BERLIN — These days Germany is known for being many things: a leader in clean technology, a manufacturing powerhouse, Europe's foreign policy center. But increasingly, it seems to have taken on yet another stereotype — as a nation of Luddites.
柏林——如今，德国拥有很多名号：清洁技术的领军者、制造业的引擎，以及欧洲的外交政策中心。然而，人们似乎越来越多地对它有了另一种成见——一个勒德派之国。And truth be told, Germany is not a great place to be a big tech company these days. Günther H. Oettinger, a German official and the European Union's incoming commissioner for digital economy and society, has assailed Google for having too big a presence in Europe, and speaks of "cuts" in the company's market power. In Berlin, Sigmar Gabriel, the vice chancellor and economics minister, is investigating whether Germany can classify Google as a vital part of the country's infrastructure, and thus make it subject to heavy state regulation.
说实话，对于大型科技公司而言，如今的德国并不是个好地方。即将就任欧盟负责数字经济与社会的委员的德国官员京特·H·厄廷格(Günther H. Oettinger)攻击谷歌(Google)在欧洲的影响过大，还表示希望能“削弱"谷歌的市场支配力。在柏林，副总理兼经济部长西格玛尔·加布里尔(Sigmar Gabriel)正在调查，德国是否能把谷歌列为国家基础设施的重要组成部分，从而将其纳入严格的国家监管的范畴。
Google is often spoken of in dark terms around cafes and biergartens. People regularly call it the Octopus. Even a figure as dominant in the global economy as Mathias D?pfner, the chief executive of Springer, Germany's largest publishing house, said he was "afraid of Google."
在咖啡馆或啤酒屋提到谷歌时，德国人往往会用上负面词汇。人们经常称之为“章鱼”。即便是像斯普林格(Springer)——德国最大的出版社——首席执行官玛蒂亚斯·德普夫纳(Mathias D?pfner)这种在国际商界地位显赫的人物，都说他“害怕谷歌”。
Google isn't the only target of Teutonic ire. A few weeks ago, a German court prohibited Uber from operating in the country, reasoning that the company was violating federal licensing laws for professional drivers. And Amazon is entangled in a long and wearying battle over working conditions and pay with Verdi, one of Germany's most powerful unions.
谷歌并非这种日耳曼怒火的唯一目标。几周前，一家德国法院以违反了针对专业司机的联邦许可法为由，禁止Uber公司在德国境内运营。亚马逊(Amazon)则因为工作条件和薪酬问题，与德国最强大的工会组织之一Verdi陷入了一场旷日持久的消耗战。To outsiders, this all seems like just another instance of collective German angst. In this view, Germany is the neurotic bystander of the digital revolution, shaken to the bone by its fear of everything new and its distrust of everything American, a secretive society still traumatized by its Stasi history, overestimating the importance of data privacy.
在外人眼中，这一切似乎只是德国人集体焦虑的又一例证。这种观点认为，德国是一个神经紧张的数字革命看客，会因为对一切新生事物的恐惧和对所有美国东西的怀疑而瑟瑟发抖，这个私密的社会仍然受到斯塔西(Stasi)历史的折磨，高估了数据保密的重要性。But this caricature misses the point. Germans don't fear technology. Nor do we dislike America. On the contrary: Whenever Apple debuts a new product, our media goes bananas and people line up in front of Apple's flagship stores. Most Germans use Google and Facebook on a daily basis, without ever getting sweaty hands when typing in a search term or answering a friendship request.
不过，这种漫画形象并没有说到点子上。德国人并不害怕科技。我们也不讨厌美国。正好相反：苹果(Apple)每有新品发布，德国媒体就会为之疯狂，人们则会在苹果旗舰店门前排起长队。大多数德国人每天都会使用谷歌服务和Facebook，可以驾轻就熟地搜索词汇或者回应加为好友的请求。In politics, Silicon Valley is a magic phrase. It's what Berlin wants to be. It's where our representatives and business leaders go when they want to look really cool or snoop around for ideas. Speaking at a rollout for a new book on Silicon Valley, Mr. Gabriel's eyes turned dreamy when he told the audience how he strolled the streets of Palo Alto on his first visit there in the late '90s, looking around for the Hewlett-Packard garage, feeling the magic of innovation in the air.
在政界，“硅谷”是一个神奇的字眼，一个柏林向往成为的地方。我们的议员和商界领袖希望自己看起来非常酷、或者想寻找灵感的时候，也会前往硅谷。在为一本关于硅谷的新书进行推介发言时，加布里尔的目光中流露出无限的向往。他告诉观众，90年代末他第一次去硅谷时，漫步在帕洛阿尔托的街道上，四处寻找惠普(Hewlett-Packard)起家的那间车库，觉得空气中弥漫着创新的魔力。What gives? How can Germany be both afraid of and in love with technology, and the companies that make it? The key is to look beyond those things, to the corporate model they represent.
