As I noted last week, clashes over how to adjust external imbalances have recurred roughly every two decades since the 1980s. I should have added the 1920s and the 1960s. The latter ended with the collapse of the Bretton Woods system of fixed but adjustable exchange rates and, ultimately, with a world of floating rates (except in the Eurozone). The former ended with a global economic depression and a world war and so, among other things, with the creation of the Bretton Woods system in 1944. One of its products was the birth of the IMF, whose job it is to help manage such imbalances today.
正如我不久前的文章指出的，自20世纪80年代以来，围绕如何调整外部失衡的冲突大约每20年就会发生一次。我原本还应该加上20世纪20年代和60年代。后者终结于布雷顿森林体系（可调节的固定汇率制度）的崩溃，还有浮动汇率时代的诞生（欧元区除外）。前者终结于一场全球经济大萧条和一场世界大战，还有布雷顿森林体系（成立于1944年）等制度的创立。该体系的产物之一便是国际货币基金组织(IMF)，该组织的任务正是协助管理跟今天一样的失衡问题。
Why is the management of global balance of payments imbalances both so difficult and so important? The short answer is that they lie at the intersection of almost everything that matters in global economics and politics: national power, full employment, industrial strength, financial stability, fiscal and monetary policies and management of exchange rates. In sum, they shape a large part of international relations.
为什么管理全球国际收支失衡如此困难又如此重要？简单地说，因为这个问题处于全球经济与政治中几乎所有重要领域的交汇点：国家实力、充分就业、工业实力、金融稳定、财政与货币政策以及汇率管理。总的来说，这个问题在很大程度上塑造了国际关系。
We are now in a “neo-mercantilist” age. The mercantilist era of the 17th and 18th centuries — an era when trade surpluses were viewed as a measure of economic strength — was also a time of constant warfare. Today, as the president of the US meets China’s leader, external balances are again a powerful source of friction.
我们现在正处于一个“新重商主义”时代。在重商主义流行的17和18世纪，贸易顺差被视为衡量经济实力的一个指标，那也是一个战乱频发的时代。今天，当美国总统与中国领导人会晤时，外部平衡问题又一次成为摩擦的强力制造机。