美国国家公共电台 NPR Beijing Is Pushing Hard To Influence U.S. Views Of China, Report Says

 

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

Russia is not the only country that tries to influence American democracy. A report out today says China's Communist Party tries too, and it has a lot of money to spend as it works to influence the U.S. government and society and economy. Here's NPR's Rob Schmitz.

ROB SCHMITZ, BYLINE¹: No, China's not trying to interfere² in our elections, not at least according to this report. But, says report co-chair Orville Schell, China's government is trying to interfere in several other sectors³ of American society.

ORVILLE SCHELL: It's much larger than simply business and trade. It now has expanded out to include things like philanthropy - large amounts of money given to universities, to think tanks, to NGOs from China. And very often, that money will come, not with any explicit⁴ prohibitions⁵, but with implicit⁶ ones that if you want to get more, don't say this, don't say that, be nice, et cetera.

SCHMITZ: The 200-page report was sponsored by Stanford University's Hoover Institution, The Annenberg Foundation Trust at Sunnylands and the Center on U.S.-China relations at the Asia Society in New York, which Schell directs. It's titled "Chinese Influence & American Interests." And it grew out of discussions with more than two dozen China experts - experts who had engaged with China for decades and who believe that as the relationship between the U.S. and China grew closer, their paths forward would gradually converge⁷ with China opening up.

SCHELL: But I think as Xi Jinping took office, the idea that we were actually diverging⁸, that China's political system - its values were not so much in transition as just there.

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SCHMITZ: This realization⁹ sunk in, says Schell, last March, when China's legislature altered the nation's constitution to eliminate term limits for leader Xi Jinping.

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PRESIDENT XI JINPING: (Speaking Chinese).

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SCHMITZ: Schell says doing away with term limits for Xi became a metaphor¹⁰ for his expansion of control and power both inside and outside China, firmly placing his country on a separate competing path with the United States. Schell's report examines eight different sectors in the U.S. that China's attempting to influence, from the U.S. Congress and local governments to universities and corporations. It examines the different agencies under the Chinese government that have led these efforts and how successful they've become at it. Schell says, after a year-and-a-half of research, he and his team came to an important conclusion.

SCHELL: That the relationship between the U.S. and China is not reciprocal - that the open society of the United States gets used for Chinese purposes in myriad¹¹ ways that are not available to Americans in China.

SCHMITZ: For example, the U.S. allows China's government to establish Confucius Institutes at more than a hundred American universities. China does not allow a similar arrangement. Chinese media is able to operate freely inside the U.S., while American media are severely¹² restricted inside of China. The same is true for businesses, think tanks, NGOs and research facilities. The Chinese always seem to enjoy more freedoms in the U.S. than the Americans do in China.

The report's solutions urge American government and society to be more transparent¹³ about their relationships with Chinese institutions. And when China limits the rights of American institutions in China, the U.S. should do the same to Chinese institutions on American soil. It also urges Americans to act with integrity when Chinese actors try to coerce¹⁴ them. As the report points out, openness and freedom are fundamental elements of American democracy and intrinsic strengths of the U.S. and its way of life - values that must be protected.

Rob Schmitz, NPR News, Shanghai.

1 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

2 interfere   

v.(in)干涉，干预；(with)妨碍，打扰

参考例句：

• If we interfere, it may do more harm than good.如果我们干预的话，可能弊多利少。
• When others interfere in the affair,it always makes troubles. 别人一卷入这一事件，棘手的事情就来了。

3 sectors   

n.部门( sector的名词复数 )；领域；防御地区；扇形

参考例句：

• Berlin was divided into four sectors after the war. 战后柏林分成了4 个区。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Industry and agriculture are the two important sectors of the national economy. 工业和农业是国民经济的两个重要部门。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

4 explicit   

adj.详述的，明确的；坦率的；显然的

参考例句：

• She was quite explicit about why she left.她对自己离去的原因直言不讳。
• He avoids the explicit answer to us.他避免给我们明确的回答。

5 prohibitions   

禁令，禁律( prohibition的名词复数 )； 禁酒； 禁例

参考例句：

• Nowadays NO PARKING is the most ubiquitous of prohibitions. 今天，“NO PARKING”（禁止停车），几乎成了到处可见的禁止用语了。
• Inappropriate, excessive or capricious administration of aversive stimulation has led to scandals, lawsuits and prohibitions. 不恰当的、过度的或随意滥用厌恶性刺激会引起人们的反感、控告与抵制。

6 implicit   

a.暗示的，含蓄的，不明晰的，绝对的

参考例句：

• A soldier must give implicit obedience to his officers. 士兵必须绝对服从他的长官。
• Her silence gave implicit consent. 她的沉默表示默许。

7 converge   

vi.会合；聚集，集中；(思想、观点等)趋近

参考例句：

• The results converge towards this truth.其结果趋近于这个真理。
• Parallel lines converge at infinity.平行线永不相交。

8 diverging   

分开( diverge的现在分词 )； 偏离； 分歧； 分道扬镳

参考例句：

• Plants had gradually evolved along diverging and converging pathways. 植物是沿着趋异和趋同两种途径逐渐演化的。
• With member-country bond yields now diverging, 'it's a fragmented set of markets. 但随着成员国债券收益率之差扩大，市场已经分割开来。

9 realization   

n.实现；认识到，深刻了解

参考例句：

• We shall gladly lend every effort in our power toward its realization.我们将乐意为它的实现而竭尽全力。
• He came to the realization that he would never make a good teacher.他逐渐认识到自己永远不会成为好老师。

10 metaphor   

n.隐喻，暗喻

参考例句：

• Using metaphor,we say that computers have senses and a memory.打个比方，我们可以说计算机有感觉和记忆力。
• In poetry the rose is often a metaphor for love.玫瑰在诗中通常作为爱的象征。

11 myriad   

adj.无数的；n.无数，极大数量

参考例句：

• They offered no solution for all our myriad problems.对于我们数不清的问题他们束手无策。
• I had three weeks to make a myriad of arrangements.我花了三个星期做大量准备工作。

12 severely   

adv.严格地；严厉地；非常恶劣地

参考例句：

• He was severely criticized and removed from his post.他受到了严厉的批评并且被撤了职。
• He is severely put down for his careless work.他因工作上的粗心大意而受到了严厉的批评。

13 transparent   

adj.明显的，无疑的；透明的

参考例句：

• The water is so transparent that we can see the fishes swimming.水清澈透明，可以看到鱼儿游来游去。
• The window glass is transparent.窗玻璃是透明的。

14 coerce   

v.强迫，压制

参考例句：

• You can't coerce her into obedience.你不能强制她服从。
• Do you think there is any way that we can coerce them otherwise?你认为我们有什么办法强迫他们不那样吗？