民将失去"铁碗政府"。然而，打了一场温和之战的保守党领袖戴维•卡梅伦(David Cameron)，以及活跃干练的自民党党魁尼克•克莱格(Nick Clegg)，抓住时机缔结同盟，让戈登•布朗(Gordon Brown)和掌权13年的工党一起出局。
卡梅伦和克莱格属意一项涉及面广泛的方案，其中包括选举改革、内阁席位分配，以及一项雄心勃勃的缩减开支计划，以期减少赤字。此举打动了市场，也深得英国央行行长默文•金(Mervyn King)之心。他在选前就敦促政府采取强硬措施，以免英国像某些深陷主权债务危机的国家一样，让人们信心大失。英国央行内部具有独立地位的"货币政策委员会"的部分同僚则认为，行长不该管财政政策的闲事。事后看来，默文•金警告必须安抚债券市场的言论显得十分中肯。
让许多评论员——以及不少政府公职人员——感到意外的，是联合政府"先开枪再发问"的倾向。国民卫生医疗服务(NHS)、社会福利和学费全被纳入了改革范畴。不过有迹象显示，关于卫生医疗方面的改革会重新考虑。开支审核从数目和口风来看都十分严峻，尤其是在国防方面——目前英国不过是勉强维持军事大国的地位。学生因抗议学费上涨而发生的暴力事件，预示着今后将困难重重。联合政权能否长久，在2011年将迎来真正的考验。
四，风险重估
智利与海地先后发生的地震，提醒了我们天灾可能造成怎样的苦难，但占据媒体版面最多的却是一场人祸。BP的墨西哥湾漏油事件，令该公司损失了数十亿美元，长着一张娃娃脸的首席执行官唐熙华(Tony Hayward)成为环保主义者和政治家们深恶痛绝的对象，被迫辞职。BP的旧称英国石油(British Petroleum)被人们搬了出来以示讥讽，这或许解释了为何随后董事会选择了一位美国人——鲍勃•达德利(Bob Dudley)——来接替唐熙华。
Macondo油井爆炸事件表明了在地下几英里深处、用前沿技术寻找石油存在的风险。尽管按照评估，发生事故的风险微乎其微，但实际上，这场灾难造成了极大的破坏——这与全球银行业危机有几分相似。同样的事情也发生在了智利矿难中，不过圣埃斯特万矿业公司(San Esteban Primera)侥幸未获得BP那么高的关注度。
接近年底，另一家英国知名公司、世界级飞机引擎制造商罗尔斯罗伊斯(Rolls-Royce)亦疲于应对一场严重程度远不及此的事故：澳大利亚航空公司(Qantas)一家空客380客机安装的特伦特900发动机(Trent 900)发生故障。尽管罗尔斯罗伊斯公司拥有出色的安全纪录与经过验证的技术，但却因为该事故陷入被动，部分原因在于这款新型超级发动机的标志性地位。
五，银行家还是没"拎清"
多德-弗兰克法案(Dodd-Frank)的通过，标志着继上世纪30年代《格拉斯-斯蒂格尔法案》(Glass-Steagall Act)令商业银行与投资银行业务分离之后，美国金融服务业意义最为深远的改革。华尔街投行进行了疯狂的游说，以阻止政府重新启用《格拉斯-斯蒂格尔法案》，不过它们接受了对投行自营业务的某些限制。在一个杠杆率较低、收益率也相应较低的环境中，高盛(Goldman Sachs)等大型投行未来的商业模式仍悬而未决。
奖金依然是引发争议的根源。银行大佬们抱怨英国一刀切的税收政策，嘀咕着威胁要离开伦敦金融城(City of London)。巴克莱离任的首席执行官韦骏贤(John Varley)悄悄地试图召集银行家同行们参与"梅林项目"（Project Merlin）——旨在限制奖金数额、就税收问题达成和解，并改善公众对投行业的印象。但事实证明，达成共识是不可能的，一个重要原因在于投行是全球性行业，而华尔街的投行无意加入"小小英格兰"的游戏。
有关过度行为的消息层出不穷，爱尔兰尤为突出，该国银行不负责任发放房地产贷款的行为遭到曝光。当英国金融监管机构金融服务管理局(Financial Services Authority)宣布弗雷德•古德温爵士(Sir Fred Goodwin)及苏格兰皇家银行(RBS)管理失当罪名不成立时，引发了众怒。而FSA起初拒绝发布自身报告的做法，令上述决定雪上加霜。
六，维基解密与开源世界
朱利安•阿桑奇(Julian Assange)，这个此前默默无名、从计算机奇客(geek)转变而来的牛虻，将外交界与新闻行业搅了个天翻地覆。在阿桑奇的策划下，他创建的网站"维基解密"(WikiLeaks)分两批披露了美国政府的机密数据，数量达到了产业化规模。第一批包括从伊拉克和阿富汗前线发回的电文，为现代战争提供了生动（尽管不够全面）的写照。第二批包括25万份机密外交电报，主要卖点是有关尼古拉·萨科齐(Nicolas Sarkozy)、弗拉基米尔•普京(Vladimir Putin)、西尔维奥•贝卢斯科尼(Silvio Berlusconi)等国家领导人的八卦扯谈。但也有一些更刺激的选段，让人们得以了解到美国在也门的军事行动、沙特阿拉伯和波斯湾酋长国对伊朗核项目的担忧、以及他们显然愿意支持美国对德黑兰采取军事行动的事实。
随着解密信息如瀑布般奔涌不止，阿桑奇最终在伦敦被捕，但稍后获得保释。他要么被遣送回瑞典，在那里面临强奸罪指控；要么被引渡至美国，而那里的公诉人正竞相准备提出起诉，大概会依据1919年的《间谍法案》为其定罪。
七，报纸业之死是夸大其词
