Rio de Janeiro

A European arriving on United States shores in 1950 could not mistake the fact that the mantle had passed. American power would define the rest of the 20th century; the nation’s energy and confidence were palpable. Today, arrival in Brazil has something of the same giddying effect: the promise of the Americas is here.
一個歐洲人在1950年抵達美國時，肯定會認清一個事實：天下已經是美國的了。美國的權勢將為20世紀下半葉定調，當時美國的活力與信心都顯而易見。如今，人到巴西也會有同樣的感受：美洲的未來就在這裡。

When I first came to know a languishing Brazil in the 1980s, I always pushed back when told that I could hardly expect anything other than instability in Latin America. Brazil, I would insist, is better viewed as a tropical United States – its size, diversity and can-do culture demanded that – than as part of the Latin disease of hyperinflation and failure.
我在1980年代頭一次到巴西，認識這個奄奄一息的國家，每當人家說我在拉丁美洲除了動盪別期待看到什麼，我總不服氣，堅稱應把巴西看成熱帶的美國，而不是高通膨和失敗之病的一部分，因為巴西的規模、多元化及樂觀進取的文化都像美國。

It’s not that I foresaw this perfect Brazilian storm: Massive oil finds have helped generate a powerful exuberance. I did, however, understand what a steel executive in São Paulo meant when he told me back in 1986 that he often worried about the end of the month but he never worried about the future. Lurching, Brazil was nonetheless headed forward. Unlike tormented Argentina, it had an unquenchable self-belief and more interest in profit than elegant pretense.
倒不是我有先見之明，能預見眼前這場完美的巴西風暴：豐富的油產造就了極為蓬勃的發展，不過我當時的確了解聖保羅一個鋼鐵廠負責人1986年對我說的那番話。他說，他常為月底發愁，但從不為未來擔憂。巴西當時儘管步履蹣跚，卻勇往直前。它不像痛苦的阿根廷那樣，巴西有一股不可抑遏的自信，但求獲取實利，無意惺惺作態。

In the quarter century since then, Brazil has been transformed. Today it offers a potent reminder that the counterpart to the travails of Europe and the United States is an intense vitality in the developing world. The West’s deep recession has coincided with an awakening in the nations from Brazil to India where most of the world’s population lives. We are living through the Great Inversion.
其後至今歷經四分之一個世紀，巴西已然脫胎換骨。今天，它清楚的提醒世人，相對於歐洲和美國的艱困，開發中國家活力四射。西方國家深陷衰退之際，從巴西到印度這些世界最多人口居住地區卻在覺醒躍升。我們正經歷這場大轉向。

Talk in Rio is of all that oil offshore, and skyrocketing real estate, and the World Cup in 2014, and the Olympics in 2016, and the commodities boom, and full employment, and gridlocked traffic, and crazy prices (anyone for a plate of spaghetti at $60?), and huge infrastructure projects like a proposed Rio-São Paulo high-speed rail, and the fact that Brazil recently overtook Britain to become the world’s sixth-largest economy.
在里約，人們談論的是外海石油、不斷衝高的房價、2014年世足賽、2016年奧運、原物料價格俏、充分就業、塞車、瘋狂的物價（誰要來盤60美元的義大利麵？）還有超大基礎建設計畫，如研議中里約到聖保羅的高鐵，以及巴西最近已超越英國，成為世界第六大經濟體的事實。

Of course, there are close to 200 million Brazilians, so per capita income is still only a third of that in Britain; and an overvalued currency plays its part in boosting the apparent dimensions of Brazilian wealth. Still, the strong real reflects Brazil’s attractiveness to investors, individual and corporate, whose faith in the dollar and the euro has been shaken.
當然，巴西人口近兩億，以致人均所得仍僅及英國三分之一，幣值高估也使巴西的財富顯得比實際要多，但強勢里拉也反映了巴西對個人及企業投資人的吸引力，這些投資人對美元和歐元信心都已動搖。

