TOKYO — Japan's economy has contracted so many times in the last few years that the meaning of recession has started to blur. If an economy is shrinking almost as often as it is growing, what does any single downturn say about its health?

东京——在过去几年里，日本经济多次出现收缩，以至于衰退的涵义都模糊了。如果一个经济体收缩的次数不下于增长的次数，那么对于该经济体的健康状况而言，区区一次收缩又能说明什么问题呢？

Now Japan appears to be faltering again.

现在，日本似乎再次出现了不景气。

After a decline in the second quarter, there are signs that output may have slipped again in the third, driven down in part by a slowing Chinese economy. Economists expect any recession to be short and shallow, but the deeper lesson looks more troubling: Nearly three years after Prime Minister Shinzo Abe gained office on a pledge to end economic stagnation, a decisive break with the past still appears far off.

第二季度的经济指标有所下滑，而且有迹象表明，第三季度的经济产出也会下滑，部分原因在于中国经济出现放缓。经济学家预计，任何衰退都是短暂的、小幅的，但更深层次的问题看起来更加令人不安：在安倍晋三担任首相、承诺结束经济停滞的三年之后，决定性的突破仍然显得遥不可及。

“The potential growth rate is close to zero, so any small shock can put the economy into recession,” said Masamichi Adachi, the chief Japan economist at JPMorgan Chase. “Growth expectations are anemic.”

“潜在增长率接近于零，任何微小的冲击都可能让经济陷入衰退，”摩根大通(JPMorgan Chase)驻日本首席经济学家足立正道(Masamichi Adachi)表示。“增长预期乏力。”

As a result, some economists are betting that the Bank of Japan, which has been pumping vast amounts of money into the economy by buying up government debt, will pull the trigger on more stimulus at its next board meeting on Friday.

因此，一些经济学家认为，日本央行在周五召开的下次委员会会议上，将出台更多刺激政策。央行正在通过购买政府债务的形式，向日本经济注入大量货币。

The central bank's aggressive intervention has been central to Abe's policies, widely known as Abenomics. But events have conspired to blunt its impact.

在安倍晋三被广泛称为“安倍经济学”(Abenomics)的政策中，央行的激进干预是一个核心。但各种事件叠加在一起，削弱了它的效果。

Last year, it was an ill-timed sales tax increase, which rattled Japanese consumers and dissuaded them from spending. Lately it has been the deceleration in China, whose factories have been important buyers of Japanese-made machinery.

去年是不合时宜地增加销售税，让日本消费者受到冲击，打击了他们的消费意愿。最近则是中国增速放缓，中国工厂是日本制造的机械设备的重要买主。

But the more fundamental problem, many specialists say, is that Japan's economy simply doesn't grow much in the first place.

但很多专家说，更根本的问题在于，日本经济本身首先就没有较大的增长。

Baseline growth is essentially zero. Gross domestic product is the same size it was in the mid-1990s, in part because the workforce is shrinking. So where a faster-moving economy might simply lose momentum in response to headwinds, Japan's goes into reverse.

日本基线增长基本为零。国内生产总值(GDP)相当于90年代中期的水平，部分原因在于日本劳动力正在萎缩。飞速增长的经济体在遭遇阻力时，可能只会趋于乏力，但在这样的情况下，日本经济却会出现逆转。

So far, Abe's policies have done little to change the dynamic.

迄今为止，安倍的政策似乎在改变形势上没有起到什么效果。

“Overseas investors appear increasingly disillusioned with Abenomics,” Naohiko Baba, chief Japan economist at Goldman Sachs, said last week after a series of meetings with clients in the United States, Europe and elsewhere in Asia.

“海外投资者对安倍经济学的期望似乎日渐破灭，”高盛(Goldman Sachs)驻日本首席经济学家马场直彦(Naohiko Baba)上周表示。此前他曾与美国、欧洲和亚洲其他地区的客户进行了一系列会面。

Foreign investors' enthusiasm for Abenomics was a central force in driving up Japanese stock prices, one of the few clear-cut successes of Abe's economic program. Although the rally has lost steam in the last few months along with other global markets, the Nikkei 225 is still about twice the level it was when Abe took office at the end of 2012.

外国投资者对于安倍经济学的看好，是推高日本股价的核心力量，股市也是安倍的政策明确取得成功的少数几个领域之一。虽然在过去的几个月里，日本股市的涨势就像全球其他市场一样失去了动力，但日经225指数(Nikkei 225)仍然维持在安倍晋三2012年底上台时的两倍左右。

Other parts of the economy look weaker. One of Abenomics' central objectives, to generate a strong and sustained rise in consumer prices, “remains very elusive,” Baba said, as do its goals of raising workers' incomes and dismantling regulatory hurdles to business.

但日本经济的其他领域看上去更为疲弱。安倍经济学的核心目标之一是促使物价稳健而持续地上升，这方面的效果“仍然非常渺茫，”马场直彦说，在提高劳动者收入，为企业扫除监管障碍方面也是如此。

Taken together, improvements in these areas were supposed to bolster the economy's metabolism and increase its underlying potential to grow.

