经济学人

web of agreements and sectoral dialogues. In 2007 no fewer than 450 European delegations visited China. Big countries like France and Britain add their own bilateral dialogues, not trusting the EU to protect their interests or do the job properly. There are now six parallel EU and national “dialogues” with China on climate change, for example.

结果是欧洲政治家们发现他们经常要疲于维护他们与中国的各种各样的联系。通常，他们声称这将慢慢使中国转变成一个国际社会的更自由、更负责任的大国。而隐含的诉求，如同人们嘀咕的，则是让欧洲得以把中国编制进他们那张由协议和地区性对话构成的网络中去。在2007年，有不少于450个欧洲代表团访问了中国。诸如法国和英国这些大国们还增加了他们自己与中国单独的双边对话，因为他们不相信欧盟能够保护他们的利益或把这项工作做好。例如，目前在气候变化方面就有六个并行的以欧盟名义的和以国家名义的对华“对话”。

Alas, familiarity with Europeans does not preclude contempt. EU-China

dialogues on human rights or the rule of law are a way of tying Europeans down with process, avoiding substance. China abruptly cancelled an EU-China summit scheduled for last December. The astonishing snub was presented by Chinese diplomats as punishment for France’s Nicolas Sarkozy for meeting the Dalai Lama when his country held the rotating presidency of the EU (with other EU countries left to take note).

哎呀，对欧洲的亲近并不能排除对其轻视。欧中关于人权或者法制问题的对话仅是封住欧洲的嘴，但却绕开了实质问题。中国突然取消了定于去年12月的欧中峰会，中国这一令人吃惊的怠慢之举旨在对法国的尼古拉斯.萨科奇在其国家担任欧盟轮值主席国之际会见达赖喇嘛做出惩罚，也对其他欧盟国家起到杀鸡敬候之效。

Chinese interest in the EU peaked in 2003, when it looked as if the club would soon acquire a constitution, a foreign minister and a full-time president. But the honeymoon had ended by 2006, after China failed to get the EU to lift an arms embargo imposed after the Tiananmen Square killings of 1989. At policy seminars and closed-door conferences, state-sponsored Chinese analysts now drip condescension. America is a strong man and China a growing teenager, said one at a 2008 conference in Stockholm; Europe is a “rich old guy”, heading for his dotage. At a recent Wilton Park conference in Britain, a Chinese academic called the EU a weak power, unprepared to challenge American hegemony: