新聞來源：民報
許銘洲/編譯 2016-07-09 13:30
《富比士》（Forbes）雜誌，7 月 6 日一篇由亞太版編輯提姆．弗格森（Tim Ferguson），撰寫的簡短專文，內容評論，蔡英文當選台灣總統，是亞洲國家一件暴動起義（uprising，另一件為，今年 5 月間當選菲律賓總統的杜特迪 Rodrigo Duterte。）任職於中部大學的外籍英語教師麥克爾．特登（Michael Turton）在其部落格撰文指出，弗格森「天龍國」言論，係因不屑台灣民主進程，並說作者的觀點是大便言論。特登還說，《富比士》先前就有一些偏頗傾向，例如該雜誌亞洲版，上海分社的社長范魯賢（Russell Flannery），就曾對台灣某位失敗者（魯蛇）領導人馬英九，多次給予激賞評價（其呵護程度，或許還不到「人間極品」地步）。
對於《富比士》的奇特異論，英國諾丁罕大學中國政策研究所非住民研究員寇謐將（ J. Michael Cole），7 月 7 日在《關鍵評論網國際版》（The News Lens International），發表一篇評論，名為「富比士對台灣無比費解的蔑視」（Forbes’ Inexplicable Contempt for Taiwan），內容指出，《富比士》總是對台灣這個島嶼國家的民主成就，表達「鮮明嫌惡感」；而且一次又一次，發布危言聳聽的專欄文章；並透過其「肆無忌憚」言論，企圖證明台灣是台海之間和平、經濟繁榮的麻煩製造者（或阻礙者）。
這次《富比士》又重施故技，由弗格森（Tim Ferguson）發表專文，表達其厭惡褊狹歐洲民族主義者的立場，也批評一些川普者流的政治人物，並將其競選美國總統行徑，視為「荒誕」（grotesque）；另一方面，這篇《富比士》文章，對於英國「脫歐」的民主公投，則將之與「政治時尚」（political craze－－ 本部落格註：應翻譯為「政治狂熱」）劃上等號。
弗格森的專文指出，目前多數亞洲國家，皆已掙脫「保護主義」潮流；不過，仍有
2 個國家還在負隅頑抗，其一是，剛就職菲律賓總統的羅德里戈·杜特迪（Rodrigo Duterte），另一個遭點名的亞洲國家，就是台灣。台灣的成就，對許多人而言，是亞洲民主轉型成功的「亮點」；從弗格森觀點看來，台灣只得到「膚淺表面」成就，實質上跟「荒誕激情」的英國脫歐公投，歐洲封閉式民族主義，以及川普現象，根本是「半斤八兩」。
弗格森的專文，用極其不公失真的詞彙「起義暴動」（uprising），來形容小英當選台灣總統；該字詞暗示其勝選，並非（或很少）透過自由、公平，以及和平等理性手段（或公眾期待）的權力轉移。弗格森的敘述，還提到其它負面詞語，如「荒誕」（grotesque）、「政治時尚」（political craze －－ 本部落格註：應翻譯為「政治狂熱」）；他還更進一步說，當作者
6 月抵達台灣期間之際，嗅出民進黨一股「衝動魯莽的本性」（impetuous bent），該黨在台灣史上第一次取得國會多數黨控制權（弗格森並沒說明，哪些事件，讓他有這番觀感）。作者也提到，對於北京咄咄逼人的敵意，台灣採取較為小心的「民主抵禦」立場，是可以被理解的（譯註：此一描述是文中唯一的客觀見解。）
很難想像，關於 2016 年 1 月 16 日台灣總統大選，作者會用「揭竿而起」（uprising）一詞，加以形容；難道透過魔法影像，作者看到了暴力、不受節制激情，以及民粹主義嗎？難道作者不曉得，台灣陳水扁
2000-2008 年就擔任台灣總統；以及
2014 年
11 月間的縣市長選舉，民進黨也獲得壓倒性勝利。寇謐將專文，設想指出，《富比士》作者可能推斷，國民黨
KMT 選戰慘敗，可能因其政黨內部的「中國因子」使然；實際上（正如其它國家的多數例證顯示），「內政治理」不力，才是
K 黨敗北主因；導致其 8 年來乏善可陳的施政，遭民意「嚴懲」；另一方面，K 黨一直承諾要重振台灣經濟，結果卻看不到起色。其三、K 黨執政 8 年來，民主發展處境艱難，民意監督機制失靈；而且政府做錯事未受究責，民怨日深。
寇謐將專文的尾聲指出，北京對台灣咄咄逼人敵意，當然是大選期間的「影響因素」之一；然而《富比士》作者卻拒絕詳細察看其背後意涵，即中國蠻橫，威脅到台灣自由民主的生活方式；正如香港經驗所呈現的諸多警示，北京的高壓統治，以及併吞主義政權野心，這才是挑激港人想要「揭竿而起」，推翻暴政的原動力。民進黨的勝選，係因
K 黨喪失民意支持，以及 K 黨的統一願景未獲青睞（主張中台終極統一者，民意支持度不到
10%），這才是 K 黨失利關鍵，而非民進黨暴動起義（uprising）。
悲哀的是，《富比士》作者不但對台灣民意潮流無知；對於北京強力暴力鎮壓中國民間社會，管制媒體，逮捕律師，以及嚴打少數民族等作為，這些才是真正的「荒謬醜陋」（grotesque,）；作者弗格森，卻對於這類北京政權醜陋面，沉默不語（譯註：這豈非《富比士》作為媒體公器的另一層醜陋面貌？）
Why you need to know：
By putting it in the same category as Donald Trump, European nationalists
and Rodrigo Duterte, Tim Ferguson provides an image of Taiwan’s democracy that
is unfair in the extreme.