这是怎么了？德国怎么会对科技，对科技公司，既爱又怕呢？要理解这一点，关键是要看到在表象之外，它们所代表的企业模式。The true origin of the conflict lies in the economic culture innate to those former Silicon Valley start-ups — now giants — that are taking the European markets by storm. To create and grow an enterprise like Amazon or Uber takes a certain libertarian cowboy mind-set that ignores obstacles and rules.
这个冲突的真正根源，在于这些正在欧洲市场上掀起风暴的硅谷企业——之前是初创公司，现在是巨头——与生俱来的经济文化。要创办和发展亚马逊或Uber这样的公司，需要有一种特定的自由意志主义牛仔心态，把障碍和规则抛诸脑后。Silicon Valley fears neither fines nor political reprimand. It invests millions in lobbying in Brussels and Berlin, but since it finds the democratic political process too slow, it keeps following its own rules in the meantime. Uber simply declared that it would keep operating in Germany, no matter what the courts ruled. Amazon is pushing German publishers to offer their books on its platform at a lower price — ignoring that, in Germany, publishers are legally required to offer their books at the same price everywhere.
硅谷既不害怕罚款，也不怕政治谴责。它投入了大笔费用，在布鲁塞尔和柏林游说，但是它发现民主政治进程过于缓慢，于是便在同时按自己的规则办事。Uber直截了当地说，不管法院怎样裁定，它都会继续在德国经营业务。亚马逊向德国出版商施压，要求它们以较低的价格在其平台上提供书籍——不顾德国要求出版商必须在所有地方以同样的价格出售图书的法律规定。It is this anarchical spirit that makes Germans so neurotic. On one hand, we'd love to be more like that: more daring, more aggressive. On the other hand, the force of anarchy makes Germans (and many other Europeans) shudder, and rightfully so. It's a challenge to our deeply ingrained faith in the state.
正是这种无政府主义，让德国人变得这么神经质。一方面，我们乐意变得更像他们那样：更无所顾忌、更积极进取。另一方面，无政府主义的力量，也让德国人（和其他很多欧洲国家的人）不寒而栗。我们当然会这样，因为这挑战了我们对国家的根深蒂固的信念。The German voter-consumer will always trust the state more than he will any private company, no matter how ardently it insists on being a good guy. Trust in "the state" is hard to measure; polls vary greatly depending on the current government's performance and personnel, among other factors. However, Germans regularly report much higher levels of trust in the leading state institutions — the federal legislature, the courts and the police — than Americans do.
德国选民和消费者对政府的信任，永远甚于对任何私人企业的信念，无论这家公司多么坚定地声称自己具有善意。对“国家”的信任是难以衡量的；根据现任政府的表现和人员等因素，民调结果的差异很大。但是，对于重要的国家机构——联邦议院、法院和警察——德国人的信任度往往远高于美国人。No major party, right or left, calls for shrinking the size of the state; the only party to do so, the Liberal Democrats, is too small to have a seat in the Bundestag, and is fighting for its life in state-level elections. Unlike in America, where trust in the state tends to dip during hard times, in Germany it rises. When problems appear, we look to "Vater Staat" — the Father State — to protect us.
主要党派，无论左右，都不会呼吁缩减政府的规模；唯一主张这么做的党派是自由民主党(Liberal Democrats)，它弱小到无法在联邦众议院获得哪怕一个席位，连要在州级选举中出线都不容易。世道艰难的时候，美国人对国家的信任往往会下降，而德国人的这种信任却会增加。当有问题出现，我们就会指望“祖国父亲”保护我们。That includes challenges by "disruptive" business models, like those coming out of Silicon Valley. Indeed, the reason politicians like Mr. Gabriel — who has said "we must tame Silicon Valley capitalism"— go after Amazon and Uber is that it is a surefire way to get votes. Even politicians who are normally pro-deregulation, like Mr. Oettinger, know it's smart to come down hard on tech companies.
像硅谷公司带来的那些“颠覆性”商业模式的挑战，也属于这种情况。事实上，像加布里尔这样的政界人士——他曾说过：“我们必须驯服硅谷资本主义”——之所以跟亚马逊和Uber过不去，原因就在于，这样做铁定可以帮他们赢得选票。即使是那些一般会支持放松监管的政界人士，比如厄廷格，也知道指责高科技公司是个聪明点子。If it wants to succeed here, Silicon Valley needs to comply with the particularities of the German and European market. We love technology, but we want it delivered on our terms. In Germany, cowboys should remain in the movies.
硅谷公司想在德国取得成功，就需要遵从德国和欧洲市场的特殊性。我们热爱科技，但我们希望科技公司以我们青睐的方式来提供它。在德国，牛仔只应存在于电影里。