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與馬凱碩談書 | 活在亞洲世紀
AsiaSocietyHK 2024年9月9日 書談
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6C0udD5zyjc
亞洲協會香港中心
亞洲協會香港中心很榮幸地為您呈現傑出外交家、學者和多產作家馬凱碩與亞洲協會香港中心主席陳啟宗之間的對話，內容是關於馬凱碩教授的最新著作《活在亞洲世紀：非外交回憶錄》。
你知道，在過去的 25 年裏，也許你和我第一次見麵是因為我們參加了同樣的活動，你代表東南亞發言，我代表我自己發言，但通常都是關於香港和中國的話題，我們都相信亞洲有一個光明的未來，所以我們反擊了很多懷疑論者，比如亞洲人無法思考之類的，所以我們在某種意義上就像康拉德·阿姆斯一樣，隻是當談到亞洲人時，我和他意見不一，他認為亞洲人是自做母親和蘋果派以來最好的東西，我仍然是一個懷疑論者，至於亞洲的未來到底有多光明，但這並不重要，這並不能改變這樣一個事實：基莎是地緣政治方麵最聰明、最善於表達的人之一，我知道世界上任何地方，嗯，你知道，我很驚訝在新加坡，我很抱歉，基莎，我有個壞消息要告訴你你不是唯一一個才華橫溢的人，多麽令人震驚，多麽令人震驚，我還能說出許多其他人的名字，湯米·科曾經經常參加亞洲協會的活動，包括在 90 年代定期來香港，甚至在 2000 年初，陳漢吉接替了你作為新加坡代表在聯合國的職位，當我離開亞洲協會全球主席的職位時，他接替了我，我很榮幸亨吉同意接替我，然後還有其他人，比如喬治，他同樣才華橫溢，你提到過，不，我不知道，如果你提到巴哈裏·基坎，他不幸在中國經曆了非常可怕的悲傷個人事件，我不知道這是否與他對中國的負麵看法有關，但一方麵他，你和喬治和其他人，你知道，新加坡培養出如此多的偉大人才真是太神奇了，即使他們真的不同意彼此的觀點另一方麵，香港沒有這樣的人才，我們培養了很多其他類型的優秀人才，偉大的人，商業領袖，藝術家，什麽的，但這是我們沒有培養的，我能想到的原因是新加坡是一個國家，香港從來不是一個國家，香港永遠隻是一個城市，新加坡有梁宇作為領導人，然後你還有康和拉賈爾·拉特南，你也提到過，他們是上個世紀真正才華橫溢的人，香港沒有這樣的特權向這些偉大的思想家學習，所以告訴我，為什麽新加坡能在地緣政治方麵培養出如此偉大的思想家，這個問題很好，嗯，我隻是對阿桑做一個簡短的補充，正如羅尼指出的那樣，我們對阿桑有不同的看法，有一個統計數據是香港每個人都應該知道的，在200000年，日本是世界第二大經濟體，你知道，當時日本比阿桑大8倍，現在日本大約是阿桑的1.2 1.3倍牙山，到 2030 年亞洲將超過日本，成為世界第二大經濟體，我之所以這麽說，是因為我知道香港有些人擔心香港的未來，或者說香港未來可能有一個非常接近香港的增長領域，香港可以利用這個領域，歡迎香港，那就是牙山，所以我想說香港人現在應該關注牙山，為什麽新加坡培養出了許多領域非常有才華的外交官，我認為關鍵的區別在於新加坡必須經曆一場非常艱難的政治鬥爭才能達到今天的水平，所以如果你讀過 Lewan 先生的回憶錄，你就會知道 Lewan 先生的回憶錄非常吸引人，我認為 Lewu 先生承認他所經曆的鬥爭塑造了他成為怎樣的人，你知道他經曆了日本占領新加坡，那段時期非常殘酷，你知道真的，你會讀到他會告訴你一些關於他的精彩故事回憶錄，然後他不得不在英國殖民地生活
還不錯，但新加坡仍然在反抗英國殖民統治，然後我們在 1963 年加入了馬來西亞，最終在兩年內與馬來西亞進行了非常激烈的離婚，是的，這是另一場鬥爭，當新加坡在 1965 年獨立時，英國媒體一致表示新加坡將會失敗，因為這是一個沒有腹地的城市，正如你所知，新加坡的領導人哭了，當新加坡獨立時，他們沒有慶祝，他們沒有說 heur，因為他們認為新加坡會崩潰和失敗，包括 leanu
