默克尔的社会实验 Merkel's success hangs on a social experiment

On September 4, Angela Merkel transformed herself into a kind of German Rosie the Riveter. Deploying the slogan used in a US wartime advert featuring a woman in a headscarf and overalls, the chancellor said: “We can do it” — and opened the borders of Germany (and Europe) to refugees. The nation has whiplashed between elation and panic ever since.

9月4日，安格拉默克尔(Angela Merkel)把自己变成了德国版的铆工露斯（Rosie the Riveter，第二次世界大战时美国女工的统称——译者注）。这位德国总理借用扎头巾、穿工作服的女性形象的美国战时宣传画中使用的口号说：“我们能办到”——然后向难民们放开了德国（和欧洲）的边界。自那以来，德国人就开始在兴高采烈和惊慌失措之间摇摆不定。

Berlin says 800,000 will seek asylum in Germany this year alone. Informal estimates put the number at 1.5m. This influx of traumatised human beings was not caused by Ms Merkel. But opening the doors was a daring political and social experiment, the most consequential act of her 10 years as chancellor.

柏林方面表示，今年到德国寻求避难的人将达到80万。非正式估算显示，这个数字将是150万。受到创伤的人群大量流入，并不是由默克尔引起的。但打开大门是一个大胆的政治与社会实验，是她担任总理10年中所采取的意义最重大的行动。

Success and total failure are both within reach. Either way, the result will be an utterly changed Germany and Europe.

成功和完全失败都是可能的。不管是哪种结局，德国和欧洲都将发生翻天覆地的变化。

There is no denying the past few weeks have brought out Germany’s ugly side. The number of recorded attacks against refugees has reached the hundreds. Rightwing populist movements such as Pegida are spewing bile on social media and on the streets.

不可否认，德国丑陋的一面在过去几周里暴露出来。记录在案的攻击难民案件达到了数百起。右翼民粹运动，比如“爱国欧洲人反对西方伊斯兰化”(Pegida)，在社交媒体和街头发泄愤怒情绪。

Tension is rife in Ms Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union party, too. Horst Seehofer, head of her Bavarian sister party, is leading the revolt; his poll numbers have risen as hers have fallen. In opinion polls, the rightwing Alternative für Deutschland party is registering more than the 5 per cent needed to enter the national parliament. Even a cabinet member has pandered to rising anxiety.

在默克尔的基督教民主联盟（Christian Democratic Union，简称基民盟）内部，关系也非常紧张。基民盟的姊妹政党巴伐利亚基督教社会联盟（Bavarian CSU，简称基社盟）党魁霍斯特泽霍费尔(Horst Seehofer)领导了这场抵制运动；默克尔的支持率在下降，他的支持率却在上升。在民意调查中，右翼的德国新选项党(Alternative für Deutschland)支持率超过了5%这一进入全国议会的门槛。就连一名内阁成员也对不断升温的焦虑表示了迎合。

At the same time, tens of thousands of Germans are taking a stand against hate crimes and speech, or the indecisiveness of overwhelmed authorities. Students work in soup kitchens, pensioners teach languages and skills. A friend who works long hours in a government job is volunteering in a refugee home. Another says his synagogue in Berlin is participating in an aid programme at a Catholic hospital. Pragmatism, they say, is the order of the day: if the rules do not solve problems, so much for the rules.

另一方面，数万德国人开始反对仇恨犯罪与言论，也反对不知所措的当局的优柔寡断。学生们到施粥所工作，退休人员讲授语言和技能。有一位每日工作时间很长的公职人员，自愿到一处难民之家提供服务。另一位朋友说，他在柏林的教堂到一所天主教医院参加了一项救助计划。他们说，务实态度是眼下最重要的：如果规则不解决问题，那就别管规矩了。

So society is changing before our eyes — but the truth is that it had already changed. Two decades ago, an interior minister vowed that the country (then mostly white and Christian) would never be a destination for immigrants. It is only a few years since Ms Merkel declared Germany had failed to integrate its migrants. By then it had taken in millions of “guest workers” and war refugees. About 10m became citizens. Today, more than 20 per cent of the population are migrants or migrants’ children. Germany is a multicultural, multireligious and multicoloured country.

