主题：【原创】炮打工业党：《论工业社会及其未来》 -- 万年看客

SOME PRINCIPLES OF HISTORY

几条历史原则

99. Think of history as being the sum of two components: an erratic component that consists of unpredictable events that follow no discernible pattern, and a regular component that consists of long-term historical trends. Here we are concerned with the long-term trends.

99，在此请将历史想象为两个组成部分的总和：一个是不规则组成部分，由无法预知也不遵循任何明显模式的事件组成；另一个是规则组成部分，由长期历史趋势组成。我们在这里考虑的是长期趋势。

100. FIRST PRINCIPLE. If a SMALL change is made that affects a long-term historical trend, then the effect of that change will almost always be transitory - the trend will soon revert to its original state. (Example: A reform movement designed to clean up political corruption in a society rarely has more than a short-term effect; sooner or later the reformers relax and corruption creeps back in. The level of political corruption in a given society tends to remain constant, or to change only slowly with the evolution of the society. Normally, a political cleanup will be permanent only if accompanied by widespread social changes; a SMALL change in the society won't be enough.) If a small change in a long-term historical trend appears to be permanent, it is only because the change acts in the direction in which the trend is already moving, so that the trend is not altered but only pushed a step ahead.

100，第一条原则。假如一个小改变影响了长期历史趋势，这种影响只能是暂时性的，趋势很快就能逆转回到原来的状态。（举例：政治反腐改革几乎总是只能取得短期效果，改革者终将懈怠，腐败也总会卷土重来。任何一个给定社会的腐败程度都是恒定的，或者只会随着社会的演变发生缓慢的变化。正常情况下，反腐改革只有在伴随着广泛社会变革的情况下才能取得长期效果，小规模改变是没有用的。）如果某个小改变看似在长期历史趋势当中取得了长期影响，这只是因为这个改变的方向与大趋势相一致，因此趋势没有得到改变，只是向前推进了一步。

101. The first principle is almost a tautology. If a trend were not stable with respect to small changes, it would wander at random rather than following a definite direction; in other words it would not be a long-term trend at all.

101，第一原则基本上就是同义反复。假如某个趋势相对小改变而言不够稳定，这一趋势就会随机发展而非追寻特定方向，换句话说就是根本无法成为长期趋势。

102. SECOND PRINCIPLE. If a change is made that is sufficiently large to alter permanently a long-term historical trend, than it will alter the society as a whole. In other words, a society is a system in which all parts are interrelated, and you can't permanently change any important part without change all the other parts as well.

102，第二条原则。假如一项改变足够大，可以永久改变长期历史趋势，那这项改变必然影响整个社会。换言之，社会体系中的各个部分都是相关的，不可能永久性改变任何重要部分而不改变所有其他部分。

103. THIRD PRINCIPLE. If a change is made that is large enough to alter permanently a long-term trend, then the consequences for the society as a whole cannot be predicted in advance. (Unless various other societies have passed through the same change and have all experienced the same consequences, in which case one can predict on empirical grounds that another society that passes through the same change will be like to experience similar consequences.)

103，第三条原则。假如一项改变足够大，可以永久改变长期历史趋势，那么任何人都无法预测社会整体将如何改变。（除非许多其他社会也经历了相同的变化与同样的结果，这样才可以在经验基础上预测下一个经历了此类改变的社会可能会遭受类似的结果。）

104. FOURTH PRINCIPLE. A new kind of society cannot be designed on paper. That is, you cannot plan out a new form of society in advance, then set it up and expect it to function as it was designed to.

104，第四条原则。新型社会无法从纸面上创造出来。换句话说，你无法提前设计新型社会，并期待该社会在得到建立之后会按照设计来运行。

105. The third and fourth principles result from the complexity of human societies. A change in human behavior will affect the economy of a society and its physical environment; the economy will affect the environment and vice versa, and the changes in the economy and the environment will affect human behavior in complex, unpredictable ways; and so forth. The network of causes and effects is far too complex to be untangled and understood.

105，第三条与第四条原则是人类社会复杂性的结果。人类行为的改变将会影响社会经济与物质环境，经济与环境互为影响，而社会与经济的改变又将以无法预测的方式作用于人类行为。因果律的网络过于复杂，任何人都无法理清并理解。

106. FIFTH PRINCIPLE. People do not consciously and rationally choose the form of their society. Societies develop through processes of social evolution that are not under rational human control.

