與馬總統會面的倫敦政經學院教授談話記要 - 宜蘭

特別注意這篇文章的中文有參雜作者的個人意見，以原文為主

1.媒體來源:
天下雜誌 「獨立評論@天下」特派員

2.完整新聞標題/內文:

【英國特派員】林孟潔：服貿協議的草率令人震驚──剛與馬總統會面的倫敦政經學院教
授Christopher Hughes談話記要

三月二十號禮拜四，倫敦時間上午十一點半，倫敦政治經濟學院國際關係系館
Christopher Hughes教授的研究室裡，他手上拿著兩個禮拜前在台灣和馬英九總統的合照
，照片裡他笑得有點窘，因為好像大家都不太願意跟總統握手，結果最後只好把他推向前
去。

Christopher Hughes教授十分猶豫到底應不應該把這張照片上傳到個人網頁。他的研究興
趣聚焦於中國外交政策、兩岸關係與國族認同，每年都會飛到東亞待一段時間做研究。禮
拜四是他固定的OFFICE HOURS，本周正逢台灣服貿抗爭風波，作為研究兩岸關係、剛與馬
總統會面的英國政治學者，他對此表達了觀察與想法。

以下為Christopher Hughes教授的談話記要：

去年夏天我受邀至台灣的政府部門討論服貿協議，為其草率感到相當震驚，因為許多涉及
重要且敏感的部門並沒有經過審慎的調查與評估，政府並沒有更仔細的檢視這個協議一旦
通過所帶來經濟上隱含的意義和後果。

這讓我想起了ECFA。台灣的問題其實並不完全如政府所說的是在經濟上，而是馬政府從以
前到現在所指稱的，如果不簽經濟協定，台灣就會落後南韓，這並不是全部的事實。馬政
府從未真正提出一個對策和足以服人的論點來說服人民。

這些如果不簽就會導致失去競爭力的說法，其實只是讓政府找到藉口轉移注意力，不去正
視問題的核心──台灣真正的問題是在國內的產業結構與財經部門並沒有很好的運作，亦
缺乏對研發與創新部門的投資。當台灣的企業在過去很輕易的就得以登陸使用他們廉價的
勞工和土地等，那長期下來其實並不太可能提供台灣自身產業創新的誘因，台灣正逐漸失
去在科技和創新產業上所掌握的技術。其實台灣並不是沒有優勢，只是政府應該正視並對
國內產業結構與整體環境進行調整，提出實際應對的政策。

馬政府上台後更加深對中國的經濟依賴，而不去考量到台灣的其他可能性，例如，更加強
與歐盟或美國的經貿合作，或者把台灣放入全球化的脈絡來思考其他的可能性。唯一強調
的就是中國。所以現在的服貿協議，必須要問的問題是，到底為什麼需要這個，台灣真的
需要嗎？誰會從中獲益？誰是贏家誰是輸家？這又牽涉到政治層面的問題，到底服貿協議
隱含了怎樣的政治意涵。當台灣過度依賴中國這個經濟體，後果將會從經濟層面滲透到政
治與社會，包含媒體、學術自由等。台灣有沒有可能變成第二個香港？

馬政府一廂情願地認為，只要我們對中國好，他們就會對我們好。然而事實上卻不是這個
樣子。不可能將經濟政策的影響與政治上的影響切割開來，因為中國很顯然地就是在使用
它的經濟影響力去達成它的政治目的，這是個公開的政策而非秘密。但問題在於，台灣如
何去面對？你不可能假裝經濟歸經濟政治歸政治，兩者不相互影響，北京不是這樣想的。
對他們而言，政治和經濟是同一件事。

台灣仍然有機會在中國的干預下與其他國家仍然有所連結，然而馬政府連嘗試都不願意。
如果你看他的政策，其實很多源自2005年連戰胡錦濤會面時的討論框架。在2008年馬的競
選中他單單聚焦於兩岸關係，事實上，對一個國家而言，這絕非真正的外交政策。經濟合
作並非解決所有問題的萬靈丹。他總是認為，只要和北京保持良好經濟關係，取得其信任
，那就可以漸漸爭取到更多在國際上發言的空間，但事實上這兩件事情並沒有關聯，永遠
不可能知道北京是怎麼想的。

貿易並不是對於一個國家的生存而言唯一重要的事情。一個國家還需要良好運作的政治系
統，台灣的民主化尚未完成，憲政秩序也一團糟。因於政黨在競選過程中募資能力的不同
，選舉雖說是自由的，但並非公平。台灣的民主政治還有很多尚待解決的問題，單單是可
以自由選舉、投票並非真正的民主，任何的民主政治系統都需要持續性的改革。

