打个比方，假设你是棒球界类固醇兴奋剂泛滥年代的一名重磅击球手。基于道德和健康方面的考虑，你可能反对使用兴奋剂，但许多竞争对手都在用，因此你面临着加入他们行列的巨大压力。
再打个比方，假设你是一所好高中的学生。也许你想拥有一个正常的青春期，不过，你被一群学习小狂人包围，他们从6岁开始就在为申请大学这件事忙活。你发现，自己不可能独自退出这场永无止境的激烈竞争，同时还申请到心仪的大学。因此你面临着巨大的压力，要以自己厌恶的方式行事。
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| 戴维・布鲁克斯 |
你可以把这些情况叫做“野蛮连锁效应”(brutality cascades)。在某些特定种类的竞争中，游戏规则由最野蛮的玩家设定。其他所有人，不管愿意与否，都面临予以仿效的压力。
政界充斥着野蛮连锁效应。比如，假设你是一名当选议员的正常人。你不想把全部时间花在筹款上，你想文明地对待对手，有可能的话甚至做出一些妥协。
但是，你发现自己的竞争对手整天都在筹款，比起文明和妥协来，他们更喜欢野蛮和专制。时间不长，你就发现，为了生存，你必须遵守他们的准则。
或者再看看国际事务领域的一个例子。美国是一个始终捍卫公海经济准则的传统资本主义国家。我们认为，与对话类似，如果全球经济拥有最大限度的开放、互信和自由交流，将会使所有人受益。
但是中国出现了，这个超级经济体的想法更具重商主义色彩。许多中国人，至少是军工复合体里的人认为，全球经济是一种战争形式，一种寻求国家主导权的斗争。
美国和欧洲则倾向于认为，对外国私营企业进行网络攻击的做法会伤及自身。这样做也许可以学到一些东西，但是这会摧毁促进自由交流的信任。不久之后，贸易就会枯竭，因为无人想与盗匪做生意。投资者会抽身寻求透明度更高的合作伙伴。
不过中国的网络重商主义者认为，欺骗是种天然的战争手段，网络攻击完全合情合理。你的竞争对手辛勤工作获取了知识产权，而你自己的体系更封闭，因此创新并不是你的竞争优势，所以偷窃是一种更快捷、更廉价的方式。别人会因此恨你，但那又能怎样？他们反正都会恨你。这是战争啊。
在野蛮连锁效应的带动下，随着竞争的持续，中国的行为方式并不会向我们靠拢，而是我们向他们靠拢。目前的走向正是如此。西方企业应对网络攻击的第一反应是筑起高墙。它们没有对全球市场敞开大门，而是开始变得更像密不透风的坚固城堡。
接下来，私营企业和西方政府的界限开始模糊。当西方企业受到攻击的时候，它们马上向所在国的政府寻求技术和政治支持。一方面，美国军方正在深化对计算机反间谍行动的介入，从而拉近了军方和私营企业之间的距离；另一方面，大家看到数码界黑水公司(Blackwater)的崛起，这些私营网络安全公司与信息时代的军队的行为方式别无二致，不仅提供对外国攻击的防御，还可以对来自中国和俄罗斯的敌人进行反击。
不久之后，全球经济就会变得不那么像《大富翁》(Monopoly)，而更像是《大战役》(Risk)。中国的军工复合体盘踞棋盘的一方，而西方的军工复合体则盘踞另一方。
野蛮连锁效应很难摆脱。你可以宣战，干脆努力消灭那些你认为在破坏竞争的人。
或者，你可以尝试建立所谓的“朋友圈”。这种方法首先要建立用来规范竞争的合法性准则，也就是创建一个规范国内政治行为或全球网络间谍活动的《日内瓦公约》(Geneva Convention)。然后，组织起一个尽可能全面网罗同道的联盟来维护这些准则。
最后，将剩余的违规者孤立起来，并发出一个信号：如果加入我们的朋友圈，并且遵守我们的准则，那么你们就会获得压倒性的好处；如果继续待在圈外，那么你们就会付出毁灭性的代价。
奥巴马总统努力与那些他眼中的共和党狂热分子进行斗争的时候，他在这两种策略之间举棋不定。他既没有将预算对决大力推进到让共和党人名誉扫地的地步，也没有提供足够的诱惑来让共和党中的务实派分子冲破党派界线。
在应对中国方面，第二种选择显然是更好的策略。先创建禁止针对公民和私营企业实施网络攻击的《日内瓦公约》，再组织一个广泛的联盟来予以执行。
不幸的是，设立标准现如今是一门奄奄一息的艺术，因此我们要继续忍受这种野蛮连锁效应。
翻译：黄铮
——纽约时报
The Brutality Cascade
March 07, 2013
Let’s say you were a power hitter during baseball’s steroids era. You may have objected to steroids on moral and health grounds. But many of your competitors were using them, so you faced enormous pressure to use them too.
