欧盟不需要主席

　　Poor Tony Blair – sabotaged by his own countryman. Just weeks ago, Mr Blair looked like the frontrunner to be president of the European Union. But now William Hague, Britain's shadow foreign secretary, has let the rest of Europe know that the opposition Conservative party would regard his appointment as a “hostile gesture”. Since the Tories and Mr Hague are likely to be in government by the middle of next year, after a British general election, their views have real weight. Charles Grant, head of the Centre for European Reform, a think-tank, says: “On my travels around Europe . . . I have found that Hague's comments have made a huge impact.” Mr Blair's candidacy has been badly damaged.
　　可怜的托尼•布莱尔(Tony Blair)遭到自己同胞的攻击。就在数周前，布莱尔似乎还是欧盟(EU)主席的热门人选，但现在英国影子内阁外交大臣威廉•黑格(William Hague)已经昭告欧洲其它所有国家，称反对党保守党将把对布莱尔的任命视为“敌意举动”。鉴于保守党和黑格在明年年中大选后可能上台组阁，他们的观点颇具分量。智库机构欧洲改革中心(Centre for European Reform)主任查尔斯•格兰特(Charles Grant)表示：“我在欧洲各地行走期间……发现黑格的言论产生了巨大的影响。”布莱尔的候选人形象已经遭到严重破坏。

　　There is, of course, history between Mr Hague and Mr Blair. A decade ago, Mr Blair was prime minister of Britain and at the height of his powers, and Mr Hague was the leader of a struggling Tory party. Ten years on, both men have gone down in the world. Mr Blair is an elder-statesman for hire. Mr Hague has seen the Tory leadership pass to a younger, more charismatic man.
　　黑格与布莱尔之间肯定存在恩怨。10年前，布莱尔是英国首相，处于权力生涯的最高峰，而黑格是陷入困境的保守党领袖。10年过去了，两人都已失势。布莱尔成为待聘的资深政治家。黑格则眼睁睁地看着保守党的领袖地位传让给了一个更年轻、更有魅力的人。

　　Some in Britain regard Mr Hague's anti-Blair comments as an act of petty spite. Others see it as worse than that: Mr Hague, they charge, is so blinded by his Eurosceptic ideology that he is prepared to damage both Britain and the EU, by blocking Mr Blair.
　　英国一些人把黑格反对布莱尔的言论看作是心胸狭隘之举，其他人则更进一步：他们指责黑格被他那种欧盟怀疑论者的意识形态所蒙蔽，准备通过阻碍布莱尔担任欧盟主席来对损害英国和欧盟。

　　But Mr Hague is right. It would be a mistake to appoint Tony Blair to the presidency of the EU. This is not because he is a bad man or a bad politician. He is neither. The problem is the job – an unelected post with no democratic mandate.
　　但黑格是正确的。任命布莱尔担任欧盟主席将是一个错误。这不是因为他是个坏人或者是个糟糕的政治家。两者他都不是，问题在于职位本身——一个未经选举产生的职位是没有民主授权的。

　　In fact, there are two closely related difficulties with nominating a president of the EU. The first is to do with the job's shaky legitimacy. The second is to do with a lack of underlying unity that still bedevils efforts to create a common European foreign policy. Both problems would be made worse by appointing Mr Blair.
　　实际上，任命欧盟主席面临两个密切相关的困难。首先，该职位的合法性不够稳固。其次，欧洲缺乏基本团结，这依然有碍欧洲建立统一的外交政策。如果任命布莱尔为欧盟主席，这两个问题都会变得更加严重。

　　The EU knows that it is far too soon to attempt direct elections for a president of the Union. The 27 members lack the common language and political identity that would make such an election work. When I once discussed the idea of a directly elected European president with a senior official in Brussels, who hails from Finland, he shook his head sorrowfully and said: “I just can't imagine Sarkozy campaigning in Lapland.” But that is just one of many amusing possibilities: how about Berlusconi in Berkshire; or Merkel in Warsaw?
　　欧盟明白，尝试直接选举欧盟主席还为时过早。27个成员国缺乏组织此类选举工作所需的统一语言和政治认同感。我曾与布鲁塞尔一位来自芬兰的高级官员讨论直接选举欧盟主席的想法，当时他沮丧地摇着头说：“我完全无法想象萨科齐在拉普兰（芬兰北部省份——译者注）举行竞选活动的场景。”但这只是众多有趣的可能性之一：如果是贝卢斯科尼(Berlusconi)在伯克郡或默克尔(Merkel)在华沙又会怎样呢？

