The Thing That Determines a Country’s Resistance to the Coronavirus
決定一個國家對冠狀病毒的抵抗力的因素
原文：The Atlantic https://tinyurl.com/ruqx524
譯文：法意讀書
刊登： https://www.guancha.cn/FuLangXiSi-FuShan/2020_04_03_545248_s.shtml
作者：Francis Fukuyama
譯者：朵悅
[導讀] 新冠病毒肆虐全球，圍繞各國不同的疫情治理現狀，弗朗西斯‧福山（Francis
Fukuyama）明確拒絕了以體制論高低的簡單二分法，並延續他自己的思想脈絡，回到了“
國家能力”的議題上。福山認為，在疫情治理的行動中，評價政府績效的關鍵不是政體的
類型，而是國家的能力，尤其是對政府的信任。對美國而言，緊急狀態下行政權的擴張是
從美國建國以來持續推進的政治實踐，但川普政府持續一貫的草率行動可能會讓這種有序
的傳統面臨嚴重的信任危機。本文於2020年3月30日發表於“大西洋月刊”（the
Atlantic）官方網站。
When the coronavirus pandemic now sweeping the world was localized in China
in January, many people argued that China’s authoritarian system was
blocking the flow of information about the seriousness of the situation. The
case of Li Wenliang, a physician who was punished for blowing the whistle
early on and who subsequently died from the disease, was seen as emblematic
of authoritarian dysfunction.
今年1月，當席捲全球的新型冠狀病毒流感在中國爆發時，許多人認為中國的體制阻礙了
關於疫情嚴重性的信息傳播。但現在的情況對民主政府來說不那麼樂觀了。歐洲現在面臨
著比中國更大的疾病負擔，僅意大利一國的死亡人數就超過了中國官方報告的死亡人數，
然而意大利人口只有中國的二十分之一。
The situation now looks less rosy for democratic government. Europe faces a
larger disease burden than China, with Italy alone exceeding the number of
deaths officially reported in China, despite having one-twentieth the
population. It turns out that the leaders of many democracies felt similar
pressures to downplay the dangers of the epidemic, whether to avoid injuring
the economy or to protect their personal interests. This was true not just of
Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro or Mexico’s Lopez Obrador, but also of President
Donald Trump, who until mid-March kept insisting that the U.S. had the
disease under control and that the epidemic would disappear shortly. This
explains why the U.S. lost two months in preparing for the onslaught,
creating persistent shortages of testing kits and medical supplies. China,
meanwhile, is reporting a leveling-off of new cases. Chinese students in
Britain have reportedly been astonished at the lax approach taken by Boris
Johnson’s government.
事實證明，許多民主國家的領導人也感受到類似的壓力，他們想要淡化疫情的危險，無論
是為了避免損害經濟，還是為了保護自己的個人利益。巴西總統博爾索納羅和墨西哥總統
洛佩斯‧奧夫拉多爾是這樣，美國總統唐納德‧川普也是如此。這就解釋了為什麼美國在
準備應對疫情衝擊的過程中損失了兩個月的時間，造成了測試設備和醫療用品的持續短缺
。與此同時，中國官方報告的新病例數量正在趨於平穩。據報導，在英國的中國學生對鮑
裡斯‧約翰遜政府採取的寬鬆政策感到震驚。
When the pandemic subsides, I suspect that we will have to discard simple
dichotomies. The major dividing line in effective crisis response will not
place autocracies on one side and democracies on the other. Rather, there
will be some high-performing autocracies, and some with disastrous outcomes.
There will be a similar, though likely smaller, variance in outcomes among
democracies. The crucial determinant in performance will not be the type of
regime, but the state’s capacity and, above all, trust in government.
大流行消退後，也許我們將不得不放棄簡單的二分法。判斷國家是否有效應對危機的分割
線，不應簡單地將集權政體置於一邊，而將民主政體置於另一邊。相反，將會出現一些高
效的集權政體，與另外一些帶來災難性後果的集權政體。民主國家之間也會面臨類似的差
異（儘管可能較小）。政府績效的關鍵決定因素將不是政體的類型，而是國家的能力，尤
其是對政府的信任。
All political systems need to delegate discretionary authority to executive
branches, especially during times of crisis. No set of preexisting laws or
rules can ever anticipate all of the novel and rapidly changing situations
that countries will face. The capacity of people at the top, and their
judgment, determine whether outcomes are good or bad.