至於在社會現狀的層次，我不認為一個真正體質健全的社會是你永遠超時工作，非常有效
率有生產力，認真讀書通過考試，但關心政治是不被允許的，當人們不太關心自己所身處
的社會時，例如在中國，那並不是一個真正完善的公民社會。或許它表面上看起來是個很
強大的社會，但事實上並不然。台灣近幾年達成了一個公民社會的共識，是民主化的過程
讓台灣社會有達致這種社會共識的能力。

台灣錢淹腳目的年代已經不復存在，1980-90年代有一段時間我人在台灣，甚至連我這樣
的局外人，都得以在當時高度經濟發展的台灣社會分一杯羹。每天每天人們變的更加富有
，而那個在過去的台灣，經濟高速成長的時代是現在中國正在經歷的。台灣早已過了那樣
的高速經濟發展階段，不可能再重返。然而，必須注意的是，在追求經濟發展的同時，執
政者不能只將政策聚焦於經濟成長本身，而必須注意許多層次，所有可以讓生活變得更好
的地方：服務業、旅遊、藝術、文化等產業，凡舉此些具備創造性(creative industry)
的產業，需要政府去經營一個良好的環境，吸引真正有創新能力的人才，必須要有自由的
環境，可以不斷的嘗試錯誤和失敗，之後才能有機會成功而達致創新，創新才是讓經濟向
前的核心動力。這是美國所提供的環境。

但中國並不是這樣的地方，你能夠數出多少真正具有原創性和創新的產品／技術是完全源
自中國？中國擅長的地方，是吸引外資，以及量產(非原創性)商品，研究發展部門
(Research and Development)是羸弱的，雖然在近些年有好轉，但仍然遠遠不及美國、日
本與歐洲。但好的人才、有能力創新的人才，大部分都不願意留在中國，他們都去了別的
地方。為什麼要留在中國？很重要的一點是，對於那些有創新能力的人才而言，他們甚至
不能夠自由的呼吸。媒體、言論、民主等自由是不可能置外於追求經濟創新的整體環境的
。例如，科學家也不是總是待在實驗室裡，晚上他們可能會想去散步、去看戲去聽音樂會
、呼吸新鮮空氣，希望他們的孩子在安全的環境下長大。並不是單單把錢砸在研究機構裡
就可以。中國砸了多少錢在研發創新部門但卻不能夠達致相對應的成效，關鍵便是肇因於
此。

台灣是在亞洲最適合居住的城市之一，很多從事商業或外交等的外國人，或具備創新能動
性的外國人才，會十分傾向留在台灣。然而，我並看不出來馬政府有任何更具體的策略去
營造把人才留在台灣的環境。

在台灣另一個令人憂心的問題是嚴重的藍綠惡鬥。在美國，縱然民主黨與共和黨視對方為
競爭對手，但仍然是可以相互溝通甚至握手言和的。因其歷史淵源，或許民進黨仇視國民
黨是比較可以理解的，但雙方依舊是為了反對而反對。李登輝時代降低了兩黨間的分歧，
推動憲政改革，發展出基本的共識。據我所知中國和部分國民黨人士並不喜歡他。但如果
仔細評估李登輝時代所替台灣做到的許多事情，是不可以輕忽其貢獻的。

民進黨的問題在於它深陷於過去的歷史，沉浸在80、90年代的民主運動的氛圍和脈絡裡，
那很重要沒有錯，但我並不清楚，那些沉重的過去對你們這個世代到底有多重要，年輕的
世代與上個世代並不同，你們並沒有活過那樣的年代，你們思考更現實的問題，關於如何
找到工作、獲得多少薪水、或者追求自己生存的基本保障等。如果檢視民進黨的權力結構
，很大一部分仍然為五六十歲的人所掌控，糾葛於自身過去的歷史與記憶。民進黨需要更
多年輕世代真正進入權力結構的中心，它需要改變，需要往前走而非總是糾纏在過去的民
主運動史的記憶與經驗之中。

全世界的民主國家都正在面臨一個問題：年輕人並不關心政治。這也是為什麼在許多國家
選舉時，候選人偏好提出利於老年的政策和預算偏向，因為他們知道，年輕人不投票，再
爭取也只是枉然。年輕世代應該尋求更大程度的政治參與，民進黨需要年輕世代的意見，
國民黨也同樣需要年輕人的參與，以擺脫其中許多根深蒂固的中國國族主義的影響。政黨
政治的循環是這樣，以英國為例，在1997年工黨勝選以前，保守黨執政了十八年，有可能
十五到二十年權力皆為同一個政黨所掌控，這並不是罕見的現象，輪替是一個痛苦的過程
，會迫使一個政黨仔細檢視它在政策運作、領導權力結構上的缺失。在下一次選舉時再尋
求改進。

