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How the Elites Lost Their Grip
精英如何丧失了掌控地位
In 2019 America's 1% behaved badly—and helped bring about a reckoning with capitalism.
2019年，美国1%的精英阶层表现不佳——甚至引发了民众对资本主义的重新审视。
By Anand Giridharadas
文/阿南德·吉里达达斯
On march 29, 2003, at a wedding reception in the Harvard Faculty Club,
2003年3月29日，在哈佛大学教师俱乐部举行的一场婚宴上，
Lawrence W. Reed gave a toast in honor of the friend whom he was serving as best man—one Joseph P. Overton.
身为伴郎的劳伦斯·W·里德向他的新郎朋友，一位名叫约瑟夫·P·奥弗顿的男子祝酒。
Overton had worked at Dow Chemical;
奥弗顿曾在陶氏化学工作，
he had since become an executive at a free-market, small-government think tank in central Michigan.
后来，他去了密歇根州中部某主张自由市场、小规模政府智库做了一名高管。
Among his duties at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy was raising money,
在麦基纳克公共政策中心，他的工作内容包括筹集资金，
and in doing so, he had made a brochure that would become his legacy.
而就在筹集资金的过程中，他收集了一本小册子，一本后来成了他留给世人的遗产的小册子。
Overton was trying to describe the role of think tanks in a society,
奥弗顿试图对智囊团在一个社会中扮演的角色加以描述，
and he posited an idea that would come to be called the Overton window.
为此他提出了一个理论，这个理论就是后来的“奥弗顿之窗”。
In a given society, at a given moment, there is a range of policies politically acceptable to the mainstream.
该理论认为，在一个特定的社会，特定的时刻，政治上能被主流社会接受的政策其实是有一个范围的。
(A 70% top tax rate and a 20% top tax rate are both within this window in America today; abolishing taxes is not.)
(就比如，在当今美国，20%和70%的最高税率都在这个接受范围之内，取消税收则不在这个范围内。)
Generally, the theory went, politicians will only propose ideas that fall within the window.
该理论认为，政客们一般只会提位于这个范围内的建议。
It falls to think tanks (and others) to propose unpopular things outside of the window
提不在这个范围内也不受欢迎的建议，
in the hope of shifting the window and making the previously unthinkable achievable.
以期对这个范围做出调整，让之前连想都不敢想的事情成为可能是智库（及其他人）的责任。
Overton was an ardent libertarian who pushed ideas like school choice—
奥弗顿是一位充满激情的自由论者，择校等想法就是他提出来的——
and, according to Reed's wedding toast, he had on occasion resorted to more extreme methods of moving the window of the possible,
而且，里德在婚礼祝酒词中提到，他有时会采取更为极端的办法调整上述接受范围，
"including the time," Reed recounted that day,
“就比如那次，”里德回忆说，
"we flew in a Cessna 172 in broad daylight at treetop level 150 miles into war-torn Mozambique
“我们在光天化日之下坐着塞斯纳172型飞机擦着树梢飞往战火纷飞的莫桑比克境内距离边境线150英里（241km)的地方，
to assist armed rebels fighting the Marxist regime there."
去协助武装叛军与当地的马克思主义政权斗争那次。”
Overton died just weeks after his wedding.
奥弗顿新婚不到几周便离开了人世。
Were Overton still alive, he would be pushing 60—
如果他还活着，现在应该已近花甲之年了——
and might be aghast to learn that his "window," having become famous after his death,
他提出的“窗口”论帮他赢得了身后名，如今，这一理论已经被用来形容
is now invoked to describe America's great, unlikely backlash against the system he defended so ardently: capitalism.
美国对他曾经热心捍卫的资本主义体制发起的强烈抵制了（这样的事原本根本不可能发生），若得知此事，他估计会大感错愕。
A democratic socialist—Bernie Sanders—is among the top contenders to be the next Democratic nominee for U.S. President.
民主社会主义者伯尼·桑德斯是下一任民主党总统候选人的头号竞争者之一。
His rival and fellow Senator, Elizabeth Warren, is also among the top tier of candidates,
他的竞争对手、参议员伊丽莎白·沃伦也是第一梯队的候选人之一，
declaring herself a capitalist who wishes to transform American capitalism as we know it,
沃伦宣称自己是一名希望通过征收财产税，实施绿色新政，
with a wealth tax, a Green New Deal and the elimination of private health insurance.
取消私人医疗保险等举措改变美国资本主义现状的资本家。
A more centrist candidate, Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Ind., illustrated the shifting winds when he recently declared
最近，比沃伦更中间派的候选人，印第安纳州南本德市市长皮特·巴蒂吉格宣称，
that "neoliberalism is the political-economic consensus that has governed the last 40 years of policy in the U.S. and U.K.
“新自由主义是过去40年来一直主宰着美国政策和英国政策的政治-经济共识。
Its failure helped to produce the Trump moment.
其失败帮助推动了特朗普时代的到来。
Now we have to replace it with something better."
现在我们必须用更好的思想来取代它。”
译文由可可原创，仅供学习交流使用，未经许可请勿转载。