所有的政治制度都需要將自由裁量權下放給行政部門，尤其是在危機時期。任何一套現有
的法律或規則都不可能預見到各國將面臨的一切快速變化的新情況。在這樣的情況下，上
層人士的能力和他們的判斷，將決定最終的結果。
And in making that delegation of authority to the executive, trust is the
single most important commodity that will determine the fate of a society. In
a democracy no less than in a dictatorship, citizens have to believe that the
executive knows what it is doing. And trust, unfortunately, is exactly what
is missing in America today.
在將權力下放給行政部門的過程中，信任是決定一個社會命運的最重要的因素。在民主體
制下，公民必須相信行政部門知道自己在做什麼。但不幸的是，這種信任正是美國今天所
缺少的。
It is a popular misconception that liberal democracies necessarily have weak
governments because they have to respect popular choice and legal procedure.
All modern governments have developed a powerful executive branch, because no
society can survive without one. They need a strong, effective, modern state
that can concentrate and deploy power when necessary to protect the
community, keep public order, and provide essential public services.
存在一種普遍的誤解，認為自由民主國家必然有弱勢的政府，因為它們必須尊重民眾的選
擇和法律程序。但是，所有現代政府都有一個強大的行政部門，因為它們需要一個強大、
有效的現代化國家，在必要時能夠集中部署權力，以保護社區、維持公共秩序和提供必要
的公共服務。
What distinguishes a liberal democracy from an authoritarian regime is that
it balances state power with institutions of constraint—that is, the rule of
law, and democratic accountability. The exact point of balance between the
principal institution of power, the executive branch, and the primary
constraining institutions (the courts and legislature) differs from one
democracy to another, and also differs over time.
自由民主與專制政體的區別在於，它平衡了國家權力與約束機制（即法治和民主問責制）
之間的關係。但主要權力機構（行政部門）和主要約束機構（法院和立法機關）之間的平
衡點在不同的民主國家之間、在不同的時間節點上都是不同的。這一點對美國與對其他任
何自由民主國家而言都一樣，儘管美國的政治文化對集中的國家權力、被神聖化的法律和
民主都抱有強烈的不信任。
This is no less true of the United States than of any other liberal
democracy, despite its having a political culture that breeds intense
distrust of concentrated state power and sacralized law and democracy. The
U.S. Constitution was written against the backdrop of the weakness of the
Articles of Confederation. Alexander Hamilton, an ardent advocate of what, in
“Federalist No. 70,” he called “energy in the executive,” understood
perfectly well the need for strong legal and democratic constraints on
executive power. But Hamilton also argued that neither the Court nor Congress
would be able to act decisively in times of national danger. These dangers
would arise in times of war or domestic insurrection, but they could also
arise from novel causes, such as the global pandemic that we are facing now.
The kinds of authority granted to the executive would differ depending on
circumstances; what was appropriate during peacetime was not necessarily what
would prevail in times of war or crisis.
美國憲法是在《美國邦聯條例》式微的背景下制定的。亞歷山大‧漢密爾頓在《聯邦黨人
文集》第70篇極力支持“行政權的活力”。他完全理解對行政權進行強有力的法律和民主
約束的必要性。但漢密爾頓也認為，在國家面臨危險的時候，法院和國會都不可能採取果
斷的行動。國家的危險會在戰爭或國內叛亂時期出現，也可能產生於不可預料的新情況，
例如我們現在面臨的全球流行病。授予行政機關的權力種類應視情況而定，在和平時期看
起來適當的做法，未必能在戰爭或危機時期適用。
And so the Constitution established, in Article II, an executive branch that
has grown in power and authority in the centuries since the Founding. This
growth has been propelled by emergencies that required strong executive
action, such as the Civil War, the two World Wars, and the financial crises
that took place in 1908, 1929, and 2008. During the Civil War, Abraham
Lincoln mobilized an army of a million men, although the Union contained
fewer than 20 million people. When the American railroads required to supply
the war effort in Europe became hopelessly snarled, Woodrow Wilson
nationalized them, turning them into state-owned enterprises. Franklin D.