科技继续重塑媒体行业。社交网站Facebook与Twitter的爆炸式增长，导致许多国家的报纸发行量进一步下滑。但前景并非一片黯淡。前克格勃谍报人员亚历山大•列别捷夫(Alexander Lebedev)以1英镑收购了《独立报》(The Independent)，增加了旗下英国印刷出版物的数量。他的《伦敦晚旗报》(Evening Standard)变成了免费报纸，因此重获新生。此外，最重要的是，iPad横空出世。史蒂夫•乔布斯(Steve Jobs)的最新力作改变了游戏规则，因为iPad以及三星(Samsung)的Galaxy等其它"平板"设备，将互动应用与报纸阅读体验结合在了一起。先别把报纸首页扔进垃圾箱！
译者/何黎
http://www.ftchinese.com/story/001036304
By any measure, 2010 was the year when conventional wisdom was challenged, redefined or comprehensively overturned. A Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition assumed power in Britain and the sky did not fall in; the eurozone ceased being a shelter and became a source of instability; Barack Obama succeeded where so many had failed and pushed through healthcare and financial services reform; Silvio Berlusconi survived a string of sex scandals; Tony Blair, reputedly one of the most hated men in Britain, wrote a best-selling memoir; and Qatar, an up-and-coming oil-rich emirate, won the right to host the 2022 World Cup, alongside a Russian bid for 2018 that saw off England.
The global financial crisis and its aftermath continued to preoccupy policymakers. Viewed from Delhi, Singapore or São Paulo, the crisis appeared less acute than in Dublin, Madrid or Washington. The impact of US-led unconventional monetary measures to head off deflation was inescapable and highly controversial. Currencies in emerging markets rose sharply against the dollar, gold soared in value and relatively open economies, such as Indonesia and South Korea, experimented with capital controls to curb the flow of hot money.
After the crash of Lehman Brothers, whose second anniversary passed without celebration in September, the inexorable advance of globalisation looked less certain. BHP, the Anglo-Australian mining giant, abandoned a $40bn bid for Potash, largely because of opposition in the Canadian fertiliser group's home province of Saskatchewan. Rupert Murdoch's bid to take full control of BSkyB was put on hold by the UK government, a rare if perhaps only temporary setback for him in Britain. Across the globe, regulators – shoved aside during the credit boom – staged a comeback.
There were extraordinary acts of courage, such as the 33 Chilean miners who survived nearly 70 days buried 2,300ft (700 metres) underground and the defiant dignity of Aung San Suu Kyi, the Burmese opposition leader released after spending almost 15 of the past 21 years under house arrest. Overall, however, seven themes helped to shape 2010.
