The Myth of Independent American Families獨立美國家庭的迷思

In Nordic countries， people rely on the state. In the U.S.， they rely on their communities.

在北歐，人們依靠國家。在美國，人們依靠自己的社區。

In 1970， a 17-year-old named Lars Tragardh left Sweden for America， trading in the collectivism of his home country for rugged individualism. Or so he thought.

1970年，一位名叫拉爾斯·特雷高的17歲少年離開瑞典前往美國，舍棄祖國的集體主義而選擇了堅定的個人主義。至少他是這樣想的。

His disillusionment began while he was applying for college financial aid. He hoped to attend Pomona College in Southern California， and even back then， tuition seemed steep compared with the cost of education in Sweden， where university was free. When he learned that the school had two sets of aid forms—one regarding his own income， and one for his parents’—he was surprised. “Well， what does that have to do with me？” Tragardh recalls asking. “I’m an adult … I have no economic relations to my family anymore.” An administrator explained that in America， parents are expected to contribute to their children’s college costs.

申請大學助學金時他的幻想開始破滅。他希望入讀南加州的波莫納學院，而即便在那個年代，美國大學的學費相較于瑞典也似乎高不可攀——瑞典的大學教育是免費的。當他得知學校有兩套助學金申請表（這兩套表分別涉及他自己的和他父母的收入）時，他很驚訝。特雷高記得自己當時問道：“呃，那和我有什么關系？我是個成年人……我和家人已經沒有經濟關系了。”一位管理人員解釋說，在美國，父母應該出錢供孩子上大學。

Tragardh thought that sounded generous， but also concerning. Wouldn’t that sort of financial dependence give parents unreasonable influence over their adult children？ What if the child wanted to study， say， history， but the parents refused to pay unless their child pursued medicine？ “They looked at me like I was from Mars，” Tragardh， now a historian living in Stockholm， told me.

特雷高覺得這聽起來很慷慨，但也很令人擔憂。這種經濟依賴難道不會導致父母對成年子女施加不合理的影響嗎？比如說，如果孩子想學歷史，但父母要孩子學醫他們才肯出錢，該怎么辦？“他們看我的眼神，就像我來自火星一樣。”特雷高對我說道。他現在是一位歷史學家，居住在斯德哥爾摩。

America has a reputation， both at home and abroad， as a country that values independence above practically all else. But from Tragardh’s perspective， that commitment to independence rings hollow. To him， Americans seem to have confused individualism with anti-statism; U.S. policy makers happily throw people into positions of reliance on their families and communities in order to keep the state out. He’s got a point. We have our own culture of dependence， and it comes with its own shortcomings.

美國在國內外都以將獨立看得高于一切而著稱。但從特雷高的角度來看，這種對獨立的信奉聽起來有些空洞。他認為，美國人似乎混淆了個人主義和反國家主義；美國的政策制定者樂見人們依賴自己的家庭和社區，這樣國家就能置身事外。他的觀點有一定道理。我們有自己的依賴文化，而這種文化有其自身的缺點。

In Nordic countries， people generally have help paying for college—just not from their parents. Take Sweden， for example： Most European students don’t have to pay tuition， and Swedish citizens can apply for a stipend to cover their living expenses. All young people， in university or not， with incomes below a certain threshold can qualify for a housing allowance. And if they go on to begin families of their own， they’re automatically eligible for paid parental leave and， after kids turn 1， low-cost child care.

在北歐國家，上大學通常會獲得學費資助，只是并非來自父母。以瑞典為例：大多數歐洲學生無須交學費，瑞典公民還可以申請助學金以維持生活開銷。所有收入低于一定水準的年輕人，無論是否在讀大學，都有資格領取住房津貼。如果他們之后生兒育女，將自動享受帶薪育兒假，孩子滿1歲后還可以享受低成本的兒童保育。

With little of this guaranteed in the U.S.， young people have to turn elsewhere. Americans are more and more likely to live with their parents in their 20s and 30s， and in most cases， the parents are paying the lion’s share of the housing costs. About a third of low-income adults cite the need for child care as a reason for such an arrangement. And many grown people who don’t live with their parents still rely on them financially for help with college tuition， loans， rent， mortgages， or child-care costs. This interdependency sometimes goes in the other direction， too： Adult children commonly take on the role of primary caregiver for their aging parents， especially those with lower incomes who can’t afford professional help.