新聞來源：The News Lens 2016/07/07, Politics
作者：J. Michael Cole
There is something about Forbes magazine
and Taiwan that I’ve always struggled to explain, and that’s the publication’s apparent dislike for the
island nation’s democratic achievements. Time and again, Forbes has
published articles, many of them alarmist, that unashamedly present the
democratic choices that the Taiwanese make as an impediment to peace and
stability in the Taiwan Strait, or to its economic prosperity.
Forbes renewed its assault in its
current issue with an op-ed by Tim Ferguson titled “Asia Can
Avoid Unprofitable Passions Of Nationalism.” In his piece, the author makes it
very clear that he dislikes European nationalists and politicians like Donald
Trump, whose candidacy he describes as “grotesque,” as well as the democratic
decision surrounding Brexit, which he likens to a “political craze.”
But “thankfully,” he writes, Asia “has been
spared most of the protectionist wave that’s come ashore elsewhere.” If I read
him correctly, Ferguson seems to argue that Asians are somehow more “rational”
and “in the main are still hopeful of rising through that mid-rung status and
on to even more prosperous days.”
However, two countries seem to have failed to
meet Mr. Ferguson’s standards, “spot expressions of frustration and doubt, and
surprises,” he writes. One is the Philippines, where the controversial Rodrigo
Duterte was recently elected. And the other is Taiwan, to many people a glowing
example of successful democratic transition in Asia, but to Ferguson ostensibly
on par with the “grotesque” passions of Brexit, European nationalism, and the
Trump phenomenon.
Ferguson uses a very loaded term to describe
the election of Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) in January: “uprising,” which suggests that her victory was
something other, and certainly much less “rational,” than what it was: a free,
fair, peaceful transition of power based on public expectations. One can almost
hear him refer to it as “grotesque” and “a political craze.” What’s worse,
during his visit to Taiwan last month, Ferguson says he sensed an “impetuous
bent by her party,” the Democratic Progressive Party, which in the same
elections gained control of parliament for the first time in the nation’s
history. What that impetuousness is he doesn’t tell us, but it is presumably
related to its more careful approach to Taiwan’s relations with China
(“Democratic resistance to an overweening China,” he writes, “is
understandable”).
It is difficult to see how the electoral
outcome of the Jan. 16 elections could be compared to an uprising, which
conjures images of violence, unchecked passions and populism. After all, the
DPP has held office before (2000-2008) and swept Taiwan in the municipal
elections in late 2014. Ferguson’s reading of the elections, moreover, seems to
assume that China was a major factor in voters’ decisions, when in reality,
just as in any other country, the key variables were primarily domestic. The
election was no uprising: it was electoral retribution for eight years of
underwhelming, and certainly disappointing, rule by the Chinese Nationalist
Party (KMT), which failed to resuscitate Taiwan’s economy as it had promised it
would. Those eight years were also marked by ailing democratic mechanisms and
an erosion of government accountability.
And since we must discuss China, yes,
Taiwan’s “overweening” neighbor, as Ferguson rightly puts it, was a factor in
the elections. What is hard to digest, however, is his notion that a refusal to
see one’s liberal-democratic way of life undermined, as the Hong Kong experience
reminds us, by an increasingly repressive and annexationist regime constitutes
an uprising. The author makes no mention of the fact that less than 10% of the
Taiwanese, including many of the (in his book) more enlightened people who
voted for the KMT, see unification with China as a desirable future. And sadly,
on China’s intensifying crackdown on civil society, the media, lawyers and
minorities, which in my book is grotesque, Ferguson is mum.
A similar, financially-driven logic applies
to his criticism of the government’s decision to shut down its nuclear power
sources, which he says “might not be the wisest course in an economy
struggling to regain its footing.” What he fails to mention are the reasons for
the apprehensions over nuclear power, which are primarily related to doubts as
to the safety and integrity of Taiwan’s nuclear power plants in the wake of the
Fukushima disaster in Japan. Whether Taiwan should become nuclear-free, as
President Tsai and her DPP advocate, is a matter of debate. But to attribute
such policies to an “impetuous bent” and, presumably, since he puts them in the
same basket, “political craze” is, well, grotesque, unless Ferguson also
believes that Germany, which also aims to be nuclear-free by 2022, is part of
the “irrational” camp he so clearly holds in contempt.
First Editor: Edward White
Second Editor: Olivia Yang
Second Editor: Olivia Yang
【J. Michael Cole is chief editor of The News Lens International, a
senior non-resident fellow with the University of Nottingham’s China Policy
Institute and an associate researcher with the French Centre for Research on
Contemporary China (CEFC).】
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