1 From banking crisis to sovereign debt crisis
The 2009 recapitalisation of the banks, coupled with massive deficit spending, saved the world from a 1930s-style Depression. In 2010, the bill came due in the form of a sovereign debt crisis. Markets woke up to the fact that liabilities and risk had simply been transferred from the private sector to the state. The eurozone suffered the most serious crisis in its 12-year history. Debt-laden Greece, followed by Ireland with its insolvent banking system, were forced to apply for rescue aid that together approached €200bn.
The German public was outraged. Angela Merkel, chancellor, insisted on new rules to deal with fiscal profligacy and future bail-outs. Spain and Portugal wobbled as markets took fright about peripheral economies. By year's end, the European Central Bank was obliged to delay phasing out its emergency provision of liquidity to stricken banks, and to buy government bonds (though not in sufficient quantity to upset the Germans or to convince the markets that this really was "shock and awe", with more to come).
The original rules for governing the eurozone proved to be either inadequate or unenforceable. The Maastricht treaty made no provision for bailing out a sovereign member but, in the heat of the crisis, Greece and Ireland had to be saved. Maastricht mandated curbing budget deficits to 3 per cent of gross domestic product, but the rules had earlier been ignored by France and Germany. These same rules failed to address what had become the problem at the heart of the eurozone's troubles: the huge current account deficits run up by the likes of Greece, Spain, Portugal and Ireland at the height of the boom.
In 2010, Germany, supported gingerly by France, started to rewrite the rules. Many concluded that if the eurozone was to survive it would be on German terms, including the appointment next year of a German (Axel Weber?) to succeed Jean-Claude Trichet as ECB president.
2 American power weakens as China rises
In 2010, China overtook Japan as the second-largest economy in the world and will soon be the world's largest manufacturer. China also became more assertive, much to the discomfort of its neighbours. Japan was forced into a humiliating climbdown after it arrested a Chinese trawlerman accused of trespassing in its waters. US pleas to Beijing to adjust the value of the renminbi were largely ignored, while at the Group of 20 summit in Seoul, US-led efforts to address global imbalances ran into a wall of Chinese-organised opposition.
Behind the new-found swagger, not all went according to plan in China. A wave of labour unrest swept through factories midyear, though foreign-owned businesses were most affected. Food prices rose, a reminder of how a burst of inflation preceded the street protests around Tiananmen Square in 1989. The authorities clamped down further on the internet, helping to drive Google offshore. The furious official reaction to the award of the Nobel Peace Prize to Liu Xiabao, a long-time human rights activist, underlined the regime's insecurity.
In the US, the recovery faltered, forcing the Federal Reserve to order a fresh round of quantitative easing, dubbed QE2. Mr Obama's popularity fell and the Democrats suffered a "shellacking" in the midterm elections. The populist Tea Party gained congressional seats and Sarah Palin's popularity rose. So did the stock of Glenn Beck, a rabble-rousing Fox News television host who regularly accused the president of being "unAmerican". Yet Mr Obama still has no credible challenger in the Democratic or Republican party.
Abroad, the US military campaign in Afghanistan picked up pace but corruption and weak civil institutions undercut the strategy. Mr Obama blinked first in the stand-off with Israel over settlements in the West Bank. More significant in the long term was Hillary Clinton's statement that the US had vital interests in the Pacific, a belated recognition of China's growing power in the region.
3 Nick and Dave double-act defies the doom-mongers
Before the UK general election in May, it was received wisdom that a "hung parliament" (whereby no individual party gained a parliamentary majority) would be disastrous. Financial markets would react badly and the British people would be denied "the firm smack of government". Yet David Cameron, the Conservative leader who fought a timid campaign, and Nick Clegg, the feisty head of the Lib Dems, seized the moment and forged a coalition, leaving Gordon Brown and the Labour party on the sidelines after 13 years in power.
Mr Cameron and Mr Clegg opted for a comprehensive deal that included electoral reform, a share-out of cabinet seats and an ambitious programme of spending cuts to shrink the deficit. The markets were impressed. So was Mervyn King, governor of the Bank of England. Mr King had urged tough action ahead of the election, lest Britain suffered a slump in confidence like countries caught in the sovereign debt crisis. Some colleagues on the Bank's independent Monetary Policy Committee thought the governor should keep his nose out of fiscal policy. With hindsight his warnings about the need to reassure the bond markets appeared pertinent.
