龔鵬程x科馬洛夫｜民族有限公司

龔鵬程對話海外學者第六十八期：在后現代情境中，被技術統治的人類社會，只有強化交談、重建溝通倫理，才能獲得文化新生的力量。這不是誰的理論，而是每個人都應實踐的活動。龔鵬程先生遊走世界，并曾主持過“世界漢學研究中心”。我們會陸續推出“龔鵬程對話海外學者”系列文章，請他對話一些學界有意義的靈魂。范圍不局限于漢學，會涉及多種學科。以期深山長谷之水，四面而出。

讓·科馬洛夫教授（Professor Jean Comaroff）

哈佛大學非洲和非裔美國人研究教授、人類學教授

龔鵬程教授：您好。傳統與現代的關系，亞洲有兩種方式，一是中國、韓國、新加坡、土耳其這類改革舊體制，走向現代化的；二是日本、泰國、馬來西亞這類保留皇室的。非洲的情況，似乎是酋長制與現代資本主義國家相結合。2018年，您編輯了一本名為《習俗的政治:當代非洲的酋長制、資本和國家》的書，內容是關于非洲的酋長制。正如您在書的開頭提到的那樣，社會學家曾自信地預測，非洲的族長制將消失，取而代之的是民族主義、民主主義和市場經濟。然而，此時此刻的未來，卻證明并非如此。為什么社會學家如此肯定地認為酋長制會消失，又是什么原因使酋長制一直存在于非洲?

讓·科馬洛夫教授：龔教授，您好。在自由主義歐洲版本的世界史中，無論是流行的還是學術的，都傾向于認為現代民主政府的出現是一個漫長的過程，從原始的政治制度進化到他們自己的政治制度，前者在非西方社會的“傳統權威”政權中仍然很明顯。這種發展的愿景，在所謂的“現代化理論”中得到了最明確的闡述，該理論借鑒了社會學家馬克斯·韋伯(Max Weber)和塔爾科特·帕森斯(Talcott Parsons)的思想，提出了一個從現代系統逐步過渡到現代國家的模型: 神圣會世俗化、習俗會化為法律、世襲角色會讓位于選舉職位、部落情感會讓位于公民理性。

正如經常被指出的那樣，現代化理論支持的是一種過于籠統的、理想化的轉型愿景，而不是基于經驗，對關于社會制度變化中的不平衡進行論述。然而，盡管受到批評，這一愿景的總體主旨代表了歐洲的常識。而且這種情況一直存在。

殖民主義的人類學家對二十世紀非洲社會的描述，再現了現代化理論的許多假設: 據說這些社會由傳統酋長統治，他們的世襲地位因宗教和習俗而得到加強。殖民政權聲稱要培養一種文明使命，在這種使命中，基督教啟蒙、教育和雇傭勞工將引領非洲人進入現代世界秩序——不可避免地使酋長制等制度過時。

但歷史卻走了另一條路。殖民者培育的采掘性經濟依賴于廉價的、種族化的勞動力，他們聲稱“土著”是落后的，仍然受傳統權威的束縛。殖民統治者實際上加強了這些權威的權力，將他們確立為“間接統治”的代理人，利用他們招募工人，征稅，并讓他們的臣民服從。

事實上，通過這樣的潛在“現代化”倡議，實際上是在復制傳統。在后殖民時代，隨著本土身份的重新確立，傳統統治者繼續在傳統政治中發揮著重要作用。

Liberal European versions of world history, both popular and scholarly, tend to presume that modern democratic government was the culmination of a lengthy process of evolution from primitive political systems to their own, the former still evident in regimes of “traditional authority” in non-Western societies. This vision of development was most explicitly spelled out in so-called “modernization theory,” which drew on the ideas of sociologists Max Weber and Talcott Parsons to posit a model of progressive transition from pre-modern systems to the modern state: the sacred would become secular, custom would become law, hereditary roles would give way to elective offices, and tribal sentiments to civic reason As often noted, modernization theory espoused an over-general, idealized vision of transformation rather than an empirically-grounded account of the uneven ways in which social systems change. Yet despite critique, the general thrust of this vision represented European common sense. And it has persisted.

