南非的抗议为何常常变得暴力

TO PROTEST the redrawing of municipal boundaries earlier this year, residents in apoor part of Limpopo province set fire to their schools.

为了抗议今年早些时候重新划定的市政边界，林波波省一个贫困地区的居民放火烧了他们的学校。

More than three dozen schools were damaged; many were burned to the ground.

共有三十余所学校受损；许多被毁为废墟。

Service delivery protests over the shoddy provision of electricity and basic sanitation regularly see major highways barricaded with burning tyres.

服务交付抗议——对质量低劣的电力和卫生基础设施的抗议经常在高速公路主干道焚烧轮胎堵塞道路。

INPRotests at universities, where students are seeking free tuition, libraries and lecture halls have been torched.

在大学中，学生们为了追求免学费而抗议，把图书馆和报告厅烧掉了。

Why do South African protests readilydescend into violence?

为什么南非的抗议经常变得暴力？

South Africans have plenty to feel angry about.

南非人有很多理由感到愤怒。

Public services are patchy.

公共服务支离破碎。

Youth unemployment runs at around50%.

青年失业率徘徊在50%的高位。

The economy is both stagnant and lopsided.

经济结构畸形，发展趋于停滞。

A majority of black SouthAfricans are still poor.

大多数的南非黑人依旧贫穷。

Many feel frustrated with the lack of fundamentalchange in their lives, 22 years after the introduction of universal adultsuffrage.

很多人对普选制度22年来依旧没能从根本上改变他们的生活感到沮丧。

Researchers at the University of Johannesburg reckon there are onaverage 11 protests a day, many of them over labour issues.

约翰内斯堡的研究人员估算每天平均有11个抗议活动，许多是关于劳工问题。

Other research hasfound an increasing number of service delivery protests in recent years.

其他研究发现，服务提供抗议近年来持续增长。

The vast majority of protestsare peaceful.

其中绝大多数是和平的。

Yet they are largely ignored by the government and media, and socitizens up the ante (burn to beheard, is one refrain).

然而，他们很大程度上被政府和媒体所忽略，所以居民们选择了加码（烧到让我们的声音被听到为止）。

Moreover, some demonstrationsget co-opted by opportunistic looters, while others are fuelled by factionalpolitics.

此外，一些示威混入了机会主义的抢劫者，还有一些被派系政治鼓动。

There is also a sense of impunity, caused by the rarity ofconvictions for burning buildings or stone-throwing.

还有一种不受惩罚的感觉，源于人们对放火扔石头没有负罪感。

The violence begets a vicious cycle.Thuggish protests draw heavy-handed responses by police.

暴力造成了恶性循环。暴力抗议引发了警察的重拳回应。

Tactical units, set upto deal with serious crimes such as car-jackings, have been dispatched touniversity campuses to quell student protests.

战术小分队被派出解决劫车等严重犯罪事件，并派往大学校园以弹压学生抗议活动。

Poorly trained private securityguards are often deployed as well.

没有受过严格训练的私人保安也经常被安排以应对抗议。

Students throw stones at security guards,who hurl them right back.

学生们对着保安扔石块，保安再扔回去。

Last week police shot one student leader 13 timeswith rubber bullets.

上周，警察用橡皮子弹射中了一个学生领袖13次。

A broader worry is that legitimate complaints are tarredas thuggish disorder.

更广泛的担忧是，合法的投诉被视为混乱无序。

And arson and looting cause billions of rand in damage—something South Africa can ill afford.

纵火和抢劫造成了数十亿兰特的损失（译注：南非兰特兑人民币大概2:1）——这是南非难以承受的。

Even by the standards of Africa’s blood-soaked colonial history, SouthAfrica has an especially brutal past.

即便以非洲沾满鲜血的殖民历史为标准，南非的过去依然显得相当残酷。

The apartheid regime metdissent with live fire.

种族隔离时期的政权直接将异见者烧死。

The African National Congress eventually resorted toviolent tactics in its struggle.

非国大最终采取暴力来斗争。

In the early 1990s South Africa stood on theverge of civil war.

在20世纪90年代初，南非处在内战的边缘。

Today the country is plagued by a high rate of violentcrime.

今天，南非深受频繁的暴力犯罪困扰。

Yet recent local elections saw South Africans express their anger at theballot box rather than on the streets; the opposition Democratic Alliancegained power in several major cities.

然而，最近的地方选举使南非人在投票箱前而不是街道上表达愤怒；反对党民主联盟在几个主要城市获得了权力。

Whether this leads to improved publicservices remains to be seen.

不过这是否意味着公共服务将得到改善还有待观察。

But if South Africans feel they are being heardand that democratic institutions are working for them, perhaps the cycle ofviolence can at last come to an end.

但如果南非人感到他们的声音正在被听到，民主的机构正在为他们工作，或许这个暴力的循环可以最终走向终结。