总之，这些方面的改进，意在提高经济的新陈代谢速度，从根本上提升其增长潜力。

The central bank has played an outsize role in the effort. Under its governor, Haruhiko Kuroda, it has pursued a “quantitative easing” strategy similar to that introduced by the Federal Reserve after the global financial meltdown seven years ago.

日本央行在这方面起到了巨大作用。在行长黑田东彦(Haruhiko Kuroda)的领导下，央行一直在实施“量化宽松”策略，与美联储在全球金融危机之后，在七年前采取的行动类似。

But the Fed has cut back its bond-buying program in response to a recovering U.S. economy, and it is now considering whether to raise its benchmark interest rate from close to zero. A move by the Japanese central bank would go in the opposite direction — toward even looser monetary policy.

但因为美国经济复苏，美联储已削减了债券购买计划。目前，美联储正在考虑是否加息，改变基准利率接近零的情况。日本央行的举动则指向相反的方向，采取更加宽容的货币政策。

The Bank of Japan's meeting this week will coincide with a twice-yearly update of board members' forecasts for growth and inflation, which are likely to show increased pessimism. Kuroda timed his last blast of stimulus with the same October review last year, catching the markets by surprise. Stocks in Japan and around the world jumped.

日本央行本周召开会议之时，正好会赶上其委员会成员更新自己对增长和通货膨胀的预期。这种更新一年两次。最新的预测可能会显示出，悲观情绪加剧。黑田东彦的上一波刺激行动，也选择在去年10月预测数据更新的时候，出乎市场预料，引发日本和全球股市大涨。

Kuroda has been doing his best to lower expectations, insisting that the bank's current monetary settings are sufficient. Inflation has been held back by falling oil prices, he says, but the underlying direction of prices and wages is upward.

黑田东彦一直在尽全力降低预期，坚称该行目前的货币政策是充分的。他表示，油价下跌抑制了通货膨胀，但物价和工资的基本方向是上行的。

“I think the current policy, so-called qualitative and quantitative easing, has been working, having the intended impact on the economy,” he said in an interview with CNBC on Oct. 11, at a meeting of global central bankers in Lima.

“我认为目前的政策，即所谓的质化与量化宽松政策一直在起作用，对经济的影响达到了预期，”他在10月11日接受CNBC的采访时说。当时，他正在利马参加一次全球央行行长会议。

Kuroda misdirected markets with similar talk before his unexpected move last year. But he may face greater constraints to action this time around. Stimulus measures by the central bank tend to drag down the value of the yen. That is good for multinational companies that earn revenue abroad, but it risks angering Japan's trading partners, as well as Japanese consumers and small businesses, whose buying power declines with the currency.

黑田东彦去年采取意料之外的动作前，也用类似的言论误导了市场。但这一次，他采取行动所面临的限制可能更大。央行的刺激措施，往往会导致日元贬值。这对有海外收入的跨国公司有利，但可能会惹怒日本的贸易伙伴，以及日本消费者和小企业，后者的购买力会随着日元贬值而降低。

This month, Japan and 11 other Pacific Rim nations, including the United States, reached a hard-won agreement on a sprawling trade deal, the Trans-Pacific Partnership. Abe says the increased trade and investment flows it promises to generate are crucial to raising Japan's long-run growth rate. But the pact is subject to approval by each country's legislature, including the U.S. Congress, where some members have accused Japan of unfairly suppressing the value of the yen to gain a competitive advantage.

本月，日本和包括美国在内的另外11个环太平洋国家就一项规模庞大的贸易协议，即“跨太平洋伙伴关系协定”（Trans Pacific Partnership，简称TPP），达成了来之不易的共识。安倍晋三称，该协议料将带来更多的贸易和投资，这对提振日本的长期增长至关重要。但该协定还须得到包括美国国会在内的各国立法机构的批准。美国部分国会议员指责，日本为获取竞争优势而有失公正地压低了日元汇率。

“Foreign exchange policy is very tricky with TPP in the balance,” said Adachi of JPMorgan, who used to work at the Japanese central bank and understands the political sensitivities that can shape its nominally independent decisions. “Ordinary households don't want to see a weaker yen, either,” he added, noting that the government faces an election for the upper house of Parliament next year.

“在TPP悬而未决的情况下，外汇政策非常棘手，”摩根大通的足立正道说。他曾在日本央行任职，了解影响该行决策的的政治敏感性。日本央行的决策名义上是独立的。“普通家庭也不想看到日元贬值，”他接着说，并指出政府还面临着明年的议会上院选举。

Abe's economic team, normally a cheerleader for bolder central bank action, has also been unusually circumspect. “The Bank of Japan may not ease policy further any time soon,” Finance Minister Taro Aso said in a recent interview with the public broadcaster NHK.

安倍晋三的经济团队通常都支持央行采取更大胆的行动，但这一次却出人意料地谨慎。“日本央行近期可能不会进一步放宽政策，”日本财务大臣麻生太郎(Taro Aso)最近在接受日本的公共广播电视机构NHK的采访时说。