摘自《复兴美国》、《格林伯格地缘经济研究中心》和《资本主义的未来》
詹姆斯·K·加尔布雷斯：美国主导的全球金融资本主义能否生存？
https://www.cfr.org/blog/james-k-galbraith-can-american-led-global-financial-capitalism-survive
人们对美国主导的经济和地缘政治秩序的信任正在逐渐消退。俄罗斯入侵乌克兰以及美国对此作出的反应，无论其优点如何，都可能是压垮美元储备体系全球垄断的最后一根稻草。
布鲁塞尔 G7 峰会布鲁塞尔 G7 峰会 Pool New/ Reuters
Roger W. Ferguson Jr. 和 James K. Galbraith 的博客文章，2022 年 5 月 3 日
作为外交关系委员会 (CFR) 未来资本主义项目的一部分，Roger W. Ferguson Jr. 邀请来自学术界、私营部门和政府的各类参与者撰写一系列博客文章，以提供有关世界各地实践中不同类型的资本主义、这些系统面临的挑战及其在 21 世纪的未来的观点。这篇文章来自 1980 年代初美国国会联合经济委员会执行主任 James K. Galbraith。他还在 1990 年代中期担任中华人民共和国国家计划委员会宏观经济改革首席技术顾问。加尔布雷斯教授目前是德克萨斯大学奥斯汀分校林登·约翰逊公共事务学院政府/商业关系系的 Lloyd M. Bentsen, Jr. 教授。
“资本主义能否生存？”这是伟大的经济学家和政治反动派约瑟夫·熊彼特在 1942 年提出的问题。他的回答是否定的，但为时过早。
1989 年，我出版了我的第一本书，除了一个有先见之明的副标题“技术、金融和美国的未来”以及新兴全球劳动分工的粗略层次结构外，这本书没有什么特别之处：先进技术强国、中等制造强国和资源型经济体。
历史上的美国兼具这三个层次，最初是英国工厂的棉花供应商，发展成为工业强国，并在 20 世纪中叶成为主导的金融和技术强国。在我父亲的世界里，在强大的工会和监管福利国家的制衡下，伟大的美国工业公司在布雷顿森林体系和原子弹的全球保护伞下整合了技术、金融、生产和资源。
但在 20 世纪 60 年代、70 年代和 80 年代，这一综合地位逐渐减弱，部分原因是企业与劳工、金融与工业的政治斗争以及越南战争，部分原因是老龄化、过时以及德国、日本、后来的韩国和最后的中国的复苏和崛起。在这些国家中，加尔布雷斯的工业公司继续成为进步的工具和引擎。但在美国，劳工全面失败，金融和美元获胜，“股东价值”大获全胜——随之而来的是工业中心地带的衰落。
当时，我在联合经济委员会的前线任职，反对里根总统和当时的美联储主席保罗沃尔克的政策。但后来，随着冷战的结束，我认为他们强行建立的世界也许会成功。如果不是因为布什、克林顿、小布什和奥巴马总统的傲慢和暴力，以及我们金融领袖的自由主义幻想，世界也许会成功。
当时，我希望建立一个共生的一体化世界体系，由美国提供军事安全、流动的稳定金融储备资产、由全球人才组成的新技术孵化器，以及全球需求的很大一部分，实现亚当·斯密的原则“劳动分工受市场范围限制”。另一个必要条件是全球信任美国的地位是通过明智的管理赢得的——通过和平世界中的全球凯恩斯主义。
自 20 世纪 90 年代初以来，人们对美国作为世界安全保障者的信任已经逐渐减弱。我们在后苏联俄罗斯的掠夺、对贝尔格莱德的轰炸、阿富汗的长期溃败、伊拉克、利比亚、叙利亚和也门的破坏和政策失败，以及——是的——2014 年乌克兰的政变都发挥了作用。还有我们对中国在台湾、香港、新疆的“前瞻性战略”。无论优劣如何，在这些问题上，牛顿定律都适用：行动引发反应。
2020 年，疫情暴露了全球供应链的脆弱性，首先是中断生产，然后是堵塞分销渠道，影响航运、半导体、汽车，而油价先是暴跌，然后反弹，引发通胀。然而，尽管金融管制过度放松，导致 2007-2009 年全球崩溃，但美元储备体系幸存了下来。甚至很明显，欧元、英镑和瑞士法郎
我依靠美联储的互换额度来维持其稳定。
现在我们进入最后一幕。它的前奏是中国和俄罗斯的崛起，经历了三个阶段，中国用了四十年的时间从??贫穷走向强大，俄罗斯用了二十五年的时间从??资产剥离、去工业化、非军事化、恶性通货膨胀、人口崩溃和资本外逃中恢复过来。美国领导人在一定程度上理解了这些发展——至于俄罗斯，人们可能对此表示怀疑——他们将其视为威胁。对威胁的认知导致了……对威胁的认知。所以今天，我们有了一场战争。
美国对这场战争的反应必然是金融方面的。正如拜登总统所说，没有严肃的军事选择。因此，美国制裁寡头，切断俄罗斯银行，冻结俄罗斯央行资产，而西方公司则逃离该国。对寡头的制裁假定他们仍然享有叶利钦统治时期的影响力，但事实并非如此。其他制裁旨在通过平民人口来损害俄罗斯，这是一种令人厌恶的做法。但世界已经改变。对俄罗斯经济的实际影响很小。另一方面，对欧洲来说，他们冒着灾难的风险，很明显，在我写这篇文章的时候，德国、奥地利、匈牙利和斯洛伐克已经退缩了。需要区分的是天然气和空谈。
与此同时，美元储备体系现在已经失去了全球垄断地位。这场战争开始才两个月，美国世界权力的一大支柱——一个以各种形式屹立了一个世纪的支柱——已经不再孤军奋战。一个非美元、非欧元的贸易区已经诞生。中国是这两个体系的新关键。印度将在这两个体系中发挥作用。德国及其欧洲邻国也将如此，不管喜欢与否。从全球资本主义的角度来看，我们已经进入了多极世界。美国的外交政策制定者以创纪录的速度创造了这个世界。
From Renewing America, Greenberg Center for Geoeconomic Studies, and The Future of Capitalism
James K. Galbraith: Can American-led Global Financial Capitalism Survive?