Roosevelt marshaled an even larger war effort during the Second World War,
and bypassed Congress in negotiating Lend-Lease. During the 2008 financial
crisis, the Federal Reserve was delegated unprecedented powers, funneling
hundreds of billions of dollars to prop up systemically important financial
institutions (including several foreign ones) with little congressional
oversight.
因此，憲法第二條確立了行政部門的地位，它的權力和權威在建國後的幾個世紀裡不斷增
長。這種增長是由緊急狀態下對強有力的行政的需要推動的，例如美國內戰、兩次世界大
戰，以及1908年、1929年和2008年發生的金融危機。內戰期間，亞伯拉罕‧林肯動員了
100萬人的軍隊，儘管聯邦的人口不足2000萬；當為歐洲戰爭提供物資的美國鐵路陷入絕
望的混亂時，伍德羅‧威爾遜把它們收歸國有，讓鐵路變成了國有企業；富蘭克林‧d‧
羅斯福在第二次世界大戰期間繞過國會實行了租借政策；2008年金融危機期間，美聯儲被
授予了前所未有的權力，動用數千億美元支持具有系統性關鍵作用的金融機構（包括幾家
外國機構），而國會幾乎沒有監督這一行動。
The U.S. has thus been able to generate huge amounts of state power when
necessary. In Latin America, legislatures have frequently bestowed emergency
powers on presidents who then kept them and became dictators. We see similar
power grabs taking place in Hungary and the Philippines today. By contrast,
the U.S. has tended to return power to society once the emergency has passed.
Armies were rapidly demobilized in 1865, 1918, and 1945; Wilson returned the
railroads to private ownership after a couple of years. The powers granted to
the executive branch under the Patriot Act after 9/11 have been gradually
clawed back.
可以看出，在必要時，美國往往能夠產生巨量的國家權力。在拉丁美洲，立法機關經常授
予總統緊急權力，但這些總統在緊急狀態結束後，會繼續保留這些權力並成為獨裁者。我
們今天在匈牙利和菲律賓看到了類似的權力爭奪。相比之下，一旦危機過去，美國往往會
將權力交還給社會。軍隊在1865年、1918年和1945年迅速復員；威爾遜在危機過去幾年後
將鐵路交還給私人所有；9‧11之後，根據《愛國者法案》授予行政部門的權力已逐漸收
回。
So while America may be slow to act at first, once it is up to speed, it can
probably match the capabilities of most authoritarian governments, including
China’s. Indeed, one can argue that because power in the U.S. is
democratically legitimated, it is more durable in the long run than the
authority of a dictatorship. In addition, the government can draw on ideas
and information from citizens and civil society in a way that China cannot.
And for all that U.S. federalism fractures authority, it also creates a
50-state laboratory for new ideas. The governors of New York and California
have been willing to move much faster and more decisively in the pandemic
than the bogged-down federal government.
因此，儘管美國一開始可能行動遲緩，但一旦加快速度，它可能就能趕上包括中國在內的
大多數政府的能力。由於美國的國家權力是以民主程序合法獲得的，因此從長遠來看，它
比其他政權更持久；另一方面，美國政府可以以中國無法做到的方式，汲取和採用來自公
民社會的思想和信息。此外，儘管聯邦制瓦解了權威，但它也為新想法的誕生提供了由50
個州組成的實驗室。在本次疫情中，與陷入困境的聯邦政府相比，紐約州和加利福尼亞州
的州長們一直願意更快、更果斷地應對疫情。
A democracy delegates emergency powers to its executive to deal with
fast-moving threats. But willingness to delegate power and its effective use
depend on one thing above all, which is trust that the executive will use
those powers wisely and effectively. And this is where the U.S. has a big
problem right now.
