2016年经济学人 美式乌托邦 短命的狂热(下)（在线收听）

Robert Owen, a British mill-owner and reformer, treated private property, along with organised religion and marriage, as a social scourge. In 1825 he bought land for a farm-and-factory commune in Indiana. It attracted farmers, artisans and intellectuals. Tools, food and housing were free. The commune had mixed-sex schools and a library. It sponsored scientific research. Without a shared faith or purpose, however, the members split into competing groups. By 1827, Owen's secular community had disbanded. The difficulty of pursuing micro-communism in a capitalist society also dogged Cabet's American followers. His New World Icarians split into several rival groupings. Shakers, Owenites and Icarians focused, each in their own way, on duties. They sought to tame human selfishness. Gloomy as he looked in portraits, the Frenchman Charles Fourier concentrated on fun. His writings inspired the Brook Farm commune near Boston and, less directly, Oneida. Fourier wanted to free people's instincts so that everyone, especially women, might lead a life of varied enjoyments and sensual delight. Stripped of emphasis on sex, Fourier's message that a good life was a cultivated life, not one of striving and work, appealed to New England intellectuals who formed Brook Farm's core.

罗伯特欧文是英国一个工厂的厂长，同时他也是一位改革家，他把私有财产同有组织的宗教与婚姻归为社会灾祸。1825年，他在印第安纳州购买了农场，建造了将农场与工厂集一身的公社，吸引农民、艺术家与学者前往。工具，食物与住房都是免费提供，还有男女混合制的学校与图书馆。此外，公社还赞助科学研究。然而因没有共同的信仰或目的，公社内部发生分裂，成员间相互争斗。到了1827年，欧文的这个非宗教团体也解散了。在美国这样一个追求内阁政策的资本主义国家中，想要追求微型公社，困难重重。欧文的新世界Icarians分裂成几个敌对群体。无论是震教徒，欧文的组织还是Lcarians，都以他们各自的方式关注职责，都寻求驯化人类自私的心理。法国人查尔斯傅里叶关注于这其中的乐趣，尽管他在肖像画里看起来很忧伤。但他的著作鼓舞了波斯顿附近的“小溪农场”公社，还间接影响了奥奈达一带。傅里叶想要解放人们的本能以便每个人，尤其是女性，都尽可能的过上享受多种娱乐与感官愉悦的生活。他传递的信息不再只具有强调性，而是指好的生活，即耕种生活，并不是奋斗与工作的生活之一，这一观点对于“小溪农场”核心力量，一些来自新英格兰的学者颇有吸引力。

“Paradise Now” is more than a record of failed hopes. Some ideas spread to the mainstream. Fourier's feminism is a good example. Fourierist communes foundered across the New World and Old; his ideas about gender equality lived on. No society could improve, Fourier believed, until women's lot improved. “The best countries”, he wrote, “have always been those which allowed women the most freedom.” That is a common thought today. It was radical when Fourier wrote it in 1808.

《现世天堂》不止记录了一系列破败的幻想，其中的一些想法也成为了主流。傅里叶的女权主义就是极佳的例子。虽然傅里叶公社在新旧世界都破产了，但有关于性别平等的想法仍在产生影响。傅里叶认为，除非女性的命运得以改善，否则整个社会难以得以发展。他写道，“最好的国家总是那些给予女性最大的自由。”而今这一想法已再寻常不过。但1808年，傅里叶写下的这句话却显得尤为激进。

Women more generally are at the centre of the Utopian story. Some communes he writes about were democratic, some authoritarian. None was patriarchal. Mr Jennings's book is rich in fond hopes and improbable ventures. Rather than nudging readers to mock, which is easy, the author reminds them instead to remember that the maddest-sounding ideas sometimes become motherhood.

女性更多的被置于乌托邦故事的中心。Jennings所描述的公社一些是民主的，一些是自治的，但没有一个是家长制的。他的书中记录了大量的温和希冀与不可信资产。尽管很容易，但作者却并不是去唆使读者去嘲弄社会，而是提醒读者要记得听起来最疯狂的想法有时候会变成为母之道。