　　Since a directly elected European president is unthinkable, the EU's Lisbon treaty – which is finally limping towards ratification – allows the leaders of the 27 EU nations to appoint a president. But the precise nature of the job has always been a little vague. There is a minimalist interpretation, which would see the president of the European Council playing a relatively modest role: co-ordinating between national governments, chairing European summits and generally providing more policy continuity than the current presidency, which rotates every six months. And then there is the maximalist interpretation, which wants the new EU president to be a high-profile figure, strutting the world stage.
　　既然直接选举欧盟主席是不可想象的，欧盟《里斯本条约》(Lisbon treaty)——该条约一路跌跌撞撞、终于有望迎来生效的那一刻——允许欧盟27国领导人任命一位主席。但这一职位的确切职能一直有些模糊。按照最低纲领主义者的解释，欧盟理事会(European Council)主席扮演着相对温和的角色：协调各国政府，主持欧盟峰会，总体而言能够提供的政策延续性要比当前的主席国机制（每6个月轮换一次）更强。按照最高纲领主义者的解释，这位新的欧盟主席将成为引人瞩目的角色，在全球舞台上叱咤风云。

　　Mr Blair's keenest supporters are maximalists. David Miliband, Britain's foreign secretary, thinks that the EU should be the third partner in a global triumvirate, managing world affairs with the US and China. He thinks that Mr Blair would be the perfect man to represent Europe at the world's top table, since he is an international figure whose presence would “stop the traffic in Beijing”. Mr Blair would be presented as a real “president of Europe” – able to speak on equal terms with Barack Obama of the US or Hu Jintao of China.
　　布莱尔最热忱的支持者都是最高纲领主义者。英国外交大臣戴维•米利班德(David Miliband)认为，欧盟应该成为全球“三头政治”的第三头，与美国和中国一起管理全球事务。他表示，布莱尔将是在全球最高级别会议上代表欧洲的最佳人选，因为他是一位国际人物，一现身就能“导致北京交通瘫痪”。布莱尔将被称作真正的“欧洲主席”——能够与美国的巴拉克•奥巴马(Barack Obama)和中国的胡锦涛相提并论。

　　But if Mr Blair turned up in Beijing claiming to be president of Europe, the only thing that he would have in common with Hu Jintao is that they would both lack a democratic mandate. Ordinary Europeans would be justified in asking by what right the unelected Mr Blair speaks for them. The former prime minister remains a deeply controversial figure in much of Europe because of his support for the Iraq war.
　　但如果布莱尔以欧洲主席的身份出现在北京，他与胡锦涛的唯一共同之处就是，他们都缺乏民主授权。欧洲普通民众有理由提出质疑：在未经选举的情况下，布莱尔有什么权力为他们代言。由于支持伊拉克战争，这位前英国首相在欧洲大部分地区仍是一位极富争议性的人物。

　　Mr Blair is particularly controversial, but any high-profile European president would be a divisive figure. For unlike the Chinese president, the president of the EU would not speak for a unified polity. In fact, European unity tends to crumble at moments of international crisis. The EU split badly when Yugoslavia broke up in the 1990s; and the major EU powers were at each other's throats over Iraq in 2003.
　　虽然对于布莱尔的争议特别大，但任何引人瞩目的欧洲领导人都会引发分歧。因为与中国国家主席不同，这位欧盟主席代表的不是一个统一的政体。实际上，欧洲的团结往往会在国际危机时期分崩离析。上世纪90年代南斯拉夫解体之时，欧洲内部出现严重分歧；2003年，在伊拉克问题上，主要欧洲国家也争吵激烈。

　　This is not to say that the effort to create a common EU foreign policy is always a joke – or that substantial progress has not been made over the past decade. The EU has presented a more-or-less united front on Iran and on climate change, and has deployed peacekeepers to more than 20 conflicts around the world. The Lisbon treaty will create a souped-up foreign minister with more resources, which should help further the long-term work of carving out common European positions on the big global issues.
　　这并不是说，建立欧洲共同外交政策的努力总是让人取笑的对象，或是过去10年没有取得任何实质性的进展。在伊朗和气候变化问题上，欧盟几乎采取了统一的立场，并向全球范围内逾20多场冲突派遣了维和部队。根据《里斯本条约》，欧盟将设立一个拥有更多资源、更大权力的外交代表职位，这应该有助于进一步实现欧洲在全球重大问题上采取共同立场的长期任务。

　　But it is too soon to appoint a high-profile “president of Europe”. If the new president claimed to speak for the nearly 500m citizens of the Union – without a direct mandate – he would invite a backlash in Europe and humiliation in the rest of the world. The EU deserves better than that. Come to think of it, so does Tony Blair.
　　但目前任命一位引人瞩目的“欧洲主席”为时尚早。如果新主席（在没有获得直接授权的情况下）宣称自己代表了欧盟近5亿民众，他将招致欧洲的强烈反对，并在世界其它地区蒙羞。欧盟理应得到更好的待遇。细想一下，布莱尔亦是如此。
　　
　　译者/君悦