[经济学人] Chaguan: China’s one-way globalisation

Posted on October 16, 2018 本文总阅读量次

字数统计: 2,922字 | 阅读时长: 13分

Chaguan
茶馆

China’s one-way globalisation
中国的单向全球化
An African enclave in Guangzhou reveals limits to Chinese openness
广州的“小非洲”暴露出中国开放的局限

RICHARD GATHIGI, a Kenyan entrepreneur, has lived in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou since 2015, oiling the wheels and gears of the low end of globalisation with doses of human trust and acuity. When an African friend had a small but urgent order—450 safety vests bearing the logo of the UN mission to Somalia—Mr Gathigi knew a factory that could help, though he wishes he had asked a higher price. “The UN has a lot of money,” he explains cheerfully, stabbing at a late-night plate of fish and rice in the Xiaobei district of Guangzhou, a hub for African traders. In a world without contracts, confidence is his currency. Near-strangers in Africa trust him to inspect goods ordered online from China. He is an old-timer in Guangzhou’s cramped, fluorescent-lit trading malls. Chinese bosses are cautious about tricking him.

理查德•加西吉（Richard Gathigi）是一位来自肯尼亚的生意人，自2015年以来一直在广州生活，用信用和商业嗅觉为全球化的低端链条添加润滑油。有一次，一位非洲朋友要下一笔不大却比较紧急的订单——450件带有联合国索马里援助团标志的安全背心。加西吉知道有一家工厂可以供货，不过他没有要很高的价钱，现在想来有点后悔。“联合国可是很有钱的。”他一边吃着一盘鱼肉配饭的夜宵一边乐呵呵地说。他所在的小北路一带是非洲商人在广州的聚集地。在没有合同的世界里，信任就是他的货币。远在非洲、几乎素未谋面的客户信任加西吉，让他检查从中国在线订购的商品。在广州那些灯火通明的拥挤的贸易商场里，加西吉已摸爬滚打多年。中国老板轻易不敢蒙骗他。

Still, Mr Gathigi is no pioneer of multiculturalism, China-style. He is one of thousands of Africans who work in the city, though their numbers have shrunk since 2014 when officials said 16,000 Africans were living in Guangzhou. He respects his host country. Now 44, he wants his teenage children to study at Chinese universities, after being brought up in Kenya. But in three years he has not learned Chinese, visited the Great Wall or eaten at a local’s home. He first saw China in middle-age, he notes. “Most of my values were formed. Apart from business, I don’t have much interest.”

不过，加西吉并不是什么“中国式多元文化”的先驱。他只是在广州工作的成千上万非洲人之一。 2014年官方公布非洲在穗人口为1.6万人，现在已有所下降。加西吉尊重东道国。44岁的他希望自己十来岁的孩子们在肯尼亚长大后能到中国来读大学。但是，来中国13年了，他还没学会中文，没登过长城，也没在当地人家里吃过饭。他说，第一次到中国时自己已经30多了。“我的价值观大体上都定型了。除了做生意，别的都不怎么感兴趣。”

Listening to Mr Gathigi, he could be an 18th-century “supercargo” or trade agent, sweltering on the riverfront to which Westerners were confined, back when the city was known as Canton. Non-Chinese then were forbidden even to learn the language. Mr Gathigi thinks that China still prefers foreigners to visit, trade with locals, then leave. America and Europe make it difficult for Africans to obtain visas, he observes, but once in the rich world migrants can easily overstay and live in the shadows, doing work that Westerners shun. “With the Chinese it’s the opposite,” he adds. “They make it easy to enter but very difficult to stay.” After all these years, he lives on a business visitor’s visa that must be reset with a run to Hong Kong or Macau every 30 days.

加西吉说话的口气就好像18世纪的西方“商船大班”或贸易代理商，那时他们被限制在珠江口岸附近汗流浃背地工作。当时的广州被称为Canton，外国人甚至还被禁止学习汉语。加西吉认为，中国现在依旧希望外国人前来和本地人做生意，结束后就离开。他指出，非洲人很难获得去美国和欧洲的签证，但一旦获得签证进入这些富裕国家，就不难逾期逗留，生活在暗处，做西方人厌弃的工作。“中国正好反，”他补充道，“入境容易，但要留下来很难。”这么多年来，他拿的一直是商务签证，每30天就要到香港或澳门重签一次。

Many countries are questioning the benefits of globalisation. The nastiest rows occur when immigration enters the equation. Citizens chafe against the free movement of goods and capital, but most of all people. China’s leaders speak as globalisation’s champions. President Xi Jinping declared to African leaders in Beijing this month that “with open arms, we welcome African countries aboard the express train of China’s development.”

许多国家都在质疑全球化的好处。当考虑到移民因素时，争议最是激烈。本国公民对货物和资本的自由流动感到厌烦不安，但最让他们恼火的还是人的自由迁移。中国领导人的公开立场是支持全球化的。习近平上月在北京向非洲领导人表示，中国“张开怀抱欢迎非洲搭乘中国发展的快车”。

Yet if Chinese leaders like the idea of goods and capital rushing at express-train speed (ideally with Chinese drivers at the controls), they have never embraced the idea that people should move freely, let alone dream of acquiring hybrid, part-Chinese identities. Even marriage to a Chinese national brings no special residency rights. A decade ago Guangzhou’s diversity prompted articles and books by Westerners pondering whether this was multiculturalism. After watching African men marrying Chinese women, Gordon Mathews of the Chinese University of Hong Kong wondered whether the world might see a “Chinese Barack Obama” (not soon, he concluded). More recently journalists and scholars have debated whether China is displaying racism with campaigns to build a “clean, safe and orderly” Guangzhou, during which street traders have been swept away, restaurants catering to foreigners ordered to close by 10pm and districts like Xiaobei flooded with police checking passports.