在美國，上述種種福利幾乎都不存在，因此年輕人不得不另想辦法。越來越多二三十歲的美國年輕人選擇與父母同住，在大多數情況下，父母承擔了大部分的住房費用。大約1/3的低收入成年人表示，父母幫忙照顧孩子，是他們做出這種安排的原因之一。而許多不與父母同住的成年人在經濟上仍然依賴父母，需要父母幫忙支付大學學費、貸款、租金、抵押貸款或兒童保育費用。這種相互依存的關系有時也會反過來：成年子女通常會承擔起照顧年邁父母的主要角色，收入較低、無力承擔專業護理費用的尤其如此。

When Anu Partanen， a Finnish journalist and the author of The Nordic Theory of Everything， moved to the U.S.， she was continually struck by the degree to which Americans’ well-being depends on their relations. Some small examples stood out， such as the fact that married couples file their taxes jointly， or that expecting parents get their child-care gear from baby showers. Others she found more troubling： an acquaintance who was battling cancer， for instance， and couldn’t leave a bad relationship without losing her partner’s health insurance. Or the many mothers who， unable to afford child care， have to leave their job and rely on their husband’s income.

當芬蘭記者、《北歐萬物論》的作者阿努·帕爾塔寧搬到美國后，她時常驚訝于美國人的幸福高度依賴親屬關系這一現象。有一些很鮮明的小例子，比如已婚夫婦共同納稅，或準父母在迎嬰派對上接受育兒用品。也有其他更令人不安的情況：比如，一位正與癌癥對抗的熟人，如果脫離一段糟糕的婚姻關系，就會一并失去伴侶的健康保險。還有許多請不起保姆的母親不得不辭去工作，依靠丈夫的收入維持生活。

The familial dependencies woven through American life are notable to Scandinavians like Tragardh and Partanen because the Nordic welfare state， especially in Sweden， is designed to eliminate precisely those dependencies. In fact， Tragardh came to conclude that Sweden’s guiding ideology is not so much collectivism as it is statist individualism; the goal， as he and his co-author Henrik Berggren once put it， is to make individuals “as independent of his or her fellow citizens as possible.” Partly for this reason， Swedish universities stopped taking parental income into account in financial-aid decisions， Tragardh told me. Policies such as universal health care serve a similar purpose： to support citizens so that their families don’t have to.

對特雷高和帕爾塔寧等斯堪的納維亞人來說，美國人生活中錯綜復雜的家庭依賴感值得關注，因為北歐的福利國家，尤其是瑞典，其宗旨正是要消除這些依賴。事實上，特雷高得出的結論是，瑞典的指導思想與其說是集體主義，不如說是國家主義下的個人主義。正如他和他的合著者亨里克·貝里格倫在書中所言，其目標是讓個人“盡可能不依賴其同胞”。特雷高告訴我，瑞典大學在審批助學金時不再考慮父母的收入，這在一定程度上就是出于上述理念。全民醫療保健等政策也有類似的目的：為公民提供支持，讓他們無須依賴家人的幫助。

Eliminating personal dependencies might sound dystopian， but the idea is not to banish our most intimate relationships—only to ensure that they are based on desire rather than need. It’s rooted in what Tragardh and Berggren describe in their book as the “Swedish theory of love，” which views mutual autonomy as a prerequisite for a healthy relationship. To depend heavily on one’s family members or friends not only puts your welfare at the mercy of their whims， the thinking goes， but hamstrings your ability to engage with them authentically. By removing power relations， Swedish social policies free people to associate while making decisions for themselves， without the pressure to stay in the good graces of a benefactor.

