【经济学人】朝鲜：剥削与统治（图集）

译者炫耀至极

IF NOBODY else, at least Kim Jong Il, North Korea’s leader, appears to have found something to fillhis belly with during the annual Chuseok harvest festival in North Koreathis week. “His face beaming with a smile,” as his propaganda machine put it,he dropped into a shop in Pyongyangselling pancakes stuffed with meat.

如果朝鲜的民众在一年一度的中秋节没有什么东西吃的话，至少他们的领袖金正日还是有东西吃的。早些时候，金正日顺道光顾了平壤一家经营肉煎饼的商店，“他的脸上堆满了笑，”他的宣传部门这样描述他吃煎饼的表情。

Outside the capital there are few such treats. Much of the rest ofthe country is suffering a severe food shortage, say aid agencies. On September9th the UN’s World Food Programme released video images from a trip to theNorth Korean countryside showing listless orphans, their growth stunted bymalnourishment. A cold start to the growing season and summer flooding hasbadly damaged rice and maize crops. Potato rations have been cut by a third, totwo a person each day.

平壤以外地区的人们可就没这样的待遇了。援助机构称，这个国家大部分的地区都面临严重的粮食短缺。9月9日，联合国世界粮食计划署公布的一份影像资料显示，在朝鲜的农村地区有无数的发育不良孤儿。由于生长季节气候突然变冷和夏天的洪水，水稻和玉米的产量遭到重创。土豆的供应量减小了三分之一，每个人每天只能领取两个土豆。

Mr Kim’s regime, with customary cynicism, has told people to“simplify” their dining habits at Chuseok this year “in the socialist way,”according to DailyNK, a Seoul-based online news agency. Yet in his paralleluniverse, Mr Kim boasted of the variety of beef, pork, goose and turkeyavailable to the privileged customers of the pancake shop. How does he get awaywith it? Loosely, that is the question posed by North Korea-watchers trying tounderstand how an odious regime has remained stable for so long, defyingfrequent predictions of its downfall.

韩国的《朝鲜日报》报道，朝鲜政府如同往常一样，告诫民众今年中秋节要“以社会主义者的方式”来“简化”他们的饮食习惯。然而同时，金正日却在煎饼店与一些特权人士享受着美味佳肴。他为何能如此泰然自若呢？这便是很多朝鲜观察家试图弄明白的问题，不管他们如何预测朝鲜政权的垮台，这个可恶的政权仍然稳固地存在了如此长的时间。

North Korea

should, by rights, be tottering under the weight of its spectaculareconomic mismanagement. It is in the midst of a shaky succession process, whichis hard for any totalitarian regime, let alone one where the chubbyheir-apparent, Mr Kim’s son, Kim Jong Un, is little known or loved. Thecountry’s food crisis has its roots in atrocious farm productivity, the highinternational price of grain, and an embargo on much food aid because of NorthKorean belligerence towards South Korea in recent years. Although thepublic-distribution system for food has collapsed in much of the country, theregime has tried, albeit imperfectly, to stamp out informal markets, the onlysuccour for many.

朝鲜本应该因其混乱的经济管理而崩溃。这个国家的政权正处在更叠当中，对于任何极权主义政权来说，政权交接都是非常困难的事情，更何况金正日的胖儿子金正恩还鲜为人知并且没那么受人爱戴。朝鲜的粮食危机主要由三个方面的原因所导致，一是其国内糟糕的粮食生产能力；二是国际粮食价格的飞涨；三是近年来朝韩双方的敌对立场使得朝鲜拒绝了许多韩国的粮食援助。朝鲜国内粮食集中分配制度在许多地区已经停止运转。虽然不能完全禁绝，但是朝鲜政府依然试图禁止民众从非正规渠道获得粮食，而这是许多人获得援助的唯一渠道。

North Korea

has an economic lifeline to China, but scholars who haveinterviewed North Korean refugees report contempt, tinged with envy, for theirgiant neighbour. The North was once able to use promises to scrap itsnuclear-weapon programmes as a means to extort hard currency from South Korea, Americaand Japan.No more.

朝鲜的经济与中国息息相关，但是采访过朝鲜难民的一些人表示，他们对于中国有着一种藐视，当然这其中带着些许嫉妒的成分。朝鲜本可以通过放弃核武器计划来获得韩国、美国和日本的资金支持，但是它最终放弃了。

The Kim family brand of extreme, race-based nationalism has supportin parts of the capital, Pyongyang,with its goose-stepping parades and bombastic high-rises. This, after all, iswhere the elites live, enjoying perks and protected by an overwhelming securityapparatus. Elsewhere in the country, the regime sees enemies. With totalitarianobsession, it groups North Koreans into 51 social categories, graded by loyaltyto the regime. Of those groups, 29 are considered to make up an underclass thatis hostile or at best ambivalent towards the regime. Most of these suspectslive not in Pyongyangor even in lesser cities, but in the countryside.