然而，中国领导人虽然喜欢货物和资本以特快列车的速度（最好由中国司机操控）流动，但却从未接受“人应该自由迁移”这个理念，更别提支持获得包含中国国籍的多重国籍的梦想了。即使与中国公民结婚也不能获得特别居留权。十年前，广州的人口多元化激发不少西方人撰文著书，思考这是否是多元文化的体现。目睹不少非洲男性与中国女性结婚后，香港中文大学的戈登・马修斯（Gordon Mathews）琢磨，中国会不会出现像奥巴马那样的混血领导人（他的结论是短期内不会）。而近些年，广州大力打造“干净整洁、平安有序”的城市环境，清理街头商贩，做外国人生意的餐馆被勒令在晚上10点前关门，小北街头涌现大批警察检查护照。记者和学者们争论这些行动是否显示出中国具有种族主义倾向。

Obtuse or callous views of ethnicity are dismayingly common in China. Racial assumptions run like an electric current through some official vows to clean up Guangzhou. But many Africans take a fatalistic view. Emmanuel Ojukwu, a prominent Nigerian trader, has no issue with the twitchy police. “Some people were taking the opportunity to conduct bad business, trading drugs and other criminality,” he says. Kiema Moussa, from Burkina Faso, describes strict visa rules as a business cost. Muslims attract no special scrutiny, he says, chewing on a street-stall kebab after Friday prayers at Guangzhou’s ancient Huaisheng mosque. Chinese officials know “straight away” if a country suffers terror attacks or an outbreak of disease and may refuse visas as a result. “It’s still worth coming,” he shrugs.

在中国，人们对种族的看法往往迟钝含混或冷漠无情，令人沮丧。在一些整顿广州的官方口号中，对种族的主观臆想如电流般传递。但许多非洲人对此持“认命”的态度。知名的尼日利亚贸易商埃马纽埃尔・奥尤库（Emmanuel Ojukwu）对警方神经质式的行动没有异议。“有些人会趁机干坏事，买卖毒品和干其他犯罪的勾当。”他说。来自布基纳法索的基亚玛・穆萨（Kiema Moussa）把严格的签证规定看作一项商业成本。在广州古老的清真寺怀圣寺做完周五礼拜后，他在路边摊上嚼着羊肉串说，在这里，穆斯林不会受到特别的审查。如果某个国家遭受恐怖袭击或爆发疫情，中国官员会“立刻”知悉，并可能因此拒发签证。“但来还是值得来的。’他耸耸肩说。

Building world cities, not melting-pots
建设世界大都会，但不是大熔炉

Ali Mohamed, a Somali freight forwarder, is a rare African with a Chinese passport, having spent long enough in Hong Kong to earn citizenship. Jaws drop when he joins the domestic immigration line at Chinese airports. He has seen many Africans leave. Officials want a “modern” Guangzhou focused on global finance and commerce, he says. But he insists they are “not targeting Africans”. Mr Mohamed, who is 50, has moved around Asia all his life. Although proud of his new passport, he is keeping an eye on Chinese factories opening in Africa and on businesses moving to Vietnam. “We are Somali nomads. Where it rains, we go.”

索马里货运代理人阿里・穆罕默德（Ali Mohamed）是少有的持中国护照的非洲人，之前他在香港生活了很长一段时间，才最终获得了中国公民身份。他在中国机场走中国公民通道时，常常引得旁人大吃一惊。他目睹许多非洲人离开。他说，中国官员希望打造一个专注全球金融和商业的“现代”广州。但他坚持认为官员们“没有针对非洲人”。今年50岁的穆罕默德一生都在亚洲各地生活。他为自己的新护照自豪，但也一直关注着中国企业到非洲设厂以及企业逐步迁往越南的趋势。“我们是索马里游牧民族。哪里下雨，我们就往哪里去。”

Western politicians and CEOs often brag about their countries’ or companies’ long relationships with China, fondly imagining that Communist leaders have a sentimental side. Chinese officials promote schemes offering permanent residence to a few, exceptionally qualified foreigners. But at the ground level of globalisation, the Africans know that outsiders stay on sufferance.

西方的政客和CEO们经常吹嘘其国家或公司与中国的长久关系，天真地想象共产党领导人有感性的一面。中国官员推出的中国永久居留权计划面向的只是极少数优秀外国人才。而处于全球化底层的非洲人深知，外来户都只是勉强获准留在这里。

Your columnist watched a packed evangelical Christian prayer service at a dowdy central business hotel, tolerated because only holders of foreign passports may attend. One worshipper, Velile Sibiya, a medical student from South Africa, thinks Chinese leaders have done “magically well” by persuading so many citizens to work hard, think alike and inhabit a “little cocoon of peace”. She is unsurprised that people are not encouraged to become Chinese by naturalisation. “Citizenship gives you rights, it gives you a voice. I think they are protecting this world that they have created.” Though grateful for her training in China, she is not planning to stay. Good guests know when to leave.

笔者在市中心一家寒酸的商务酒店观看过一场人气爆满的福音派基督徒祷告仪式。这场活动只有持外国护照的人可以参加，因而获官方准允。祷告的人群中有来自南非的医科生费里莉・西比亚（Velile Sibiya）。她认为，中国领导人能说服这么多国民努力工作，思想一致，安居在“和平的小茧”中，已是“出奇地成功”。对于中国不鼓励外国人入籍成为中国公民，她并不感到惊讶。“公民身份给你权利，给你发言权。我觉得他们在保护自己创造的这个世界。”虽然感恩自己在中国所受的专业培训，但她并不打算留下来。好的客人懂得何时该离开。

原文链接

博客今后如果无法访问，请自行挂代理。

下方可以留言评论，欢迎交流！