封闭是进步的大敌Only closed systems can hold us back

I sincerely hope not – because globalisation is the quickest way to reduce income inequality and raise living standards globally. This year it will get a bad rap from people who fear that more winners in poorer nations turn richer countries into losers. But these caricatures from traditional manufacturers and farmers assume trade and globalisation are zero-sum games.

我衷心希望不会——因为全球化是全球减轻收入不平等和提高生活水平的最快途径。今年，那些唯恐穷国中涌现更多赢家将使富国沦为输家的人士将对全球化大加挞伐。然而，传统制造业者和农场主们歪曲全球化的言论却假设贸易和全球化是“零和游戏”。

The evidence suggests otherwise. As access to goods, markets and new technology increases, so does opportunity. The internet, the ultimate globalising force, has made the world’s collective knowledge more accessible than at any time in our history. Pupils who previously had no books can now read online; people who had no bank accounts can do business on mobile phones; and automated translation tools let Russian and American scientists collaborate in real-time on vaccines.

事实不然。随着获得商品、进入市场和新技术的途径增多，机会也在增多。互联网——推动全球化的终极力量——已使得全球集体知识的可获得性超过了史上任何时候。昔日没有书本的小学生如今可以在网上阅读；昔日连银行账户都没有的人如今可以通过手机做生意；得益于自动翻译工具，俄罗斯和美国的科学家可以开展疫苗方面的实时合作。

More than that, however, globalisation has already seen 2bn people move into a middle-class lifestyle, meaning a greater population than ever before has a stake in future global growth. It is happening quickly, too, in contrast to previous centuries when wealth slowly trickled down from the richest countries to the poorest. With technology, such change can happen as soon as people are hooked up to the web, creating instant participants in a knowledge economy previously thought to be reserved only for the richest and best-educated nations.

何止如此，全球化还使20亿人享受上了中产阶层的生活方式，意味着与未来全球发展利益攸关的人口超过了以往任何时候。而且，与以往相比，这个变化的过程非常迅速。多少世纪以来，财富只能缓慢地从最富裕国家渗透到最贫穷国家。而如今借助于科技，只要人们一联通上网络，这样的变化瞬息就能完成——人们即刻就能融入以往人们以为只属于最富裕和教育最发达国家的知识经济之中。

History has shown a correlation between the amount of information available to the average citizen and economic growth. There are smart people everywhere, and the more they can share ideas the easier it will be to find the building blocks of a new economic life. So while I plead guilty to being a shameless optimist, it’s an optimism born from facts.

历史已经证明，普通公民可以获得的信息量与经济增长之间存在正相关性。世界各地都不乏有识之士，他们越是能共享思想，找到建设新经济生活所需的砖瓦就越容易。所以，虽然我承认自己是个不以为耻的乐观主义者，但上述乐观思想却是源自于事实。

In this global era our real enemies are inflexibility, proprietary systems and “walled gardens” that let the elite in but leave the rest out. Governments around the world will continue to raise barriers to growth in 2011. But this only means we must work harder to maintain the free flow of information, promote new trade agreements and uphold the openness of the internet.

在这个全球化时代，我们真正的敌人是顽固不化、独占体制，以及只准精英通行、将其余人等拒之门外的“有围墙的花园”。2011年，世界各国政府将继续加筑阻碍发展的壁垒。面对这种形势，我们唯有加倍努力，维护信息自由的流动，推动达成新的贸易协议，并支持互联网的开放。

Such openness to divergent points of view is critical to the process of discovery and invention. That’s how the printing press transformed Europe in the 15th century, and how succeeding generations of media transformed the world from then on. So let’s not spend 2011 fretting about whether the wave of globalisation should be reversed. It shouldn’t. Instead let us build the next economy – one based on education, sharing information, adapting technology to work with many cultures, and constant exposure to new ideas – giving everyone access to the opportunities currently enjoyed by the few.

这种对不同观点的包容态度，对于发现和发明进程至关重要。15世纪印刷媒体改变欧洲，以及其后数代媒体改变整个世界，都源于此。因此，在2011年，我们不要忧心于全球化浪潮是否应逆转。当然不应该。相反，让我们建设一种基于以下各项条件的崭新经济：教育、信息共享、使技术适于不同文化间的协作，以及让人们能够立刻获知新思想——让人人得享当前只为少数人享有的机会。

The writer is chairman and chief executive of Google

本文作者系谷歌(Google)董事长兼首席执行官