一些批评家批评美国总统奥巴马竞选时口号颇具鼓动性（inspirational），还提出了“弯曲历史之弓”的雄心，当选后却表现得事务（transactional）而现实（pragmatic）。但是，在这方面，奥巴马并不是绝无仅有的。
很多领导然在职业生涯中会改变他们的目标和风格。历史上最伟大的变革型（transformational）领袖——俾斯麦在实现普鲁士领导下的德国统一后变得渐进（incremental）而现实导向。类似地，富兰克林·罗斯福的外交政策目标和风格在其第一个任期内是温和而渐进的，但在1938年认定希特勒代表了外部威胁后成为变革型。
事务型领导在稳定而可预测的环境中更加有效，而鼓动风格更可能在快速而间断的社会和政治变化时期中出现。像印度的甘地和南非的曼德拉这样的具有变革型目标和鼓动型风格的领袖可以极大地影响不稳定的政治环境所产生的结果，特别是在制度性约束结构薄弱的发展中国家中。
相反，美国外交政策的形成受国会、法院和宪法等制度的高度约束。因此，出现变革型领袖的机会更低。
但即使是美国宪法，对国会和总统在外交政策方面的权力也语焉不详。往好了说，它也只是某宪法专家所谓的“斗争邀请”。此外，外部条件的影响力很大。威尔逊、富兰克林·罗斯福和杜鲁门均在入主白宫后、在应对外部事件时才发展出了变革型目标。
危机环境可以将天赋异禀的领袖从美国制度的顽疾——既得利益和官僚惰性的重重约束中解放出来。20世纪90年代踌躇满志的克林顿据说相当嫉妒富兰克林·罗斯福可以遇到20世纪30年代的危机环境。
在这样的局面中，行动的弹性更大。有着变革型目标的领袖的机会更大，鼓动型风格更可能找到积极响应的追随者并让他们扮演更重要的角色。比如，小布什就利用了2001年9月11日之后的危机环境要求表现实力并出兵伊拉克。
但是，尽管动荡时期能为变革型领袖创造舞台，并不能因此得出果断而乐于冒险的领袖总是适合解决决定“动荡”性质的危机的结论。老布什就与他的儿子不同，他是位事务型领袖，但实施了颇为成功的外交政策。
不管领袖的目标是变革性的还是渐进性的，他们都需要一定的软实力和硬实力技能来增加效率。软实力技能包括情商（自我控制和利用心理暗示吸引他人的能力）、愿景（平衡理想、目标和能力的有吸引力的未来描述）以及沟通（用词语和符号说服内部圈子和外部听众的能力）。在使用硬实力资源方面，两种技能特别重要：组织力以及在通过欺压、收买和讨价还价中形成获胜联盟方面的无所不用其极。
说到底，高效领导要求有肆应商（contextual intelligence）和本能判断力，这两种能力有助于领袖理解变化、设定目标并据此协调战略和战术。现代新加坡国父李光耀曾经对我说，领袖必须能够快速学习、检验现实、随时准备随环境改变思维并且在危机中保持镇定。
肆应商既包括面对复杂局面识别趋势的能力，也包括一边改变事件一边适应的能力。俾斯麦曾把这种技能称为历史中的本能神迹，一种在清扫过去是抓住要领的能力。更平白点说，有肆应商的领袖与冲浪者一样，具有判断和驾驭新潮流的能力。
这种类型的领袖不但能让自己的风格适应环境和追随者的需要，还能创造“教育他们的直觉”的信息流。这包括揣摩集团政治并理解不同相关利益者的立场和优势，以便确定何时以及如何使用事务性和鼓动性技能的能力。这是可以自我制造的幸运。
这一技能在无序局面中至关重要，在这种局面下，通常问对问题比得到正确的答案更难。有肆应商的领袖善于通过定义集团所面临的的问题提供意义或给出路线图。他们明白一个问题中不同价值之间的冲突，也知道如何平衡所欲和所能。特别地，肆应商要求领袖理解集团文化、实力资源的分布、追随者的需要和需求、信息流以及时机。
肆应商在外交政策中特别重要，因为高效的领袖必须理解其他社会的文化和实力结构，以及它们如何互相影响形成国际体系。在多年的外交实践经验中，老布什练就了卓越的肆应商。而几乎没有外交实践经验的小布什则否。其中的差距就是父亲的成功和儿子的失败的差别的来源。
作者Joseph S. Nye 是哈佛大学教授。
英文原题：The Right Stuff in Foreign Policy
The Right Stuff in Foreign Policy
By Joseph S. Nye
Some critics complain that US President Barack Obama campaigned on inspirational rhetoric and an ambition to “bend the arc of history,” but then turned out to be a transactional and pragmatic leader once in office. In this respect, however, Obama is hardly unique.
