China takes a gamble in scapegoating the west
责怪“西方敌对势力”的危险游戏
广州视频翻译公司：中国官方最近推出一批视频，把国内种种弊病归咎于“西方敌对势力”。这种逻辑不通的宣传很有效，但也很危险。
Across much of the world, fear-mongering and xenophobia are creeping into public and political discourse.
在当今世界的很多地区，制造恐慌以及仇外情绪正在蔓延到公共和政治话语中。广州视频翻译公司。
In liberal democracies with traditions of free speech, vociferous denunciations of these attitudes can act as a counterweight. But in authoritarian countries where alternative narratives are forbidden, official attempts to demonise foreigners and “others” can be especially dangerous. In the past week, the Chinese government has launched several viral online videos that blame “western hostile forces” for a host of ills and supposed conspiracies within China.
在有言论自由传统的自由民主国家，对这些态度的强烈谴责可以起到制衡作用。但在不允许有“杂音”的威权国家，官方丑化外国人及“其他势力”的企图可能尤为危险。过去一周，中国政府推出了几个热播在线视频，把国内众多弊病和所谓阴谋归咎于“西方敌对势力”。
The videos are crude but exceptionally powerful in their simplicity and emotional appeal. One video promoted by the Supreme People’s Procuratorate and Communist Youth League, two of the most powerful state bodies, begins with heartbreaking scenes of orphans and victims of the wars in Iraq and Syria, and then jumps to an assertion that the west, led by the US, is trying to subject China to the same fate.
这些视频制作粗糙，但简单明了，煽动情绪，因而具有极大震撼效果。在最高人民检察院和共青团——实权最大的两个国家机构——发布的一个视频，开头是伊拉克和叙利亚战争造成的孤儿和受害者的令人心碎的场景，然后跳跃到一个断言：在美国的领导下，西方势力正企图让中国遭受同样命运。广州视频翻译公司。
“Under the banner of ‘democracy, freedom and rule of law’ western forces are constantly trying to create societal contradictions in order to overthrow the [Chinese] government,” the subtitles read over pictures of democracy protesters in Hong Kong and President Barack Obama meeting the Dalai Lama.
“西方势力常年打着‘民主、自由、法治’的旗号，在目标国制造社会矛盾，意图颠覆政权”，配合这些字幕，视频中出现了香港民主抗议者，以及美国总统巴拉克•奥巴马(Barack Obama)会晤达赖喇嘛(Dalai Lama)的画面。
According to the video, western plots and the “dark shadow of the Stars and Stripes” are also to blame for everything from attacks on Chinese peacekeepers in Africa, to farmers’ riots in China’s hinterland, to the Tibetan independence movement. The effect is heightened by ominous music and juxtaposition of chaos elsewhere with heroic images of Chinese soldiers and weaponry.
按照这段视频的说法，从中国驻非洲维和部队遇袭，到中国内陆的农民骚乱，以及西藏独立运动，这一切都应该被归咎于西方阴谋和“星条旗幽深的影子”。沉重的背景音乐，加上世界各地的动荡景象与中国军人和武器装备的英雄形象之间的对比，令效果加倍显著。广州视频翻译公司。
In some ways this is a mirror of the populist, jingoistic tilts happening elsewhere in the world. While not a direct reaction to the assertive Trumpism emanating from the US or the rise of rightwing nationalism in Europe, some of the same collective animus is taking hold in China, partly at the instigation of the ruling Communist party.
在某些方面，这反映出了当今世界普遍出现的民粹主义、狭隘爱国主义倾向。虽然并不是对美国出现的强悍“特朗普主义”或欧洲兴起的右翼民族主义的直接反应，但某种相同的集体敌意正在中国生根，这在一定程度上受到执政的中国共产党的煽动。
Many of those propagating this message are the shallowest of nationalists — the kind of party apparatchiks who are diversifying their (often ill-gotten) assets abroad as fast as they can and sending their children to study in Australia, the US, Canada or the UK.
