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美国需要调整对华政策
作者：美国耶鲁大学教授 杰弗里•加滕 为英国《金融时报》撰稿 2010-02-11
华盛顿向台湾出售武器，已致使北京方面威胁将予以报复，但中美关系曾经受住了更严峻冲突的考验。美国对华经济政策制造的问题要远大于此。目前美国的做法是，在双边会谈上拍着胸脯做出种种保证——类似于早些时候比尔•克林顿(Bill Clinton)和小布什(George W. Bush)任内的战略。鉴于当今世界已经改天换地，这种战略已经落伍，也没有成效。
在克林顿任内，美国军事实力处于鼎盛时期，而且正在经历有史以来最强劲的商业扩张。当时美国的信息技术正改变着世界，美国企业的首席执行官们被奉为全球领袖。而另一方面，中国刚刚从落后中崛起。因此，美国对华政策具有浓重的双边色彩是符合逻辑的。美国有迫使中国开放市场、放松银行监管的资本。中美商贸联合委员会(Joint Committee on Commerce and Trade)以及一个类似金融事务论坛的创立，占据了中美关系舞台的中心。
作为小布什政府的对华政策沙皇，财政部长汉克•保尔森(Hank Paulson)于2006年建立了中美战略经济对话机制(Strategic Economic Dialogue)。这一论坛兼顾贸易与金融事务，而且较之其所取代的前两个论坛，涵盖的话题范围更广，涉及的部长级官员也更多，不过仍然是一种完全双边的机制，所依赖的前提假设是山姆大叔依然有能力强迫中国调整政策。
奥巴马(Obama)最主要的创新之处，就是给这个核心论坛重新命名，称之为战略与经济对话(Strategic and Economic Dialogue)。目前由美国财长和国务卿与中国同级别官员共同主持相关会议。不过美国依旧以为，自己有能力劝说中国改变政策。
继续以惯常的力度推行这种双边主义的问题在于，与十年前相比，美国如今已式微力衰：财政状况失控、银行体系失信、军队则因两场旷日持久的战争而筋疲力竭。无论过去二十年美国占据了怎样的道德高地，如今都已失不复得。与此同时，中国的崛起令人震惊：国内生产总值迅速增长，数亿民众摆脱贫困，在国际贸易中扮演的角色日益重要，不仅与亚洲国家加强外交来往，与拉美和非洲国家同样如此。但或许最重要的一点是：中国已累积了2.4万亿美元的外汇储备，成为对美国至关重要的债权国。
双边关系与行动非常重要，例如奥巴马政府建立起的能源合作。但美国过分倚重于这种机制，已经开始有些弄巧成拙。美国的筹码不断贬值，而中国对此心知肚明。单靠华盛顿来敦促北京对人民币重新估值、或是签署气候变化条约、或是接受网络自由，效果甚微。要撼动中国根深蒂固的立场，唯一可能有效的政策就是编织一张多边协议的大网，既符合中国的利益，又能够约束中国。当然，在这些协议的制定方面，中国也必须拥有很大的发言权。
现有的最佳范例就是世界贸易组织(WTO)。在这个组织中，中国必须遵循众多主要国家都赞同的行为准则。该组织还拥有一个有序的裁定程序。尽管美国依然拥有领导力，但应该将努力重心放在为其它类似的协议谋取多边支持上面。美国应竭力推动一个以多元货币为基础、更为强大的新全球货币体系的创设，为货币管理制定中美两国都认可的强制性规则。华盛顿应加倍努力，与一系列国家共同起草一个可执行的气候变化条约。还应该就互联网管理的全球安排谋求其它国家的支持。
美国不能独自制定协议条款，但通过运用灵活的外交手段鼓励欧洲、日本以及特定的新兴国家接受具有法律约束力的多边规则，它就更有希望说服中国也加入其中。这需要美国换一种思维来看待中国，所需要的时限也不是以年、而是以十年为单位来计算。但尝试一下不会有什么损失。
本文作者是美国耶鲁大学管理学院(Yale School of Management)胡安•特里普(Juan Trippe)国际贸易和金融学教授，曾在克林顿任内担任商务部主管国际贸易事务的副部长。
译者/管婧
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Washington's sale of arms to Taiwan has produced threats of retaliation from Beijing, but US-China ties have survived worse disputes. America's economic policy towards China poses a far bigger problem. The present US approach is to pound its chest in bilateral meetings – similar to earlier strategies under presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush. This is anachronistic, given how different the world looks today, and it is not working.
During the Clinton years, US military power was at its height and the country was experiencing its strongest ever business expansion. America's information technology was changing the world and its chief executives were regarded as global leaders. China, on the other hand, was just emerging from backwardness. It was logical for America's China policy to be heavily bilateral. The US had the leverage to press China to open markets and deregulate banks. Centre stage was the creation of a Joint Committee on Commerce and Trade and a similar forum for financial matters.
As tsar of China policy in the Bush administration, Hank Paulson, Treasury secretary, established in 2006 the Strategic Economic Dialogue between the two countries. This forum consolidated trade and finance and included a broader array of topics and ministers than the two it replaced, but remained strictly bilateral, based on a premise that Uncle Sam could still compel China to modify its policies.
Mr Obama's chief innovation seems to have been to rename the central forum, calling it the Strategic and Economic Dialogue. Now both the Treasury secretary and the secretary of state chair the meetings, with their Chinese counterparts. Yet America still assumes it has the clout to persuade China to change its policies. The problem with continuing this bilateralism at its habitual intensity is that the US is a pale shadow of what it was a decade ago: its fiscal situation is out of control, its banking system discredited, its military stretched by two protracted wars. Whatever philosophical high ground it has had over the last two decades has been lost. At the same time, China's ascent has been mind-boggling: its growth in gross domestic product, its lifting of hundreds of millions out of poverty, its expanding role in global trade, its growing diplomatic ties not just in Asia but in Latin America and Africa. Most important, perhaps, China has amassed $2,400bn (€1,750bn, £1,530bn) in reserves and become the critical creditor to the US.Bilateral ties and initiatives – such as co-operation on energy, which the Obama administration instituted – are essential. But it has become self-defeating for the US to place so much weight on them. America has decreasing leverage, and China knows it. There is little use in Washington alone exhorting Beijing to revalue the renminbi or sign a climate change treaty or embrace internet freedom. The only policy that could move China from its deeply entrenched positions would be to weave a web of multilateral arrangements into which China could fit, and by which China would be bound. China would, of course, need to have a substantial say in the shape of such arrangements.
The best existing example is the World Trade Organisation, where China is obliged to play by the rules that a number of leading countries have subscribed to, and which has an orderly process of adjudication. While it still has leadership clout, the centrepiece of US efforts ought to be marshalling multilateral support for other such arrangements. It should press for a new, strengthened global monetary system based on multiple currencies, with enforceable rules for currency management to which both it and China would subscribe. Washington should redouble efforts to work with a number of countries on an enforceable climate change treaty. It should garner other nations' support for global arrangements regarding the operation of the internet.
The US cannot alone dictate the terms, but with skilful diplomacy that encourages Europe, Japan and selected big emerging markets to buy into legally binding multilateral rules, it has a better chance of getting China to sign up, too. This would require a new way of thinking about China and a time horizon measured not in years but decades. There is little to lose by trying.
The writer is the Juan Trippe professor of international trade and finance at the Yale School of Management and former undersecretary of commerce for international trade in the Clinton administration
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