消除個人依賴可能聽起來反烏托邦，但其本意并非要切斷人與人之間最親密的情感紐帶——只是為了確保這些關系基于意愿而非需求。這種理念植根于特雷高和貝里格倫在他們的書中所描述的“瑞典式愛的理論”。該理論將彼此獨立視作健康關系的先決條件。該理論主張，嚴重依賴家人或朋友不僅會讓你的生活狀態受制于他人，還會削弱與他們真誠交往的能力。通過消除權力關系，瑞典的社會政策使人們在與人交往時可以自主決策，不必曲意逢迎有恩于己之人。

Of course， the cost of interpersonal independence is dependence on the state， which comes with its own risks of abuse. But the point isn’t that the Nordic model is perfect. It’s that America’s culture of self-reliance is a bit of a myth—and that as a policy goal， fostering total self-reliance is unrealistic. The alternative to the nanny state is not a country full of rugged individualists bootstrapping their way to self-sufficiency; it’s one where adults are heavily dependent on the bank of Mom and Dad. “We are dependent animals，” W. Bradford Wilcox， a sociology professor at the University of Virginia， told me. “It’s a kind of chimerical1 claim to think that you can kind of live in this autonomous way. And so the question is： dependent upon whom？”

當然，人際獨立的代價是對國家的依賴，這也伴有受制的風險。但關鍵不在于北歐模式是否完美，而是美國的自力更生文化缺少現實依據——以培養完全的自力更生作為政策目標是不切實際的。替代保姆型國家的這個國家并非人人都是堅定的個人主義者，愿意通過個人努力實現自給自足；這里的成年人嚴重依賴父母幫襯。弗吉尼亞大學社會學教授W.布拉德福德·威爾科克斯對我說：“我們是依賴性動物，想著自己能以這種自主的方式生活，近乎虛妄。問題在于：依賴誰呢？”

When citizens are left to rely on their families， their prospects are wildly unequal： The more money your relations have， the better off you’re likely to be. And in an economy in which social mobility can require physical mobility—moving away from home to pursue an education or career—reaching financial independence is especially difficult. Some people just aren’t able to sacrifice child care or the roof over their head in order to take such a leap.

當公民只能依靠家人時，他們的前景就非常不平等：你的親戚越有錢，你的生活就可能越好。在一個社會流動可能以人員實際流動——離家求學或工作——為必要條件的經濟體中，實現經濟獨立尤其困難。有些人根本無法犧牲兒童保育或居住條件去實現這樣的飛躍。

Others might not want to; caring for people can， admittedly， be enriching. In fact， perhaps because I am American， the Nordic fear of family dependence strikes me in much the same way I imagine American fears of government overreach might strike a Swede—as a little exaggerated. My mother cared for my grandparents in their declining years; I expect to do the same for her， and that prospect feels more like an expression of my love than a threat to it.

還有些人可能并不想；不可否認，照顧他人會令人充實。事實上，也許因為我是美國人，在我看來，北歐人對家庭依賴的恐懼就像瑞典人眼中美國人對政府越界的恐懼一樣——都有點小題大做了。我母親在我外祖父母晚年時照顧他們；我希望為她做同樣的事情，這種前景更像是對愛的表達，而不是對愛的威脅。

Then again， I remember well the quarrels that arose among my mother and her siblings under such strains. In America， we take those difficulties for granted， but it may be worth considering what life would look like without them. Perhaps without the burden of my grandparents’ care， my mother might have been freer to enjoy the precious time she had left with them.

然而，我清楚地記得在這種壓力下，我母親和她的兄弟姐妹之間發生的爭吵。在美國，我們認為這些困難是理所當然的，但或許值得想一想，倘若沒有這些負擔，我們的生活會是怎樣的。也許，如果沒有照顧外祖父母的壓力，我母親可能會更自由地享受那些與他們共度的寶貴時光。

（譯者為“《英語世界》杯”翻譯大賽獲獎者）

1 chimerical妄想的；荒誕不經的。