Many leaders change their objectives and style over the course of their careers. One of the great transformational leaders in history, Otto von Bismarck, became largely incremental and status quo-oriented after achieving the unification of Germany under Prussian direction. Likewise, Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s foreign-policy objectives and style were modest and incremental in his first presidential term, but became transformational in 1938 when he decided that Adolf Hitler represented an existential threat.
Transactional leadership is more effective in stable and predictable environments, whereas an inspirational style is more likely to appear in periods of rapid and discontinuous social and political change. The transformational objectives and inspirational style of a leader like Mahatma Gandhi in India or Nelson Mandela in South Africa can significantly influence outcomes in fluid political contexts, particularly in developing countries with weakly structured institutional constraints.
By contrast, American foreign-policy formation is highly constrained by institutions like Congress, the courts, and the constitution. Thus, we would expect less opportunity for transformational leadership.
But even the US Constitution is ambiguous about the powers of Congress and the president in foreign policy. At best, it creates what one constitutional expert called “an invitation to struggle.” Moreover, much depends on external conditions. Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt, and Harry Truman developed transformational objectives only in response to external events after they entered office.
Crisis conditions can liberate a gifted leader from the accumulated constraints of vested interests and bureaucratic inertia that normally inhibit action in the American system. Bill Clinton, caught up in the complacent 1990’s, is said to have envied Franklin Roosevelt’s crisis conditions of the 1930’s.
In such situations, action becomes more fluid. A leader with transformational objectives faces better odds, and an inspirational style is more likely to find responsive followers and to make their role more relevant. For example, George W. Bush used the crisis conditions after September 11, 2001, in the service of an assertion of executive power, as well as to invade Iraq.
But, while turbulent times may set the stage for transformational leaders, it does not follow that bold and risk-loving leaders are always best suited to address the crises that define such periods. President George H. W. Bush, unlike his son, was transactional, but implemented a very successful foreign policy.
Whether they are transformational or incremental in their objectives, leaders need certain soft- and hard-power skills to be effective. Among the soft-power skills are emotional intelligence (self-control and the ability to use emotional cues to attract others); vision (an attractive portrait of the future that balances ideals, objectives, and capabilities); and communication (the ability to use words and symbols to persuade both an inner circle and a broader audience). For the use of hard-power resources, two skills are particularly important: organizational capacity and a Machiavellian proficiency in bullying, buying, and bargaining to form winning coalitions.
Above all, effective leadership requires contextual intelligence and an intuitive diagnostic ability that helps a leader understand change, set objectives, and align strategies and tactics accordingly. As Lee Kuan Yew, the founding father of modern Singapore, once told me, a leader must be a quick learner, test reality, be prepared to change his mind as conditions change, and act calmly in a crisis.
Contextual intelligence implies both a capability to discern trends in the face of complexity and adaptability while trying to shape events. Bismarck once referred to this skill as the ability to intuit God’s movements in history, and seize the hem of His garment as He sweeps past. More prosaically, leaders with contextual intelligence, like surfers, have the ability to judge and adjust to new waves and ride them successfully.
Leaders of this type not only adapt their style to the situation and to their followers’ needs; they also create flows of information that “educate their hunches.” This involves the ability to size up group politics and understand the positions and strengths of various stakeholders in order to decide when and how to use transactional and inspirational skills. It is the self-made part of luck.
This skill is crucial in unstructured situations, when it is often more difficult to ask the right questions than it is to get the right answers. Leaders with contextual intelligence are good at providing meaning or a road map by defining the problem that a group confronts. They understand the tension between the different values involved in an issue, and how to balance the desirable with the feasible. In particular, contextual intelligence requires an understanding of groups’ cultures; the distribution of power resources; followers’ needs and demands; information flows; and timing.
Contextual intelligence is particularly important in foreign policy, because an effective leader must understand the culture and power structure of other societies, and how they interact as an international system. With years of experience in foreign affairs, George H. W. Bush had excellent contextual intelligence. With almost no experience in foreign affairs, “W” did not. That gap proved the difference between the success of the father and the failure of the son.
(Joseph S. Nye is University Professor at Harvard University.)
来源: 联合早报
