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ご無沙汰しております。
ブランク1年を取り戻す為に、タイムアタックします。
具体的には下記の社説（2010/12/04付THE TIMES/LEADING ARTICLE）をタイムアタック＆暗記。
経過を一月三日に動画でアップします。
語句や構文の解説は随時追記予定。
■Twilight of Liberalism?
The assertiveness of autocratic states is a challenge to the West. But isolation and abasement are not ways to respond
After the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe, Francis Fukuyama, the American political thinker, wrote a celebrated essay proclaiming the end of history. The failure of Marxism marked “the end point of mankind’s ideological evolution”, in which the spread of Western liberal democracy became the final form of government.
The triumphalist notion of the inevitability of democracy, or even just of the rule of law, has long since been superseded. The great geopolitical fact of the early 21st century is the rise of nations that do not embrace liberty. But that trend is not historically determined either. Western liberal societies may merely hasten the shrinking of democracy if they lose confidence in the justification and the resilience of their principles.
The shift in global authority was exemplified this week in ostensibly non-governmental fields. Fifa awarded the siting of the World Cup in 2018 and 2022 to Russia and Qatar. Meanwhile, the Government of China announced a boycott of the ceremony in Oslo next week in which Liu Xiaobo, the jailed dissident, will be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. These are illiberal states. They are powerful because they have money.
China’s wealth illustrates how the fault line in global politics has shifted in a generation. It is no longer a separation between communism and the open society. For China has become the world’s second-largest economy through adopting liberalising policies. But the liberalism that it has adopted is in economics: the use of the price mechanism and markets to allocate scarce resources. Politically, China remains autocratic. As Mr Liu’s outrageous treatment demonstrates, the Chinese Government remains determined to crack down ruthlessly on political dissent.
China is moreover only the most dramatic aspect of the rising influence of the emerging economies. These economies typically used to seek capital from abroad because their profitable investment opportunities exceeded their domestic savings. That position has now reversed. Emerging economies, and China most of all, now run persistent current account surpluses. The standard of living of American consumers depends on attracting funds from China and oil-producing nations. The wealth of these nations, invested in special vehicles called sovereign wealth funds, puts immense economic influence at the disposal of mainly non-democratic governments.
There are two peculiarly bad responses that Western democracies might adopt in response to these new facts of the international. One is economic nationalism and protectionism, to try to insulate themselves from the power of the emerging autocracies. While China’s rise demonstrates that economic liberalism does not necessarily produce political liberty, this would still be a hugely self-defeating course. The gains from open trade and investment are measured in enhanced productivity and higher living standards. And because markets are decentralised forms of decision making, they also hold out the hope, though not the certainty, that they will carry with them the logic of decentralising political power as well.
The second is for the Western democracies to abase themselves in the hope of securing commercial advantage. After Fifa’s perverse decision, some embittered commentators in the UK blamed not those who took the decision but The Sunday Times and the BBC for exposing the cynical manoeuvres that lay behind it. The ability of an independent press to investigate malfeasance in high places is an integral part of a free society. The singular merit of democracies is not that they are guaranteed power and prosperity, but that they embody criticism. They thus have a greater capacity than autocracies to discard mistaken ideas quickly. That is a source of strength and resilience. It must never be compromised.
ブランク1年を取り戻す為に、タイムアタックします。
具体的には下記の社説（2010/12/04付THE TIMES/LEADING ARTICLE）をタイムアタック＆暗記。
経過を一月三日に動画でアップします。
語句や構文の解説は随時追記予定。
■Twilight of Liberalism?
The assertiveness of autocratic states is a challenge to the West. But isolation and abasement are not ways to respond
After the collapse of communism in Eastern Europe, Francis Fukuyama, the American political thinker, wrote a celebrated essay proclaiming the end of history. The failure of Marxism marked “the end point of mankind’s ideological evolution”, in which the spread of Western liberal democracy became the final form of government.
The triumphalist notion of the inevitability of democracy, or even just of the rule of law, has long since been superseded. The great geopolitical fact of the early 21st century is the rise of nations that do not embrace liberty. But that trend is not historically determined either. Western liberal societies may merely hasten the shrinking of democracy if they lose confidence in the justification and the resilience of their principles.
The shift in global authority was exemplified this week in ostensibly non-governmental fields. Fifa awarded the siting of the World Cup in 2018 and 2022 to Russia and Qatar. Meanwhile, the Government of China announced a boycott of the ceremony in Oslo next week in which Liu Xiaobo, the jailed dissident, will be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. These are illiberal states. They are powerful because they have money.
China’s wealth illustrates how the fault line in global politics has shifted in a generation. It is no longer a separation between communism and the open society. For China has become the world’s second-largest economy through adopting liberalising policies. But the liberalism that it has adopted is in economics: the use of the price mechanism and markets to allocate scarce resources. Politically, China remains autocratic. As Mr Liu’s outrageous treatment demonstrates, the Chinese Government remains determined to crack down ruthlessly on political dissent.
China is moreover only the most dramatic aspect of the rising influence of the emerging economies. These economies typically used to seek capital from abroad because their profitable investment opportunities exceeded their domestic savings. That position has now reversed. Emerging economies, and China most of all, now run persistent current account surpluses. The standard of living of American consumers depends on attracting funds from China and oil-producing nations. The wealth of these nations, invested in special vehicles called sovereign wealth funds, puts immense economic influence at the disposal of mainly non-democratic governments.
There are two peculiarly bad responses that Western democracies might adopt in response to these new facts of the international. One is economic nationalism and protectionism, to try to insulate themselves from the power of the emerging autocracies. While China’s rise demonstrates that economic liberalism does not necessarily produce political liberty, this would still be a hugely self-defeating course. The gains from open trade and investment are measured in enhanced productivity and higher living standards. And because markets are decentralised forms of decision making, they also hold out the hope, though not the certainty, that they will carry with them the logic of decentralising political power as well.
The second is for the Western democracies to abase themselves in the hope of securing commercial advantage. After Fifa’s perverse decision, some embittered commentators in the UK blamed not those who took the decision but The Sunday Times and the BBC for exposing the cynical manoeuvres that lay behind it. The ability of an independent press to investigate malfeasance in high places is an integral part of a free society. The singular merit of democracies is not that they are guaranteed power and prosperity, but that they embody criticism. They thus have a greater capacity than autocracies to discard mistaken ideas quickly. That is a source of strength and resilience. It must never be compromised.
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