极端民族主义的金氏家族在首都平壤地区有着一定的支持率，在平壤，有着高昂的士兵方阵和虚妄的高楼大厦。但是，毕竟，这是精英们居住的地方，他们享受着特权，并且有强大的安全机构保护。在这个国家的其他地方，人们对政府有着某种敌意。受集权主义的影响，朝鲜政府将朝鲜人按照对于政府的忠诚度分为51类。在这51类人中，有29类人被认为是下层阶级，他们对政府有敌意或者属于骑墙派。这些人当中的绝大多数都没有在平壤或者较小的城市生活，他们都生活在农村地区。

Some people brave harassment and shooting to cross the border into China to earn hard currency (many North Koreans,especially black-market traders, cross and recross into China). Somechildren in the North live ferally: they are known as

kotjebi

, or“fluttering swallows”, and roam in packs. When they cannot steal in themarkets, they eat dead dogs and rotten food (reportedly chewing toothpaste inthe belief that it prevents food poisoning). Many people, particularly women,live dangerously off the black markets, which have flourished again after anunsuccessful attempt to crack down on trade in hard currency. Most endurehunger at least some of the time. So why do they not revolt?

一些人冒着被迫害或者枪毙的风险跨越国境进入中国赚取硬通货（许多朝鲜人，尤其是黑市商人会在中朝边界往来）。许多小孩像野蛮人一样生活，他们被称为kotjebi（飞舞的燕子），成群结队，四处流浪。每当他们在市场里偷不到东西的时候，他们就吃死狗或者腐烂的食物。他们会咀嚼牙膏，据说这样可以防止食物中毒。政府最近曾经试图打击黑市交易，但是并不成功，黑市又重新兴起，许多人，尤其是妇女在黑市中危险度日。大多数人都忍饥挨饿至少一段时间了。那么，他们为什么不反抗呢？

One intriguing explanation comes from Go Myong-hyun, a statisticianat the Asan Institute for Policy Studies, which has just held a conference in Seoul on the viability ofthe North Korean regime. On the basis of satellite imagery of crop areas,vegetation and human settlement, Mr Go believes that both North Korea’scrops and the population that tends them are more geographically scattered thanoutsiders have hitherto thought. He contests UN estimates that overthree-fifths of the country is urbanised. That would require every farmer tosustain nearly two city dwellers, which a shortage of fertiliser, farmmachinery and fuel precludes. Mr Go reckons that urbanisation could be as lowas 25%, based on data from the Global Rural Urban Mapping Project, a globalpopulation map. That would imply three farmers for each city dweller. Itsuggests that, even though much of the country is cut off from thefood-distribution system, rural dwellers survive precariously throughsubsistence farming.

最近，韩国峨山政策研究所在首尔举行了一次主题为朝鲜政权存续能力的会议，一位统计学家Go Myong-hyun给出了一个有趣的解释。根据朝鲜作物种植区域、植被和人类居住区的卫星地图显示，他认为朝鲜的作物种植区和人口聚集区比外界认为的还要分散。他对联合国评估的朝鲜有五分之三的地区已经实现城市化这一观点提出了质疑。如果事实如联合国所估计的那样，那么在肥料、设备和燃料都如此匮乏的朝鲜，一个农民就需要养活两个城市人口。根据全球农村城市测绘项目（Global Rural Urban Mapping Project）测绘出的数据，GoMyong-hyun估计朝鲜的城市化程度只有25% 。也就是说，4个朝鲜人中，有3个是农民。这意味着，即使切断了粮食分配，农村居民仍然可以靠自给自足的农业种植勉强度日。

Transport—or rather the lack of it—may be another, unintended formof social control. North Korea inherited railways from the formerJapanese colonialists that run predominantly up the west of the country. Thatis the more populated side: the food-distribution system works better therethan in the rural north and east. Ahn Byung-min, of the Seoul-based KoreaTransport Institute, has made 40-odd trips to monitor the distribution of SouthKorean food aid. His photographs show how decrepit the rail system is, withrotten railway ties, different track gauges and bridges that are stillpockmarked by bullets from the Korean war. Yet communication by road is evenharder, Mr Ahn says, which further isolates the rural areas. Some cars havecrank handles, or are powered by wood-burning stoves. He showed a photo of oneold truck stamped with a star for every 50,000km (31,250 miles) on the clock.The stars added up to 1m km.

交通运输，或者说匮乏的交通运输，或许是另一种无意识的社会控制形式。朝鲜从当初的日本殖民者手中继承了他们留下来的铁路，它们中的大部分架设在这个国家的西部地区。这个地区人口较多，而且粮食分配体制比在北部和东部的农村地区运转的要好。韩国交通研究院的Ahn Byung-min曾经去过朝鲜40次，监管韩国对朝食品援助的分配工作。他的照片显示了朝鲜的铁路系统是多么陈旧，轨道上的枕木都已经腐烂，并且轨道距还不尽相同，桥梁上满是朝鲜战争时期的弹孔。公路运输更是艰难，Ahn Byung-min称这愈发导致了农村地区的孤立。一些汽车还需要手摇，或者要烧柴火才能运行。他同样展示了一张照片，上面有一辆破旧的卡车，每行驶5万公里，人们就在上面印一个五角星。现在，那辆车上的五角星已经密密麻麻了。

The tentative conclusion is that North Korea has not only managed tocut itself off from the world, but also created an internally isolatedunderclass, mostly in the east, that is left to fend for itself. Theunderclass’s isolation reduces the burden on the state—and the odds of itrising up in organised fashion to challenge the regime.

那么我们可以做出这样的假设，朝鲜不仅仅想把自身隔绝于世界之外，在其国内，他们也在孤立东部的大部分下层阶级，任其自生自灭。对于下层阶级的置之不理减轻了这个国家的负担，也让其不能团结起来，对朝鲜政权构成威胁。