推荐序二应对帝国衰退之道

国际劳工研究与信息组织资深研究员肖恩?哈丁

我同意作者有关美国实力在衰退的说法。实际上，大概从20世纪60年代起，美国的全球经济主导地位就开始动摇。美国应对这种变化的方式，是公然的单边军事主义与多边主义的混合体。比如，在20世纪70年代，欧洲国家，比如德国和法国，以及亚洲的日本，国家实力开始增长，在全球经济中的某些方面与美国竞争。美国的应对之策是创立G7/G8，把这些国家拽入一个由美国领导的联盟。

在美国的领导之下，G7开始在推动全球新自由主义方面扮演中心角色。当然，这并没有阻止美国经济实力的下滑，但是，它确实在某种程度上有效，其他G7/G8国家接受了美国在政治和军事领域的主导。

不过，到了20世纪90年代，新的地区大国也开始崛起，比如巴西、中国、印度，以及在某种程度上的南非。这就进一步侵蚀了美国的经济实力。

在某些时候，美国也通过多边方式——在20世纪90年代创立G20——应对这些国家，比如巴西和南非等。这也是为了将这些地区大国纳入某种程度上的松散的联盟。这对跨国公司非常有利，因为加入G20的国家，比如巴西和南非，成为新自由主义的重要的地区推手。

虽然如此，但美国还使用公然的单边主义和军事主义方式，警告可能的全球竞争者，比如中国和俄罗斯。这两个国家不像巴西和南非那样，愿意继续接受美国的主导。美国对伊拉克和阿富汗的入侵，其目的是控制石油和天然气的供应，并将俄罗斯和中国关在中东之外。美国与朝鲜的政治对质，也可以被理解为对中国的警告。

实际上，美国一直在应对其实力的衰退，并维持在某种形式上的主导地位。它采取的一种方式是，多边的政治机制以及富有侵略性的军国主义的混合体。美国对伊拉克、阿富汗以及朝鲜的战略，其实主要是针对像中国这样的国家。当然，在如何应对其实力衰退方面，美国精英中也存在不确定性和分歧。

美国实力的衰退确实创造了南方国家与美利坚帝国决裂的可能性。委内瑞拉就是一个好例子。

英文原文：

英文原文：

I agree that US power is in decline. In fact, it has been in decline since about the 1960s as,since then,its global economic dominance has been shrinking.The way the US has dealt with this has involved a combination of multilateralism mixed with overt unilateral militarism.For example,by the 1970s,European countries like Germany and France,along with Japan,started growing and in some ways competing with the US in the global economy.The US’s response to this was to create the G7/G8.The idea was to draw these powers into an alliance,headed up by the US itself. Under the leadership of the US,the G7 has played a central role in promoting neoliberalism globally.Of course this has not stopped the decline of the US ’s economic power,but it did work in a sense that it got many of these other G7/G8 powers to accept the dominance of the US in political and militarily terms.

By the 1990s,however,new regional powers had also arisen, such as Brazil,China,India and to a lesser extent South Africa.This has created a further erosion of the US’s economic power.In some ways the US has also used a multilateral approach to deal with some of these countries,like Brazil and South Africa,by creating the G20 in the late 1990s.Again it was trying to draw in these regional powers into some kind of lose alliance.This has been very effective for multinational corporations,as countries involved in the G20 like Brazil and South Africa have been strong regional promoters of neoliberalism.Nonetheless,the US has also used overt unilateralism and militarism as a warning to possible global competitors like China and Russia,who have proven less amicable than Brazil and South Africa in accepting the continued dominance of the US.Hence the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan,which were aimed at securing oil supplies and shutting out Russia and China from the Middle East.The US’s political confrontation with North Korea could also be read as a symbolic warning to China.

So essentially,the US has been trying to deal with its decline－and maintain some form of dominance－through a mixture of multilateral political maneuvers and at times aggressive militarism,which has been symbolically aimed at countries like China through surrogate actions in Iraq,Afghanistan and to a lesser extent North Korea.This perhaps also reflects the uncertainty and divisions amongst the US elite on how to deal with their declining power.Of course, the decline of the US does create possibilities for countries in the South to begin to break free from US imperialism. A good example of this is Venezuela.（Shawn Hattingh，International Labour Research and Information Group)