民主國家將緊急權力下放給行政部門，以應對快速變化的威脅。但是，放權的意願和權力
的有效使用取決於一個前提：信任行政人員將明智和有效地使用這些權力。這才是美國現
在面臨的一個大問題。
Trust is built on two foundations. First, citizens must believe that their
government has the expertise, technical knowledge, capacity, and impartiality
to make the best available judgments. Capacity simply has to do with the
government having an adequate number of people with the right training and
skills to carry out the tasks they are assigned, from local firemen,
policemen, and health workers to the government executives making
higher-level decisions about issues such as quarantines and bailouts. Trust
is something the U.S. Federal Reserve had in spades in 2008: Its chairman,
Ben Bernanke, was a former academic who had studied the Great Depression in
depth; the Fed is staffed with professional economists rather than political
appointees likely to favor friends and cronies.
這一信任建立在兩個基礎上。首先，公民必須相信他們的政府具有專業知識、技術和能力
，能夠秉公做出最好的判斷。能力僅僅與政府是否擁有足夠數量的受過適當培訓和技能的
人來執行各自的任務有關，即從當地的消防員、警察和衛生工作者到政府的執行人員，能
否在諸如隔離和救助等專業問題上做出更高級別的決策。2008年，美聯儲絕對擁有信任：
其主席本‧伯南克曾是一位深入研究大蕭條的學者。美聯儲由專業經濟學家組成，而不是
由任人唯親的政治家組成。
The second foundation is trust in the top end of the hierarchy, which means,
in the U.S. system, the president. Lincoln, Wilson, and Roosevelt enjoyed
high levels of trust during their respective crises. As wartime presidents,
this trio succeeded in symbolizing, in their own persons, the national
struggle. George W. Bush did initially after September 11, but as his
invasion of Iraq soured, citizens began questioning the delegations of
authority they had made to him via legislation like the Patriot Act.
第二個基礎是對高層的信任，在美國的體系中，也就是對總統的信任。林肯、威爾遜和羅
斯福在各自的危機中都享有高度的信任。作為戰時總統，這三位成功以他們自己的身份象
徵了國家的鬥爭。喬治‧w‧布希在9‧11之後的最初一段時間也享有這種信任，但隨著他
對伊拉克的入侵，民眾開始質疑他們通過《愛國者法案》授予他的權力。
The United States today faces a crisis of political trust. Trump’s base—the
35–40 percent of the population that will support him no matter what—has
been fed a diet of conspiracy stories for the past four years concerning the
“deep state,” and taught to distrust expertise that does not actively
support the president.
而今天的美國則面臨著一場政治信任危機。川普當選的基礎是無論如何都會支持他的35
- 40%的人口，他們在過去的四年裡被灌輸了關於“深度國家”的陰謀故事，並被教導不
去信任那些不積極支持總統的專家。
President Trump continues to denigrate and undermine agencies he feels are
hostile: the intelligence community, the Justice Department, the State
Department, the National Security Council, even the National Oceanographic
and Atmospheric Administration. Many administrative agencies have seen a
steady depletion of career civil servants in recent years, with positions of
high responsibility going either to acting agency and bureau heads, or else
to political friends of the president such as Acting Director of National
Intelligence Richard Grenell. With a 29-year-old partisan conducting a purge
of federal agencies, the administration has placed personal loyalty far above
competence. Trump appears to be well on his way to sidelining the highly
trusted Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and
Infectious Diseases, for disagreeing with him publicly.
川普總統還持續詆毀和破壞他認為敵對的機構：情報界、司法部、國務院、國家安全委員
會，甚至國家海洋和大氣管理局。近年來，許多行政機構的職業公務員不斷減少，一些責
任重大的職位要麼落到代理領導手中，要麼落到總統的政治盟友手中，比如國家情報局代
理局長理查德‧格倫內爾。黨派人士正在對聯邦機構進行清洗，將個人忠誠置於能力之上
。川普似乎很有可能將備受信任的美國國家過敏和傳染病研究所所長安東尼‧福奇排擠出
局，原因是福奇公開反對川普。
All of which highlights the extent of the challenge to the second foundation:
trust in the president and his immediate circle. Donald Trump has never,
during his three and a half years as president, sought to reach out to the
more than half of the country that didn’t vote for him. He has not taken any
of the simple steps he could have to build trust. When recently asked by a
journalist what he would say to fearful Americans—a softball question any
other leader would have hit out of the park—he instead went on a tirade
against the question and the journalist.