The big change since the mid-1980s, when I started covering Latin America, is the arrival of democratic institutional stability. I covered the fall of Pinochet and lived through the turbulent immediate aftermath of dictatorships in Brazil and Argentina. These dictators, as in the Middle East, had been propped up by the West as the only alternatives to violent extremism – of the communist variety in the Latin American case, whereas the specter from Cairo to Damascus today is jihadist Islamism.
我自1980年代中期起報導拉美新聞，其後至今最大改變在於穩定民主體制的到來。我曾報導過智利前獨裁者皮諾契特的倒台，也經歷過巴西及阿根廷獨裁政權瓦解後的動盪期。這些獨裁政權就跟中東的一樣，被西方國家視為暴力極端主義的唯一替代品而予以扶植，暴力極端主義在拉美是各樣共產主義，在今日中東則是從開羅到大馬士革的伊斯蘭聖戰主義。

Dilma Rousseff, the president of Brazil, was one such leftist. She was tortured by the military and imprisoned for nearly three years in the early 1970s. Now, a little over a year into her presidency, she governs Brazil with an intense pragmatism praised by business leaders and social reformers alike. Perhaps that says something about the kinds of ex-radicals, adjusting to the realities of power, who will be governing Egypt or Tunisia a generation from now.
巴西現任總統狄爾瑪．羅瑟夫就曾經是這麼個左派份子。她1970年代初期曾被軍方刑求並監禁近三年，如今，她任總統剛過一年，以高度務實主義治國獲商業領袖及社會改革者同聲稱讚。也許這也道出了昔日激進派適應權力現實的一二，這種人將在一個世代之後統治埃及或突尼西亞。

Rousseff will visit the United States next month and has a meeting scheduled with Barack Obama on April 9. Brazilians are angry that her trip has not been accorded the status of a “state visit,” as was the case for the presidents of China, India and Mexico. State visits usually include a formal address by the visiting leader to Congress and a black-tie dinner at the White House. There is also dismay at the United States Air Force’s recent cancellation of a $355 million contract to buy 20 military planes from Embraer, the Brazilian aircraft manufacturer.
羅瑟夫下月訪美，排定四月九日與美國總統歐巴馬會談。此行未若中國、印度及墨西哥總統（或國家主席）般獲得「國是訪問」待遇，令巴西人感到憤怒。國是訪問通常包括讓到訪國領袖在美國國會發表演說，以及在白宮設國宴款待。而最近美國空軍取消與巴西飛機製造商「巴西航空工業公司」一紙3億5500萬美元的20架軍機購買合約，也讓巴西人失望。

On the American side, unease persists at Rousseff’s coziness with Cuba (in part a hangover from leftist days) and Brazil’s cordial relations with Iran.
就美方而言，羅瑟夫與古巴安然相處（這有部分屬左傾年代的遺緒）以及巴西與伊朗交好，都仍令美國不安。

I think it’s a mistake to have slighted Rousseff, even if the White House has tried to insist state visits in an election year are not done. America needs a close Brazilian partnership not only to help revive global economic growth but also for its energy needs and for precisely the difficult diplomatic dilemmas presented by the likes of Iran. Brazil’s global heft is growing, but it does not carry the baggage of the United States or Europe, and can be a useful intermediary in negotiations with powers that still bear grudges over Western imperial intervention. Nobody in Iran has forgotten the American-British coup of 1953.
我認為怠慢羅瑟夫錯了，雖然白宮堅稱選舉年不安排國是訪問。美國需與巴西締結緊密的夥伴關係，這不只有助於提振全球經濟，也能解決美國的能源需求，並正好因應伊朗之類國家帶來的兩難外交局面。巴西全球重要性日增，卻未背負美國與歐洲的包袱，在與對西方帝國主義干預仍懷恨在心的強國折衝時，可以扮演有用的中人。伊朗人忘不了1953年美英聯手在該國策動政變。

In 1950, a European had to look west. In 2012, there is much to be said for an American to look south to a power that will help define the 21st century.
1950年，歐洲人必須向西看。2012年，美國人實在應該放眼南方，注視那個將為21世紀定調的強國。

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2012-03-27聯合報/G5版/UNITEDDAILYNEWS 馮克芸譯 原文參見紐時週報二版左