经济学人下载:英国陷入无政府状态

David Cameron, the prime minister, recalled Parliament to discuss the crisis, declaring that pockets of Britain were “frankly sick”. Politicians will no doubt come up with all manner of responses over the weeks to come. Job-creation and welfare schemes will surely play a part in the debate. But the immediate focus was on policing, and why, especially on the first few nights of trouble and particularly in London, the police seemed unable to cope.

首相卡梅伦召回议员商议危机事宜，他宣称有些地方的英国人“脑子显然有病”。政客们无疑会在未来几周提出各种应对措施，创造就业机会计划和福利计划谅必在争论中占有一席之地，但当前关注的焦点是治安问题和为什么警察似乎不能应付骚乱，尤其是头几个晚上的骚乱和发生在伦敦的骚乱的问题。

The spark for the initial incident in Tottenham was a fatal shooting by police officers; some hooligans cited resentment of the police as a motive. But as the violence spiralled and spread, the main criticism levelled at them—particularly London’s Metropolitan Police—was that they were too soft. That criticism was partly justified. The Met was caught out by the scale of the unrest and unable to respond quickly enough. In some parts of the capital the police were outnumbered, outmanoeuvred and unable or unwilling to prevent looting.

托特纳姆骚乱是由警方射杀了一名男子引起的。一些街头恶棍称自己的动机源自对警察的不满。但随着暴力急剧升温和四处蔓延，他们——特别是伦敦警察署的警察——则主要被指责过于软弱。这种批评在一定程度上是正确的。伦敦警察署对危机的规模准备不足，疲于奔命，不能足够快速地应对。在首都的一些地区，暴徒在数量上超过警察，警察无计可施，不能或不愿阻止抢劫行为。

With suitable reinforcements and better tactics, they and other forces performed better on subsequent nights. Nevertheless, there were widespread calls for much more draconian measures. One opinion poll suggested a third of respondents favoured the use not only of rubber bullets but of live ones. The imposition of curfews and the deployment of the army were discussed but thankfully not implemented.

由于适当的增援和更高明的战术，他们和其他警察部队在随后的几个晚上表现得更加出色。然而，各界普遍呼吁加强严管力度。一项民意测验显示，三分之一的应答者支持使用橡皮子弹甚至实弹。强制实行宵禁和部署军队也被讨论过，幸好没有施行。

Thankfully, because that sort of response would make Britain a different place from the open, liberal country most of its citizens want it to be. Yet one message of this week’s events is that the reality of modern Britain doesn’t quite live up to that hope. The widespread assumption that, for all their inequalities and fissures, the country and its capital are fundamentally orderly and harmonious, has been revealed to be complacent. The cracks in British society—economic and moral—have opened up, and they are deeper than they seemed.

真是谢天谢地，因为那种应对措施将使英国悖离于其大多数公民所期待的那种开放、自由的国家。而本周骚乱的要旨是现代英国的现实并没有完全达到期待的标准。尽管英国和其首都存在不平等和社会裂痕，但普遍认为它们从根本上讲是秩序井然和和谐的，而今这个看法被证明不过是自以为是而已。英国社会的裂痕——经济和道德上的——已经扩大，其深度超过想象。

The riots have been bad for Britain’s already stuttering economy. They have been ruinous for the people whose homes and businesses have been damaged and destroyed. They have tarnished Britain’s image around the world. But most of all, they have been desperately disorienting for the country’s own sense of itself.

这场骚乱对英国已然迟滞的经济来说无异于雪上加霜。一些人的住宅和公司也遭到了损毁，这对于他们来说是灾难性的。骚乱也玷污了英国的国际形象，但最糟糕的是，它使英国严重地迷失了自我感的方向。