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I.H.T. Op-Ed Contributor
A Nobel Prize for a Chinese Dissident
By VACLAV HAVEL, DANA NEMCOVA, and VACLAV MALY
Published: September 20, 2010
PRAGUE — It is hard to believe that it was more than 30 years ago that we, a group of 242 private citizens concerned about human rights in Czechoslovakia, came together to sign a manifesto called Charter 77. That document called on the Communist Party to respect human rights, and said clearly that we no longer wanted to live in fear of state repression.
很难相信，三十多年前，我们242个关心捷克斯洛伐克人权的普通公民结为团体，共同签署了一个叫做“77宪章”的宣言。那宪章呼吁共产党尊重人权，并声明我们再也不愿在国家的压制下惶恐度日了。
Our disparate group included ex-Communists, Catholics, Protestants, workers, liberal intellectuals, artists and writers who came together to speak with one voice. We were united by our dissatisfaction with a regime that demanded acts of obedience on an almost daily basis: Shopkeepers were pressured to put up propaganda signs that read “Workers of the world, unite!” Schoolchildren, students and workers were compelled to march in May Day parades. Office workers had to denounce American imperialism at the start of the workday. Citizens had to “vote” in elections in which the only choice was the ruling party.
我们团体的成员身份各异，有前共产党员，有天主教徒和新教徒，有工人和自由主义的知识分子，还有艺术家和作家，大家异口同声地走到了一起。我结为一体，是因为我们都不满那个在各个方面都强制人民服从的政体：商店里被迫张贴“全世界无产者联合起来”的标语，工人们被要求在上工前谴责美帝国主义，公民们投票时只能选举唯一的执政党。
Communist parties, then as now, prefer to divide and conquer. After Charter 77 was released, the government did its best to try and break us up. We were detained, and four of us eventually went to jail for several years. The authorities also got back at us in petty ways (including the suspension of driver’s licenses and confiscation of typewriters). Surveillance was stepped up, our homes and offices were searched, and a barrage of press attacks based on malicious lies sought to discredit us and our movement. This onslaught only strengthened our bonds. Charter 77 also reminded many of our fellow citizens who were silently suffering that they were not alone. In time, many of the ideas set forth in Charter 77 prevailed in Czechoslovakia. A wave of similar democratic reforms swept Eastern Europe in 1989.
共产党向来善于运用分化瓦解的手段。77宪章发布后，政府竭尽全力打击了我们。我们被拘留，包括我在内的四个人随后被关押了七年。对其他人，当局则采取了吊销驾照和没收打字机等无聊的报复手段。我们受到跟踪和监视，住宅和办公室遭到搜查，报刊上对我们人身攻击，造谣中伤，污蔑我们的运动。但所有那些攻击到头来更加强了我们的团结。77宪章的公布毕竟提醒了我们很多默默受难的同胞，使他们感到他们并不孤单，其中的很多理念随之传遍捷克斯洛伐克，及至1989年，类似的民主改革浪潮席卷了各东欧国家。
We never would have guessed that our short manifesto would find an echo in China some 30 years later. In December 2008, a group of 303 Chinese activists, lawyers, intellectuals, academics, retired government officials, workers and peasants put forward their own manifesto titled Charter 08, calling for constitutional government, respect for human rights and other democratic reforms. It was published to mark the 60th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Despite the best efforts of government officials to keep it off of Chinese computer screens, Charter 08 reached a nationwide audience via the Internet, and new signatories eventually reached more than 10,000.
但我们从未料想到，我们那简短的宣言会在30年之后从中国传来了回响。2008年12月，303个中国的活动家、律师、知识分子、学者、退休干部、工人和农民推出他们题曰“08宪章”的宣言，呼吁宪政、人权和民主改革。尽管当局尽力阻止它在网上传播，“08宪章”还是通过网络传遍了全中国，后续的签名者后来竟达上万人之多。
As in Czechoslovakia in the 1970s, the response of the Chinese government was swift and brutal. Dozens if not hundreds of signatories were called in for questioning. A handful of perceived ringleaders were detained. Professional promotions were held up, research grants denied and applications to travel abroad rejected. Newspapers and publishing houses were ordered to blacklist anyone who had signed Charter 08. Most seriously, the prominent writer and dissident Liu Xiaobo, a key drafter of Charter 08, was arrested. Liu had already spent five years in prison for his support of peaceful Tiananmen Square protests in 1989. Held for more than a year with limited access to his wife or his lawyer, Liu was put on trial for subversion. In December 2009, he was sentenced to 11 years in prison.