在传播这类消息的人中，有很多是最流于形式的民族主义者——这些党政官员以最快速度将资产（往往为非法所得）转移到海外，还将子女送往澳大利亚、美国、加拿大或英国去留学。
Indeed, one of the main producers of the video on western plots is a 29-year-old PhD student from China now living in Canberra, Australia. Meanwhile, the party has called for the rejection of western values and concepts in favour of Marxism — an ideology named after a German living in London and refracted into China via Moscow.
的确，这波谴责西方反华势力视频的主要制作者之一，就是一位现居澳大利亚首都堪培拉的29岁中国博士生。此外，中共还呼吁抵制西方价值观和理念，拥护马克思主义——这一意识形态得名于一位当年生活在伦敦的德国人，经莫斯科传到中国。广州视频翻译公司。
Regardless of the hypocrisy and contradictions, this kind of propaganda is highly effective and gives licence to ordinary people to indulge their most primitive prejudices.
姑且不论其虚伪性与矛盾性，这种宣传非常有效，而且让普通人可以放任自己最原始的偏见。
Since President Xi Jinping took power in late 2012, there has been a noticeable negative shift in Chinese attitudes towards foreigners living in the country.
自习近平2012年底上台以来，中国人对在华外国人的态度有了明显的负面变化。
In the past, most foreigners in China enjoyed a certain level of unstated protection and privilege. In business and in everyday life “foreign friends” were welcomed and often treated with kid gloves by the authorities. Some of them undoubtedly took advantage of this to flout the rules or behave badly without fear of retribution.
在过去，在华外国人大多享受着一定程度不言而明的保护和特权。在商务活动和日常生活中，“外国友人”受到欢迎，而且往往受到政府部门的善待。其中一些人无疑利用了这一点，或藐视规则，或肆无忌惮地举止不端。广州视频翻译公司。
Today, that informal immunity seems to have vanished. In its place are hints of a backlash that many long-term foreign residents will tell you can be very ugly, ranging from casual discrimination and racial slurs, to physical altercations that take on a racist dimension.
现在，这种非正式的豁免权似乎已经消失了，取而代之以暗中抵制。许多长期生活在中国的外国人会告诉你，这些抵制可以非常恶劣，从日常歧视和种族歧视，到具有种族主义色彩的肢体冲突。
This extends from individuals to the treatment of multinationals companies that increasingly complain about the absence of a level playing field in China.
而这种抵制已从个人感受扩大到跨国公司的遭遇，越来越多的跨国企业抱怨中国缺乏公平竞争环境。
The privileges Chinese officials and many ordinary citizens used to extend to foreigners should never have existed. But the calculated and repetitive demonising of “western hostile forces” risks whipping up the kind of xenophobia that will limit the government’s own room for manoeuvre in the future.
中国官员和许多普通公民过去给与外国人的特权本就不该存在。但这种有意且不断丑化“西方敌对势力”的行为，很可能会煽动起排外情绪，在未来将限制政府的回旋余地。广州视频翻译公司。
By convincing its people that many of China’s ills are the work of foreign spies and conspiracies, Beijing could eventually be forced to hit back against such perceived enemies in order to placate popular outrage. The less welcoming environment is also to blame for recent slipping foreign direct investment and an exodus of international talent.
通过让人民相信国内许多问题都是外国间谍和西方势力所为，中国政府可能最终被迫对这类假想敌予以回击，以安抚民众的愤怒。而大环境友好度下降，对近期外国直接投资下滑，以及国际人才流失也负有一定责任。
China’s impressive economic rise began nearly four decades ago with a policy known as “reform and opening” and since then the country has been more open to the outside world than at almost any time in its very long history.
近四十年前，在一项名为“改革开放”的政策下，中国开始了惊人的经济崛起。自此以后，中国对外部世界的开放程度，几乎胜过其悠久历史上的任何时候。
An end to that openness would be terrible for China and the world.
而结束这种开放，不管是对中国还是全世界来说，都将是可怕的。