所以，社会正在我们眼前改变——但真相是，社会已经发生了改变。20年前，一名内政部长发誓称，德国（当时国民中多数是信仰基督教的白人）永远不会成为移民的目的地。就在几年前，默克尔宣告德国未能成功让移民融入主流社会。当时，德国已然接收了数百万名“客籍工人”和战争难民。大约1000万人变成了德国公民。如今，逾20%的德国人口是移民或移民的后代。德国是一个多文化、多宗教和多肤色的国家。

The nation needs large-scale immigration to help secure its welfare state and its economy. But many German families remember having been refugees themselves. After 1945, 13m deportees from east Europe resettled in West Germany; 3m came from the Soviet Union in the 1990s. On October 3 1990, 16m East Germans woke up in a new country. These were big challenges. If there is one lesson from all these experiences, it is that history is not destiny, and identity is a matter of choice. In the refugees who choose Europe, and Germany, Germans recognise themselves.

德国需要大规模的移民，以帮助维持福利国家和经济发展。但是，许多德国家庭记得，他们自己也当过难民。1945年后，1300万来自东欧的被驱逐者在西德安家；1990年代，有300万人从苏联来到德国。1990年10月3日，1600万东德人一觉醒来，发现已身处一个新国家里。这些曾是重大挑战。如果说可以从这些历史中得出一条经验的话，那就是，历史并非定数，而身份认同是一个选择问题。在那些选择欧洲和德国的难民身上，德国人看到了自己。

Yet the German example also shows that social change needs time, money and wise policies. It took 50 years to acknowledge the full horrors of the second world war. Reunification cost an estimated ㈠琀渀. Decades of indifference created Turkish ghettos — until Berlin made it easier for migrants to become citizens. Fresh polls show a majority of Germans now fear the nation might not be able to absorb all the latest refugees.

不过，德国的例子也表明，社会改变需要时间、金钱和明智的政策。德国承认第二次世界大战的全部恐怖花了50年时间。统一付出了大约2万亿欧元的代价。几十年的漠不关心造就了土耳其人聚居区，直到德国政府放宽了移民转为公民的条件。最新民调显示，如今大多数德国人害怕，他们的国家或许没有能力吸收所有最近到来的难民。

Ms Merkel seems determined to stand her ground. To make her experiment work, she will have to make difficult compromises. Building walls on the border is not an option, but there will be holding areas and repatriation for migrants from countries held to be safe.

默克尔看来决心坚守自己的立场。若要这场实验成功，她将不得不做出一些艰难的妥协。在边境建起高墙不是选择，但德国将设立收容区，并遣返来自被视为安全国家的移民。

Turkey is securing privileged access to the EU for cracking down on traffickers. Germany also needs a foreign policy that addresses root causes of conflict in the Middle East, and supports vulnerable host countries such as Lebanon. Above all, it must adapt its humanitarian unilateralism to legitimate needs of more vulnerable member states.

土耳其由于打击人口贩运而争取到了优先进入欧盟的权利。德国的外交政策也需要针对中东冲突的根源，并向黎巴嫩等脆弱的难民接纳国家提供支持。最重要的是，德国必须调整其在人道主义问题上的单边做法，照顾到比较脆弱的欧盟成员国的正当需求。

Failure could mean that Ms Merkel finds she has presided over the destruction of the European project. But if she succeeds, she might yet become a candidate for the Nobel Peace prize that rightly eluded her this year.

实验失败可能意味着，默克尔发现自己成了欧洲一体化破产的主要推手。但如果实验成功了，她或许还能成为诺贝尔和平奖的候选人。今年的诺贝尔和平奖合情合理地没有颁给默克尔。