台灣的問題在於，無法置外於中國因素(china factor)的影響，它扭曲了正常的政黨政治
和民主程序。在政黨政治較為良好運作的國家，我們可以確信，就算一黨掌握了相當長時
間的政治權力，總有一天，它若不夠兢兢業業，必然會有失勢的一天。然而，時間的優勢
並不在台灣這一邊，台灣並沒有這樣的奢侈可以想要擁有多少時間就擁有多少時間去妥善
處理中國因素。政府又提不出一個更具體的方案來妥善處理現況。民主要良好的運作對台
灣而言是艱難的，因為中國因素過份地影響了台灣的政黨政治。需要非常有創造力的思考
和應對，才能尋求新的出路和可能。然而現在的政府看起來是全然地放棄，根本毫無任何
的策略可言。

誰知道台灣的下一個世代會變得怎麼樣？

更好或更壞，這就交給年輕世代來處理和面對。

這秩序繽紛的世界／就留給你整理。

（作者為台大歷史系／政治系四年級 英國倫敦政經學院訪問學生；英文逐字稿部分由台
大外文系四年級／現為德國杜賓根大學訪問學生林欣蓓整理）

－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－－

★　英文原文內容逐字稿

I couldn’t recall the detail of the conference I attended in Taiwan last
year, but I remember that there was this big discussion about ECFA. I was
quite skeptical about ECFA. Was it necessary? Why do you even need ECFA,
really? Even if you look at KMT, the impact on GDP is relatively small, much
smaller than predictions. And there are a lot of political arguments made
about it. There are a lot political than economic I think, both sides, for
and against. For the Ma administration, they had to show some progress on the
cross-strait relations to get some support from Beijing. The arguments they
made were that we have to compete with South Korea. This is not really an
argument. If you’re competing with South Korea, it’s hopefully
high-technology. Now that is already covered by WTO.

The big problem for Taiwan is not economic. I’m not an economist, but I
speak in an economic sense. I’m not from Taiwan, you know…you know more
about Taiwan. The problem is domestic, the structure of Taiwanese industry,
the business practices, and financial sectors. The fact that it’s very easy
for Taiwanese businesses is to use cheap labor and land in China. It means
that there’s no incentive to upgrade Taiwanese industry, so the more
businesses in China, the less incentive to actually restructure Taiwan’s own
domestic industry. And so essentially, Taiwan is losing its technology now,
very little, in terms of new developments in products. And you have a lot of
advantages in the language and so on. It’s much easier for Taiwanese
businesses to work in China, much easier than South Korea.

So the argument they hold, you know, that the South Korea got this trade
agreement with China. If we don’t have one we’d be frozen up. I don’t
think these arguments really stand up, they’re more political. That was one
of the big arguments Ma’s administration made over ECFA constantly. And
during the election in 2008, it was a big part of Ma’s campaign that South
Korea signed FTA with China, and have much easier access to China’s market
and we’ll be frozen up from south east Asia. I don’t think it’s really
economical thought, it’s much more political. It diverts the real attention
away from the real problems, which is Taiwan itself. Domestics, manufacture,
R&D. Also the financial sectors were still not properly reformed.

I think if you look at those issues, Taiwan has had a lot of advantages.
Still, with china, the economy. Going back to… it wasn’t KMT who started,
it was DPP. They speak open a lot to Chinese mainland economy. That was very
easy. I mean it couldn’t go wrong, even I could run a business like that, I
guess. So In some ways, it was good for Taiwan’s economy, but it was a bit
too easy. It made Taiwan’s economy become very dependent on China. Not
enough effort was put into the global aspect, with the EU, with the US. And
all its attention is China, China, China. And that led to dependency,
distortion, in economy.

So now the trade services agreement. You have to ask what is the need for
this, who is going to really benefit from this? So who are the winners and
losers? But it also deliberates political issues… what are the political
implications for Taiwan. We’re all looking at Hong Kong, of course. And you
can see there, what happens when you become dependent on Chinese economy. And
it’s used for political leverage. To press freedom, to control the media,
the academic freedom… all of these things are reflected by this huge
economical leverage.