包括 leanu，所以你可以看到，這是一場巨大的鬥爭，這些與這三個創始人新加坡的領導人經曆了艱苦的歲月，在鬥爭中他們形成了堅韌的精神，這真是太神奇了，我認識了這些人，我認為我寫這本書的主要目標之一，我的回憶錄《生活在亞洲世紀》就是要告訴你關於這三個人的故事，我想我見過很多偉大的世界領導人，我和羅納德·裏根、喬治·H·W·布什握手，就像你見過亨利·基辛格、新任大總統布拉津斯基一樣，但新加坡的三位領導人與我見過的大多數世界領導人不相上下，甚至更好，這是非常了不起的，正是因為這些傑出的領導人，如果你以某種方式與他們共事，你就會受到他們的鼓舞，因為你從他們身上學到了很多東西，他們提升了我所做的所有地緣政治分析，以及所有 10 本書我寫過，如果我沒有拜倒在這三位地緣政治大師的腳下，我不可能寫出這些文章，而他們也經曆了許多地緣政治鬥爭，才獲得了他們所取得的理解，所以，這是一係列連鎖事件，導致了我們今天的處境，我們都知道你，但我們並不熟悉他，我有幸見過他很多次，即使是在很小的場合，但你和他很親近，我是從 H 那裏得知的，順便說一下，女士們先生們，現在是亞洲協會的全球主席，也是陳大使 Chanan Chi 的聯席主席，她告訴我，Leang Yu 曾經把三個人聚集在一起，從年齡上看，最年長的是 Tommy Cole，他是聯合國海洋法公約的主席，他成為了美國，他成為了新加坡駐聯合國大使30 歲，你告訴我的，然後 Changi 成為學者，轉為政治家和外交官，而你 Leu 會花時間與你們三人在一起，他和你們做了什麽，他在那裏聽你們說話嗎，他在那裏給你們講課嗎，你們從這個人身上學到了什麽，嗯，我可以告訴你，我們確實學到了很多東西，順便說一下，Tommy Co Chan hchi 和我，我們三人之間還有一件共同點，那就是我們都年輕，我們三人上大學時都批評過新加坡政府，所以你是怎麽被壓製的，我是怎麽被壓製的，你們三人是怎麽被壓製的，或者你被啟發了嗎，事實上，我們確實被罵了很多，事實上，如果你讀我的書，你會發現每一個資深的
新加坡人都被罵過，每當資深的新加坡被製造出來時，都是
一枚榮譽徽章，你知道你知道嗎，你罵我或不罵我，這就是為什麽我很好，因為他從不責備我，所以我們，但新加坡最了不起的是，盡管我們三個都是知名人士，但政府意識到我們可能有用，所以他們邀請我們與政府合作，所以 Tommy Co 在 30 歲時從法律係講師成為駐聯合國大使，Ching 從政治學講師接替我擔任駐聯合國大使，然後我最終因為新加坡總統獎學金而為政府工作，但你成為新加坡駐聯合國大使時已經 34 歲了，大多數 34 歲的人我都不想這麽說，但我仍然尿褲子，當我像他們那麽大的時候，你當時尿褲子了嗎，我實際上不知道，不知道沒錯，我當時不是 34 歲，我當時 35 歲，年紀大得多，呃，不，我的意思是，我呃，對我來說，這又是一個巨大的機會，你知道，當你被推上一個非常大的工作時，對我來說，困難的部分是，我接替湯米·科擔任新加坡大使，他已經擔任大使 13 年了，所以湯米·科是聯合國的傳奇人物，我被要求接替這位傳奇人物，我學到的一個教訓是，當你被要求接替一個非常非常成功的人時，無論你做什麽，都不要試圖取代他，不要試圖，我沒有，我不想模仿湯米·科，我說湯米·科有自己的說話風格，我會選擇自己的風格，我不會試圖模仿湯米·科說話的方式，所以我去發展我自己的性格，我自己的個性和我自己做事的方式，當然，盡管如此，我接替湯米還是有很大幫助的，因為湯米非常出名，一旦我自我介紹，說我是湯米的接班人，每個人都會向我敞開大門，所以，在某種程度上，我也寫了，他成功的秘訣，當然，基沙有一種非常非常有效的風格，包括你的說話風格，你們很多人都知道我可能有點衝動，在過去的40年裏，我一直在國際舞台上挑起爭端。耳朵，很多時候 Kisha 會是坐在我旁邊的紳士，我會跟著任何人，呃，而 Kisha 會坐在那裏微笑，在我講完之後，他會用最溫柔的方式說一句簡單的話來支持我，而另一個人並沒有被我打敗，而是被 Kish 和他的風格打敗了，呃，我稱之為溫柔地殺死我，我不知道這是否也發生在你身上，但這不是我的事，我最好不要深入研究呃，但你的風格確實非常好，讓它看起來不錯。
Book Talk with Kishore Mahbubani | Living The Asian Century
AsiaSocietyHK
2024年9月9日 BookTalk
Asia Society Hong Kong Center is proud to present a dialogue between Kishore Mahbubani, distinguished diplomat, academic, and prolific author, and Ronnie C. Chan, Chairman of Asia Society Hong Kong Center, about Professor Mahbubani’s newest book Living the Asian Century: An Undiplomatic Memoir.