106，第五条原则。人们并不有意识地并理性地选择他们所属社会的形态。舍同通过社会演化而形成，不受人的理性控制。

107. The fifth principle is a consequence of the other four.

107，第五条原则是前四条的结果。

108. To illustrate: By the first principle, generally speaking an attempt at social reform either acts in the direction in which the society is developing anyway (so that it merely accelerates a change that would have occurred in any case) or else it only has a transitory effect, so that the society soon slips back into its old groove. To make a lasting change in the direction of development of any important aspect of a society, reform is insufficient and revolution is required. (A revolution does not necessarily involve an armed uprising or the overthrow of a government.) By the second principle, a revolution never changes only one aspect of a society; and by the third principle changes occur that were never expected or desired by the revolutionaries. By the fourth principle, when revolutionaries or utopians set up a new kind of society, it never works out as planned.

108，在此说明一下：根据第一条原则，一般说来进行社会改革的尝试要么遵从社会发展的方向（因此仅仅加速了无论如何都要发生的改变）要么就只有暂时性的效果，而社会很快就会恢复原状。如果要在任何重要的社会方面遵循发展方向进行持续性的改变，改革是不够的，必须诉诸于革命。（革命并不必然意味着武装暴动或推翻政府）根据第二条原则，革命绝不会仅仅改变某一个单独社会方面；根据第三条原则将会发生革命者们未曾期望或不想看到的改变。根据第四条原则，革命者或乌托邦主义者们建立的新型社会永远无法按照计划运作起来。

109. The American Revolution does not provide a counterexample. The American "Revolution" was not a revolution in our sense of the word, but a war of independence followed by a rather far-reaching political reform. The Founding Fathers did not change the direction of development of American society, nor did they aspire to do so. They only freed the development of American society from the retarding effect of British rule. Their political reform did not change any basic trend, but only pushed American political culture along its natural direction of development. British society, of which American society was an off-shoot, had been moving for a long time in the direction of representative democracy. And prior to the War of Independence the Americans were already practicing a significant degree of representative democracy in the colonial assemblies. The political system established by the Constitution was modeled on the British system and on the colonial assemblies. With major alteration, to be sure - there is no doubt that the Founding Fathers took a very important step. But it was a step along the road the English-speaking world was already traveling. The proof is that Britain and all of its colonies that were populated predominantly by people of British descent ended up with systems of representative democracy essentially similar to that of the United States. If the Founding Fathers had lost their nerve and declined to sign the Declaration of Independence, our way of life today would not have been significantly different. Maybe we would have had somewhat closer ties to Britain, and would have had a Parliament and Prime Minister instead of a Congress and President. No big deal. Thus the American Revolution provides not a counterexample to our principles but a good illustration of them.

109，美国独立运动并不是反例。所谓的美国“革命”并不是我们所谓的革命，而是一场独立战争加上一场用力过猛的政治改革。开国元勋们没有改变美国社会的发展方向，也没有这么做的打算。他们仅仅将美国从英国的拘束性统治之下解放了出来。他们的政治改革没有改变任何基本趋势，仅仅将美国政治文化在自然发展方向上推了一把。美国社会是从英国社会分生出来的，而英国社会早已在代议制民主的方向上发展很久了。独立战争之前美国已经在各殖民地代表大会内部实行了相当程度的代议制民主。美国宪法确立的政治体系是根据英国政体与殖民地代表大会为模版构建出来的。开国元勋们的确进行了重大修改，他们走出了重要的一步。但是这一步仅仅是踏在了英语国家早已走了很久的道路上。证据就是英国本土以及所有英国人永久居留的殖民地最终都发展出了与美国类似的代议制民主。就算当年开国元勋们一时手软没有签署《独立宣言》，我们今天的生活方式也不会有显著差异。我们与英国的联系或许会更紧密，或许会有议会与首相而不是国会与总统，但这都不是什么大事。美国独立运动并未对我们的原则构成反例，而是对其进行了很好的诠释。

110. Still, one has to use common sense in applying the principles. They are expressed in imprecise language that allows latitude for interpretation, and exceptions to them can be found. So we present these principles not as inviolable laws but as rules of thumb, or guides to thinking, that may provide a partial antidote to naive ideas about the future of society. The principles should be borne constantly in mind, and whenever one reaches a conclusion that conflicts with them one should carefully reexamine one's thinking and retain the conclusion only if one has good, solid reasons for doing so.

110，不过人们在应用这些原则时依然需要依靠自己的常识。这些原则的表述语言并不周密，有进行阐释的空间，也可以找到例外。因此我们提出这些原则并非将其当作牢不可破的定律，而是作为思考指南，希望能为关于未来社会的不成熟想法提供部分解药。应当牢记这些原则，假如某人得出了与这些原则相冲突的结论，他应当仔细审视自己的思考过程，仅仅在有坚实理由的前提下才维持原有结论。