经济学人下载:墨西哥崛起 或成中国未来主要竞争对手(1)

Special Report
特别报道

From darkness, dawn
冲破黑暗，走向黎明

After years of underachievement and rising violence, Mexico is at last beginning to realise its potential, says Tom Wainwright
Tom Wainwright说道经过长年停滞和内乱，墨西哥终于迎来曙光

The Apocalypse was on its way, and it would begin in Mexico. Where elsen When archaeologists dug up Mayan calendars that ominously seemed to run out in the final days of 2012, some doomsayers predicted the end of the world. To many Mexicans it seemed like just another example of their country’s unending run of bad luck. The steepest recession on the American mainland, a plague of H1N1 swine flu and a deepening war against organised crime had made the preceding few years fairly grim. In 2009 the Pentagon had given warning that Mexico could become a “failed state”. Armageddon would be the icing on the cake.
《圣经·启示录》中的预言正在实现，而首当其冲的就是墨西哥。舍此其谁？考古学家挖掘出的玛雅日历似乎到2012年末为止，这一凶兆为部分末日论者所用，预言为世界末日。而众多墨西哥人看来，这不过是他们无限厄运的另一实例而已。除了美洲大陆上经济最为不佳之外，墨西哥还遭受H1N1猪流感和缉毒战争的洗礼，其前途一片黯淡。2009年，美国五角大楼（Pentagon）警示称，墨西哥可能成为“失败国家”。《启示录》中的“大审判”（Armageddon）不过给其“锦上添花”罢了。

But it turns out that the Mayan glyphs were misunderstood. The men with magnifying glasses now say that the world is not about to end—in fact, it seems that the Mayans were predicting something more like a renewal or a fresh start. Could the same be true of Mexicon?
但事实上，人们误解了玛雅石雕上的日历。现在，石雕上手握圣杯的男子已不再表示终结。相反，玛雅人的预示似乎更接近重生或新生。而同样的事能在墨西哥成真吗？

This special report will argue that there is a good chance of it. Some awful years are giving way to what, if managed properly, could be a prosperous period for Latin America’s second-largest economy. Big, irreversible trends, from a falling birth rate at home to rising wages in China, are starting to move in Mexico’s favour. At the same time the country’s leaders are at last starting to tackle some of the home-grown problems that have held it back.
本篇特别报道支持这一说法。惨淡的岁月已然过去。只要管理得当，在今后的日子里，这一拉美第二经济体将迎来繁荣昌盛。不可阻挡的时代潮流，已从劳动减少、成本上涨的中国，转而眷顾起了墨西哥。与此同时，墨西哥的政府高官最终开始处理个别阻碍其发展的国内问题。

Many of the things that the world thinks it knows about Mexico are no longer true. A serially underachieving economy, repeatedly trumped by dynamic Braziln Mexico outpaced Brazil last year and will grow twice as fast this year. Out-of-control population growth and an endless exodus to the northn Net emigration is down to zero, if not negative, and the fertility rate will soon be lower than that of the United States. Grinding povertyn Yes, but alleviated by services such as universal free health care. A raging drug warn The failure of rich countries’ anti-drugs policies means that organised crime will not go away. But Mexico’s murder rate is now falling, albeit slowly, for the first time in five years.
世人所熟知的那个“墨西哥”已不复存在。那个“经济连年停滞的”、“总被势头较好的巴西踩在脚下的”墨西哥已不复存在——墨西哥的经济增速已于去年超过巴西，今年有望翻其一番；那个“人口增长失控，大量人群北迁”的墨西哥也已不复存在——墨西哥的净移民数（出境移民减去入境移民的结果，译者注）不计负数已减少至零，其出生率也即将低于美国。至于“百姓贫穷不堪”确实不错，但无偿公共卫生等公共服务已加以缓和。而墨西哥“国内缉毒战争不断”也确非虚言。发达国家在反毒品政策上都比较失败，这导致毒枭集团始终存在。但墨西哥国内的谋杀率在近五年来首次下降（尽管下降速度不大）。

A vast country with deeply ingrained problems and unreformed corners, Mexico could yet squander the opportunities that are coming its way. But there are signs that it is beginning to realise its potential. With luck, the dire predictions made by the Pentagon and others may turn out to be as reliable as a misread Mayan calendar.
由于深陷国内各种问题以及改革不力的窘境，墨西哥也有可能错失眼前的机遇。但是种种迹象表明，其潜力已被开发。若一切顺利，五角大楼等等关于墨西哥的消极预言可能也终将和遭误解的玛雅日历那般不靠谱。

Preparing to lead Mexico into this brightening future is the party most associated with its past. The Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) ran Mexico without interruption for most of the 20th century, silencing opposition through a mixture of co-option, corruption and occasional violence. Only in 2000 did it give up its grip on power to the conservative National Action Party (PAN), which fielded two presidents in succession: Vicente Fox, a former executive at Coca-Cola, and Felipe Calderon, a lawyer whose father was a founding member of the party. On December 1st Mr Calderon will hand over the presidency to the PRI’s Enrique Pena Nieto, who won a clear election victory on July 1st. A handsome 46-year-old with a gift for communication, Mr Pena claims to be the opposite of the crooked party men who ran the country in its pre-democratic days. But will the change be more than superficialn？
带领墨西哥走向光明的重任落在其历史悠久的党派上。“革命制度党”（PRI）就曾领导了墨西哥不间断地度过20世纪的大半，期间该党通过游说拉拢、贪污行贿、时而付诸暴力的手段，让反对派偃旗息鼓。直到2000年，该党才选择退位，由保守派的“国家行动党”（PAN）当政，期间先后轮替了两位总统：曾任可口可乐（Coca-Cola）首席执行的福克斯（Vicente Fox）和担任律师的国家行动党元老子弟卡尔德隆（Felipe Calderon）。今年12月1日，卡尔德隆总统即将让位给革命制度党的裴纳尼托（Enrique Pena Nieto），后者于今年6月1日的选举中大获全胜。46岁的裴纳尼托外表俊朗、善于演讲。他自称将与那些“墨西哥前民主时期”当政的狡猾政客背道而驰。但他所宣称的改革究竟能否触及核心？

Mr Pena says his priority is to make the economy grow faster in order to reduce poverty. Nearly half the population are poor, many of them in the south (see map). To achieve more rapid growth he will need to introduce a series of big economic reforms, some of which Mr Calderon attempted during his presidency, only to see them get stuck in Mexico’s cantankerous Congress.
裴纳尼托表示，他将优先推进经济增长，以减少贫困。墨西哥约半数人口处于贫穷状态，大部分集中在南部（见地图）。为此，裴纳尼托需引入一系列经济改革，这些措施在卡尔德隆总统执政期间也曾受到推行，但却堵在争论不休的国会之中。