What surprised many commentators – and many Whitehall civil servants – was the shoot-first, ask-questions-later tendency within the coalition. The National Health Service, welfare and student fees were all targeted for reform, though there were signs of second thoughts about the NHS. The spending review was brutal in numerical and rhetorical terms, especially in respect of defence where Britain is only just hanging on as a serious military power. Violent student protests against tuition fee rises foreshadowed trouble ahead. The true test of the coalition's durability will be in 2011.
4 The reassessment of risk
Successive earthquakes in Chile and Haiti reminded us of the misery inflicted by natural disasters, but it was a man-made calamity that dominated the news. BP's oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico cost the company billions of dollars and forced the resignation of Tony Hayward, the cherubic chief executive who became a hate figure for environmentalists and politicians. BP was sneeringly called by its old name of British Petroleum, which may explain why the board chose an American – Bob Dudley – as Mr Hayward's successor.
The Macondo well explosion illustrated the risks of operating on the frontiers of technology, several miles underground, in search of oil. Although the risks of an accident were judged to be infinitesimal, the actual disaster proved disproportionately damaging – a little like the global banking crisis. A similar story unfolded in the Chilean mining accident, though the company – San Esteban Primera – escaped the same degree of attention as BP.
At year's end, Rolls-Royce, another top British company and world-class aero-engine maker, struggled to deal with the fallout from a far less serious accident: the failure of one of its Trent 900 engines on a Qantas Airbus 380. In spite of its excellent safety record and proven technology, the company was put on the back foot, partly because of the new superjumbo's iconic status.
5 Bankers still don't 'get it'
The passage of the Dodd-Frank measures marked the most far-reaching reform of the US financial services industry since the 1930s Glass-Steagall Act that separated commercial and investment banking. Wall Street lobbied ferociously to prevent a return to Glass-Steagall but accepted some curbs on the ability of banks to trade on their own book. The future business model of big investment banks such as Goldman Sachs remains open in a world of lower leverage and correspondingly lower returns.
Bonuses remained a source of controversy. Bank bosses complained about a one-off tax in Britain and muttered about leaving the City of London. John Varley, the outgoing chief executive of Barclays, quietly tried to rally fellow bankers around "Project Merlin", an effort to cap bonuses, settle tax issues and promote a better image for the industry. But it proved impossible to organise agreement, not least because banking is a worldwide business and the Wall Street players had no intention of joining a "little England" effort.
Stories of excess continued to emerge, especially in Ireland where the banks' irresponsible lending on real estate was laid bare. There was anger when the Financial Services Authority, the UK's financial watchdog, exonerated Sir Fred Goodwin and the board of Royal Bank of Scotland of mismanagement – a decision made worse by the FSA's initial refusal to publish its own report.
6 WikiLeaks and the world of open source(s)
A previously obscure computer geek-turned-gadfly called Julian Assange turned the worlds of diplomacy and journalism upside down. Mr Assange and his internet site WikiLeaks engineered two industrial-scale dumps of confidential US government data. The first involved dispatches from the front lines in Iraq and Afghanistan, and offered vivid – if partial – snapshots of modern war. The second featured 250,000 classified diplomatic cables featuring tittle-tattle about leaders such as Nicolas Sarkozy, Vladimir Putin and Silvio Berlusconi. But there were far juicier extracts offering insights into US involvement in Yemen, as well as concerns in Saudi Arabia and Gulf emirates about Iran's nuclear programme and their apparent willingness to support US military action against Tehran.
As the leaks turned into a cascade, Mr Assange was arrested in London, though later released on bail. He faces deportation either to Sweden to face rape allegations or extradition to the US where prosecutors are scrambling to prepare charges, possibly under the 1919 Espionage Act.
7 The death of newspapers has been much exaggerated
Technology continued to recast the media industry. The explosive growth of Facebook and Twitter as social networks contributed to further decline in newspaper circulation in many markets. But it was not all gloom. The ex-KGB officer Alexander Lebedev added to his stable of British print publications with the purchase of The Independent for £1. His Evening Standard went free and took on a new lease of life. And, most important, the iPad arrived. Steve Jobs' latest product is a game-changer because it and other "tablet" devices such as Samsung's Galaxy combine interactive applications with the newspaper reading experience. Hold the front page!
没有评论:
发表评论