Hong Kong Wrong
It had to happen. Hong Kong's policy of "positive noninterventionism" was too good to last. It went against all the instincts of government officials, paid to spend other people's money and meddle in other people's affairs. That's why it was sadly unsurprising to see Hong Kong's current leader, Donald Tsang, last month declare the death of the policy on which the territory's prosperity was built.
The really amazing phenomenon is that, for half a century, his predecessors resisted the temptation to tax and meddle. Though a colony of socialist Britain, Hong Kong followed a laissez-faire capitalist policy, thanks largely to a British civil servant, John Cowperthwaite. Assigned to handle Hong Kong's financial affairs in 1945, he rose through the ranks to become the territory's financial secretary from 1961-71. Cowperthwaite, who died on Jan. 21 this year, was so famously laissez-faire that he refused to collect economic statistics for fear this would only give government officials an excuse for more meddling. His successor, Sir Philip Haddon-Cave, coined the term "positive noninterventionism" to describe Cowperthwaite's approach.
The results of his policy were remarkable. At the end of World War II, Hong Kong was a dirt-poor island with a per-capita income about one-quarter that of Britain's. By 1997, when sovereignty was transferred to China, its per-capita income was roughly equal to that of the departing colonial power, even though Britain had experienced sizable growth over the same period. That was a striking demonstration of the productivity of freedom, of what people can do when they are left free to pursue their own interests.
The success of laissez-faire in Hong Kong was a major factor in encouraging China and other countries to move away from centralized control toward greater reliance on private enterprise and the free market. As a result, they too have benefited from rapid economic growth. The ultimate fate of China depends, I believe, on whether it continues to move in Hong Kong's direction faster than Hong Kong moves in China's.
Mr. Tsang insists that he only wants the government to act "when there are obvious imperfections in the operation of the market mechanism." That ignores the reality that if there are any "obvious imperfections," the market will eliminate them long before Mr. Tsang gets around to it. Much more important are the "imperfections" -- obvious and not so obvious -- that will be introduced by overactive government.
A half-century of "positive noninterventionism" has made Hong Kong wealthy enough to absorb much abuse from ill-advised government intervention. Inertia alone should ensure that intervention remains limited. Despite the policy change, Hong Kong is likely to remain wealthy and prosperous for many years to come. But, although the territory may continue to grow, it will no longer be such a shining symbol of economic freedom.
Yet that doesn't detract from the scale of Cowperthwaite's achievement. Whatever happens to Hong Kong in the future, the experience of this past 50 years will continue to instruct and encourage friends of economic freedom. And it provides a lasting model of good economic policy for others who wish to bring similar prosperity to their people.
Mr. Friedman, the 1976 Nobel laureate in economics, is a senior research fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution.
香港模式的夭折
这种情况终于发生了。香港的“积极不干预政策”太好了，以至于无法持续下去。它同政府官员支出他人金钱和干预他人事务的所有本能背道而驰。香港现任行政长官曾荫权(Donald Tsang)在上个月宣布放弃推动香港走向繁荣的积极不干预政策也就是意料之中的悲哀了。
真正令人吃惊的现象在于，半个世纪以来，他的前任一直在抵制征税或干预的诱惑。尽管英国的经济制度曾颇具社会主义色彩，但作为英国殖民地的香港却实行了自由放任的资本主义政策，这在很大程度上要归功于英国人郭伯伟(John Cowperthwaite)。郭伯伟于1945年被派往香港从事财经工作，并在1961-71年期间出任香港的财政司，他已于今年1月21日去世。郭伯伟支持自由放任的经济政策是出了名的，他甚至拒绝收集经济统计数据，担心这会给政府官员以增加干预的借口。他的继任者夏鼎基(Philip Haddon-Cave)提出了“积极不干预”一说，用以描述郭伯伟的做法。
他的政策取得了巨大的成果。第二次世界大战后，香港是个非常贫穷的小岛，人均收入仅为英国的四分之一左右。到1997年香港回归中国时，香港的人均收入已同英国基本持平，尽管英国在同期也经历了高速的增长。这充分证明了自由的巨大生产力，证明了当人们能自由追逐自己的利益时他们能取得什么样的成就。
香港自由放任政策的成功是鼓励中国大陆和其他国家放弃中央集权控制、更多依靠私有企业和自由市场的重要因素。其结果是，这些国家也都尝到了经济高速增长的甜头。我认为，中国的最终命运取决于大陆向香港路线靠拢的速度是否比香港向大陆路线靠拢的速度更快。
曾荫权坚持说，他只是希望政府在“市场机制明显失调时”不会袖手旁观。这里忽略了一个事实，就是如果存在“明显的失调”，市场将会在曾荫权采取措施之前很久就把它们消除了。更重要的是，过于积极的政府反而会带来明显的或不太明显的“失调”。
半个世纪的“积极不干预”使香港的富裕程度足以消化大多政府滥用权力的不当干预。仅仅是惯性就会使干预的影响依然有限。虽然改变了这个政策，香港在今后多年里仍将保持富裕繁荣。不过，尽管香港经济将继续增长，但它却不会再是经济自由的象征了。
不过，这无毁于郭伯伟的成就。无论香港的未来会怎样，过去50年的经验将会继续指导和鼓舞追求经济自由的人士。这也为希望给其人民带来同样繁荣的决策者提供了一个良好经济政策的持久样板。
（编者按：本文作者米尔顿?弗里德曼(Milton Friedman)为1976年诺贝尔经济学奖获得者，他是斯坦福大学胡佛研究所(Hoover Institution)的高级研究员。）