Q: Might Taiwan be the next Hong Kong after the Service Agreement is passed?

I would imagine that’s why those students are upset or worried. And I think
there are a lot of good reasons for that, and it’s up to the government of
Taiwan to ensure that it’s done properly with the safe guards. And I don’t
think there’s any trust in Ma’s administration. I mean, what’s their
intention? What does Ma really want? Group of advisors were around him.

The Agreement hasn’t passed (when I was in Taiwan), but it was being
discussed last year. I go every year to Taiwan to do some research, to China
as well, to see both sides.

You can’t separate economic influence from political influence because china
’s policy is clearly to use economic influence for its political purposes. It
’s China’s official policy to use economic influence to achieve
unification. That’s an open public policy, there’s no secret about that. So
there’s no separation. The question there is: how does Taiwan deal with
that? Do you pretend, “oh there’s a separation, that these are purely
pragmatic economic matters, we can separate it from politics.” You can’t
state that. That’s not how they see it in Beijing at all. For them,
economics and politics are the same thing. It goes back a long way for the
Chinese communist party.

Q: Is the connection with other nations apart from China possible?

I think it’s possible, and it’s worth a try, but Ma’s administration hasn’
t even tried it. Their policy all along… if you look at Ma’s policy, which
really goes back to 2005, 胡連會, where they had the agreement. That’s
really where this situation comes from. Ma’s policy in 2008, where he ran
for the presidency, purely focused on the cross-strait relations. There was
not really any foreign policy. There was only one page, you know, something…
we’ll do something with America… but it was really nothing. If we can just
get cross-strait relation right, that economic integration, would solve all
out. And that’s what they thought it, and voted it… to give it a try. The
idea was that if we have these good economic relations, we would build up
trust with Beijing, then we will somehow gradually get more international
space, but it was never explained how it worked or why would Beijing want to
do this. It was really built on trust from the 胡連會.

Well, you know a lot of people believe that, and it may have worked in a
short term to release some pressure on Taiwan. But it’s not a long-term
strategy. It lacks a foreign policy, it lacks defence policy… there’s no
real, I mean, where is the diplomacy? I mean, if you’re in London, what does
the Taiwan office (台灣代表處) do? They have meetings where they talk about
the Qing dynasty. Very interesting, they never mentioned Taiwan.

We all know the limits. The UK is not going to recognize Taiwan as a state, I
wish we would, but we are not going to because China will stop that. But there
’s a lot of grey area where in the past Taiwan was able to achieve quite a
lot international space, not diplomatic recognition but joining international
organizations. And often it did require some courageous diplomacy, but it
requires calling Beijing’s bluff. And Beijing would always threaten to go to
wars, but Taiwan didn’t back down at that time.

As cross-strait relations improved, there were also some more international
space. That was 李登輝’s strategy, back to 1990s. And 陳水扁, but they would
never trust him whatever he did. He did try that strategy, but they didn’t
trust him. But with Ma, when he came in 2008, he had a good opportunity
because whatever he did, he could have done a lot more, because the deep fear
of Beijing was that DPP comes back to power. He could have pushed forward
more in international space. He could have… he didn’t try. There was no
foreign policy. I think he lost the opportunity for Taiwan. He could have
come back to something like李登輝’s strategy. For the DPP, it is very
difficult because the Beijing government just won’t trust them because their
party committed to the independence of Taiwan. That may change the future,
and we don’t know what will happen in 2016. If Ma and KMT are working for
Taiwan’s interest, they’d been thinking in long-term, they’ll try to have
cross party consensus, domestic consensus, which should really focus on Taiwan
’s interests, but I don’t see that at all. I see a policy that only based
on one thing, which is keep DPP out, whatever that takes.

And another thing that worries me is that lots of people in KMT are really
Chinese nationalists. And their hearts are really toward China’s unification
and China. And they’re quite high up in KMT, and Ma could be one of them. So
that rouses another issue: what is their intention? Is he just incompetent?
That’s why he didn’t use his opportunity, or his intention is really to get
some sort of agreement with 習近平? Getting Nobel Prize for unification? The
conference I attended didn’t reflect the public opinions in Taiwan. People
from previous generation are still with this mindset. How influential are
they? I know there’re younger people who don’t like that… And the personal
links with China, and how much time they spent there, whom they talked to…
there’s a network as well. That is very China focused. That’s the product
of China’s policy since 1979.