以上情況都凸顯了對第二種信任——總統及其政府班子的信任的挑戰。唐納德‧川普在擔
任總統的三年半時間裡，對一半以上沒有投票給他的人，他從未採取任何措施來建立信任
。最近，一位記者問他會對膽怯的美國人說些什麼，這是一個任何領導人都能輕易回答的
簡單問題，但川普卻對這個問題和發問的記者進行了激烈的抨擊。
Because of Trump’s hesitancy to take the COVID-19 pandemic seriously, many
conservatives have come to deny that we are in a crisis at all, and insist
that the panic surrounding the virus is the result of a Democratic plot to
take down the Trump presidency. Trump himself, after briefly pivoting to
portray himself as a “wartime” president, declared that he wanted to reopen
the country by Easter. He has admitted that this date was chosen not on any
epidemiological grounds, but because it would be a “beautiful” date for
churches to be full. Perhaps he is thinking of the national spectacle of
thanksgiving he could stage around his reopened rallies, and how that would
affect his reelection chances.
由於川普不願認真對待新型冠狀病毒，許多保守派人士開始否認我們正處於危機之中，並
堅稱，圍繞該病毒的恐慌是民主黨推翻川普總統任期的陰謀。川普本人在短暫地把自己描
繪成一個“戰時”總統後，宣佈他希望在復活節前重新開放這個國家。他承認，選擇這一
天不是因為流行病學的原因，而是因為這將是一個“美麗”的日子，在這一天教堂將十分
熱鬧。他可能還在盤算在重新開放的那天上演一場全國性的感恩節慶典，在他的計畫裡，
這種慶典可能會對他的連任機會產生影響。
The intense distrust that Trump and his administration have aroused, and the
distrust of government that they have instilled in their supporters, will
have terrible consequences for policy. The Democrats were insistent on
including transparency requirements for use of the corporate-bailout fund
included in the $2 trillion relief bill passed on Friday. The Trump
administration, in signing it, asserted that it will not be bound by this
provision, just as it refused congressional oversight during the impeachment
proceedings. This guarantees that any future exercise of emergency powers to
help distressed businesses or hard-hit regions will be second-guessed, and
subject to accusations of cronyism on the part of an administration that up
to now has been quite happy to reward cronies.
川普和他的政府引發的強烈的不信任，以及他們向支持者灌輸的對政府的不信任，將產生
可怕的後果。民主黨堅持要求在週五通過的2萬億美元救助法案中納入使用公司救助基金
的透明度要求。但川普政府在簽署該法案時堅稱，它不會受到這一條款的約束，就像它在
彈劾程序期間拒絕接受國會的監督一樣。這將使得任何為了幫助受困企業或地區而動用的
緊急權力，都將受到事後的質疑，並受到任人唯親的指責。因為到目前為止，川普政府一
直樂於獎勵裙帶關係。
In the end, I don’t believe that we will be able to reach broad conclusions
about whether dictatorships or democracies are better able to survive a
pandemic. Democracies such as South Korea and Germany have been relatively
successful so far in dealing with the crisis, even if the U.S. is doing less
well. What matters in the end is not regime type, but whether citizens trust
their leaders, and whether those leaders preside over a competent and
effective state. And on this score, America’s deepening tribalism leaves few
reasons for optimism.
最後，我不相信我們能夠就哪種政體更有能力在大流行中生存下來得出普遍性結論。到目
前為止，儘管美國的表現沒那麼好，但韓國和德國等民主國家在應對危機方面取得了相當
的成功。歸根結底，重要的不是政體類型，而是公民是否信任他們的領導人，以及這些領
導人是否領導著一個稱職而有效的國家。在這一點上，美國不斷加深的部落主義讓我們沒
有理由感到樂觀。
//
心得：
1. 「和體制無關，是領導人有問題」的結論非常脆弱，它完全回避了該體制如何走到今
天這種局面 (權力收放問題)，產生出這種領導人 (信任問題)，而這才是應該討論的重
點。
2. 文中既然已經認為應用高效和低效在劃分政體，就不該再糾結於民主、專制這種無意
義的稱呼。