you know over the last 25 years maybe K
you and I first met because uh we showed
up in the same events and you spoke on
behalf of Southeast Asia and I spoke on
behalf of myself but on the subject of
Hong Kong and uh China usually and both of us believe that Asia
has a bright future and so we fought off
a lot of the doubters how that Asians
cannot think or something like that and
so we were uh Conrad at Arms in a sense
except that when it comes to aian then
he and I disagree he think that aian is
the best thing since motherhood and
apple pie and I am still a doubtful
person as far as really how bright the
future of aen is but doesn't matter it
does not take away from the fact that
Kisha is one of the most bright uh uh
articulate uh person on geopolitics that
I know anywhere in the world um you know I'm amazed how that in
Singapore I'm sorry Kisha I got bad news
for you you're not the only brilliant
guy how how shocking how shocking I can name many others Tommy Co
used to participate in asan society
events a lot uh in this part of the
world including coming to Hong Kong
regularly in the '90s and even into the
early 2000 Chan hangi uh who succeeded
you at the United Nation as a as a
representative of Singapore uh hchi
succeeded me when I left the
chairmanship of the global chairmanship
of Asia Society I was very honored that
hungi would agree to take my place um
and then you have other people like
George yo uh who is equally brilliant uh
you have people like uh you mentioned no
I don't if you mentioned Bahari
kikan who unfortunately had a very
terrible sad personal incident in China
I don't know if it has anything to do
with his negative views about China but
he on the one hand you and George and
others on the other um you know it is
amazing how Singapore produce so many
great brains even when they really dis
disagree with each other in Hong Kong on
the other hand produce no such people we produce a lot
of other kind of good people great
people Business Leaders right uh artists
what have you but that's one thing that
we don't produce and the reason I can
think of is Singapore is a state Hong
Kong is never a state Hong Kong is
always just a city and Singapore has
Liang Yu as the leader and then you have
Kang and rajar ratnam that you mentioned
also those are Tru trly brilliant people
in the last century and Hong Kong have no such
privilege of learning from such great
minds so tell me tell us why can Singapore produce such great
minds in geopolitics well great great question um
I'm just as a quick just a quick side
note on asan as he as Ronnie pointed out
we have different views uh on asan uh
there's one statistic that everyone in
Hong Kong should know in the year 200000
Japan was the second largest economy in
the world as you know and at that time
Japan was 8 times bigger than
asan now Japan is about 1.2 1.3 times
bigger than asan and by 2030 Asian be bigger than
Japan what was the second largest
economy in the world and I tell that
because I know some people in Hong Kong
are worried about Hong Kong's future or
where what your future might be one
growth area that is very close to Hong
Kong that Hong Kong can tap on that
would welcome Hong Kong is asan so
that's why I would say uh people in Hong
Kong should pay attention to asan now on
why Singapore has produced you know
you're right very very talented uh
diplomats in many areas I think the the
key difference is that Singapore had to
undertake uh a very tough political
struggle uh to get to where it is today
so if you read Mr Lewan's as as you know
Mr Lewan's Memoirs are fascinating I think Mr lewu acknowledges
that the struggles that he went through
Forge what how the man he became so as
you know he lived through the the
Japanese Occupation of Singapore which was brutal you know
really and you read he'll tell you some
amazing stories in his Memoirs and then
he had to live through a British colony
not too bad but still Singapore struggle
against British colonial rule and then
we joined uh Malaysia in 1963 and ended up having a very
acrimonious divorce with Malaysia within
two years yeah which was of so another
struggle and when Singapore became
independent in 1965 the British media unanimously said
Singapore is going to fail because this
is the city without a hinterland and as
you know the leaders of Singapore cried
uh when Singapore became independent
they didn't celebrate they didn't say
heur because they thought Singapore
would collapse and fail including leanu
including leanu so you could see
therefore for that it was an immense
struggle that these with the the three
founding leaders of Singapore went
through nanu gingu rajar ratnam and as a
result of that struggle they developed a certain
toughness of spirit you know which is
quite amazing I mean I got to know these
men I think one of the one of my key
goals with this book my Memoirs living
the Asian century is to tell you stories
about these three men and they were I think I I've met I've
met many great world leaders I mean I've
shaken hands with Ronald Reagan George