Let’s say you are a student at a good high school. You may want to have a normal adolescence. But you are surrounded by all these junior workaholics who have been preparing for the college admissions racket since they were 6. You find you can’t unilaterally withdraw from the rat race and still get into the college of your choice. So you also face enormous pressure to behave in a way you detest.
You might call these situations brutality cascades. In certain sorts of competitions, the most brutal player gets to set the rules. Everybody else feels pressure to imitate, whether they want to or not.
The political world is rife with brutality cascades. Let’s say you are a normal person who gets into Congress. You’d rather not spend all your time fund-raising. You’d like to be civil to your opponents and maybe even work out some compromises.
But you find yourself competing against opponents who fund-raise all the time, who prefer brutalism to civility and absolutism to compromise. Pretty soon you must follow their norms to survive.
Or take a case in world affairs. The United States is a traditional capitalist nation that has championed an open-seas economic doctrine. We think everybody benefits if global economics is like a conversation, with maximum openness, mutual trust and free exchange.
But along comes China, an economic superpower with a more mercantilist mind-set. Many Chinese, at least in the military-industrial complex, see global economics as a form of warfare, a struggle for national dominance.
Americans and Europeans tend to think it is self-defeating to engage in cyberattacks on private companies in a foreign country. You may learn something, but you destroy the trust that lubricates free exchange. Pretty soon your trade dries up because nobody wants to do business with a pirate. Investors go off in search of more transparent partners.
But China’s cybermercantilists regard deceit as a natural tool of warfare. Cyberattacks make perfect sense. Your competitors have worked hard to acquire intellectual property. Your system is more closed so innovation is not your competitive advantage. It is quicker and cheaper to steal. They will hate you for it, but who cares? They were going to hate you anyway. C’est la guerre.
In a brutality cascade the Chinese don’t become more like us as the competition continues. We become more like them. And that is indeed what’s happening. The first thing Western companies do in response to cyberattacks is build up walls. Instead of being open stalls in the global marketplace, they begin to look more like opaque, rigidified castles.
Next, the lines between private companies and Western governments begin to blur. When Western companies are attacked, they immediately turn to their national governments for technical and political support. On the one hand, the United States military is getting a lot more involved in computer counterespionage, eroding the distance between the military and private companies. On the other hand, you see the rise of these digital Blackwaters, private security firms that behave like information age armies, providing defense against foreign attack but also counterattacking against Chinese and Russian foes.
Pretty soon the global economy looks less like Monopoly and more like a game of Risk, with a Chinese military-industrial complex on one part of the board and the Western military-industrial complex on another part.
Brutality cascades are very hard to get out of. You can declare war and simply try to crush the people you think are despoiling the competition.
Or you can try what might be called friendship circles. In this approach, you first establish the norms of legitimacy that should govern the competition. You create a Geneva Convention of domestic political conduct or global cyberespionage. Then you organize as broad a coalition as possible to agree to uphold these norms.
Finally, you isolate the remaining violators and deliver a message: If you join our friendship circle and abide by our norms, the benefits will be overwhelming, but if you stay outside, the costs will be devastating.
In his effort to fight what he regards as Republican zealots, President Obama is caught between these two strategies. He never quite pushes budget showdowns to the limit to discredit Republicans, but he never offers enough to the members of the Republican common-sense caucus to tempt them to break ranks.
Clearly the second option is better for dealing with the Chinese. Establish a Geneva Convention that bans cyberactivity against citizens and private companies. Establish a broad coalition to enforce it.
Unfortunately, standard-setting is a dying art these days, so we are living with these brutality cascades.
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