与70年代捷克斯洛伐克的情况相同，中国政府的反应也是迅即和凶狠的。数十个签名者被传唤问讯。几个牵头人被拘留。其中有人被停止提职，有人的研究经费被否决，
有人的出国申请被拒绝。报刊和出版社被指令不许发表签署者的文字。最严重的是，著名的作家和异议人士刘晓波，08宪章的主要起草人随即遭到拘留。刘因参与1989年的天安门抗议活动曾有过五年的牢狱之灾。这次被捕后，被限制与妻子和他的律师会面，2009年12月，他被控为颠覆国家罪判刑十一年。
Despite Liu’s imprisonment, his ideas cannot be shackled. Charter 08 has articulated an alternative vision of China, challenging the official line that any decisions on reforms are the exclusive province of the state. It has encouraged younger Chinese to become politically active, and boldly made the case for the rule of law and constitutional multiparty democracy. And it has served as a jumping-off point for a series of conversations and essays on how to get there.
对刘晓波的监禁并无助于钳制其民主观念的传播，08宪章的公布毕竟展示了中国改革一条可走的道路，它不但挑战了官方在改革问题上的专断和独占，也激励中国年轻的一代人为健全法制和实现多党的民主宪政而积极和勇敢地投身政治活动，引发了一系列与此相关的论辩和文章。
Perhaps most important, as in Czechoslovakia in the 1970s, Charter 08 has forged connections among different groups that did not exist before. Before Charter 08, “we had to live in a certain kind of separate and solitary state,” one signatory wrote. “We were not good at expressing our own personal experiences to those around us.”
正如在70年代的捷克斯洛伐克，也许最重要的是，08宪章铸造了此前并不存在的许多团体之间的联系。诚如一名签署人所说：“我们曾处于孤立和隔绝的状态，我们不善于向周围的人表达我们的个人经验。”
Liu Xiaobo and Charter 08 are changing that, for the better.
刘晓波和08宪章改善了这一状况。
Of course, Charter 08 addresses a political milieu very different from 1970s Czechoslovakia. In its quest for economic growth, China has seemed to embrace some features far removed from traditional Communism. Especially for young, urban, educated white-collar workers, China can seem like a post-Communist country. And yet, China’s Communist Party still has lines that cannot be crossed. In spearheading the creation of Charter 08, Liu Xiaobo crossed the starkest line of all: Do not challenge the Communist Party’s monopoly on political power, and do not suggest that China’s problems — including widespread corruption, labor unrest, and rampant environmental degradation — might be connected to the lack of progress on political reform.
当然，08宪章所陈述的政治状况已大不同于70年代的捷克斯洛伐克。在追求经济增长的过程中，中国已变得远非传统的共产主义了。特别是对年轻和有文化的城市白领来说，中国更像是一个后共产国家，只是党依然大权在握，设下了不可逾越的界限。刘晓波起草的08宪章却跨越了那最僵硬的界限：它挑战了中共对政权的垄断，批评了自上至下的腐败，指出了劳工动乱和环境恶化等不实行政改所导致的种种恶果。
For making that very connection in an all too public way, Liu got more than a decade in prison. In an especially spiteful move, the authorities, perhaps fearful that his prison cell would become a political rallying point, have forced him to serve his sentence in the northeastern province of Liaoning, far from his wife Liu Xia and friends in Beijing.
正因为刘晓波将不实行政改的恶果和盘托出，公之于众，最终遭到了十多年徒刑的惩罚。大概是担心刘的囚禁引起政治抗议，当局心怀叵测，现在已把他转移到远离北京的黑龙江关押起来，好拒其妻刘霞和其他朋友于千里之外。
Liu may be isolated, but he is not forgotten. Next month, the Nobel Peace Prize Committee will announce the recipient of the 2010 prize. We ask the Nobel Committee to honor Liu Xiaobo’s more than two decades of unflinching and peaceful advocacy for reform, and to make him the first Chinese recipient of that prestigious award. In doing so, the Nobel Committee would signal both to Liu and to the Chinese government that many inside China and around the world stand in solidarity with him, and his unwavering vision of freedom and human rights for the 1. 3 billion people of China.
刘可以被孤立，但不会被忘却。下一个月诺贝尔和平奖评委会将宣布2010年的获奖人。我们要求评委会将此殊荣授予刘晓波，因为他二十多年来一直毫不畏惧、和平地倡议改革，他应成为第一个获此大奖的中国人。通过颁发此奖，也可向刘晓波本人和中国政府示意，在中国国内和全世界有很多人都与刘站在一起，都支持他对自由的坚定信念和13亿中国人的人权。
Vaclav Havelis the former president of the Czech Republic.Dana Nemcova is a leading Czech human rights advocate, and Vaclav Maly is the bishop of Prague. All three are signatories of Charter 77 and former leaders of the 1989 Velvet Revolution in Czechoslovakia.
Vaclav Havelis，捷克共和国前总统。Dana Nemcova，捷克人权组织领袖。Vaclav Maly，布拉格主教。三人均为77宪章签署人和1989年捷克天鹅绒革命领导人。
（康正果 译）
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