????今年9月的一個早晨，精力充沛的法國人、世貿組織（World Trade Organization）總干事帕斯卡爾?拉米站在一屋子經濟學家面前，開始發表他對世界經濟健康狀況的年度解讀。“今年和去年一樣，都以經濟劇烈震蕩為特征，”他開場就說。“經濟增長放緩、高失業率和新發布的貿易數據都讓人擔憂。”這不是什么經濟新癥狀。但最后一句話，提到令人擔憂的最新貿易數據，還是讓很多人豎起了耳朵。

????過去20年的大部分時間里，全球貿易增速一直高于全球經濟增速，通常是后者的2倍左右。2006年GDP增長3.5%，貿易增長8%，是此次危機爆發前最后一年經濟健康的年份。看起來，這個比例就像是個完美的金齒輪，將整個地球更緊密地聯系了起來。但最近24個月的有些情況，看起來很像是貿易休克。不只是貿易不再以2倍的經濟增速增長，相反，貿易在放緩。在一些重點地區，貿易增速已低于GDP增速——而且，今年全球貿易增速將再次低于20年來的平均增速。可能最能體現全球化熱情的海外資產投資數據也已經降至40%，顯著低于2008年時的50%多。這樣的變化足以讓經濟學家們開始質疑：全球化是否正在倒退？

????拉米表示，世界的聯系越來越緊密，這是我們預測未來時的核心假設。有鑒于此，這樣的數據確實令人擔憂。這些變化對政治的影響不亞于對市場的影響。人們應該還記得全球保護主義盛行的年代，清楚國際合作停滯的后果，想到18世紀法國經濟學家弗雷德里克?巴師夏的冷酷論斷就會憂心忡忡：“一旦商品不能跨越國界，軍隊就會跨越國界。”美國從開放的世界貿易秩序中獲得了最多的好處。因此，如今看著美國人反對國際貿易，就好像看著人們正在想辦法擺脫重力一樣。但如今的狀況就是：2/3的美國人相信，發展國際貿易對這個國家有害。

????在本文隨后幾頁，我想用這些冰冷的貿易數據來講述一個更大范圍內的趨勢，一個正在發生的深層次變化：內部的崛起。過去20年的全球化帶來地區和國家間相互聯系度的提升，成就了全新的全球生活品質。冷戰結束后，全球長舒了一口氣，人們開始探索外面的世界。公司、天性和度假都引導我們前往世界最遙遠的角落。現在，我們在身邊看到了一些不同的東西。我們發現每個地方都出現了世界“內向化”發展的跡象，這個時代將由“內部”決定成功、提供增長。不論是公司、國家，甚至個人職業，都是如此。一切就像“外部”曾經起到的作用一樣。想一想：

????? 過去20年的大部分時間里，中國經濟的發展是受到對外開放和低廉的勞工成本推動。低廉的勞工成本使得中國成為了世界工廠。但未來10年，中國需要盡快修復失衡的內部體系。正如中國官員去年在解釋中國新的五年計劃時所述：“全球化的黃金時代可能已經過去。”

????One morning this past September, Pascal Lamy, the energetic Frenchman who heads the World Trade Organization, stood in front of a room of economists and began his annual recitation on the health of the world's economy. "This year, like last, has been marked by extraordinary economic turbulence," he began. "Sluggish economic growth rates, high unemployment, and newly released figures on world trade that are just as worrying." It was not an unfamiliar diagnosis. But that last bit, the mention of the worrying new trade data, caught a number of ears.

????For most of the past 20 years trade has raced ahead of global economic growth, usually at about double its pace. GDP grew by 3.5% in 2006, the last healthy, pre-crisis year, and trade at 8%. This was, it seemed, a golden ratchet binding the planet ever closer. But the most recent 24 months show something that looks an awful lot like a trade shock. It isn't just that trade is no longer doubling -- it's slowing. In some crucial areas trade growth has slipped below GDP growth -- and this year, globally we'll be below the 20-year average rate of trade growth yet again. Figures on investment in assets held overseas, probably the best indicator of enthusiasm for globalism, are drifting down toward 40%, from more than 50% in 2008. The move is serious enough that economists have begun to ask: Is globalization running backward?

????Given that the idea of a more interconnected world has been at the heart of our assumptions about our future, such figures are, as Lamy said, worrying. They echo in our politics as loudly as they do in our markets. People remember a world of protectionism, understand the consequences of no international cooperation, and nervously consider the icy historical proposition of 18th-century French economist Frédéric Bastiat: "When goods don't cross borders, armies will." Watching the country that in recent years has benefited most from an open world-trading order rebel against it is like hearing that people are looking for ways to opt out of gravity. But here it is: Two-thirds of Americans now believe more trade is bad for the country.

????What I want to do in the next few pages is start with those chilling trade numbers to tell a larger story, the story of a deep shift now under way: The rise of the inside. The past 20 years of globalization delivered a quantity of connectedness that produced a whole new quality of global life. At the end of the Cold War, the world released a big, tense breath and began stretching out. Our companies, our instincts, our vacations -- all led us to the farthest corners of the planet. Now, all around us, we see something different. We find everywhere signs of a world turning inward and of an era when the inside will define success and deliver growth -- for companies, for nations, even for your career -- in the way the outside once did. Consider:

????? For most of the past 20 years China's development was driven by opening to the outside and by low labor costs that made it the world's factory. But the next 10 years will be defined by fixing, urgently, its broken internal systems. As officials in Beijing noted last year when explaining their new five-year plan: "The golden age of globalization may come to a halt."