What does Taiwan do to balance that? Under 李登輝and 陳水扁, they tried to
build democracy and constitutional reform, changing education system. This is
a good strategy, to solid the Taiwanese democratic system and its identity.
What does Ma do? Changing your textbooks’ facts, so you’re all Chinese!
Constitutional reform? Where’s the strategy? Apart from saying: “Let’s be
nice to China, they’ll be nice to us.” That’s not a strategy. He’s trying
to deal with the pragmatic issues, economic issues… but we leave the
political issues to the future. If you’re going to do that, you need a
balancing strategy. To release a much better foreign policy, domestic policy,
political policy, cultural policy, education policy, and defence policy. All
of those issues are a mess in Taiwan. Defence policy doesn’t exist. You’re
trying to develop volunteer services but it’s not working.

Trade is not the most important thing to national security. You need a well
function political system. Democratization in Taiwan is not finished in the
past 30 years. The constitution is a mess. The elections are free elections,
but they are not fair elections because of the party financing. While KMT has
sufficient wealth, DPP has very little. The last round of the political
reform in the sea boundary was very unsatisfactory. It’s almost impossible
for the DPP to win the elections. There are lots of problems still. Any
democratic system needs reform constantly. Taiwan has pretty serious problems
with the democratic system. Just to have votes and elections is not really
democracy, is it? It’s a very uneven play in Taiwan, if you look at the
party financing. Ultimately there’s the issue with the constitution because
it’s a constitution written for China, not for Taiwan. Obviously it’s hard
to change that, but it’s possible to find ways, like additional articles.
Every time there’s a change, like finance or presidential elections, China
threatens with attack but they didn’t.

As for the social situation, I don’t think it’s a strong society if
everyone has to work very hard all the time, to pass the exams, to try to be
productive and efficient but not allowed to do anything political at all.
This is not a strong society. It may look strong on the surface but it’s
very weak underneath. And Taiwan has a lot of strength building up its
society, this was the consensus until recently. And it’s a shame if your
generation feels that it’s making it weaker. I wouldn’t make judgment
myself, but you’re from Taiwan, you should judge. I was just saying you have
to be careful to make that judgment. I guess you could compare Taiwan with
the US, the people there are more lazy, and more wasteful. And they spend
even more time on politics, but they have very efficient economy, very
productive.

Taiwan is at a different stage of development. One of the big problem still
experience 1980s and 1990s. The economic growth very fast, just like in China
now, people felt richer and richer every week. No economy can carry on like
that for more than a period of time. Taiwan has passed that stage. What
Taiwan is focused on is the service sector, like tourism, art and culture.
And creative industry, which means also technology, and creating environment
in which brilliant young scientist can really have the freedom to innovate
and to make mistakes and do stupid things as well as things that are
successful. That’s what Americans do. And we try to do it here, but in China
it’s not like that.

How many inventions come from China? The one thing China is good at is
getting foreign investment and producing large quantity of goods, quite high
quality. Research and development is not good. It’s getting better but it’s
still nothing like the US and Japan or Europe. Anyone who is a great
scientist would immediately leave China and go somewhere else. First of all,
he can’t breathe. Media freedom, democracy all go together. Scientists are
human beings, too. They don’t always stay in the laboratory in the evening.
They might want to go to a play, some music, go for a walk and get some fresh
air. Children can grow up in a healthy environment. Beijing’s not like that.
No matter how much money China invests in R&D, there’s no result. Now Taiwan
is one of the best places to live in Asia. Any foreigner, businessmen,
diplomats, wants to live in Taiwan because of the safe environment. You don’
t have this communist party looking at you. Multi-nationalists prefer to live
in Taiwan for their R&B, and that’s what Taiwan needs to build.

DPP has not been in power since 2008, and it’s not normal, so they still
need to do a lot of work. The normal courses are distorted by the China
factor. The tide is not on Taiwan’s side. If one party is in power for a
long time, we can live with it. It’s not really healthy, but we can live
with it, you know, some of the other parties will come back in. In Taiwan,
with this China factor constantly distorting, one party is out for a long
time. It develops different kinds of problems, so that makes a difference. So
this is hard for Taiwanese democracy to function properly. The Chinese effect
distorts everything. It requires very creative thinking to change the
situation. Not going too far, but… not just giving in, and having no
strategy at all. It’s very unclear what Ma’s strategy is, where his heart
is, or what his intentions are, if he has any.

Perhaps you should be telling me what’s going on in Taiwan. You’re from
Taiwan. You know much about it than I do. And it’s about your generation.
What’s going to happen in your generation?



3.新聞連結:
http://opinion.cw.com.tw/blog/profile/187/article/1138





--