https://www.cfr.org/blog/james-k-galbraith-can-american-led-global-financial-capitalism-survive
Trust in the U.S.-led economic and geopolitical order has been eroding. The Russian invasion of Ukraine and the U.S. response to it, whatever its merits, may be the last straw for the global monopoly of the dollar-reserve system.
G7 summit in Brussels Pool New/ Reuters
“Can Capitalism Survive?” was the question posed in 1942 by Joseph Schumpeter, a great economist and political reactionary. His answer was negative, but premature.
In 1989 I published my first book, unmemorable except for a prescient subtitle “Technology, Finance and the American Future,” and a rough hierarchy of the emerging global division of labor: Advanced Technological Powers, Intermediate Manufacturing Powers, and Resource-Based Economies.
The historical United States laminated all three layers, beginning as supplier of cotton to British mills, progressing to industrial strength and emerging in the mid-twentieth century as the dominant financial and technological power. In my father's world, the great American industrial corporation, countervailed by strong unions and a regulatory welfare state, integrated technology, finance, production and resources, under the global umbrella of Bretton Woods and the atomic bomb.
But through the 1960s, 70s, and 80s this comprehensive position eroded, partly from the political struggle of business against labor, finance against industry, and the Vietnam war – and partly from aging, obsolescence, and the recovery and rise of Germany, Japan, later Korea, and finally China. In each of these, the Galbraithian industrial firm continued to be the tool and engine of advance. But in the United States there was a comprehensive defeat of labor, a victory for finance and the dollar, the triumph of “shareholder value”—and a consequent decline of the industrial heartland.
At the time, from my post on the front lines at the Joint Economic Committee, I opposed the policies of President Reagan and Paul Volcker, the then-chair of the Federal Reserve. But I thought afterwards, as the Cold War ended, that the world they forced into being might have succeeded. It might have, but for the arrogance and violence of Presidents Bush, Clinton, Bush Jr., and Obama, and for the libertarian fantasies of our financial leaders.
I hoped, back then, that a symbiotic, integrated world system might be made to work, with the United States providing military security, a liquid and stable financial reserve asset, incubators for new technologies staffed by worldwide talent, and also a large share of global demand, realizing Adam Smith's principle that “the division of labor is limited by the extent of the market.” The other requisite was global confidence that the privileges of the American position were earned by a wise stewardship—by a global Keynesianism in a peaceful world.
Trust in the United States as a guarantor of world security has eroded since the early 1990s. Our predations in post-Soviet Russia, the bombing of Belgrade, the long debacle in Afghanistan, the destruction of and policy failures in Iraq, Libya, Syria, and Yemen, and—yes—the 2014 coup in Ukraine all played a role. Also our “forward strategy” toward China, over Taiwan, Hong Kong, Xinjiang. Irrespective of merits, in these matters a Newton's Law applies: actions beget reactions.
In 2020 the pandemic exposed the fragility of the global supply chain, first by interrupting production, then by clogging distribution channels, with effects on shipping, semiconductors, automobiles, while oil prices first slumped and then rebounded, generating inflation. Yet through it all, and despite abusive deregulation of finance, leading to global crash in 2007-2009, the dollar-reserve system survived. It even became clear that the euro, the pound, and the Swiss franc all depend for their stability on swap lines from the Federal Reserve.
We come now to the final act. Its prelude is the rise of China and Russia, in tandem, through all the three stages, from poverty to power over forty years in China's case and in the case of Russia back from asset-stripping, deindustrialization, demilitarization, hyperinflation, demographic collapse, and capital flight in twenty-five years. To the extent that America's leaders understood these developments—and with respect to Russia one may doubt it—they saw them as threats. The perception of threat begets... the perception of threat. And so today, we have a war.
The U.S. response to that war is necessarily financial. There is no serious military option, as President Biden has stated. Therefore the U.S. sanctions oligarchs, cuts off Russian banks, and freezes Russian central bank assets, while Western firms flee the country. The sanctions on oligarchs presuppose they still enjoy the influence they wielded under Yeltsin, which they do not. The other sanctions aim to damage Russia through its civilian population, a repellent practice. But the world has changed. The actual effects on Russia's economy are minor. Against Europe on the other hand they risk catastrophe, so clearly that already, as I write, Germany, Austria, Hungary and Slovakia are backing down. The distinction to draw, is that between natural gas and hot air.
And meanwhile, the dollar-reserve system has now lost its global monopoly. It's been just a two months since the start of this war, and already one great remaining pillar of American world power—a pillar that has stood for a century in various forms—no longer stands alone. A non-dollar, non-euro trading region has been born. China is the new linchpin of both systems. India will play in both. And so will Germany and its neighbors in Europe, like it or don't. From the standpoint of global capitalism, we have already entered the multipolar world. The foreign policy makers of the United States have created it—in record time.
