经济学人 | 马来西亚，一籍难求（微信文章未删减版）

(本文选自《经济学人》20191130期)

背景介绍：

马来西亚是世界上国籍制度最为严苛的国家之一，一个外国人想要加入马来西亚国籍是非常困难的。除此之外，马来西亚还是全球少数几个的在国籍制度上存在性别歧视的国家之一。

Malaysia still discriminates against women over citizenship

马来西亚仍然在国籍问题上歧视女性

The law may be changed, but how long will that take?

法律或许终将改写，但还需多久？

Eight months pregnant, Noor (not her real name) flew from Washington back home to Malaysia, desperate to arrive before her baby did. Travelling so close to a due date poses risks, but for her, giving birth overseas did too.

怀有8个月身孕的努尔从华盛顿飞回了马来西亚，她不顾一切地要在孩子出生前回到老家。如此临近预产期的旅途是有风险的。但对她来说，在海外生孩子也是同样有风险的。

Her child would not automatically receive Malaysian citizenship. The constitution guarantees that fathers can pass their nationality to children born abroad. But mothers must apply for it, a process that can leave foreign-born children in limbo for years.

她的孩子不会自动获得马来西亚的国籍。马来西亚的宪法规定，父亲可以将国籍传给自己在海外出生的孩子。但母亲却要申请，这个过程可能会让在国外出生的孩子在未来几年内都没有国籍。

To avoid such a wait, Noor and her American husband even asked the Malaysian embassy in Washington to let her give birth there, technically on her country’s soil, but in vain.

为了避免这样的等待，努尔和她的美国丈夫甚至请求在马来西亚驻华盛顿大使馆（严格来说，也算是马来西亚的领土）内进行生产，但最终遭到了拒绝。

So she hid her big belly under a heavy winter coat and boarded an aircraft. “I cannot fathom how the government can expect women to take on that level of risk,” muses her husband.

于是，她只得把大肚子藏在厚厚的冬衣下，踏上了回家的飞机。她的丈夫沉思道：“我不明白政府为什么要让女性承担这样的风险。”

Malaysia is one of 25 countries that restricts their women from conferring their nationality to their children, and is one of roughly 50 that limit them from passing it to foreign spouses.

马来西亚是全球25个限制女性将国籍传给其子女的国家之一，也是50个限制女性将国籍传给其外籍配偶的国家之一。

Still more unusually, Malaysia discriminates against some fathers, too—it is one of three countries that prevent men from passing citizenship on to their children born outside marriage. Between 2012 and 2017 more than 15,000 children born in Malaysia to Malaysian fathers were denied citizenship.

更让人不可思议的是，马来西亚对一些父亲也有歧视——它是全球3个禁止男性将国籍传给其私生子女的国家之一。2012年至2017年间，超过1.5万名在马来西亚出生的马来西亚父亲的孩子没能取得马来西亚国籍。

Sixty years ago most countries had nationality provisions that varied according to sex. They made assumptions about women’s roles and expectations that are now widely viewed as wrong and discriminatory.

六十年前，大多数国家的国籍规定存在性别差异。他们对女性角色和前程的假定现在被人们普遍认为是错误的且带有歧视性的。

Since 2000 more than 20 countries with such laws—from Kenya and Yemen to Morocco and Zimbabwe—have reformed them. The holdouts are mostly in Africa and the Middle East.

自2000年以来，从肯尼亚、也门到摩洛哥和津巴布韦等20多个国家已经对这些法律进行了改革。反对改革的大都是一些非洲国家和中东国家。

Of the ten members of the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN), Malaysia is one of only two, alongside neighbouring Brunei, to persist with gender discrimination in their citizenship rules.

在东盟（ASEAN）十国中，仅有马来西亚和文莱两个国家在国籍规则中仍然存在性别歧视。

Why do they not change? “Xenophobia and a patriarchal mindset,” says Catherine Harrington of the New York-based Global Campaign for Equal Nationality Rights. The World Economic Forum ranks Malaysia 131 out of 149 countries for women’s political empowerment.

他们为什么不做出改变呢？总部位于纽约的全球国籍权利平等运动的凯瑟琳·哈林顿说：“都是仇外心理和男权主义在作祟。”在世界经济论坛对149个国家赋予女性政治权力的排名中，马来西亚排在第131位。

(红色标注词为重难点词汇)

本文翻译：Vinnie

校核：Vinnie

编辑：Vinnie

小编说

马来西亚是当今世界少有的几个在国籍法中存在性别歧视的国家之一，联合国也曾多次呼吁，要消除国籍法中的性别歧视。但其实除了国籍制度外，马来西亚在社会的其他许多方面都存在着性别歧视,而根深蒂固的男权思想或是一个主要原因。

重难点词汇：

discriminate [dɪˈskrɪmɪneɪt] vt. 歧视；区别；辨别 vi. 区别；辨别

desperate [ˈdespərət] adj. 不顾一切的；令人绝望的；极度渴望的

embassy [ˈembəsi] n. 大使馆

confer [kənˈfɜːr] vt. 授予；给予 vi. 协商