HW Bush I mean like you have uh Henry
Kissinger the big new brazinski but the
three leaders of Singapore or on par if
not better than most world leaders that
I have met which is remarkable true now
it is because of these remarkable
leaders then if you if you work with
them in some some way or another you
pulled up by them because you learn so
much from them and and they elevate so
all the geopolitical analysis that I do
and that and and all the 10 books I've
written I could not have written them if
I hadn't sat at the feet uh of these
three geopolitical Masters who in their
turn had to go through lots of
geopolitical struggles to achieve the
kind of understanding that they did so
it was a sort of a cascading series of
uh events and that sort led to where
where we are today well we all know um
leang you but we don't know him
intimately um I have had the privilege
of meeting him quite a number of times
um even in the small occasions but you
are very close to him and I was told by
um H who is by the way ladies and
gentlemen the global chair of Asia
Society right now the co-chair of Chan
Ambassador chanan Chi she told me that
leang Yu used to bring three people
together in ter by by from descending in
terms of age oldest is Tommy Cole who
was the the chairman of the law of the
sea convention for the United Nation uh
he became the US he became the
Singapore's ambassador to the United
Nation at the tender age of 30 you you
told me that and then Changi an
academician turn politician and Diplomat and yourself Leu would spend
time with the three of you what did he what did he do with you guys was he
there to listen to you guys was he there
to lecture you guys what do you learn
from this man uh well I can I can tell
you that we we did uh learn a lot and by
the way Tommy Co Chan hchi and myself
another thing that's common about among
the three of us is that we were at our
young ages we were also denters all three of us had been
critical of the Singapore government
when we were in University so how were
you suppressed uh how was I how were the
three of you suppressed uh or did you
get enlightened by well we we definitely
got a lot of scolding in fact and in fact if you read
my book you'll find that every senior
Singaporean has been scolded by
and whenever senior Singapore is made is
a badge of honor you know you know what
howu scolded me or not that's why I'm
good because he never sced
me and so we but the remarkable thing
about Singapore is that even though the
three of us were wellknown
denters the government realized that we
could be useful and so they invited us
uh to work with the government so Tommy
Co went from being a lecturer in the law
faculty to becoming ambassador to the UN
at the age of 30 Ching she went from
being a you know a lecturer in political
science to succeeding me as ambassador
to the UN you know and then I ended up
working for the government because of my
uh bond from the singap uh president
scholarship but you became the the
Singaporean ambassador to the United
Nation attend the age of
34 most 34 year old is I hate to say
this but still wetting in the
pants I was when I was their age uh uh
were you w in your pants were you well I
actually I no no I to be correct I
wasn't 34 I was 35 much
older uh the no I mean I uh it was it
was to me again a tremendous opportunity
being you know when you're thrust into a
very big job and for me the hard part
was that I was succeeding Tommy CO as
Singapore's Ambassador un who had
already been ambassador went for 13
years Al together so Tomo was a legend
uh in the United Nations and I was asked
to succeed a legend and the one lesson I
learned is that when you asked to
succeed someone who's very very
successful whatever you do don't try to
step into his shoes don't try to I
didn't I I didn't want to copy Tommy Co
I said Tomo had a certain style of
speaking I would choose my own style I
wouldn't try to what Tommy Co does in
the way that he spoke and so I had to
evolve my own character my own
personality and my own way uh of of of
doing things uh but of course
nonetheless it helped a lot that I was
succeeding Tommy because Tommy was so
well known once I introduced myself and
said I'm the successor of Tommy code
everyone will open their doors to me so
I in some ways I also wrote uh on the
coales of his success sure enough Kisha has a very very
effective style uh including your style
of speaking and many of you know that I can
be a little hotheaded and I go pick pick
a fight in the international arena for
the last 40 years and often times Kisha
will be the gentleman sitting next to me
and I would be going with whoever uh and
Kisha would just sit there and smile and
after I finish he would just speak one
simple word in my support in a most
Gentle Way and the other guy wasn't
defeated by me defeated by Kish and his
style uh I call it Killing Me Softly I don't know an if if that's what
happened to you too but it's not of my
business I better not delve into that uh
but your style is certainly very
good fore make it look good May back