The descriptions of twentieth-century African societies provided by colonial anthropologists reproduced many of the assumptions of modernization theory: those societies were said to be governed by traditional chiefs, their hereditary positions reinforced by religion and custom. Colonial regimes claimed to be fostering a civilizing mission in which Christian enlightenment, schooling, and wage labor would usher Africans into the modern world order -- inevitably rendering institutions like chiefship obsolete. But history took a different course. The extractive economies fostered by colonizers depended on cheap, racialized labor, and on the claim that the “natives” were backward, still in thrall to customary authorities. Colonial rulers actually reinforced the power of those authorities by establishing them as agents of “indirect rule,” using them to recruit workers, collect taxes, and generally keep their subjects in line. In fact, by so doing, would-be ‘modernizing’ initiatives actually reproduced tradition. And in postcolonial times, as indigenous identities have been revalorized, customary rulers have continued played a significant role in the politics of custom.

龔鵬程教授：2012年，您出版了《來自南半球的理論:或者，歐美如何向非洲發展》一書。從何種意義上來說，歐美正在向非洲發展?

讓·科馬洛夫教授：這個標題有幾分“半開玩笑”，但也只是部分玩笑。它旨在打破那種假定現代性“首先發生在歐洲，然后是其他地方”的進化思維。這當然不是在暗示今天的“歐洲文明”將處境惡化，向頑固地未能實現“現代化”的非洲大陸倒退。

我們認為，歐美國家和南半球國家都陷入了同樣的世界歷史進程，比如全球化、放松管制和市場化等。在這種情況下，所有國家都變得越來越相似，但南半球往往比北半球更早感受到全球影響。

這在歷史和地緣政治上都有充分的理由，很大程度上與殖民主義的遺產有關。因此，曾經的邊緣地帶正在成為新前沿，在這里，具有全球競爭力的流動資本可以找到監管最低的區域來轉移其業務;在這里，民主被威權主義和/或技術官僚削弱，而資本主義繁榮。在這里，工業制造業為自己開辟了成本效益更高的場所。

在這里，靈活的非正規經濟也長期蓬勃發展，在2008年和新冠肺炎之后，也已成為北半球的“新常態”。在南半球，當代資本的“先進”之處在于正在嘗試新的法律和監管形式、更密集的提取和積累模式以及新型知識產權。

簡而言之，地球上一些最具創新力的經濟體現在位于南方，這也是當代資本主義的驅動力。印度和非洲等地的年輕人口處于新興市場的前沿。新的亞非貿易和發展東西軸線正在取代新殖民主義的南北軸線，改變了公認的全球核心和邊緣地區的地理格局。

而且，與之相輔相成的是，北方現在正在發展以前與后/殖民世界相關的特征：經濟增長下降、勞動力市場不安全、工資下降、中產階級脆弱、種族沖突、基礎設施衰落、國家衰弱、選舉有爭議、和財閥政府。

我們開始看到美國的公共知識分子出版諸如《第三世界美國》（赫芬頓）之類的書籍。這并不意味著現代性“演變”的空間邏輯被顛倒了；但資本主義運作規模的變化打亂了北方壟斷全球財富生產和傳播世界文明從歐洲演進的霸權觀點的能力。

This title is partly ‘tongue in cheek,’ but only partly. It is meant to disrupt the kind of evolutionary thinking which presumes that modernity happens “first in Europe, then elsewhere.” It certainly isnot meant to imply that ‘European civilization’ today is going to hell in a handbasket, devolving backwards towards Africa, as a continent that has stubbornly failed to ‘modernize.’ We argue that the countries of Euro-America and the Global South are all caught up in the same world-historical processes, processes like globalization, deregulation, and marketization. Under these conditions, all are becoming more alike, but the South tends to feel the world-wide effects before the Global North. There are good reasons for this, both historical and geopolitical, related largely to the legacies of colonialism. As a consequence, old margins are becoming new frontiers, places where mobile, globally competitive capital finds minimally regulated zones to relocate its operations; where capitalism flourishes as democracy is diminished by authoritarianism and/or technocracy. Here industrial manufacture opens up more cost-efficient sites for itself. Here, also, flexible informal economies have long thrived and -- post 2008 and COVID – have become the “new normal” in the North as well. In the South, the “advanced” edges of contemporary capital are experimenting with new legal and regulatory forms, more intensive modes of extraction and accumulation, and new kinds intellectual property.

In short, some of the most innovative economies on the planet are now located in the South, as is the driving impulse of much contemporary capitalism. Youthful populations in places like India and Africa are at the forefront of emerging markets. A new East-West axis of Asian-African trade and development is replacing the neocolonial axis of North and South, altering received global geographies of core-and-periphery. And, in complementary fashion, the North is now developing characteristics formerly associated with the post/colonial world: declining economic growth, insecure labor markets, falling wages, fragile middle classes, ethno-racial conflict, decaying infrastructure, weakened states, disputed elections, and plutocratic government. We are beginning to see public intellectuals in the USA publish books with titles like Third World America (Huffington)3. This does NOT mean that the spatial logic of the modernity’s ‘evolution’ has been reversed; but the changing scale of capitalist operations has disrupted the ability of the North to monopolize the global production of wealth and propagate a hegemonic view of the evolution of civilization from Europe to the world.

龔鵬程教授：最近您編撰了《種族、商品、企業》一書。您所說的種族合并和商品化，分別指的是什么？您能舉一些例子嗎?

讓·科馬洛夫教授：“種族”是一個被廣泛使用的術語，但很難被準確定義。著名的社會學家馬克斯·韋伯（Max Weber）發現這是個很模糊的概念，與階級或親屬關系不同，它被賦予了主觀信仰和身份。

盡管如此，當文化與原始聯系相遇時，種族通常蘊含了各種在世的存在，它已日益成為現代世界晚期一個重要的社會類別。作為一種根植于集體認同的根深蒂固的情感，人們為此而戰，有時甚至準備為之而犧牲。直到最近，關于種族的關鍵分析辯論，在于它是否源于“原始”——甚至是遺傳——身份，還是共同歷史和環境下的產物。

在《民族有限公司》一書中，我和約翰·科馬羅夫（John Comaroff）認為，在20世紀末的世界各地，我們一直在見證文化身份的產生和意識的轉變。

這源于民族認同和文化制品與市場力量的日益聯系，以及民族群體傾向于將他們共同擁有的物質和非物質遺產視為一種集體所有、共同財產的形式。雖然民族商品在過去經常被推銷，但它們越來越被視為品牌商品，如Shipibo薩滿療法、Me-Wuk美洲原住民賭場賭博、斐濟水、科伊桑茶或祖魯珠飾。

這種轉變涉及兩個相互關聯的過程:身份的整合和文化的商品化。

第一個，是指那些出售其文化身份的人傾向于將自己轉變為一種或另一種財產控股公司的事實。第二個，是文化的商品化:民族習俗和產品成為具有交換價值的物品，旨在喚起消費者的欲望。

然而，民族商品是奇怪的存在：它們可能越來越多地被出售，但很少被輕易地異化。民族商品營銷與身份意識是相輔相成的：文化產品通常不會因為出售而被貶值，而對于出售它們的人來說，文化制品的價值往往因以下事實而提高——它們不再是邊緣化的標志，而是被視為民族藝術。

“Ethnicity” is a term widely used, but difficult to pin down. Sociologist Max Weber famously found the concept slippery and vested in subjective beliefs and identities, unlike class, or kinship. Nevertheless ethnicity, which generally implies the kind of being- in-the-world that emerges when culture meets primal connectedness, has increasingly become a significant social category in the late modern world. As a deep-seated sentiment rooted in collective identity, it is something people fight wars over and are sometimes prepared to die for. Until recently, the key analytical debate about ethnicity was whether it arose from “primordial” – even genetic – identity or is a product of shared history and circumstance.

In the bookEthnicity, Inc. John Comaroff and I argue that, across the world in the late twentieth-century, we have been witnessing a shift in the production and consciousness of identity-as-culture. This stems from the increasing engagement of ethnic identities and cultural artifacts with market forces, and the tendency of ethnic groups to view their shared heritage, both material and intangible as a collective possession, a form of joint property. While ethnic goods have often been marketed in the past, they are increasingly being seen as branded commodities, as in Shipibo shamanic healing, Me-Wuk Native American casino gambling, Fiji water, Khoisan tea, or Zulu beadwork) This transformation involves two interrelated processes: the incorporation of identity and the commodification of culture. The first refers to the fact that with those selling their cultural identity tend to transform themselves into property holding companies of one kind or anothe; hence “Ethnicity, Inc. The second, related process is the commodification of culture: ethnic practices and products become objects with exchange value, designed to evoking consumer desire. Yet ethnic commodities are queer things: they may increasingly be for sale but are seldom simply alienated. Ethnic commodity marketing and identity consciousness enhance each other: rather than being cheapened by being sold, cultural artifacts are often enhanced in value for those who vend them by the fact that – rather than being markers of marginality, they become valued as ethnic art.

龔鵬程教授：您在 60 年代種族隔離時期在南非開普敦大學學習人類學。在種族隔離制度下長大，對您的職業生涯和人類學家的工作有何影響？

讓·科馬洛夫教授：在種族隔離制度下長大，深刻地影響了我的生活和工作。

我的父母出生在南非，1930 年代曾在英國工作，并在歐洲度過了二戰——我的父親在英國陸軍醫療隊任職，我的母親在倫敦大轟炸期間在倫敦擔任社會工作者。

1940年代末，他們回到了我長大的南非，在 1948 年國民黨選舉和種族隔離正式出現之前，定居在伊麗莎白港（現在的 Gqeberha）。

他們有著自由主義的政治觀點，而我的母親，一名家庭主婦，對隨后加劇的的種族不平等深感不安。她和伊麗莎白港的一群婦女與非洲同行合作，在所謂的城市邊緣鄉鎮中解決黑人兒童的需求。她讓我意識到種族隔離對日常生活的潛在影響，從空間政治和學校課程，再到勞動力市場和預期壽命等方方面面。她還使我意識到非洲語言和文化的活力，以及黑人教會和非洲民族主義抵抗的堅韌力量。

在開普敦大學，人類學家莫妮卡·威爾遜(Monica Wilson)等導師加強了這種這種宣傳。她在東開普省的非洲人口中長大，是一位傳教士的女兒。在這所白人專設的學院里，她是為數不多的幾位學者之一，挑戰絕大多數教學中以歐洲為中心的焦點，并向學生灌輸了對豐富的非洲中心知識的強烈尊重。她堅信他們將南非多數人口的世界理解為對征服的反應，并讓我去倫敦經濟學院攻讀博士學位，在那里我從事南非克理奧爾化的非洲教會的研究——以《圣經》為解放福音為中心。

Coming of age under apartheid profoundly affected my life and work. My South African-born parents had worked in the UK in the 1930's and spent WW2 in Europe – my father in the British Army Medical Corps, my mother as a social worker in London during the Blitz. They returned to South Africa, where I was raised, in the late 1940's, settling in Port Elizabeth (now Gqeberha) just before the election of the Nationalist Party in 1948 and the advent of formal apartheid. They were liberal in their political views and my mother, a homemaker, was deeply disturbed by the intensification of racial inequality that followed. She and a group of women in Port Elizabeth collaborated with African counterparts to address the needs of black children in so-called townships on the fringes of the city. She made me aware of the insidious effects of segregation on ordinary existence, on everything from the politics of space and school curricula to the profile of the labor market and life expectancy. She also made me alive to the vitality of African language and culture, and the resilient power of the black church and African nationalist resistance.

This sensitization was reenforced at University of Cape Town by mentors like the anthropologist, Monica Wilson, who had grown up as a missionary’s daughter amidst the African populations of the Eastern Cape. She was one of the few scholars in a Whites-Only institution who challenged the overwhelmingly Eurocentric focus of most instruction and instilled a keen respect for the richness of Afrocentric knowledge in her students. She insisted that they understood the world of South Africa’s majority population as aReaction to Conquest,1 and set me on course for doctoral study at the London School of Economics, where I was to undertake research on the creolized African churches in South Africa – centered on the Bible as a gospel of liberation.

龔鵬程，1956年生于臺北，臺灣師范大學博士，當代著名學者和思想家。著作已出版一百五十多本。

辦有大學、出版社、雜志社、書院等，并規劃城市建設、主題園區等多處。講學于世界各地。并在北京、上海、杭州、臺北、巴黎、日本、澳門等地舉辦過書法展。現為中國孔子博物館名譽館長、美國龔鵬程基金會主席。